Leon Uris (87 page)

“We hereby proclaim the establishment of the Jewish state in Palestine, to be called the State of Israel.”

Kitty Fremont felt her heart leap—Jordana smiled.

“The State of Israel will be open to immigration to Jews from all countries of their dispersion; will promote the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; will be based on the principles of liberty, justice, and peace as conceived by the prophets of Israel; will uphold the full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of religion, race, or sex; will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, education, and culture, will safeguard holy places of all religions; and will loyally uphold the principles of the United Nations Charter ...

“... In the midst of wanton aggression, we yet call upon the Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel to preserve the ways of peace and play their part in the development of the state, on the basis of full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its bodies and institutions.

“... we extend our hand in peace and neighborliness to all the neighboring states and their peoples, and invite them to cooperate ...

“... With trust in Almighty God, we set our hand to this declaration at this session of the Provisional State Council, on the soil of the homeland, in the city of Tel Aviv, on this Sabbath eve, the fifth of Iyar 5708, the fourteenth day of May 1948.”

After two thousand years, the State of Israel was reborn.

Within hours, through President Harry Truman, the United States became the first of the nations of the world to recognize the State of Israel.

Even as the crowds in Tel Aviv danced the
hora
in the streets, Egyptian bombers took off en route to the city to destroy it and the armies of the Arab world crossed the frontiers of the infant state.

A
S THE INDIVIDUAL
A
RAB
armies violated the borders of Israel they boasted of immediate victory and began to issue glorious communiques giving vivid descriptions of imaginary triumphs. The Arabs revealed that they had a “master plan” for throwing the Jews into the sea. If a master plan existed there was no master commander, for each Arab country had its own idea of who should run the armies and each Arab country had its own idea of who should rule Palestine afterward. Bagdad and Cairo both claimed leadership of the Arab world and of a “greater Arab state”; Saudi Arabia claimed leadership as the country which held the sacred cities of Mecca and Medina; Jordan aspired to Palestine as part of the mandate; Syria had never dropped the claim that Palestine was the southern part of an Ottoman province. And so—the “united” Arabs attacked.

NEGEV DESERT

A much-heralded Egyptian aggressive force came from bases in the Sinai through Arab-held Gaza along the coast. The first of two Egyptian columns, backed by tanks, armored cars, artillery, and modern aircraft, moved along the coastal road which followed the railroad due north to the Jewish provisional capital of Tel Aviv. The Egyptians were confident the Jewish settlements would break and run before their awesome, overwhelming power.

At the first
kibbutz
, Nirim, the Egyptians made a headlong rush and were hurled out. At the second and third settlements along the way they met the same stiff resistance. This shocking bit of business caused the Egyptian staff to re-evaluate the situation. They decided to bypass these tougher spots and continue on up the coast. However, they ran the danger of overextending their supply lines and leaving their rear open for attack from these Jewish pockets: it was mandatory that they stop and fight in certain key places.

Egyptian artillery pounded the settlements to the ground and Egyptian planes bombed and raked them. After furious encounters the Egyptians captured three settlements. The majority of the settlements held and were bypassed.

The most vital strategic settlement in the Egyptian line of march was
kibbutz
Negba—Gate of the Negev—which was located near the intersection of the north road to Tel Aviv and a lateral road that ran inland. This was one of the places that the Egyptians had to capture.

Less than a mile from
kibbutz
Negba stood the Taggart fort of Suweidan—the Monster on the Hill. Suweidan had been handed over to the Arabs by the British. From the fort they were able to shell
kibbutz
Negba to rubble. Negba did not own a gun which could reach the fort.

The farmers of Negba realized the importance of their vital junction to the invaders. They also knew they were not invincible. They knew what to expect; nevertheless, they made the decision to stay and fight. As the guns from Suweidan knocked down every last building and the water ration was reduced to a few drops a day and the subsistence fell to starvation level, Negba continued to hold. Assault followed assault, and each time the Jews threw the Egyptians back. During one Egyptian attack led by tanks, the Jews were down to their last five rounds of antitank ammunition and they knocked out four tanks. For weeks Negba held the Egyptians at a stalemate. It refused to be taken. It fought as the ancient Hebrews of Masada had fought, and Negba became the first symbol of the defiance of the new state.

The Egyptian coastal column left huge forces in Suweidan and continued on up the coast. They moved dangerously close to Tel Aviv.

At Isdud, only twenty miles from Tel Aviv, the Israelis stiffened their defenses. As quickly as arms could be unloaded at the docks, they were rushed to Isdud, along with green new immigrants, to block the Egyptian column.

The Egyptians called a halt to regroup, resupply, and probe in preparation for a final thrust which would take them into Tel Aviv.

The second half of the Egyptian invasion force wheeled inland to the Negev Desert. As they advanced unmolested through Arab cities of Beersheba and Hebron and Bethlehem, Radio Cairo and the Egyptian press hailed “victory after victory.”

It was intended that this second column join in the “glorious” conquest of Jerusalem by attacking from the south simultaneously with an attack of the Arab Legion. However, the Egyptians decided not to share the credit and went after Jerusalem by themselves.

Massing at Bethlehem, they assaulted Ramat Rahel—the Hill of Rachel—a
kibbutz
outpost defending the southern approach to New Jerusalem, the place where Rachel once wept for the exiled children of Israel.

The farmers of Ramat Rahel held under the Egyptian attack until they could hold no longer and they fell back slowly into Jerusalem. At the southern outskirt of the city they were met by Haganah reinforcements and they regrouped and roared back into their
kibbutz
and threw the Egyptians out and chased them to Bethlehem.

JERUSALEM

When the British left Jerusalem, the Haganah moved quickly to seize the sections where the British had been and to launch attacks on sections which held Kawukji’s irregulars. The fighting consisted of street-to-street engagements, with Cadna children serving as runners and men in business suits leading attacks.

The second objective of the Haganah was to take an Arab suburb which separated the Jews on Mount Scopus from the Jews in New Jerusalem. With this done, a decision had to be made. The Jews were now in a position to win the Old City of Jerusalem. With the Old City in their hands they would have a solid strategic front. Without the Old City they were vulnerable. International politics, the fear of damage to the holy places, and great outside pressures made them decide to leave the Old City alone, although inside the walls was a quarter of several thousand pious Jews.

The Jews abandoned a lookout post in the tower of an Armenian church inside the Old City, at the request of the monks. The moment the Jews left, the irregulars grabbed the same place and refused to leave. Despite this fact, the Jews felt that the Arabs would not dare to attack the Old City, sacred to three religions, and would follow the example set by the Jews in this holiest ground in the world.

The Haganah then became faced with the final bit of treachery. Glubb Pasha, British commander of the Arab Legion, had given solemn promise that the Legion would be returned to Jordan when the British evacuated. But when the British left Jerusalem, the Arab Legion rushed to that city in open violation of the promise. The Legion attacked and was able to gain back part of what the Haganah had taken earlier. The suburb linking New Jerusalem with Mount Scopus had been given to the Maccabees to defend; they lost it to the Legion, thus isolating the forces on Scopus. Then Glubb ordered the Arab Legion to attack the Old City!

The Jews had no illusions left after their years of dealing with the Arabs, but this attack on the most sacred shrine of mankind was the nadir. There was nothing to stop the Legion but a few thousand ultra-Orthodox Jews who would not raise a finger in their own defense. The Jews rushed as much of the Haganah as they could spare into the Old City, and the Haganah was followed by several hundred angry Maccabee volunteers. Once inside the Old City there was no escape for their forces.

JERUSALEM CORRIDOR

The road from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv continued to bear the hardest fighting of the war. The Hillmen of the Palmach had cleared a half dozen heights in the Judean hills. The Kastel was firmly in their hands and they had assaulted and won the Comb, Suba, and enough key places to open the tricky and vulnerable Bab el Wad.

Then the blackest blot on the Jewish record occurred. The Maccabees were given the high Arab village of Neve Sadij to hold. In a strange and inexplicable sequence of events a panic broke out among Maccabee troops and they opened up a wild and unnecessary firing. Once started it could not be stopped. More than two hundred Arab civilians were massacred. With the Neve Sadij massacre the Maccabees, who had proved so valuable, had fixed a stigma on the young nation that it would take decades to erase.

Although the Hillmen Brigade had opened the Bab el Wad, the British made it more convenient for the Arabs to blockade Jerusalem by handing the Legion the Taggart fort of Latrun. Latrun, once a British political prison at one time or another graced by all the leaders of the Yishuv, sat squarely on a junction in the road, blocking the entrance to the Bab el Wad.

Latrun, therefore, became the most important objective of the Israelis. In a desperation plan to capture the fort a special brigade was formed. Most of it consisted of Jewish immigrants freed from Cyprus internment or from the DP camps. The officers were equally unequipped for a major operation. Quickly armed and trained, this brigade was moved into the corridor and a night attack on Latrun was tried. It was ill-planned and badly executed. The disciplined Arab Legion threw it back.

The brigade tried two more attacks on Latrun on succeeding nights with equal lack of success. Then the Palmach Hillmen Brigade, badly overextended by the attempt to cover the long stretch of the Bab el Wad to Jerusalem, nevertheless made an attack on Latrun and almost, but not quite, succeeded in taking the place.

An American army colonel, Mickey Marcus, who used the code name of Stone, had joined the Israeli Army. Now he was sent to the corridor, where his tactical and organizational experience was desperately needed. His efforts there began to bear fruit. In a short time he had reorganized the transportation and amplified the mechanized jeep-cavalry which the Israelis had used in Iron Broom. Marcus was mainly concerned with quickly forming a well-trained and well-led unit capable of carrying out a strategic movement on the Latrun bottleneck. He was close to attaining this objective when another tragedy befell Israel: Marcus was killed.

Jerusalem remained sealed off.

HULEH VALLEY—SEA OF GALILEE

The Syrian Army swept into Palestine from the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River in several columns, led by tanks and supported by aircraft.

The first Syrian column chose as its objective the three oldest collective settlements in Palestine: the bloc consisting of Shoshanna, the birthplace of Ari Ben Canaan, and Dagania A and Dagania B, where the Jordan flowed from the Galilee.

The Jews were so short of men in that area that they daily drove trucks back and forth from Tiberias to these settlements to make the Syrians believe they were bringing in reinforcements and arms.

The farmers at the Shoshanna bloc had so little to fight with that they sent a delegation up to see Ari Ben Canaan. The Shoshanna bloc was actually outside his command, but they hoped to appeal to a sentimental regard for his birthplace. Ari’s hands were full, however, with Kassi at Gan Dafna and at Safed and with another of the Syrian columns. He told the delegation that only one thing might save them—anger. He advised them to make Molotov cocktails and to let the Syrians get inside the villages. If anything could raise the Jews to an inspired defense, it would be the sight of Arabs on their beloved soil.

The Syrians went after Dagania A first. The Haganah commanders ordered the defenders to hold their fire until the tanks leading the attack penetrated to the center of the village houses. The sight of Syrian tanks on their rose gardens enraged the
kibbutzniks
to the point where they loosed their barrage of fire bottles with deadly accuracy from a distance of a few feet and gutted the lead tanks. The Syrian infantry which followed the tanks was no match for the farmers. They fled under the wrath of the Jews and would not return.

The second Syrian column attacked farther to the south in the Jordan-Beth Shean valleys. They managed to win Shaar Hagolan and
kibbutz
, Massada—where the Yarmuk flowed. When the Jews counterattacked, the Syrians burned the villages to the ground, looted everything that could be carried off, and fled. At the Gesher fort, taken earlier by the Haganah, the Jews held and they held at the rest of their Jordan-Beth Shean settlements.

The third column came over the Jordan River in Ari Ben Canaan’s area of the Huleh Valley. They overwhelmed and captured Mishmar Hayarden—the Guardpost of the Jordan. Then they regrouped for the thrust that would carry them into the center of the Huleh to link up with Kawukji’s irregulars on the Lebanese side. But Yad El, Ayelet Hashahar, Kfar Szold, Dan, and the rest of the tough settlements stiffened and held, patiently enduring the artillery fire which they could not return, then fighting like tigers when the Syrians came within rifle shot. At Ayelet Hashahar a rifleman actually managed to bring down a Syrian airplane, the credit for which was taken by every
kibbutznik
in the settlement.