The Sword And The Olive Read Free Page B

had to be constructed under exceptionally difficult circumstances. On the one hand the work had to be carried out against the background of constant skirmishes with the local Palestinian population; on the other, much of it had to take place underground and in the teeth first of the Ottomans who ruled the country and then of the British mandatory authorities.

    “Battle-Worthy Guards”: Ha-shomer members dressed up as Arabs, ca. 1910.
     

III
     
    RUNNING OUT OF STEAM, 1974-1997
     
    T HE END OF THE October War saw the IDF in a state of considerable demoralization. Public faith in it, as well as its own self-image, suffered badly. Commanders accustomed to being treated as demigods suddenly saw their professional expertise questioned and their social status steeply declining. The title of the very first book published about the war said it all: Ha-mechdal (The Oversight). The cover showed a weeping Ms. Meir, and the term mechdal gave rise to a family of related terms such as mechdalnik (an officer who by virtue of his affiliation with the IDF was regarded as sharing responsibility for the mechdal ) and mechdalit (the car IDF officers drove). Previously any attempt to criticize the IDF had resulted in protest, as in 1971 when a play named Malkat Ambatia (Bathroom Queen) caused its audience to run wild and had to be withdrawn. Now, however, and for the first time in Israel’s history, it became possible for people to make a name for themselves by touring the country and explaining all the things that the IDF had not done right.
    More seriously, the months immediately after the war saw pressure build for an investigation. The government, which at first tried to resist, was forced to give in. A commission of inquiry was put together with the state comptroller and two former chiefs of staff (Yadin and Laskov) as its members; its chairman was High Court Justice Shimon Agranat, and the fifth member also a High Court justice. The commission was given a mandate to examine the events that led to the war as well as the first three days of operations. In its report it subjected the IDF to scathing criticism, including the failure to build up sufficient stores and to properly maintain those available. The chief of intelligence, the CO Southern Command, and the chief of staff were pilloried: the first for having failed to serve advance warning; the second for his conduct of operations during the first three critical days; and the third for having failed to order mobilization in good time. All three were forced to resign, and Elazar died soon after. Much to the former chief of staff’s chagrin, the commission exonerated Dayan, who thereby gave one last display of his knack for avoiding responsibility. However, the former national idol was crucified by public opinion. When Ms. Meir resigned in April and was replaced by Yitschak Rabin, Dayan was left out of the government.
    Meanwhile, even as the “First Separation of Forces Agreement” was signed with Egypt in January 1974, the work of reconstruction got under way. At first sight it was highly successful; as we shall see, a combination of massive U.S. aid (financial and technological), plus the mobilization of Israeli resources to an extent never previously attained in peacetime, resulted in the creation of a true juggernaut not only in regional terms but even on a worldwide scale. This army was still capable of spectacular feats, such as the Entebbe raid in 1976 and the bombing of the Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981. When it invaded Lebanon in June 1982 its early victories—especially those of the IAF over Syria’s air force and antiaircraft defenses—astonished the world.
    Yet something of the earlier enthusiasm was gone. Particularly in the years immediately following 1967, war had been regarded almost as a lighthearted adventure in which heroic Israeli tankmen crashed into ( nichnesu be -, Israeli slang meaning, literally, “entered”) second-rate opponents while they themselves