Yehoshua Cohen

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Yehoshua Cohen
Native name
יהושע כהן
Born(1922-06-22)June 22, 1922
Petah Tikva, Mandatory Palestine
(present-day Israel)
DiedAugust 8, 1986(1986-08-08) (aged 64)
Sde Boker, Israel
Allegiance

Yehoshua Cohen (

Negev Desert, where David Ben-Gurion
later lived. While Ben-Gurion lived at Sde Boker, he and Cohen became close friends.

Early life and activity

Cohen was born in

marksmanship, training for future missions.[4]

In September 1942, Cohen helped Lehi leader

Polish Army uniforms to Shamir and another prisoner, Eliahu Gilaldi, who disguised themselves in the uniforms and then crawled under the barbed wire surrounding the prison.[5] For his role in the escape, Cohen became recognized as "Lehi's most valued fighter".[2]

After helping Shamir escape from prison, Cohen became a leader in Lehi. He trained members in the tactics of

land mines.[6]

Moyne assassination

Cohen (right) on Wanted Poster of the Palestine Police Force offering rewards for the capture of Lehi members

In 1944, the leaders of Lehi decided to assassinate Lord Moyne, the British Minister of State for the Middle East. Yitzhak Shamir originally planned the assassination, and chose Eliyahu Bet-Zuri and Eliyahu Hakim to carry it out. Cohen was picked to train the two assassins for their mission, and traveled from Tel Aviv to spend several weeks training them in Jerusalem.[7] After the assassination, Cohen became "a legend" within Lehi,[3] and a reward was once again offered for his capture.[8]

After the attack, Cohen was also involved in planning an attack on

Israel's independence.[3]

Assassination of Bernadotte

During the

Yehoshua Zeitler began to make plans for it. Cohen was chosen to lead the actual attack on Bernadotte and picked two other long-time members: Yitzhak Ben Moshe and Avraham Steinberg, to join him.[14]

Cohen began training his team in West Jerusalem in August, practicing with the weapons and tactics they would use in the assassination.[15] During the planning stage, Zetler and Cohen chose to ambush Bernadotte on a narrow road in the Katamon neighborhood, blocking his vehicle with a Jeep across the road and then attacking.[16]

On September 17, 1948, Cohen and his team put their plan into action. As planned, they placed a Jeep across the road to stop Bernadotte's convoy at around 5:00 PM. Moshe and Steinberg then opened fire on the tires of Bernadotte's vehicle, while Cohen fired inside the car with a

Andre Serot.[1]

The day after the murders, the

UN Security Council condemned the killing of Bernadotte as "a cowardly act which appears to have been committed by a criminal group of terrorists in Jerusalem while the United Nations representative was fulfilling his peace-seeking mission in the Holy Land."[17]

The identity of the assassins remained unknown for some time, with various nations accusing each other of complicity until eventually it became clear that Lehi was responsible. Although Cohen's involvement was an open secret within Lehi and other groups, his role was not made public for over forty years.[1]

At a ceremony in Tel Aviv in May 1995, attended by the Swedish deputy prime minister, Israeli Foreign Minister and Labor Party member Shimon Peres issued a "condemnation of terror" and stated that "Bernadotte was murdered in a terrorist way".[18]

Later life

Yehoshua Cohen on the left, with David Tovyahu

After the assassination, Cohen was one of the founders of the

New York Times article from 1964, Cohen became Ben-Gurion's "closest companion."[20] Cohen also served as the head of security at Sde Boker.[21]
Cohen was married and had two children, a son and daughter.

Death and revelation of role

Cohen's involvement in the assassination of Bernadotte was long-rumored, but was not confirmed during his lifetime. Historian Michael Bar-Zohar claimed for a number of years that Cohen had privately confessed in his role in the attack to Ben-Gurion, but Cohen never responded to these claims publicly.[21]

Cohen died at Sde Boker of a heart attack in 1986 at the age of 64, with his role in the attack still unclear,[21] but in 1988 two of his co-conspirators in the attack, Yehoshua Zettler and Meshulam Markover, publicly confessed to their role in the attacks and confirmed that Cohen killed Bernadotte.[22][23]

Notes

  1. ^ a b c Fetherling (2001), p. 101.
  2. ^ a b Marton (1994), p. 96.
  3. ^ a b c Ilan (1989), p. 209.
  4. ^ Marton (1994), p. 89.
  5. ^ Marton (1994), pp. 89–90.
  6. ^ Frank (1963), pp. 125–6.
  7. ^ Marton (1994), pp. 96–97.
  8. ^ Marton (1994), p. 99.
  9. Daily Telegraph
    , May 21, 2009.
  10. ^ A. Ilan, Bernadotte in Palestine, 1948 (Macmillan, 1989) p194
  11. ^ J. Bowyer Bell, Assassination in International Politics, International Studies Quarterly, vol 16, March 1972, 59—82.
  12. ^ Haberman, Clyde (22 February 1995). "Terrorism Can Be Just Another Point of View". New York Times. Retrieved 28 December 2008. Mr. Shamir, nearly 80, still speaks elliptically about the Bernadotte assassination. Years later, when Ben-Gurion moved to a kibbutz in the Negev desert, Sdeh Bokker, one of his closest friends there was Yehoshua Cohen, who had been one of the assassins. Review of Kati Marton's biography.
  13. ^ Cowell, Alan (2 November 1991). "THE MIDDLE EAST TALKS: REPORTER'S NOTEBOOK; Syria Offers Old Photo To Fill an Empty Chair". The New York Times. Retrieved 28 December 2008. In recent years, several members of the group known by the British as the Stern Gang have acknowledged responsibility for the killing. Mr. Shamir, who was a member of the Stern Gang, has declined to discuss the killing, and one of his spokesman has said he had no role in it.
  14. ^ Marton (1994), p. 210.
  15. ^ Marton (1994), pp. 211–12.
  16. ^ Ilan (1989), p. 212.
  17. ^ Security Council 57 (1948) Resolution of 18 September 1948. Archived 18 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  18. ^ "Israel belatedly condemns U.N. negotiator's murder" and "Israel tries to ease tensions with Sweden" (two articles), Reuters News, 15 May 1995. "Peres apologizes for assassination of Bernadotte," Jerusalem Post, 15 May 1995, p. 1.
  19. ^ Marton (1994), p. 253.
  20. ^ Blair, Granger (January 12, 1964). "Visit With Ben Gurion in the Desert; Israel's elder statesman sought sanctuary in the Negev, but in retirement he has found little time for the reading and meditation he planned. Visit With Ben Gurion". The New York Times.
  21. ^
    ProQuest 292465142
    .
  22. ^ Kifner, John (September 12, 1988). "2 Recount '48 Killing in Israel". The New York Times. Retrieved February 18, 2009.
  23. ^ Golda Meir, 'My Life'. Steimatzk's Agency Ltd. Jerusalem/Tel Aviv. Reprint 1976. Page 200. 'although his (Bernadotte) assailants were never identified we knew it would be assumed that they were Jews.'

References

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