Day 35 of 599 of מלחמת העצמאות MILḤEMET HAʾAẒMAʾUT (War of Independence)

Engineer Shevah Slavin sought reimbursement connected with explosives procurement. The diary discussed a purchase of 250 tons of TNT and its cost, but did not record delivery of that entire amount into ארץ ישראל EREẒ YISRAʾEL. Ben-Gurion also described a defense budget gap and requests for financing abroad. An authorization, a purchase claim and usable stock were different stages.¹

Ze'ev Sherf presented plans for government departments at a Political Department meeting. Ben-Gurion also discussed a proposed 20,000-member militia and an immigration rate to seek through the United Nations process. These were preparations and negotiating aims under the British Mandate, not evidence that the state or that size of militia already existed.²

A security report passed to Ben-Gurion warned of a plan in Syria involving 5,000 men under Fawzi al-Qawuqji. The diary documents receipt of intelligence. It does not document a crossing by those men on 3 January. Subsequent organized Arab Liberation Army movements have their own disputed dates.³

This is Day 35 of the 599-day civil-date series: 1948-01-03. Its public Ivrit route is 5708-10-21; after local sunset the adjacent Hebrew route is 5708-10-22.

The diary itself is dated Saturday, 3 January 1948. This daily civil slot has the daytime route 21 Tevet 5708 and would pass to 22 Tevet after local sunset. The meetings and diary entry support the day's institutional focus. The Syrian warning is dated here as information received or discussed, not as the date of an invasion. The diary's edited English translation contains editorial brackets that should not be mistaken for Ben-Gurion's original wording.⁴

• How did financing limit the choices available to leaders of ההגנה HAʾHAGANA?
• What would turn an intelligence warning into evidence of an actual border crossing?