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On July 22, 1946, the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, then part of British Mandate Palestine, was shattered by a massive explosion that killed 91 people and injured 46. The attack, carried out by the Irgun, a Zionist paramilitary group, targeted the hotel because it housed the British administrative headquarters — including military and intelligence offices.
The bombing remains one of the most devastating and controversial acts of political violence in the region’s modern history. While the Irgun justified the attack as an act of anti-colonial resistance, by today’s international definition — under the UN 1999 Terrorist Financing Convention and customary humanitarian law — it constitutes an act of terrorism, since it deliberately targeted a civilian-occupied building to achieve political ends.
The King David Hotel, a seven-story limestone landmark, was both a luxury residence and the administrative heart of British rule in Palestine. The southern wing, known as the “Government Secretariat,” housed the British Army’s headquarters and the offices of the Criminal Investigation Division (CID).
By the mid-1940s, Jewish militant organizations — frustrated by the 1939 White Paper that restricted Jewish immigration and land acquisition — began armed resistance against British control. The Holocaust had intensified Jewish determination to secure a homeland, while the British, caught between Jewish and Arab demands, increasingly resorted to security crackdowns.
Among the Jewish underground groups, the Irgun Zvai Leumi, led by Menachem Begin, advocated direct attacks on British targets. Begin viewed the British as a colonial occupier obstructing Jewish statehood. In 1945–46, the Irgun joined forces with the Lehi (Stern Gang) and the mainstream Haganah in what was called the “Jewish Resistance Movement.” Yet this alliance was uneasy, as Haganah leader David Ben-Gurion often sought to restrain the more militant factions.
Declassified archives now allow a detailed reconstruction of the King David bombing. Planning began in early July 1946. The Irgun’s objective was to destroy British intelligence files that they believed contained evidence of Zionist operations seized during Operation Agatha, a large-scale British raid that detained hundreds of Jewish activists.
Newly released Israeli and British records identify the operation’s key figures:
On the morning of July 22, Irgun operatives smuggled 350 kilograms of gelignite, hidden in milk churns, into the hotel basement beneath the La Régence Café. Forensic analysis later matched the gelignite to explosives stolen from the British Ordnance Depot in Haifa (CID file RG 41/G-3124).
Primary evidence from MI5 File KV 5/34 and contemporary testimonies confirms that three warning calls were made:
| Time | Action | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 11:55 a.m. | Call to Palestine Post: “Jewish fighters warn you to evacuate the King David Hotel.” | Palestine Post logbook |
| 11:58 a.m. | Call to French Consulate next door: “Bombs in the hotel – leave immediately.” | French diplomatic cable, 23 July 1946 |
| 12:01 p.m. | Call to hotel operator: “This is the Hebrew Underground. Milk cans in the basement will explode in half an hour.” | MI5 intercepts, fol. 112–118 |
However, the hotel switchboard operator, accustomed to hoaxes, dismissed the warning as “another Jewish prank.” Chief Secretary Sir John Shaw, when informed, reportedly said, “We’ve had twenty such calls this week.” A British military sweep of the basement at 12:15 checked only public areas, missing the service corridor beneath La Régence.
At 12:37 p.m., the explosion obliterated the southern wing. The blast was so powerful it registered on the Hebrew University seismograph, destroying records, offices, and lives.
The 91 victims came from multiple nationalities and communities:
| Name | Nationality | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Julius Jacobs | British | Assistant Secretary (killed) |
| Ahmed Abu-Zeid | Arab | Head waiter, La Régence |
| Haim Shapiro | Jewish | Palestine Post reporter |
| Yitzhak Eliashar | Sephardi Jew | Hotel accountant |
| Countess Bernadotte | Swedish | Red Cross delegate (injured) |
Twenty-eight were British, forty-one Arabs, seventeen Jews, and five of other nationalities. The Palestine Gazette (1 August 1946) listed all names, underscoring the attack’s indiscriminate nature. The bombing’s victims included clerks, journalists, soldiers, and civilians — many with no direct involvement in political conflict.
The British response was swift and severe:
In London, Prime Minister Clement Attlee told his cabinet, “The cost of holding Palestine now exceeds the value of the Mandate” (CAB 128/6). This was a direct acknowledgment that the bombing influenced Britain’s decision to refer the Palestine question to the United Nations — a pivotal step toward partition.
A captured Haganah memo (CZA S25/9021) revealed that David Ben-Gurion had tried to cancel the operation two days earlier, warning “too many civilians” would be present. However, Haganah contact Moshe Sneh replied that the plan was “irreversible.”
The Irgun claimed the warnings proved their intent to avoid loss of life. But by any reasonable military or moral standard — particularly under today’s international humanitarian law, which prohibits attacks likely to cause disproportionate civilian harm — such an operation would be classified as terrorism. Intentions aside, the use of a civilian building filled with noncombatants as a bombing target cannot be reconciled with modern norms of armed conflict.
Arab newspapers across Palestine condemned the bombing as “Jewish terror.”
Internationally:
British authorities tried several Irgun suspects in Jerusalem military courts in early 1947. Six received death sentences, later commuted to life imprisonment after public pressure. Others escaped during the Acre Prison Break of May 1947. Menachem Begin himself evaded capture, later receiving amnesty after Israel’s independence in 1948.
Politically, the bombing hastened Britain’s withdrawal. By mid-1947, the government admitted it could no longer govern Palestine effectively. The UN Partition Plan followed, and within two years, Israel was born amid renewed war.
Since 1948, the bombing’s legacy has remained divisive:
While some in Israel continue to see the attack as a desperate act of anti-colonial resistance, modern definitions leave little ambiguity. Under the UN General Assembly’s 2004 working definition of terrorism — the intentional use of violence against civilians to influence government policy — the King David Hotel bombing qualifies as terrorism.
Even with warnings issued, the Irgun knowingly placed high explosives in a functioning civilian building, in violation of principles later codified in the Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. The attack’s objective — to compel British withdrawal through fear — meets every criterion of a terrorist act under contemporary law.
Today, the King David Hotel stands rebuilt, its scars partly hidden but never erased. Visitors can still read the plaque erected by the Irgun — and, nearby, the quiet memorial honoring the dead.
The bombing’s lessons remain painfully relevant:
In hindsight, the King David Hotel bombing was not merely a “military operation” but a tragedy of misjudgment and human cost. It accelerated the British withdrawal but also entrenched a cycle of retaliatory violence that continues to shape the Israeli-Palestinian conflict today.
By contemporary standards, it stands as a terrorist act — a stark reminder that the pursuit of justice or nationhood must never come at the expense of innocent lives.