Page 153 - ISRAEL'S CRADLE

Logistically, this was the most comprehensive operation of the Jewish Institutions, particularly the "Haganah." During these five months, until the end of April 1948, 224 convoys were launched from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, only eight of which failed to reach their destination. The 216 convoys carried about 11 thousand tons of equipment, supplies, weapons as well as reinforcements of fighters for Jerusalem. We must remember and never forget: Jewish Jerusalem was saved thanks to those convoys.
The convoy guards came from two elite units of the Palmach – The "Furmans" from Jerusalem and the "Zehavi" Unit from Tel Aviv. A particularly heavy burden was placed on the drivers, and quite a few of them paid with their lives in the battles that broke out during the convoys' journeys. Every now and then, a special cargo needed to be brought up: On the eve of Passover 5708, two trucks carried carp fishes, so that the Seder Night could be celebrated with gefilte fish...
A major role was filled by the female fighters – young women ages 18-19. They joined the young men, escorted the convoys, participated in fending off the Arab attacks on them, and were additionally required to secure the weapons – disassembled submachine guns, pistols and grenades – which they hid in their cloths.
The assumption, which repeatedly turned out to be correct, was that the British would not search the women's bodies, while they confiscated the weapons found on the male fighters.
The leaders of the Yishuv, members of the Executives of the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Council who moved back and forth between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, were regular passengers in the convoys and experienced the battlefields of Sha'ar HaGai and the Castel up close. Upon arriving in Jerusalem, they returned to their offices and chambers in the National Institutions Building, although the activity in the building lessened as the battles escalated and a large share of the activities moved to Tel Aviv.
The "Furmans" headquarters was not the only, nor even the most central, "security" site in the National Institutions Building. For several months, the headquarters of the "Haganah" in Jerusalem resided in the building and the Security Officer of the Jewish Agency, Chaim Herzog -
who later became a Major-General in the IDF, Israel Ambassador to the UN and the President of Israel - was responsible for a series of significant security issues. He had begun this even before the outbreak of fighting. He had been involved in secret intelligence activity already in the summer of 1947, pertaining to the visit of the UN Committee of Inquiry – UNSCOP – in the Land of Israel.
As told by Shelomoh Naḳdimon in a study he conducted, Herzog, who later became the sixth President of the State of Israel was at the time a discharged combat intelligence officer from the British Army. He had been called in one day by David Shaltiel, the Head of the Shai (the Intelligence Service of the "Haganah"), to head the surveillance of the Committee during its stay in the Land of Israel. The mission was of the utmost importance, if only because many believed that the Committee would be the driving force behind the expected UN resolution – the possibility of the establishment
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