MIDDLE EAST: On the Move

The war of bullets did not rage as hot last week as the war of communiques. But behind the curtain of Arab and Jewish censorship, men & women were fighting and dying. For the most part, both Jews and Arabs stayed within the partition boundaries, fixed by U.N., but Israeli* forces captured Acre in the north, fanned out toward the Lebanese border, and attacked Arab Ramie near Tel Aviv in an effort to open the lifeline road to Jerusalem's Jews.

Long Drumfire. The fiercest battle of the week was fought in the no-government's-land of Jerusalem, which U.N. had once marked for international control.

In the heavy-walled Old City, the fight was at close quarters. Cabled TIME Correspondent Don Burke, who was watching the Arab Legionnaires : "A drumfire from the semiautomatics goes on for long periods against a background of mortars, howitzers and heavier guns, as the Arab Legion works over the Jewish positions outside the Old City. When we arrived, the Jews inside the Old City were confined within an area of about 800 square yards, undergoing a constant pounding but replying constantly with semi-automatic fire. Their main vantage points were two synagogues.

"In working their way through the rubble, squads of tough Arabs laid charges close to the walls of Tiferet Israel synagogue. Now Tiferet Israel resembles a Dali-like nightmare with gaping walls and smashed dome. House after house is similarly blown down or crushed in by explosives. But the Jews are still holding on despite their hopeless position. The main thing in the Jews' favor is a labyrinth of underground passages through which they move from house to house."

Sudden Change. In Tel Aviv, the air raids continued. At first, Tel Avivians had looked on the sporadic Egyptian air raids as a mildly exciting diversion. "But one afternoon last week," cabled TIME Correspondent Eric Gibbs from Tel Aviv, "that attitude suddenly changed. High up in the blue sky, a grey-green Egyptian Spitfire ' plunged almost vertically toward the town. As it plummeted with the sun glinting on the wings, it seemed to twist slightly, giving the impression that the plane was out of control. Some Tel Avivians standing in the street began to clap their hands, thinking it had been shot down.

"But a few seconds later the plane leveled out and the warm afternoon air shuddered with the explosion of bombs. In the screaming confusion of blood-spattered bodies and burning buses, 41 lay dead or dying, 65 wounded. From then on the raids were no joking matter."