Haapalah / Aliyah Bet

In 1939, ITzL אצ"ל sent Yitzhak Ben-Ami to the United States to organize support for Aliya Bet.

In 1941, Yitzhak Ben-Ami, Hillel Kook Peter Bergson, Samuel Merlin, Alex Rafaeli, Arieh Ben-Eliezer, and Eri Jabotinsky replaced the American Friends of a Jewish Palestine AFJP with the Committee for a Jewish Army of Stateless and Palestinian Jews, which lobbied for creation of a Jewish armed force to fight alongside the Allies against the Nazis.
The Committee for a Jewish Army of Stateless and Palestinian Jews employed protest tactics unheard of in the American Jewish community at that time, placing full page advertisements in major daily newspapers, displaying the names of prominent political figures, intellectuals, and Hollywood celebrities who supported the Jewish army cause.
The Bergson Group’s newspaper advertisements, rallies, and lobbying in Washington, combined with behind the scenes efforts by the established Jewish organizations, persuaded the British to establish the Jewish Brigade הבריגדה היהודית, an all-Jewish military unit that was part of the British Army.

In June, 1947, Yitzhak Ben-Ami, Avrasha Stawsky, Gershon Hakim and Victor Ben-Nachum, of the Bergson Group,acquired Altalena, as surplus, originally intended to carry new immigrants to Israel, but, perhaps partially due to Begin's influence, was used to ship arms.
Initially, they wanted to call the boat the Zeev Jabotinsky. who wrote in Yiddish using the pen name The Elter Learner (The old student), which was disguised by calling the boat, Altalena.

The Battle of Altalena אלטלנה resulted in the loss of 19 lives, among them, Abraham Stavsky, who was struck by bullets while in the water, but did not die of his wounds, he died of a heart attack.
16 ITzL אצ"ל fighters were killed in the confrontation, and 3 IDF soldiers:
* 6 ITzL אצ"ל fighters were killed in the Kfar Vitkin כפר ויתקין area
* 10 ITzL אצ"ל fighters were killed on Tel Aviv תל-אביב beach.
* 2 IDF soldiers were killed:at Kfar Vitkin כפר ויתקין
* 1 IDF soldier was killed in Tel Aviv תל-אביב
Machal.org.il cites: three Machalniks who were killed by Haganah הגנה fire on the stricken Altalena אלטלנה.
After the shelling of Altalena אלטלנה, more than 200 members of ITzL אצ"ל were arrested on David Ben-Gurion's orders.
Most of them were released several weeks later, with the exception of five senior commanders, Moshe Hason, Eliyahu Lankin ,Yaakov Meridor, Bezalel Amitzur and Hillel Kook, who detained for more than two months, were released on August 27, 1948.
Jerold S. Auerbach cites: "Yitzhak Ben Ami was one of the so-called “Bergson Boys” who had come to the United States on the eve of World War II to raise funds for the rescue of European Jews and shatter the silence about the Nazi program of annihilation. Auerbach writes that while the Altalena was still offshore, Ben Ami, who had managed to disembark, was on the beach with other Irgun men when Israeli soldiers suddenly raked the area with bullets and mortar shells. As he and a friend took refuge in a sandy foxhole, Ben Ami asked him if he had read Josephus. “Do you remember the description of the final days in the defense of Jerusalem…[when] the Judeans continued to massacre each other…Doesn’t this look like the Third destruction of the Temple?"