Work to upgrade the entrance to the old city of Safed has unearthed a tunnel that experts are certain local Arabs dug during the 1948 War of Independence, intending to use it to blow up Ashtam Building, an old commercial structure that served as the important outpost and weapons stockpile protecting the city's Jews.
At that time, Jews were in a small minority in Safed compared to the number of Arab residents in the city's Muslim Quarter.
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"This is the only attack tunnel we know of from the time of the War of Independence [other than the sewers used by the Haganah forces in Jerusalem], and also the first attack tunnel in the history of modern Israel," says Dr. Nissan Sharifi, a researcher on the history of Safed.
A few years after the War of Independence, the ground near Ashtam Building was leveled to build a parking area for tourist buses bringing visitors to the old city.
Workers employed on a recent refurbishment of the area uncovered the tunnel, and initially thought they had stumbled across an antiquity. They contacted the Israel Antiquities Authority, which began a rescue excavation, which turned up findings from the 16th century, the 19th century, a water cistern from the Ottoman Period, and the tunnel, which had been filled it at the end of the war and later paved over.
The IAA, as well as many Safed residents, were worried that the city would opt to re-cover the tunnel as part of its project to improve tourist facilities.
Binyamin Geiger, 96, who served as the commander of Safed during the war, said that "If the Arabs had managed to blow up Ashtam Building, it would have ended us. The tunnel was the biggest strategic threat to the outpost, which was the most important one for our defense, and if it had fallen then, they would have gone into the Jewish Quarter and killed all the Jews."
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"It's really exciting for me that they found it, and I'm very worried it will be covered up again. We have to preserve it for the sake of future generations," Geiger said.
The tunnel, which became almost a myth for Safed residents, was described in various books published by commanders who served in Safed during the war, including Geiger.
"One night, when I was patrolling, I was summoned urgently to the central position. The guy who was permanently stationed there, Mussa Sarur, told me excitedly, 'Binyamin, listen to this, put your ear here on the earpiece, I can hear noise from the Arab market.'" Geiger wrote.
"I listened closely. It was dark and shots could be heard from every direction, all the time. Aside from the shots, I also heard a kind of noise, like a shovel digging, as if it came from far away," Geiger's memoir states.
Geiger informed Haganah commander of the city Meir Meivar, who sent him to neutralize what he suspected was a tunnel to be used in an Arab attack.
When Geiger set out, the noise stopped, and only after Safed was liberated did the Israeli fighters discover the tunnel.
"Later, we were informed that the heavy rains of that winter had caused the ground above part of the tunnel to collapse," Meivar wrote.
"The Arabs thought that we had discovered it, and were watching it, so they stopped digging. After the city was liberated, we discovered the tunnel, whose ceiling had caved in at a point about 10 meters [11 yards] from the Ashtam Building," Meivar recalled.
In light of public pressure to preserve the tunnel, the Safed Municipality has frozen work at the site.
"The city sees great importance in developing tourism in the city … After the discovery came to light, Mayor Shuki Ohana issued instructions to look into its significance, and to promote a plan to preserve it and turn it into a tourist attraction. From the moment it was discovered, the city hired architects, consultants, and architects to carry out in-depth research and prepare a detailed plan. We will publish the findings when they are available," a statement from the Safed Municipality announced.
