"We Created Terror Among the Arabs"

On April 9, 1948, members of the underground Jewish terrorist group, the Irgun, or IZL, led by Menachem Begin, who was to become the Israeli prime minister in 1977, entered the peaceful Arab village of Deir Yassin, massacred 250 men, women, children and the elderly, and stuffed many of the bodies down wells. There were also reports of rapes and mutilations.

Begin said at the time, "We created terror among the Arabs and all the villages around. In one blow, we changed the strategic situation."

Begin was the leader of the Irgun. That group regularly assassinated English soldiers in Palestine and frequently hung their booby-trapped bodies in public places

blew up the King David Hotel

killing 97 British civil servants

assassinated the U.N. representative to Palestine, Count Bernadotte

sealed in houses, as the village was systematically razed

hundreds of children died in the march, from dehydration