The Sergeants affair

The Sergeants Affair
Part of the Jewish insurgency in Mandatory Palestine
The hanged bodies of Sergeants Clifford Martin (left) and Mervyn Paice (right)
Date 29 or 30 July 1947 (76 years, 11 months and 2 days ago) Location Mandatory Palestine Result British public opinion turns against the war in Palestine, leading to Britain's withdrawal Anti-Jewish riots in the United Kingdom and reprisals against Jewish civilians in Palestine
Belligerents
Irgun	United Kingdom  Mandatory Palestine
Commanders and leaders
Menachem Begin	Gordon MacMillan
Strength
At least three kidnappers	Two sergeants of the British Army
Casualties and losses
None	2 hanged
5 Jewish civilians killed in reprisals

The Sergeants affair (Hebrew: פרשת הסרג'נטים) was an incident that took place in Mandate Palestine in July 1947 during Jewish insurgency in Palestine, in which the Jewish underground group Irgun kidnapped two British Army Intelligence Corps NCOs, Sergeant Clifford Martin and Sergeant Mervyn Paice, and threatened to hang them if the death sentences passed on three Irgun militants—Avshalom Haviv, Meir Nakar, and Yaakov Weiss—were carried out. The three had been captured by the British during the Acre Prison break, tried, and convicted on charges of illegal possession of arms, and with 'intent to kill or cause other harm to a large number of people'.^[1] When the three men were executed by hanging, the Irgun killed the two sergeants and hung their booby-trapped bodies in a eucalyptus grove near Netanya.

When the bodies were found, the booby trap injured a British officer as they were cut down. This act was widely condemned in both Palestine and the UK. After news of the deaths became widely known, some British troops and policemen went on rampages in Tel Aviv; five were killed and others wounded by the police, while anti-Jewish rioting broke out in some British cities.^[2][3][4]

The incident happened in the backdrop of the ongoing Civil War in Mandatory Palestine, and there is general consensus the incident directly led to Prime Minister Attlee's decision to permanently evacuate all British Forces until the end of the Jewish insurgency in Mandatory Palestine and the Civil War between Jews and Arabs.^[5] The permanent evacuation of all British Forces in Palestine, along with Palestine Police Force, created a power vacuum in the area, from which the Israeli independence war ensued after David Ben-Gurion declared Israeli independence the same day on which the British abandoned the area. Menachem Begin, the commander of Irgun, was barred from entry to the United Kingdom and rejected for a visa to the United States for many years afterwards.^[1]