Norma Davidov

LEAGUE FOR THE HAGANAH OFFICE IN CAPE TOWN

In March 1948 I was twenty-one years old, and had just moved from my small hometown, Livingstone, in Northern Rhodesia, to Cape Town. Looking for work, I was offered a job by a distant relative of mine, Isabel Rabinowitz, who was working for Sam Levine at the Cape Town Zionist Office at 85 Plein Street. “We are opening a recruitment office of the League for the Haganah, and signing up ex-army pilots and soldiers to go and fight in Palestine. We want you to run it.”

It was exciting, but we had to be careful. The United Nations charter clearly stated – no country was permitted to send men of fighting age to Palestine. So we operated our office in secret, in a small room at the back of a Mr. Gershon’s furniture store: that was the last little building at the bottom of Adderley Street.

I was briefed by Sam that the police might pay a surprise visit, and if they did I was to say that we were only registering people “just in case the policy might change.”

In the meantime, the South African Zionist Federation purchased a ship, the “Benny Skou,”¹ in order to send vital provisions to the refugees of the Holocaust in Palestine. Several doctors and other volunteers planned to catch a ride.

Link to Dr. Harry Bank’s story of his voyage on the “Benny Skou”

Link to Menashe Balka’s story

Work in the office consisted of signing up volunteers, advising them of training camps held at weekends on a small farm near Paarl, and finally, processing their travel arrangements.

There was no shortage of girl volunteers. They insisted on being trained as well, and I joined them. I recall two memorable camps in Paarl, just for the girls, and a gun-drill in the beautiful drawing room with red carpets and velvet curtains in one of the most elegant homes in Cape Town.

I felt I was part – however small – of an adventure story that was going to change the world. The Norwegian captain of the “Benny Skou” used to come and drink coffee in our office and tell us tales of his adventures at sea. The Federation had also bought two small mine-sweepers² which were being maintained by two ex-sailors from the South African Navy, Alec Singer and Wally Friedman, who were also frequent visitors to our office. Many of the volunteers used to “pop in” to find out if there were any developments about their departure.

Alarm Bells

One day I received a phone-call, and after a pause I heard someone say, “This is the police”. Before I could answer, the phone went dead. We never found out if it really was the police, or someone playing a joke, but it was scary.

On another occasion, two tall blonde fellows with very Afrikaans accents came into the office, wanting to sign up to go to Palestine. I was sure that they were plain-clothes policemen, and I told them we could only take their names, but we were not permitted to send anyone to the area. They argued with me, saying they knew others who were being sent, and stormed out of my office and hurried to Sam to complain. It turned out they were two Jewish brothers who looked and sounded like South African policemen.³

The League for Haganah Office closed in October 1948 and I moved to 85 Plein Street as Sam’s secretary until his departure on aliyah to Israel in January the following year.

I still remember all the names of the volunteers I signed up, and whenever I see them mentioned in Telfed magazine, I always become so nostalgic about that very exciting time in my life during which, in May that year, Israel was born.

¹ On 9^th September 1948, the ‘Benny Skou’ dropped anchor off Tel Aviv, having left Cape Town three weeks earlier. Amongst the foodstuffs for the Jewish refugees who arrived from Europe with little more than the clothes on their backs, were dehydrated vegetables, medical supplies, linen, clothing, toiletries and cigarettes. On board to meet the ship was a reception committee from the South African Zionist Federation (Israel).

² The two mine-sweepers had been converted during World War II from fishing trawlers, and were renamed the Drom Africa I and II. Both these vessels would sail into the history books by playing their role in Israel’s War of Independence.

³ Researcher Joe Woolf believes these two Jewish brothers were Chaim and Louis Geffen of Maitland, Cape Town, also described as “tall and blonde” by another former member of Kibbutz Timorim, Cecil Ross, now of Herzlia.

Author: Norma (Wasserson) Davidov

Editor’s note:

1. Norma Davidov has contributed considerably by helping to type material for the World Machal website.

2. This article appeared in the South African Zionist Federation’s magazine “Telfed” 60^th Anniversary issue (2008)