Olei Hagardom (, lit. "those who ascended to the gallows") refers to members of the two Jewish Revisionist pre-state underground organisations Irgun and Lehi, most of whom were tried in British Mandate military courts and sentenced to death by hanging. Most of the executions were carried out at Acre Prison. There were 12 Olei Hagardom.
The term, which was coinage by the Irgun to describe underground militants hanged by the Mandatory government, their does not include members of the Nili organisation hanged by the Ottoman government during World War I. The language chosen resonates with a positive moral evaluation: olei means 'he who ascends', while gardom (gallows) was a traditional term for Jews martyred in pogroms, the Holocaust and the like.
History
The British Mandate for Palestine was an instrument of government instituted by the League of Nations for the administration of territories formerly under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. British rule lasted from 1917-1948.The British Mandatory authorities during their rule executed hundreds of residents of Palestine, the overwhelming majority being Palestinian Arabs.
At the outset of the 1936–1939 Arab revolt, the formal policy expressly reaffirmed by the Yishuv was a dual one, of reinforcing the Haganah, while at the same time exercising restraint (havlagah) by refraining from retaliation and privileging defensive measures such as the fortification of settlements. Nonetheless, the Yishuv was involved in countering the uprising. British forces coordinated with the Haganah, which systematically furnished mandatory authorities with information about Arabs reportedly involved in the revolt, information which led to the arrest of Palestinian militants. Special Night Squads, composed of British soldiers and Zionist volunteers, which specialized in night raids on villages suspected of supporting the rebellion and summary executions people deemed to be members of armed bands.
At this period, a quarter of the estimated 5,000 Palestinian dead (in Walid Khalidi’s calculation) were killed by fellow Palestinians as a result of internecine fighting. The insurgents themselves killed somewhere in the range of 429-547 Jews, a figure which may, or may not include some 78 Jews serving with the Palestine Police Force.
Revisionist Zionists apart from Ze’ev Jabotinsky, harshly criticized this tactic of forbearance, and the movement's militant wing the Irgun, under the leadership of David Raziel, broke with self-restraint in July 1937, opting for a policy of ‘massive anti-Arab terrorism’.
With the outbreak of World War II, militant actions by the Irgun against the British were halted, but one of the leaders of the group, Avraham Stern, insisted that the fight must go on, leading to a split in the Irgun which led to the formation of a new group, Lehi (also known as the Stern Gang or Stern Group). In 1944, the Irgun, now headed by Menachem Begin resumed attacks on the British. On the night of 31 October-1 Novem,ber 1945, the Yishuv via the Jewish Agency, ordered the Haganah to detonate 153 explosive charges on railroads throughout Palestine in an episode known as the Night of the Trains and thereafter Jewish militias united to form a Jewish Resistance Movement, which was active for several months, and gave the new High Commissioner, Alan Cunningham, the impression that the Jewish public was growing increasingly sympathetic to acts of terrorism carried out by the Jewish Resistance Movement and breakaway organizations by Lehi and the Irgun.
The term "Olei Hagardom" refers to the eight Irgun and two Lehi members who were executed during this period and a further member of each group who committed suicide prior to their intended executions. Two of the executions were carried out in Egypt in 1945. With the exception of Ben Yosef, all the executions and suicides within the British Mandate of Palestine occurred in 1947. They were tried under the Defence Emergency Regulations, enacted in September 1945.