Page 142 - ISRAEL'S CRADLE

terrorism, and it had proof that the Jewish Agency operated a terrorist network of the "Haganah" and also maintained close communication with the Irgun. There is no intention to destroy the Agency or abolish it, but rather to prevent it from using violence against the British forces. Jewish Members of Parliament, including Sydney Silverman and Brent Jenner, protested the attack on the Yishuv, its administration and the National Institutions Building in Jerusalem. Prime Minister Attlee explained, in typical British understatement, that the "'Haganah' was initially an organized and beneficial force, however since the end of the war [World War II] this undoubtedly has changed somewhat."
The British news media was split over the recent actions in the Land of Israel, between the government's supporters and its opponents. The "Daily Mail" Newspaper, which supported the British military's operation against the Yishuv, raised in its edition from July 5 the possibility that the Jews would soon launch a counterattack in response to the blows they received – In the leaders' arrest, in the seizure of weapons in Kibbutz Yagur and in the exposure of many documents in the National Institutions Building in Jerusalem. The British goal was to prove a connection between the Jewish leadership and the terrorist organizations, and that it in fact instigated the actions against the British. The newspaper could tell that in order to quickly read the documents that were captured, two Jews from England who were fluent in Hebrew were brought in advance, and interpreted the documents that were taken from the Jewish leadership's building. The newspaper even discovered that in the searches of the kibbutzim Mizra and Yagur, complete lists of the members of the Palmach and "Haganah" were captured. In the Land of Israel. These news items were met with derision.
After they finished going over all the documents confiscated from the National Institutions Building, the British published a "White Paper" (government document) based upon the materials they found there. They particularly focused upon a series of encrypted telegrams that were exchanged between the heads of the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem and in London, and claimed that these telegrams, as well as additional evidence that was discovered, exposed the fact that some of the Agency's heads maintained firm ties with "Haganah" and even directed its actions. Moreover, the documents revealed cooperation between the "Haganah," which was subordinated to the Yishuv institutions, and the Irgun and Lehi (the British did not call this cooperation "the Resistance," as it was called in the Yishuv). This was the "smoking gun," from the British's perspective. The search of the Jewish Agency building, so they said, was not performed in vain since the findings proved that that building was used for illegal activity that undermined the British rule over Palestine.
The National Institutions Building in Jerusalem was held by the British for 12 days (June 29–July 10, 1946), during which time they overturned almost every table, bookstand, cupboard and archive. Life in the Land of Israel had not yet returned to normal, especially in those dozens of agricultural settlements where a majority of the members had been arrested and detained for long weeks in the Rafah Detention Camp. The leaders that were imprisoned in Latrun were also
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