The Palmach, the elite fighting unit of the Haganah self-defence force in British Mandate Palestine, is at the core of Palmach Rising, a 95-part Israeli television series now available on the Izzy streaming platform.
Described as a teen drama, each episode is about 20 minutes in length. Judging by the first five, they are likely to attract an audience interested in Israel’s emergence from British colony to sovereign state. Within this historic framework are universal elements such as fear, love and valor.
The episodes under review take place in 1946, two years before David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, proclaimed independence, sparking an invasion of five Arab armies and the outbreak of the first Arab-Israeli war.
Shortly after the first segment gets under way, a ship loaded with “illegal” Jewish immigrants heading to Palestine is stopped and boarded by British sailors. Under the combined weight of Palestinian pressure and British policy, Jewish immigration has been severely restricted. The Yishuv, the Jewish community of Palestine, refused to accept this diktat. And the “illegals” were acutely aware that they might be arrested and incarcerated or, worse still, sent back to Europe.
Among the passengers on the ship are the Dasbergs, a family of Holocaust survivors from the Netherlands. As British servicemen board the vessel, the parents urge their two young adult children, Elinore and Emile, to jump off to avoid arrest.
Brother and sister manage to brave rough seas and reach shore near a Palmach base on a kibbutz. Mistakenly thinking that one of them is in danger of drowning, a Palmachnik jumps into the water on a rescue mission. He almost drowns and, ironically, is saved by Elinore.
Since the British are after “illegals,” Elinore and Emile are swiftly taken to the Palmach base and hidden in a barn. The Palmachniks, a blend of attractive and robust men and women, must now decide what to do with the new arrivals. Since they are divided over the issue, they take it to a vote.
Elinore and Emile are allowed to stay. “We don’t turn away helpless Jews,” says a member of the Palmach. This pithy comment accurately sums up the sentiment of the day in the Yishuv.
Eventually, Elinore and Emile are invited to join the Palmach, where they receive military training.
Palmach Rising, a well-crafted and fast-moving series featuring credible performances, promotes the idea that Jews have an intrinsic right to return to their ancestral homeland and form a Jewish homeland in Palestine. This, of course, is the essential principle of Zionism.
The Arab point of view is conspicuously missing, but that’s not what Palmach Rising is all about. It celebrates Jewish tenacity, strength and heroism in the face of daunting odds without losing sight of the everyday wonders of human experiences.
As they sit around a campfire telling stories and jokes, a Palmach practice designed to foster camaraderie, Emile and Elinore bite into slices of watermelon for the first time in their lives. “It tastes like summer,” says Emile, summarizing a small but eventful moment he probably will never forget.
When Emile meets Sarah (Neta Roth), a winsome worker in the laundry, romantic sparks fill the air. It appears that they will be a couple.
In the last episode, Yitzhak Rabin, a Palmach commander and a future prime minister, suddenly appears for a pep talk. Singling out Emile and Elinore, who risked their lives to reach the Jewish homeland, Rabin says that the emerging state will be built by people like themselves.
Rabin was prescient.
During the 1947 civil war in Palestine, and the subsequent War of Independence in the following year, the Palmach played a crucial role in the battlefield victories that would earn the Jewish people statehood.
Palmach Rising deftly reflects these historic events.