PALESTINE: Traitors, Inc.

In Jerusalem's cool, rose-tinted Y.M.C.A. building last week, the U.N.'s Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) gathered around a horseshoe table to begin its hearings. "Think it's worth listening to?" asked a prospective spectator of the guard at the door. "Well," said the British Tommy, "it might be good for laughs."

It was not. UNSCOP plowed prosily through tons of documents submitted by rival Jewish organizations. (The Arabs boycotted the committee.) Meanwhile, members of the underground Irgun Zvai Leumi attempted to kidnap a Palestine Government liaison officer attached to UNSCOP, but failed. The underground Stern Gang, rejecting a proposed truce during the inquiry, killed four British soldiers, wounded seven others.

Haganah, the moderate defense organization of the Jewish Agency tried vainly to curb the violence. In the all-Jewish city of Tel-Aviv, Haganah patrols clubbed Irgunists as they tried to hold up a Jewish shopkeeper. Haganah also carried its fight to New York last week, lashed out at remote-control Terrorist Ben Hecht and his American League for a Free Palestine. In a full-page advertisement, Haganah asked the public not to contribute to what it called "Traitors, Inc." "With your money," said the ad, "the Irgun and Stern groups killed 81 Britons, 59 Arabs and 42 Jews during the last eight months. . . . Every time Ben Hecht 'makes a holiday in his heart' Ernest Bevin sends in more reinforcements. . . .Haganah has repatriated 34,000 Jews to Palestine, the American League for a Free Palestine only 623."