Aliyah Bet עלייה ב'

Clandestine immigration to the Land of Israel from 1934 to 1948, in defiance of British limits, above all the White Paper (1939). Most voyages were organized by the Haganah's Mossad LeAliyah Bet, many of them after the Holocaust. More than a hundred ships sailed, and the British intercepted most of them and held tens of thousands of passengers in camps on Cyprus. The ship Exodus 1947 was sent back to Germany, and the outcry helped turn opinion against British rule.