12 Facts About Yehoshua Zettler

Yehoshua Zettler was an Israeli who served as the Jerusalem commander of the Jewish terrorist group Lehi, often called the Stern Gang.

Yehoshua Zettler joined the Haganah when he was 14 years old.

Yehoshua Zettler took part in the July 6,1938 raid in which five Arabs were shot and killed in the village of Biyar 'Adas, the first organized attack in Mandatory Palestine by Jewish forces against an Arab village.

In June 1940, when the Irgun decided to suspend its underground military activities against the British during World War II, Yehoshua Zettler followed Avraham Stern and others who created Lehi, which would follow a combative approach with the British authorities in Palestinian Mandate.

Yehoshua Zettler organized the robbery of a Tel Aviv bank in September 1940 and was arrested for the crime in May 1941.

Yehoshua Zettler then escaped from British detention and was chosen by the Lehi leadership to be its chief of operations.

Yehoshua Zettler eluded police for several weeks, until December 2,1941, when he was re-arrested at his Tel Aviv apartment.

Yehoshua Zettler was sentenced to 15 years in prison for robbery.

On May 4,1947, Yehoshua Zettler was freed in the Acre Prison break, a complex operation in which Irgun fighters blasted a hole in the wall of Acre Prison, while Jewish prisoners inside blasted the doors with smuggled explosives and escaped.

Yehoshua Zettler acknowledged his role in directing the assassination in a 1988 interview with Israel Radio.

Yehoshua Zettler was married in 1948 to Bella Shechter, a member of Lehi.

Yehoshua Zettler remained on Israel's political right wing, retaining a long-held suspicion of Arabs and foreigners in Israel, and believed that Israel should retain territories occupied during the Six-Day War.