Irgun and Lehi ( the latter also known as the Stern Gang ) followed their strategy of placing bombs in crowded markets and bus-stops . As on 30 December , in Haifa , when members of Irgun , threw two bombs at a crowd of Arab workers who were queueing in front of a refinery , killing 6 of them and injuring 42 . An angry crowd massacred 39 Jewish people in revenge , until British soldiers reestablished calm . In reprisals , some soldiers from the strike force , Palmach and the Carmeli brigade , attacked the village of Balad ash-Sheikh and Hawassa . According to different historians , this attack led to between 21 and 70 deaths
attacked the village
Balad al-Shaykh massacre
1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine