Day 424 of 599 of מלחמת העצמאות MILḤEMET HAʾAẒMAʾUT (War of Independence)

Ben-Gurion said he had left his sickbed yesterday to vote. At 9 inthe morning he received returns excluding key districts and the army, then updated his calculations during the day. His estimates of seats and possible coalitions were working judgments. They cannot replace the final national count.³

He sought collective cabinet responsibility, a defined foreign policy and a labor majority. Those conditions reveal the choices facing a government that would answer to elected representatives. They were not evidence that a cabinet had already formed. His February 1 public program belongs to a later evening address.

The contemporary arrival dispatch says today, January 26. Klir says yesterday in his January 26 entry and supplies a different passenger and infant count. The full transport study uses January 26 as a provisional placement while keeping January 25 as an alternative. It does not create two voyages or two populations from conflicting descriptions of one arrival.⁴⁵

The reported reception by the state’s own institutions gave the former detainees a different relationship to public power than confinement under a foreign administrator. Named passenger and port records remain necessary to establish the families and precise arrival sequence.

The existing House of Commons article dates the debate about departure restrictions to January 26. It preserves a complaint and an official claim of relaxation; those statements are not an exit-visa implementation roster. Klir also reports Italian recognition under this date, while the supplied embassy lead gives January 25. That original instrument remains unrecovered, so the disagreement is retained as a diplomatic dating lead.⁶

This is Day 424 of the 599-day civil-date series: 1949-01-26. Its public OTD route is כ״ה בטבת ה׳תש״ט 25th 𝑜𝑓 Tevet, AM 5709, the daytime fixed-Hebrew-calendar conversion in the checked series register. This slot does not establish the Hebrew occurrence date of every incident discussed. The diary dates coalition planning 26 and Dayan’s reported meeting 25. Arrival witnesses disagree 25/26. Parliamentary debate dates 26; later reportage does not move it. ⁷ Events after local sunset on this civil date use כ״ו בטבת ה׳תש״ט 26th 𝑜𝑓 Tevet, AM 5709; exact clocks remain unverified unless stated above.

• How did incomplete military returns affect coalition projections?
• What would resolve arrival timing more decisively than a dated chronology heading?