138 Haitian massacre (1937) cooperated with it during the Arab revolt (1936–39) and yet again during World War II In 1941, select members of the Haganah under British training became an elite command force, the Palmah, which was created to counter an anticipated Nazi takeover of Vichy-held Lebanon and Syria At the conclusion of World War II, it became apparent that Britain would not change its policies in Palestine, nor would it allow a mass Jewish migration into the region The Haganah then decided to join in on the actions of the Irgun and Lehi by attacking the British in commando raids and sabotage attacks The Haganah membership consisted of illegal immigrants as well as over 26,000 Palestinian Jews who had served with the British in World War II Some of the strengths of the Haganah included its bravery, its initiative, and its ability to improvise during battle It developed an impressive military intelligence system that allowed it to spy on the British and the Palestinian Arabs It also became very skilled in covert operation tactics such as stealing weapons from the British and hiding the many immigrants it helped smuggle into the region Training activities and the purchase of weapons abroad were stepped up after the 1947 UN partition plan, which called for the partition of Palestine between the Palestinian Arabs and the Jews Shortly after this, the Haganah, along with Irgun and Lehi, began concerted attacks on Palestinian Arabs in an attempt to force them out of the Jewish areas that were outlined in the UN plan Some 300,000 Palestinian Arabs were displaced from their homes in five weeks, including an all-day attack on Deir Yasin village resulting in the deaths of over 250 men, women, and children Days after the British mandate ended, Israel was declared an independent state, and in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, also known as the War of Independence, Israel held on to the territory that had been allotted to it in the partition plan and also extended its territory by approximately one-third At the time of the Israeli declaration of independence, the new government, led by David Ben-Gurion, decided that the new state would not have any armed militias or partisan groups, and the Haganah dissolved into the Israeli Defense Force, or IDF See also Zionism Further reading: Morris, Benny Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict, 1881–1998 New York: Vintage Publishers, New York, 2001 Brian M Eichstadt Haitian massacre (1937) For seven bloody days during October 1937, the Dominican army massacred thousands of Haitian men, women, and children living in the northwestern frontier region of the Dominican Republic Thousands more fled for their lives across the border into Haiti Many of the victims were Dominican-born and thus were accorded Dominican citizenship, as guaranteed by the country’s constitution Some came from families that had lived in the Dominican Republic for generations The country’s president-dictator, Rafael Trujillo, ordered this wave of genocidal violence and justified his actions as an act of national self-preservation, declaring that an invasion of Haitians threatened the Dominican Republic Trujillo, reflecting the view of many other Dominicans, defined Dominican national identity according to its difference from Haitians Dominicans, especially the elite, identified themselves as a white and Hispanic nation, in stark opposition to the black and African Haiti The borderlands region dividing Haiti and the Dominican Republic represented a porous boundary marked by a transnational, bilingual, and bicultural community of Haitians and Dominicans, some of whom intermarried Unlike Haitians living in the eastern regions of the Dominican Republic, the Haitians in the borderlands were mostly independent small farmers Many Haitians had immigrated to the Dominican Republic in the second half of the 19th century in search of land in the sparsely populated western region of the country Their descendants, although ethnically and culturally Haitian, were born on Dominican soil and considered it their home The residents of this region did not regard the border between the two countries as a concrete boundary and frequently traveled back and forth several times a day The porous and transnational Haiti-Dominican border troubled Trujillo and the Dominican elite, and soon after his rise to power he worked to formalize the border He feared that the open border provided an easy passageway for exiled revolutionaries to launch an attack on his regime Trujillo signed a boundary treaty with Haitian president Sténio Vincent in March 1936 Trujillo and his elite Dominican officials actively engaged in a program of nation building and national identity dedicated to a strict geographic and cultural national boundary between Haiti and the Dominican Republic When the massacre began on October 2, both Haitians and Dominicans living in the borderland region