Irgun was a Jewish paramilitary group that existed from 1931 to 1948, operating in Mandatory Palestine. The group broke from Haganah due to ideological differences, arguing that every Jew had the right to enter Palestine, that only active retaliation would deter the Arabs, and that only Jewish soldiers could ensure that a Jewish state could be founded. Irgun was right-wing, and it used terrorist tactics to fight against the British and hostile Arabs, bombing the King David Hotel on 22 July 1946 and taking part in the 1948 Deir Yassin massacre. The group was violently anti-Arab, and it would become the post-independence Herut party in Israel and, later, the Likud party; its fighters joined the IDF in 1948.
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