With the establishment of the State of Israel, Jerusalem was besieged inside a siege. The entire city was under siege and there was an additional siege on the Old City. The fighters and residents of the Jewish Quarter did everything in their power to defend the Quarter and the Western Wall, but on this date, 75 years ago, on the 19th of Iyar, May 28th, after long and difficult days of fighting, they surrendered to the Jordanian Legion.
Abdullah el-Tell, the commander of the Legion, gathered the remaining Jews of the Quarter in the Batei Machseh square and ordered all the fighters to step forward. Few did, and he was shocked by their small number. He reportedly said to the crowd in front of him, “If I had known how few of you there are, I would have fought you with brooms.”
The casualties of the Jewish Quarter were buried in a mass grave in the center of the Quarter, and for 19 years the Jordanians refused to allow access to the Old City or to the grave. For 19 years the grave was out of sight, without visitors.
Nineteen years later, on the 28th of Iyar, Israeli forces broke into the Old City. The Jerusalem fighters looked towards the Western Wall and the Jewish Quarter, and when they arrived there, led by Moshe Rusnak, commander of the Jewish Quarter in 1948, they worked to locate the mass grave of the fighters.
The grave was found and the fighters were brought for reburial on the Mount of Olives, opposite their homes, the Jewish Quarter, and the Western Wall – which they tried to defend to the death.
The words from Jeremiah (31, 19) were etched on their tomb, “For whenever I speak of him, I still remember him.”
Along with the joy over the reunification of Jerusalem, we continue to remember the heroism of those who fought for it.
“I still remember him…”
