Editing Safed (section)

===1948 war===
{{Further|1948 Palestine war}}

In 1948 the city was home to about 12,000 Arabs and about 1,700 Jews, mostly religious and elderly.<ref name="vilnai" /> On 5 January 1948, Arabs attacked the Jewish Quarter.<ref>Martin (2005). Routledge Atlas of the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Routledge. {{ISBN|0-415-35901-5}}.</ref> In February 1948, during the [[1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine|civil war]], Muslim Arabs attacked a Jewish bus attempting to reach Safed, and the Jewish quarter of the town came under siege by the Muslims. British forces that were present did not intervene. According to [[Martin Gilbert]], food supplies ran short. "Even water and flour were in desperately short supply. Each day, the Arab attackers drew closer to the heart of the Jewish quarter, systematically blowing up Jewish houses as they pressed in on the central area."<ref>Martin Gilbert ''Israel, A history'' William Morrow & Co, NY 1998 {{ISBN|0-688-12362-7}} p. 174</ref>

On April 16, the same day that British forces evacuated Safed, 200 local Arab militiamen, supported by over 200 [[Arab Liberation Army]] soldiers, tried to take over the city's Jewish Quarter. They were repelled by the Jewish garrison, consisting of some 200 [[Haganah]] fighters, men and women, boosted by a [[Palmach]] platoon.<ref>Benny Morris, ''1948, The First Arab-Israeli War'', 2008 Yale University Press, p. 157</ref>

The Palmach ground attack on the Arab section of Safed took place on 6 May, as a part of [[Operation Yiftah|Operation Yiftach]]. The first phase of the Palmach plan to capture Safed, was to secure a corridor through the mountains by capturing the Arab village of [[Biriyya]].<ref name="Gilbert, 1998, p. 177">Gilbert, 1998, p. 177</ref> The Arab Liberation Army placed artillery pieces on a hill adjacent to the Jewish quarter and started its shelling.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://archive.org/details/1948historyoffir00morr|title=1948|date=April 28, 2008|publisher=Yale University Press|via=Internet Archive}}</ref> The Palmach's Third Battalion failed to take the main objective, the "citadel", but "terrified" the Arab population sufficiently to prompt further flight, as well as urgent appeals for outside help and an effort to obtain a truce.<ref>Morris, 2004, p. 223</ref>

The secretary-general of the Arab League [[Abdul Rahman Hassan Azzam]] stated that the goal of Plan Dalet was to drive out the inhabitants of Arab villages along the Syrian and Lebanese frontiers, particularly places on the roads by which Arab regular forces could enter the country. He noted that Acre and Safed were in particular danger.<ref>Broadmead to HC, 5 May 1948, SAMECA CP III\5\102. Quoted in Morris, 2004, p. 223</ref> However, the appeals for help were ignored, and the British, now less than a week away from the end of the British Mandate of Palestine, also did not intervene against the second and final Haganah attack, which began on the evening of 9 May, with a mortar barrage on key sites in Safed. Following the barrage, Palmach infantry, in bitter fighting, took the citadel, Beit Shalva and the police fort, Safed's three dominant buildings. Through 10 May, Haganah mortars continued to pound the Arab neighbourhoods, causing fires in the marked area and in the fuel dumps, which exploded. "The Palmah 'intentionally left open the exit routes for the population to "facilitate" their exodus...' "<ref>Morris 2004, page 224 quoting unnamed source from ''Book of the Palmah II''</ref> According to Gilbert, "The Arabs of Safed began to leave, including the commander of the Arab forces, [[Adib Shishakli]] (later Prime Minister of Syria). With the [[Birya Fortress|police fort]] on Mount Canaan isolated, its defenders withdrew without fighting. The fall of Safed was a blow to Arab morale throughout the region... With the invasion of Palestine by regular Arab armies believed to be imminent – once the British had finally left in eleven or twelve days' time – many Arabs felt that prudence dictated their departure until the Jews had been defeated and they could return to their homes.<ref name="Gilbert, 1998, p. 177"/> According to Abbasi, the exodus of the Arabs of Safed had three phases.<ref name=Abbasi40>Abbasi (2004) pp. 40–42.</ref> The first was due to the departure of the British compounded by the failure of an attack on the Jewish quarter and a disagreement between the Jordanian and Syrian commanders.<ref name=Abbasi40/> The second was due to the fall of nearby Ein al-Zeitun and the [[Ein al-Zeitun massacre|massacre]] that Jewish forces committed there.<ref name=Abbasi40/> The third was due to the deliberate creation of panic by Jewish forces.<ref name=Abbasi40/>

Some 12,000 Arabs, with some estimates reaching 15,000, fled Safed and were a "heavy burden on the Arab war effort".<ref>Morris, 2004, page 224 quoting [[Yigal Allon]] from ''Book of the Palmah II''</ref> Among them was the family of [[President of the Palestinian Authority|Palestinian Authority President]] [[Mahmoud Abbas]].<ref name="Honig">{{cite news |author=Sarah Honig |newspaper=The Jerusalem Post |url=http://fr.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1246443837339&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull |title=Another Tack: Self-exiled by guilt |date= July 17, 2009 |author-link=Sarah Honig}}</ref>{{efn|Abbas is quoted as saying "People were motivated to run away... They feared retribution from Zionist terrorist organizations – particularly from the Safed ones. Those of us from Safed especially feared that the Jews harbored old desires to avenge what happened during the 1929 uprising.... They realized the balance of forces was shifting and therefore the whole town was abandoned on the basis of this rationale – saving our lives and our belongings."<ref name="Honig"/> In 2012 Abbas stated "I visited Safed before once. I want to see Safed. It's my right to see it, but not to live there."<ref>{{cite news|author=Harriet Sherwood in Jerusalem |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/nov/04/mahmoud-abbas-palestinian-territories |title=Mahmoud Abbas outrages Palestinian refugees by waiving his right to return &#124; World news |work=The Guardian |date= 2012-11-04|access-date=2013-03-12 |location=London}}</ref>}} The city was fully under the control of Jewish paramilitary forces by May 11, 1948.<ref name="vilnai" />

Early in June, Jewish dignitaries from Safed journeyed to Tel Aviv to ask the government to block the return of Arabs to the city, threatening to abandon it if the latter were allowed back. They reasoned that since most of the Arabs' property had been seized or stolen in the meantime, the Jewish community would be unable to withstand the pressure of the returnees' demands for restitution.<ref>[[Benny Morris]], [http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/.premium.HIGHLIGHT.MAGAZINE-was-israeli-looting-in-48-part-of-a-broader-policy-to-expel-arabs-1.9873157 'Was Israeli looting in '48 part of a broader policy to expel Arabs?,'] [[Haaretz]] 3 June 2021.</ref>

<gallery>
File:Zoltan Kluger. Safed.jpg|Safad 1937
File:Safed iv.jpg|Mandate Police station at Mount Canaan, above Safed (1948)
File:Safed 1948.jpg|Safed (1948)
File:Safed citadel.jpg|Safed Citadel (1948)
File:Safad v.jpg|Safad Municipal Police Station after the battle (1948)
File:Safad i.jpg|Bussel House, Safad, 11 April 1948: [[Yiftach Brigade]] headquarters
File:Mount Canaan iv.jpg|View of Safed from Mount Canaan (1948)
File:Mount Canaan Police station.jpg|Mandate administration building on the eastern outskirts of Safed (1948)
File:Safed v.jpg|[[Yiftach Brigade]], with their [[Hotchkiss M1929 machine gun|Hotchkiss]] machine guns, based at Bussel House, 1948
File:Druze in Safad.jpg|Druze parading in Safed after the [[Palmach]] victory in 1948
</gallery>