At the end of World War II, following the pressing demands of the Zionist movement and the influx of Jewish immigration to Palestine, the problem arose to provide a homeland for the Jewish people. The United Nations recently established, had appointed a Commission on this subject, but it marked the pitch. However, many Jewish survivors of concentration camps during the war, wanted to enter Israel all costs ...

But Great Britain, arriving at the end of his mandate by the UN in Palestine, refused to repatriate its troops to prevent any excessive immigration into the territory of the new state, according to a "White Paper", dating from 1939, arbitrarily limiting the number of Jews allowed to settle in a "National Home". It was unwise to tarnish diplomatic relations and especially trade (always oil ..) with the Arab countries ...

All this is causing the drama of "Exodus" (which the director Otto Preminger draw the subject of his film in 1960.

On July 10, 1947, by a hot summer, but the "President Warfield", scheduled for 700 passengers, is chartered by the Haganah (the Jewish underground military organization in Palestine). He embarked in the port of Sète near 4554 emigrants came quietly trucked from various reception camps of the Bouches du Rhone. The British immediately pressure the Quai d'Orsay, which gives the order to prohibit the departure. With the complicity of the special commissioner of the port, Mr. Lebontet the ship, its passengers renamed "Exodus 1947", sailed clandestinely in the night of 11 to Palestine. Eight days later, at 2.30am, while still in international waters a few miles from its destination, the British navy that followed the boat from Sète, the boarding. The collision of the vessel, yet disarmed, causes the death of three people and left 146 wounded (shot mostly ..), the crew then went to English. Landed in Haifa on July 19, passengers are deprived of their luggage searched and immediately transferred to three prison ships. The French Foreign Minister Bevin, wanting to make an example of the Exodus to deter other attempts at illegal immigration, decided that the refugees will be carried out in France under British escort. On July 27 the ships arrived in Port de Bouc, but the passengers refused to disembark and the French authorities to compel them to refrain from force. Suddenly, out of a hundred of them, they all remain on board in the hell of decks for 24 days. The French press and the diplomatic world are outraged. Returned Aug. 22 by the British occupation zone in Hamburg, the poor will arrive on September 7 and soon begin a hunger strike. The world outcry. Despite this, the British authorities forced by violence recalcitrant passengers to disembark the 8 / 09: 27 are wounded. They will then be transferred to camps for displaced persons in Germany.