Summary
Canadian-citizen Israeli army officer, commander of the seventh battalion, who signed Nazareth’s surrender agreement on 16 July 1948 and refused the next day’s order to expel the city’s entire population, in Manna’s account (Nakba and Survival, PDF p.70, 73).
Details
- Dunkelman entered Nazareth from the north (al-Khannuq) on the afternoon of 16 July 1948 after shelling the retreating Arab Rescue Army remnants, sent for the mayor and the heads of the Christian sects, and headed the Israeli signatories of the eleven-article surrender agreement signed in Shafiq al-Jisr’s house (Nakba and Survival, PDF p.71-72).
- One day after the fall of Nazareth, Moshe Carmel issued an order on 17 July to expel its entire population; Ben-Gurion’s memoirs say Dunkelman “hesitated” to carry it out, so Haim Laskov contacted the defence minister, and Ben-Gurion intervened and prohibited the expulsion (Nakba and Survival, PDF p.73).
- Dunkelman confirms the incident in his memoirs, prepared for publication in the 1970s: Laskov issued the expulsion order, he refused to execute it, and there was consequently an attempt to withdraw his troops and replace them with another battalion led by Elie Yafeh (Nakba and Survival, PDF p.73).
- Manna asks whether it was Dunkelman’s hesitation or opposition that saved the people of Nazareth, or Ben-Gurion’s decision — and whether that decision was genuine opposition to the expulsion or fear of the political and media scandal if it was uncovered (Nakba and Survival, PDF p.74).
Related pages
Nakba and Survival, Nazareth, Nazareth surrender agreement (16 July 1948), David Ben-Gurion