The Zion Mule Corps

In 1914, two refugee camps - the Gabari camp and the Mafruza camp - were erected in Alexandria, Egypt, for Jews deported from Palestine by the Ottoman authorities on the grounds of holding foreign citizenship. One of the refugees was a young man from Kibbutz Degania, Joseph Trumpeldor. Unlike most of his fellow kibbutz members, he refused to take on Ottoman citizenship, believing that the Zionist cause would be realized by relaying on the Allied powers, and not on the Ottoman Empire, whose power was declining.

Shortly after the Gabari camp was founded, another 34 year old man, Ze'ev Jabotinsky, arrived at the camp. He, like Trumpeldor, believed that hope lay with the defeat of the Ottomans by the British. Even more so, he also believed that the Zionists must take an active part in that defeat. The British, and not the Ottomans, Jabotinsy claimed, would be able to grant the Jews a national home in Palestine. He therefore claimed that the Zionists should display allegiance to the British, by establishing a Jewish fighting force that would be active within the framework of the army of the British Empire.

Jabotinsky's ideas were not well received by most of the Zionist leadership, who believed them to be dangerous, especially with regards to the Jews living in Ottoman-controlled Palestine. But Jabotinsky, together with Trumpeldor, lobbied extensively for the founding of an all-Jewish battalion. The British finally agreed, but insisted on various changes: the battalion would not be a fighting force, but would transport supplies to British forces fighting at the front. Colonel Peterson was assigned to be the commander of the battalion, and Trumpeldor, his deputy.

The Zion Mule Corps took part in the campaign in the Dardanelles and delivered supplies to forces fighting against the Ottoman army in Gallipoli. Although it did not directly participate in the fighting, its existence was in important step in the founding of the Jewish Legion later in the War.