The 1947-48 Palestine League was the twelfth and last season of league football in the

British Mandate for Palestine The Mandate for Palestine was a League of Nations mandate for British administration of the territories of Palestine and Transjordanwhich had been part of the Ottoman Empire for four centuriesfollowing the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in Wo ...

. The defending champions were

Maccabi Tel Aviv Maccabi Tel Aviv () is one of the largest sports clubs in Israel, and a part of the Maccabi association. Many sports clubs and teams in Tel Aviv are in association with Maccabi and compete in a variety of sports, such as football, basketball, j ...

. The league started on 1 November 1947, after several delays.Liga Alef starts "on one leg"
Al Hamishmar, 31.10.47, Historical Jewish Press with only few matches played, one month later, on 30 November 1947, the

1947–1949 Palestine war The 1948 Palestine war was fought in the territory of what had been, at the start of the war, British-ruled Mandatory Palestine. During the war, the British withdrew from Palestine, Zionism, Zionist forces conquered territory and established ...

erupted. As most of the players joined the forces of

Haganah Haganah ( , ) was the main Zionist political violence, Zionist paramilitary organization that operated for the Yishuv in the Mandatory Palestine, British Mandate for Palestine. It was founded in 1920 to defend the Yishuv's presence in the reg ...

Palmach The Palmach (Hebrew: , acronym for , ''Plugot Maḥatz'', "Strike Phalanges/Companies") was the elite combined strike forces and sayeret unit of the Haganah, the paramilitary organization of the Yishuv (Jewish community) during the period of th ...

and

Irgun The Irgun (), officially the National Military Organization in the Land of Israel, often abbreviated as Etzel or IZL (), was a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated in Mandatory Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of th ...

, and due to the difficulty to hold regular league fixtures, the league abandoned. Nordia Tel Aviv replaced Beitar Tel Aviv as a league member, as the British authorities banned

Beitar The Betar Movement (), also spelled Beitar (), is a Revisionist Zionism, Revisionist Zionist youth movement founded in 1923 in Riga, Latvia, by Ze'ev Jabotinsky, Vladimir (Ze'ev) Jabotinsky. It was one of several right-wing youth movements tha ...

clubs following claims that their players operated within the Irgun (which were actually right). In order to continue football activities, the Beitar management decided on temporary renaming of all Beitar clubs to Nordia (named after

Max Nordau Max Simon Nordau (born Simon Maximilian Südfeld; 29 July 1849 – 23 January 1923) was a Hungarian Zionism, Zionist leader, physician, author, and Social criticism, social critic. He was a co-founder of the Zionist Organization together with Theo ...

).Beitar in Football
Beitar National Sport Center

Maccabi Haifa Maccabi Haifa () is one of the biggest sports clubs in Israel and a part of the Maccabi association. It runs several sports clubs and teams in Haifa which have competed in a variety of sports over the years, such as Football, Basketball, Weightl ...

and Hapoel HaTzafon, winners of

Liga Bet Liga Bet () is the fourth tier of the Israeli football league system. It is divided into four regional divisions. History League football started in Israel in 1949–50, a year after the Israeli Declaration of Independence. However, the financial ...

North and South divisions, replaced bottom clubs

Hapoel Rehovot Hapoel Rehovot was a handball team from the city of Rehovot, Israel. Hapoel was the biggest handball club in Israel until the mid-1980s; they won 13 championships and 5 Israeli cups. They also competed 9 times in the European Cup The UEF ...

and Hapoel Herzliya. Nordia Tel Aviv was top of the table when after the last round of matches, played on 3 January 1948. The leading goal scorer was Yehoshua Glazer with 12 goals.Summary of the League and Top Scorer
Aspaklaria Shel HaSport (The Sport Mirror), p. 3

League table (as of 3 January 1948)

Ligat Herum

After the abandoning the national league, the

Football Association A football association, also known as a football federation, soccer federation, or soccer association, is a governing body for association football. Many of them are members of the sport's regional bodies such as UEFA and CONMEBOL and the world gov ...

operated an interim league, Ligat Herum (, lit. ''Emergency League''), which started on 14 February 1948, and consisted only clubs from

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

and neighboring cities, and depended on the possibilities to hold football matches and of available time.Tomorrow Emergency League starts
Davar, 13 February 1948, Historical Jewish Press Only a handful of matches were played before Ligat Herum was also abandoned as well.

League table (as of 17 April 1948)

References

Previous seasons
The Israel Football Association {{DEFAULTSORT:1947-48 Palestine League Palestine League seasons

Palestine Palestine, officially the State of Palestine, is a country in West Asia. Recognized by International recognition of Palestine, 147 of the UN's 193 member states, it encompasses the Israeli-occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and th ...

1947–48 in Mandatory Palestine football