The numbers don’t lie: Jews made a giant contribution to Britain’s WW2 fightback

British Jewry has never been more than about one half of 1 per cent of the general population, yet the figures show that our fighting contribution always has been way out of proportion to our numbers, both in frontline units and in the receiving of awards for courage.

As an illustration, at Arnhem for example, Jewish Paras were 2 per cent of the strength (four times our numbers), and as aircrew in the Battle of Britain, 1.2 per cent (over twice). If British Jewry numbered at the time, as a guestimate, 300,000 to 350,000, and we know that we had 60,000 to 70,000 in the Forces, then Jewish participation can be modestly assessed at least at 20 per cent of our Jewish population, a truly astonishing figure.

Our British Jewish dead, together with Jews from Israel, numbered almost 4,000, 1 per cent of our tiny population, which represents in real terms a huge sacrifice from a small community.

[Missing Credit]

In addition there was a huge part played by Palestinian Jewish volunteers from Israel in the “good fight”. As part of the British Empire and Commonwealth Forces, 130,000 of them registered to serve and 60,000 of them volunteered – virtually every able-bodied Jewish man and woman from the relatively small Jewish population – and 30,000 were finally accepted; almost 700 were killed and hundreds were decorated for valour; they served in every branch and theatre of war, many in special forces. Seven were even held as prisoners of war by the Japanese in the Far East.

Sadly, the part played by Palestinian Jewry from Eretz Yisrael, the Yishuv of Israel, nation-in-waiting, has been deliberately erased from the memory of those who are keepers of the British war remembrance communities, by those who should know better. They never appear in British tributes to the Commonwealth/Empire Forces who served, be it at historical exhibitions or commemorations, or on any memorial in Britain, while those of many other ethnic groups are well represented.

Most disgracefully, Israel is never invited to attend at the Cenotaph in Whitehall each Remembrance Sunday, to lay a wreath for their war dead who, although they lie under Commonwealth War Graves Commission headstones around the world, are clearly not considered worthy. The Palestinian Jewish/Israeli proportionately huge contribution has been made totally invisible.

Meanwhile, and in stark contrast, it is well recorded how the Arab world at best remained indifferent to the struggle against the Nazis and at worst openly collaborated. Few Palestinian Arabs volunteered and a diplomatic attempt to keep the numbers of Palestinian Jews and Arabs at even recruitment in the British Forces, for example with the forming of the Palestine Regiment in 1942, was embarrassingly abandoned by the British authorities as the Jews came forward in droves to fight, in stark comparison to the Arab population. It is well documented that the Palestinian Arab leader, the Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin El Husseini, was wanted by the British for treachery and fled to Berlin in 1939 where he planned with Hitler to construct gas chambers outside Nablus on the present West Bank to exterminate the Jews of the Middle East; that hundreds of Arabs and Muslims served in the SS battalions in the Balkans and took part in atrocities there, and hundreds belonged to the notorious “Freies Arabien” (Arab volunteers serving in SS units of the German army).

As Rommel approached Cairo in the dark days of 1942, the Egyptians prepared to welcome him and the young army officer Anwar Sadat (later President of Egypt) was arrested with a group of traitors, on the way to receive Rommel in the desert in October 1942, and guide him into Cairo. Rashid Ali led a pro-Nazi fascist revolt against the British in Iraq in 1941, which was put down by British and Commonwealth troops spearheaded by Jewish Palestinian scouts and commandos.

British Jewry, with Jews from Israel, may thus be deeply and justly proud of this history of fighting back, fighting for democracy and peace, dispelling the myths that we were just civilians or victims or bystanders in the struggle.

​

Martin Sugarman is the archivist of the Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen and the author of Fighting Back: British Jewry’s Military Contribution in the Second World War (published by Vallentine Mitchell)