The Irgun (Hebrew: ארגון), officially the National Military Organization in the Land of Israel, often abbreviated as Etzel (אצ״ל) or IZL, was a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated in Mandatory Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of the older and larger Jewish paramilitary organization Haganah.
The Irgun policy was based on Revisionist Zionism, founded by Ze'ev Jabotinsky. Two of the most infamous operations for which the Irgun were known were the bombing of the British administrative headquarters for Mandatory Palestine in Jerusalem on 22 July 1946 and the Deir Yassin massacre, carried out with Lehi on 9 April 1948.
The organization committed acts of terrorism against Palestinian Arabs, as well as against the British authorities, who were regarded as illegal occupiers. In particular the Irgun was described as a terrorist organization by the United Nations, British, and United States governments; in media such as The New York Times newspaper; as well as by the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, the 1946 Zionist Congress and the Jewish Agency. Hannah Arendt and Albert Einstein, in a letter to The New York Times in 1948, compared Irgun and its successor Herut party to "Nazi and Fascist parties" and described it as a "terrorist, right wing, chauvinist organization".
Following the establishment of the State of Israel during the 1948 Palestine war, the Irgun began to be absorbed into the newly created Israel Defense Forces. Conflict between the Irgun and the IDF escalated into the 1948 Altalena Affair, and the Irgun formally disbanded on 12 January 1949. The Irgun was a political predecessor to Israel's right-wing Herut ("Freedom") party, which led to today's Likud party. Likud has led or been part of most Israeli governments since 1977.
Members of the Irgun came mostly from Betar and from the Revisionist Party both in Palestine and abroad. The Revisionist Movement made up a popular backing for the underground organization. Ze'ev Jabotinsky, founder of Revisionist Zionism, commanded the organization until he died in 1940. He formulated the general realm of operation, regarding Restraint and the end thereof, and was the inspiration for the organization overall. An additional major source of ideological inspiration was the poetry of Uri Zvi Greenberg. The symbol of the organization, with the motto רק כך (only thus), underneath a hand holding a rifle in the foreground of a map showing both Mandatory Palestine and the Emirate of Transjordan (at the time, both were administered under the terms of the British Mandate for Palestine), implied that force was the only way to "liberate the homeland."
The number of members of the Irgun varied from a few hundred to a few thousand. Most of its members were people who joined the organization's command, under which they carried out various operations and filled positions, largely in opposition to British law. Most of them were "ordinary" people, who held regular jobs, and only a few dozen worked full-time in the Irgun.
The Irgun disagreed with the policy of the Yishuv and with the World Zionist Organization, both with regard to strategy and basic ideology and with regard to PR and military tactics, such as use of armed force to accomplish the Zionist ends, operations against the Arabs during the riots, and relations with the British mandatory government. Therefore, the Irgun tended to ignore the decisions made by the Zionist leadership and the Yishuv's institutions. This fact caused the elected bodies not to recognize the independent organization, and during most of the time of its existence the organization was seen as irresponsible, and its actions thus worthy of thwarting. Accordingly, the Irgun accompanied its armed operations with public-relations campaigns aiming to convince the public of the Irgun's way and the problems with the official political leadership of the Yishuv. The Irgun put out numerous advertisements, an underground newspaper and even ran the first independent Hebrew radio station – Kol Zion HaLochemet.
As members of an underground armed organization, Irgun personnel did not normally call Irgun by its name but rather used other names. In the first years of its existence it was known primarily as Ha-Haganah Leumit (The National Defense), and also by names such as Haganah Bet ("Second Defense"), Irgun Bet ("Second Irgun"), the Parallel Organization and the Rightwing Organization. Later on it became most widely known as המעמד (the Stand). The anthem adopted by the Irgun was "Anonymous Soldiers", written by Avraham (Yair) Stern who was at the time a commander in the Irgun. Later on Stern defected from the Irgun and founded Lehi, and the song became the anthem of the Lehi. The Irgun's new anthem then became the third verse of the "Betar Song", by Ze'ev Jabotinsky.
The Irgun gradually evolved from its humble origins into a serious and well-organized paramilitary organization. The movement developed a hierarchy of ranks and a sophisticated command-structure, and came to demand serious military training and strict discipline from its members. It developed clandestine networks of hidden arms-caches and weapons-production workshops, safe-houses, and training camps, along with a secret printing facility for propaganda posters.
The ranks of the Irgun were (in ascending order):
Segen Rosh Kvutza, Segen ("Deputy Group Leader", "Deputy") = Assistant Squad Leader (Lance Corporal)
Rosh Kvutza ("Group Leader") = Squad Leader (Corporal)
Samal ("Sergeant") = Section Leader (Sergeant)
Samal Rishon ("Sergeant First Class") = Brigade Leader (Platoon Sergeant)
Rav Samal ("Chief Sergeant") = Battalion Leader (Master Sergeant)
Gundar Sheni, Gundar ("Commander Second Class", "Commander") = District Commander (2nd Lieutenant)
Gundar Rishon ("Commander First Class") = Senior Branch Commander, Headquarters Staff (Lieutenant).
The Irgun was led by a High Command, which set policy and gave orders. Directly underneath it was a General Staff, which oversaw the activities of the Irgun. The General Staff was divided into a military and a support staff. The military staff was divided into operational units that oversaw operations and support units in charge of planning, instruction, weapons caches and manufacture, and first aid. The military and support staff never met jointly; they communicated through the High Command. Beneath the General Staff were six district commands: Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa-Galilee, Southern, Sharon, and Shomron, each led by a district commander. A local Irgun district unit was called a "Branch". A "brigade" in the Irgun was made up of three sections. A section was made up of two groups, at the head of each was a "Group Head", and a deputy. Eventually, various units were established, which answered to a "Center" or "Staff".