Operation Igloo

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The operation Igloo was a British action to illegal Jewish immigrants , which on the coast of Palestine were intercepted in internment camps on Cyprus to deport. The basis was the government declaration of August 13, 1946 . Operation Igloo should not be confused with Operation Igloo White in the Vietnam War .

Operation Igloo, under the direction of Sir Alan Cunningham, began at midnight on August 11, 1946, before the underlying government statement was made. In preparation, the port area of Haifa was extensively secured with barbed wire and armored personnel carriers by the 1st Infantery Division. The first action of the operation itself was the deportation of the passengers who arrived in Haifa on August 11th with the Yagur and on August 12th with the Henrieta Szold . Instead of being put in internment camps on land as before, the refugees were brought to the deportation ships Empire Heywood and Empire Rival . These ships were secured with chain-link fences and barbed wire barriers like an internment camp against attempts to escape.

Even when the refugee ships were evacuated, the Jews offered considerable resistance, which was broken by the British soldiers using flash and irritant gas grenades and sometimes firearms. Jewish citizens of Haifa tried from the land side to break through the cordon off the port area and come to the aid of the refugees. They were pushed back by rifle fire by the infantry division, killing three people and injuring seven others.

In the further course the resistance against Operation Igloo in Palestine took on war-like features. Deportation ships, launches, patrol boats and destroyers were attacked by acts of sabotage by the Ha'Chulya Palyam group . Operation Igloo, however, could not be stopped. On the other hand, the British failed to achieve their goal of curbing the flow of illegal immigrants or even bringing them to a standstill. As a result, the internment camps in Cyprus soon became very cramped. The British government tried to counteract the shortage of space with Operation Oasis , with which illegal refugees were transported back to Europe. The first action of Operation Oasis was the Exodus affair, after the disastrous worldwide echo of this action for Great Britain it remained the only one.

The approach taken with Operation Igloo was not approved by the US government under Truman . According to an American-British agreement of 1924, Great Britain should coordinate such changes in the mandate area with the USA, which did not take place in this operation. Already through different, uncoordinated activities in the case of partition proposals for Palestine, as well as support from Jewish and Arab groups, the differences between British and American Middle East policy grew and contributed to the increasing isolation into which the British got with their mandate policy.

With the end of the British mandate on May 14, 1948, Operation Igloo also ended. The total number of Jews deported to Cyprus and Europe as part of the operation is around 56,300.

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