Altalena affair

The Altalena, named after a pen name of Ze'ev Jabotinsky, was a ship bought by the Irgun. It sailed from France in June 1948 with about 940 volunteers and a large cargo of weapons, after the State of Israel had been declared and the Israel Defense Forces formed as its only army. Menachem Begin and David Ben-Gurion's government disagreed over how the arms would be distributed, the Irgun wanting part of them for its units in Jerusalem. When the ship reached Kfar Vitkin on 20 June, fighting broke out with IDF troops. The Altalena then sailed to Tel Aviv and ran aground off the beach, and on 22 June, on Ben-Gurion's orders, it was shelled and set on fire. Sixteen Irgun fighters and three IDF soldiers were killed.

Begin, who was on board, ordered his men not to fight back, saying there must be no civil war. The Irgun was absorbed into the IDF, establishing that the new state would have a single army. The affair left a lasting scar between the political camps of Israel.