Lawyer Claims Rabin Ordered Ship Fired Upon to Kill Begin
Attorney Yoram Sheftel revisited the controversial Altalena affair during a Sunday interview on Channel 14's "Morning Edition," presenting a dramatic new claim: that the shelling of the ship intensified after it became known Menachem Begin was aboard, and that David Ben-Gurion ordered the ship destroyed to prevent a military coup.
Sheftel cited passages from Yitzhak Rabin's autobiography, asserting that Rabin's description of the intense fire opened on the ship, particularly after shouts of "Begin is on the ship! Save Begin!" indicated a deliberate attempt to kill Begin. Sheftel interpreted Rabin's account as an admission that the shelling was intended to sink the ship and its occupants, not merely to intimidate them.
According to Sheftel's interpretation of Rabin's writings, the decision to fire on the Altalena, which carried weapons and fighters for the Irgun, was driven by Ben-Gurion's conviction that the ship's arrival was a prelude to a military takeover. Sheftel vehemently rejected this notion of a coup, arguing that the hundreds of Irgun members who arrived disembarked and later joined the IDF, with some even dying in the War of Independence.
Sheftel recounted the events leading up to the confrontation, stating that Begin had inquired about bringing the ship despite a new ceasefire, and was urged by Yisrael Galili to do so quickly. An agreement was reportedly reached for 20% of the weapons, including thousands of rifles, millions of bullets, and nine half-track vehicles, to be transferred to Irgun forces in Jerusalem. Sheftel claimed the government initially agreed to this arrangement.
The Altalena arrived at Kfar Vitkin at night and began unloading weapons. After approximately 900 rifles were unloaded, the confrontation erupted. Sheftel alleged that members of Hashomer Hatzair convinced Ben-Gurion that the quantity of weapons and the number of Irgun members indicated an intent to stage a military coup. Sheftel concluded that Ben-Gurion then ordered the destruction of both the ship and Begin, stating, "This is the story of the Altalena."
The Altalena incident occurred in June 1948, shortly after Israel's establishment and during the War of Independence. The ship, affiliated with the Irgun, arrived with fighters and a large cache of weapons. Its arrival coincided with efforts to unify underground forces into the IDF. The dispute over weapons control escalated into armed conflict, beginning near Kfar Vitkin and culminating in the shelling and burning of the ship off the coast of Tel Aviv, resulting in casualties and becoming one of the state's most controversial events. Last week, 78 years later, the ship's remains were discovered intact at a depth of 503 meters, about 20 kilometers off the Israeli coast.
