A group of British Christians have expressed their shame and sorrow for the way the British treated Jewish refugees kept in internment camps in Israel in the 1930s.

The delegation visited the British Mandate’s internment camp at Atlit, in the North of Israel last week

The group was shown a film titled "“The Forsaken Promise”, a film documenting Britain’s betrayal of Europe’s Jews before, during and after the Holocaust, according to The Jerusalem Newswire.

The group watched the film in one of the many huts that were used to house those Jews the British imprisoned. The three hour film documented the sad tale of refugees fleeing the Holocaust for Palestine, only to be prevented by the British who imprisoned and sometimes sent the refugees back to Europe.

Military camp

The Atlit detention camp was constructed by the British Mandate in pre-state Palestine, at the end of the 1930s, as a military camp on the Mediterranean coast. It was converted by the British between 1939-1948 to a detention camp for “illegal“ immigrants who found themselves, yet again, incarcerated behind barbed wire, but this time on the soil of Eretz Israel - “illegal” immigrants who were caught after a struggle while arriving by any and every route, sometimes even those who held entry certificates.

After the film, one of the British Christians, Hugh Kitson publicly expressed to those at the screening Britian’s shame and sorrow for its actions. Many Israelis who had been imprisoned at Atlit were at the screening, including former Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Meir Lau who was also a Holocaust survivor.

Monument unveiled

A monument was also unveiled to the Jews who died trying to reach Eretz Yisrael but were prevented by the British from doing so. The monument made to look like billowing sea waves, was sponsored by “Love Never Fails,” a network of Zionist British Christian ministries.

The Atlit detention site was officially declared a National Monument in 1987 by the Government of Israel. Since that time many have flocked to the site to bear witness to the obstruction by the British to the nascent Jewish State.