Fran Morris
A dream, hope, faith, acting on that faith, fighting to keep that faith and hope alive, and accepting the consequences of defeat. This is my lesson, as I read, hear, or view the filmed account of the desperate flight from murderous persecution to freedom and peace.
The story of the modern-day exodus of Jews leaving the country where they have lived to go to Israel, not knowing if they would survive, can have you sitting on the edge of your seat. Especially, when it was an illegal journey. And to do it on an old ship that had been moored in a river near Baltimore, Maryland!
The ship was sold, repaired, and taken to France. Would you get on a boat that was built to hold 400, and stuffed with over 4,000 inside it for the trip? What courage, what hope, what faith!
The ship was renamed “Exodus 1947” and set sail, being trailed by British destroyer convoy. Before the ship got close enough to the shore for passengers to swim to land, British marines stormed aboard, and the people’s bravado rose up as they joined the ship’s crew to fight.
Only three people were killed and over 100 were injured!
With all that, they surrendered, and were shipped to Cyprus, then to Europe, and eventually to German concentration camps.
After World War I, Great Britain had possession of the area of the Middle East that included the land of Israel. Jews were allowed to return, but on a limited basis. That didn’t stop illegal returning, though, and that picked up during the time Adolf Hitler was waging his war against the Jews.
A lot has been written and told about Jews leaving their European homes to go to the newly created state of Israel after World War ll, during which an estimated millions of people died, including six million Jews, Even so, much has been forgotten over the past 75 years, partly because other wars and tragedies have occurred, and social issues have taken the forefront.
What most people don’t know, is that throughout the past 2,000 years after being dispersed, Jews have been trying to return to their fatherland. But what many people don’t know is that the land was never barren of Jews, even though the Temple was destroyed and there was no king to govern them. I call those who stayed and dwelled and farmed in the ancient homeland, the “land’s caretakers.”
