Haapalah / Aliyah Bet

Rafi רפי sailed back to Greece, with her crew, and Avraham Lichovski, and waited two months to sail again as escort for Henrietta Szold.

From October 1941 – March 1942, Gad Hild was in London, waiting to return to Haifa on Verbania.
During the wait, he was officially accredited with the rank of Able Seaman (AB), and received DEMS training, as an anti-aircraft gunner in the defense of merchant ships.

Gad Hild cites he saw the sinking of Patria in Haifa harbor.

From December. 1940 to October, 1941, Gad Hilb, served as a seaman on Verbania, on a 9 month voyage from Haifa to London, with a stopover at Port Louis, in Mauritius.

From April 2, to May 12, 1942, Gad Hilb served as a seaman, with Ephraim Tzuk and another Israeli, on MS Koenjit M/S Stjernebor, a Dutch cargo ship that sailed from Liverpool to Halifax, Nova Scotia, and to Port Suez ميناء السويس, via the Cape of Good Hope.

On May 12, 1942, MV Koenjit was sunk in the Atlantic Ocean, 500 miles east of the Caribbean Islands, torpedoed by a German submarine, U-156, under U-boat commander, Werner Hartenstein.

While working as second mate on the American ship, John S. Casement, Gad Hilb received a letter from Yosef Israeli, Hechalutz shaliach in the United States.
In, August, 1946, he took a train from San Francisco to New York, to meet Zeev 'Dani' Shind, Mossad leAliyah Bet represntative in the United States, who wanted Gad Hilb to join the crew of a Haapalah ship.

In June, 1947, Gad Hilb was sent as a passenger to Marseille, with a false identity and false papers, aboard the Romanian passenger ship, Transylvania.

Gad Hilb served as Captain aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.
Gad Hilb cites: "Yosef (Yossi) Hamburger, the CEO of the operation involving these two ships, joined us. With him came the Palyamnik, Akiva Offenbach."
"On 15th August 1947 I was appointed captain of the “Pan York” with a crew consisting of 3 professional Israeli officers (me, Ephraim Tzuk and Werner Salomon). There were three other officers, six experienced Spanish seamen, and 7 American Jewish volunteers. There were also 3 men of the Mosad for Aliya Bet, Nissan Levitan, Reuven (Pupchen) Oren and Shlomo Hans Rosen."

Nimrod Eshel served as Palyam Escort aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

Esteban 'Captain Steve' Hernandorena served as 1st Mate aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

Donald 'Donny' Aaron Molofsky served in the Catering Department aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

Akiva Offenbach served as Palyam Escort aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

In December, 1947, Willie Rostoker was appointed 3rd Mate by by the Captain, Gad Hilb, aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

Efraim Tzuk served as Chief Engineer abaord Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

Irving Weingarten served as Senior Deckhand aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

Yoash 'Chato' Tzidon served as Palyam Escort aboard Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות.

On August 15, 1947, Gad Hilb was appointed Captain of Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות, with a crew of 3 Israeli officers, Gad Hilb, Ephraim Tzuk as Chief Engineer, and Werner Salomon.
The crew also included three other officers, including Estaban Hernandorena "Captain Steve', six experienced Spanish seamen, 7 American Jewish volunteers, and 3 men from Mossad le'Aliyah Bet, Nissan Levitan, Palyam Commander and Shlomo Hans Rosen, and Palyamniks, Zalman Perach, Akiva Offenbach, Willie Rostoker, David Lowenthal, Irving Weingarten, and Gidonim, Reuven Oren and Malka Rofeh.

On December 23, 1947, Dr. Harden Ashkenazy sailed on Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות. from Constanţa, for Palestine.

On December 23, 1947, Eugene Herzberger, and his wife, Magda, and Magda's mother, a relative of Magda's helped arrange the voyage, sailed on Pan York Kibbutz Galuyot קיבוץ גלויות, from Constanţa, for Palestine.

On June 20, 1948, Reuters cited in The New York Times that Gad Hilb, Ship Captain was to be Tried by the British Pan York Master Faces Charge of Disobeying British Order "Gad Hilb, 24-year-old master of the Jewish immigrant ship Pan York, arrested by a British naval boarding party Saturday when his ship arrived off Haifa, will be tried by a special British military court, it was learned here today. He will face a charge of having willfully disobeyed an order to assist a British naval captain to go aboard the ship. Captain Hilb, a Palestinian, asserted that the British Navy was not entitled to board his ship before representatives of the Haifa port authority had first gone aboard. British officers ordered the Pan York and her sister ship the Pan Crescent, which brought Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe at the beginning of the year, not to move their anchorage."