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When Frank Sinatra Helped Israel

(The Librarians-Jerusalem Post) Nati Gabbay - In March 1948 the Haganah was working back channels in order to arm the Jewish population in Mandatory Palestine as the fight for Israel's independence was already underway. Teddy Kollek, later to be Mayor of Jerusalem, was in a New York hotel with a mission to transfer funds to the captain of an Irish ship, docked not far away and loaded with ammunition, before it set sail to the Land of Israel. But Kollek, a known Haganah operative, was being monitored by U.S. federal agents. In the same hotel was the Copacabana nightclub, frequented by entertainer Frank Sinatra. One morning Kollek left the hotel holding a bag. FBI agents followed him. At the same moment, Frank Sinatra left out the back exit, carrying a million dollars in a paper bag. He went down to the pier, made the delivery to the captain, and the ammunition ship sailed on its way. "It was the beginning of the young nation, I wanted to help," Sinatra later told his daughter Nancy.
2022-07-07 00:00:00
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