155 a suspicious mind like Stobart’s to accept. The story told by the emigrees who communicated in German was that they walked from East Germany through Russia/Siberia/Manchukuo and China until they reached Hong Kong where they were informed of arrangements for their transportation to Israel by air. Stobart was very suspicious of the veracity of the story. He, however, recommended that the next load of emigrees have some papers from the British authorities in Shanghai. The America pilot of the Near East flight said that he was going to do his best in that regard. According to Stobart everything went well until at a later time an oddlyshaped piece of paper carrying an illegible signature arrived saying that the emigrees to Israel were moving by arrangement with the General Consul of His Britannic Majesty in Hong King (or something as strange). Stobart also stated that between 22 September – 2 November 1950, Near East did not conduct any flights and he had no knowledge whether the work had stopped or had been resumed anew.12 On 25 February 1951, Near East Air Transport aircraft No. CCT/448 landed at Sharjah. “ The names of those passengers holding travel documents are marked with an asterisk on the passenger list (as requested by Mr Stobart, the Political Officer in Sharjah. Those documents were arranged by the American Pilot of the Near East Air Transport Co., but it was unknown how he did so.) We enclose a separate table giving the details of these documents. There are also two holders of passports whose names are not on the passenger list. You will see that most of the passengers were young Jews, leaving Bombay for Israel. Although fewof thempossessed travel documents of any kind all held vaccination certificates and clean bills of health. ” 13 12 Ibid. 13 Ibid., GA58/10. THE SONGS OF THE CITY
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