Hey boys and girls, the idea of a Security Wall around the whole Land
of Israel is a recent idea just invented by Israeli politicians, right?
Wrong!


Want to know who the guy was who thought up the idea? Ready to tell
your Limey friends over in the UK?


Yep, the inventor of the idea was a British Diplomat!! In 1938.


Read on:
 http://www.afsi.org/OUTPOST/2004FEB/feb6.htm


Tegart's Wall:
The First Security Fence
(Editor's Note: The following article, from the Palestine Post of May 31,
1938 , shows how bad ideas keep resurfacing. The Tegart's Wall scheme ,
designed to protect British forces in the aftermath of the Arab rebellion
of 1936, was abandoned. Sharon's plan to destroy Israeli communities in
Judea, Samaria, and Gaza, build a fence around a designated area, and
leave the remaining territory to the Palestinian Authority, merely turns
over the abandoned areas to terrorist control, without in any way
interfering with Arab demands or stemming international pressures. Yaakov
Amidror, former chief of Israeli Military Intelligence, points out in
Middle East Quarterly [Winter 2004] that without control of the territory
from which terrorism emanates, a military force "cannot detroy the
infrastructure of terrorism [such as laboratories, training centers and
safe houses]. Without territorial control, counterterrorism operations
become risky, both in terms of physical danger and political cost." In the
absence of territorial control, writes Amidror, "Israel's real line of
defense is its own cities and towns. And because the terrorists target
civilians, their success is almost assured." )




The Fence Round Palestine
"Tegart's Wall"
A scheme for a barbed-wire "wall," suggested by Sir Charles Tegart,
adviser to the Palestine Government on suppressing terrorism, is being
undertaken at a cost of L90,000 to prevent the bands fleeing from justice,
smuggling arms, or entering for terrorism and agitation across the
frontiers between Palestine and Syria, Trans-Jordan, and the Lebanon,
(wrote the Jerusalem correspondent in The Times yesterday). Terrorism in
Palestine has been difficult to isolate and control because these
frontiers, practically undefended and in un-inhabited and rough terrain,
have proved easy bases for troublemakers. When pursued by police and
military the bands, and especially their leaders, have been able to slip
over the borders, often carrying away cattle and other booty, and have
thus effectively escaped capture. Arms and other warlike equipment
unprocurable in Palestine have been easily secured from among the people
in Syria and Trans-Jordan and smuggled into Palestine, along with many
cheaply hired gunmen. The stopping of these practices has become an
essential to the restoration of order in the British Mandated territory.




French Indifference
Efforts made by the Palestine Government to obtain the cooperation of the
French Mandatory authorities in Syria in preventing the use of that
country as a base have been unsuccessful. The French have given over much
of the detail of government to the Syrian and Lebanese States, whose
sympathy with the Palestine Arab nationalists prevents them from doing
anything. Furthermore, the French point out that when they were having
troubles in Syria in 1925 and 1926, the British professed inability to
prevent the flight of Syrian nationalists into Palestine and Trans-Jordan.
Something might be done to bludgeon the Syrians into cooperation by
stopping all trade with them, but it would not improve international
relations nor solve the problem of the undefended frontiers. For this
reason Sir Charles Tegart advised the erection of some physical barrier on
the frontier which would make guarding it more practicable. Unfortunately
the Northern Frontier road, built close to the international boundary in
very rugged country at no small expense, has not been very helpful as it
could not be patrolled at night without marauding bands knowing from the
lights of the cars just where they were and timing their passage
accordingly. A stout physical barrier difficult of penetration was,
therefore the last resort. Contracts for Sir Charles Tegart's scheme have
been let to Solel Boneh, Limited, of Haifa.




50 Miles of Barbed Wire
The specifications call for a barbed wire fence extending for about 50
miles from the coastal road at Ras en-Nakura eastwards to Nebi Yusha
(Metullah) and curving down to the Huleh marshes. Jewish colonies at that
point form a barrier, but the fence resumes at Rosh Pina and extends to
Tabgha on the Sea of Galilee, which in turn will be patrolled by
motor-launches. South of the Sea of Galilee a two-and-a-half miles stretch
as far as the mouth of the Yarmuk River will be fenced. Plans are being
made for obstructing the passage of the Jordan River between Palestine and
Trans-Jordan at its 70 fords.


The fence is to vary in thickness according to local conditions. The
single bay type will consist of two parallel barbed wire fences some 6 ft.
high and 5 ft. apart, each fence consisting of iron posts with 2 in. mesh
rabbit wire at the bottom surmounted by barbed wire, and the space between
the two fences not only crisscrossed with barbed wire but also filled with
loose masses of tangled wire below. This in itself would form a barrier
difficult to pass. But in some places there will be three parallel fences,
the two outer bays being as elaborately wired as that mentioned above. The
fence will be guarded from the seven police posts now placed along the
frontier road, which will be made easier to defend than at present, and
supplemented by pillboxes armed with Lewis guns at places where deep wadis
or customary tracks cross the frontier. Searchlights on the police posts
and pillboxes will be able to keep most of the defence line under
observation at night. As the strength of the fence when tested
by Sappers and specially equipped troops was such that they could not get
through in less than 20 minutes even by daylight, the additional
precaution of patrolling the fence at 10-minute intervals with police cars
equipped with searchlights will doubtless be enough to protect those parts
out of observation of the police posts.
The 70 fords of the Jordan River by which terrorists and contraband have
crossed to and from Trans-Jordan as easily as the peasantry and Ghor Arabs
for many generations present another type of problem. Thirty-five of the
fords can be watched effectively from high ground near by. The remainder
will be rendered impassable by fences on the banks, supplemented by
submerged wiring which will serve the same purpose as the wooden stakes
used by the ancient Britons and Romans. The erection of this formidable
barrier, which is quickly becoming known as Tegart's Wall, is
unquestionably a necessity in present conditions, just as Hadrian's Wall
in the past, concludes the Times correspondent. But if the other
experiments being made in Palestine are to be permanent, the necessity for
such wartime precautions must be removed by so just a settlement of the
problems of the country that her frontiers will be guarded by the mutual
good will and confidence of herself and her neighbours. It would be a
tragedy if the future State or States could only exist behind barbed wire
entanglements.