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YOSEF (Joseph) HIRSCH : 1940 - 1942 ORIGINAL HANDWRITTEN HUNGARIAN LANGUAGE MANUSCRIPT OF A JEWISH REFUGEE IN ISRAEL, KEPT AT THE NOTED DETENTION CAMP AT ATLIT AND THEN WORKING ON A KIBBUTZ IN THE MOUNTAINOUS GALILEE

4to - over 9¾" - 12" tall. On offer are a diary and letter of the detainee Yosef Hirsch, written during and after his time at the detention camp for the illegal immigrants to Mandate Palestine in Atlit. Joseph Hirsch was born in Romania in 1918. In 1939 he boarded an illegal immigrant ship sailing to Eretz Israel. On January 14, 1940, the ship was stopped by a British warship, from where they were taken to the port of Haifa and to the detention camp at Atlit, was released on April 21, 1940 and worked on a kibbutz in the village of Masaryk in what is now Northern Israel, in the Western Galilee. The diary covers the period from the time Hirsch was interned in the Atlit detention camp, January 29, 1940, to the period he began work in Kfar Masaryk. the letter in Hebrew is a letter of declaration written in September, 1945 requesting legal recognition. Almost all the diary entries are from 1940, though there are a few from 1941 and 1942 while Hirsch is at the Kibbutz. The book is roughly 120 in length, of which there is writing in 70 or so. Hirsch writes his diary entries in Hungarian, with some script Hebrew mixed in. Even though he was born in Romania, he was most probably born near the Western border with Hungary. The back pages are entirely in Hebrew, as is the letter that comes along with the diary. There are a few pages where the writing is faded, but the words can still be read. The cover is soft black leather that shows a good deal of wear. The pages inside are in good condition, with some discoloration from age, especially on the edges. (Background: The Atlit detainee camp was a detention camp established by the authorities of the British Mandate for Palestine at the end of the 1930s on the Israeli coastal plain (what is now Israel's northern coast), 20 kilometers (12 mi) south of Haifa. The camp was established to prevent Jewish refugees from entering Mandatory Palestine. Tens of thousands of Jewish refugees were interned at the camp, which was surrounded by barbed wire and watchtowers. Many of the detainees during the 1930s and 1940s were Jewish refugees from Nazi-controlled Europe. In the late 1940s, most were Holocaust survivors. The British authorities, acceding to Arab demands to limit Jewish immigration, refused to allow them to enter the country. The Atlit camp is now a museum of the history of Ha'apala (the immigration by Jews to Mandatory Palestine in violation of British White Paper of 1939 restrictions, in the years 1934 to 1948.) Atlit was declared a National Heritage Site in 1987.). Manuscript. Book Condition: Good

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