Palmah

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PALMAH

labor zionist elite military organization (1941–1948).

The Palmah (Plugot Mahatz, or "shock companies") was the Haganah's elite strike force, founded in May 1941 to help defend the Yishuv against potential German invasion. Its founders were Yitzhak Sadeh and Yigal Allon, Haganah leaders affiliated with the left-wing Kibbutz ha-Meuhad (United Kibbutz) movement. The elite force of pioneer-soldiers was largely recruited from and was based and housed at the movement's kibbutzim. Trained in commando tactics, the Palmah had a strong esprit de corps that stressed military professionalism and socialist values. It became the military vanguard of the Zionist Left, which caused tensions with the MAPAI-affiliated Haganah, to which it was ostensibly subordinate.

In its early years, the Palmah actively cooperated with the British. Palmah units served alongside the British Army in the campaign against the Vichy regime in Syria and later saw service against Iraq's pro-Nazi regime. But after 1945, the Palmah participated along with the other Jewish undergrounds in the armed struggle against the British Mandatory authorities in 1945 and 1946. Specially trained Palmah volunteers played a lead role in "the Saison" of 1944 and 1945 against the renegade Irgun and LEHI underground groups. This internecine operation took on an ideological dimension as left-wing Palmah members captured and sometimes tortured right-wing Irgunists. Political rivalries again came to the fore in June 1948, when a Palmah unit under the command of Yitzhak Rabin was used to destroy the Irgun weapons ship Altalena, commanded by Menachem Begin.

The Palmah produced a number of senior officers in the 1948 War, and five Palmah officers later served as chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF): Moshe Dayan (1953–1957), Yitzhak Rabin (1963–1967), Haim Bar-Lev (1968–1972), David Elazar (1972–1975), and Mordechai Gur (1975–1978). During the 1948 war, Palmah battalions fought on all fronts (Galilee, central, and south) and played a critical role in defeating the Egyptians in the Negev. Of the more than 4,000 Israeli combatants killed in the war, approximately 1,000 were from the Palmah, about one-fifth of its ranks. Because of its strong ties to the leftist MAPAM party and the United Kibbutz movement, David Ben-Gurion viewed the Palmah with suspicion, and on 7 October 1948, it was formally dissolved as a separate military structure and was blended into the newly established IDF, which incorporated the Palmah's military tactics and professionalism.