Madam Speaker. I rise today with great sadness to note the recent passing of Yossi Harel. the legendary Haganah commander responsible for shepherding thousands of Jewish refugees through British blockades and to safety in the nascent Jewish homeland. Harel was perhaps best known for commanding the ship Exodus 1947. which was intercepted off the coast of Haifa by British warships in July 1947. carrying 4.553 Jewish refugees from Europe. The unconscionable decision by the British authorities to send these Holocaust survivors aboard the Exodus back to Germany focused the worlds attention on the plight of Jewish refugees and their desire to leave the fetid displaced persons camps in Europe for a new life in soon to be sovereign Israel. Members of the United Nations Special Commission on Palestine saw first hand as these refugees. with their meager possessions. were unloaded from the ramshackle Exodus 1947 in the port of Haifa and prepared for their return to Europeall just precious feet away from the land they had so desperately yearned to reach. Incredibly these refugeesjust two years removed from the horrors of the Holocaustwere held by the British in a former S.S. concentration camp after their return to Germany. This shocked the conscious of much of the world and further galvanized opinion against the British blockage and in favor of the establishment of a Jewish state in Mandateera Palestine. The story of those aboard the Exodus 1947 and their harrowing journey to Haifa was immortalized in Leon Uriss novel Exodus and subsequent film featuring the character Ari BenCanaan based on Harel himself and played by Paul Newman. Though Harel is best known for commanding Exodus 1947. he also led three other ships to the shores of Israel. helping 24.000 refugees find safe harbor in the Promised Landall by the time he was 28. Today we mourn the loss of a great hero. who not only touched the lives of these 24.000 refugees and won the admiration of millions of people worldwide. but also came to symbolize the determination and pluck of the modern state of Israel.
Keywords matched
refugeesjust refugees