54 Friday, March 7, 1975
Shechinah'
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
YK War Book: Good on Battles, Bad on Bias
It is claimed that this ex-
pression is related to the
"The Yom Kippur War" is
Biblical term "Mishkan" a brilliantly written, com-
which is the appellation prehensive account of the
given to the tabernacle used war of October, 1973, by the
in the wilderness as the London Sunday Times' im-
abode of worship and sacrif- pressive team of corre-
ice; and which was consid- spondents. It covers the bat-
ered to be the abode of the tlefields and the diplomatic
Almighty.
negotiations with expertise.
Scholars like to differen-
The authors explain why
tiate between the root
"Yashov," which indicates a Sadat struck . . . Why Is-
permanent act of dwelling rael didn't guess . . . The
and the root "Shkon" which victory Egypt threw away
indicates a temporary act of . . . Why the U.S. nuclear
dwelling. It is thus claimed alert and . . . The greatest
that the tabernacle in the tank battle ever fought.
They claim that Prime
wilderness was termed the
"Mishkan" because the Im- Minister Golda Meir was so
minence of the Almighty distracted by Austria's clos-
there was either somewhere ing of the transit camps for
in the celestial spheres or Soviet Jewish emigrants
that the warnings of the im-
everywhere in the world.
In the sense that man pending Egyptian attack
comes to know the Al- were not taken seriously un-
mighty only by temporary til it was almost too late.
flashes of nearness, it is
The book spells out the
claimed that the expression reasons why Israel was
"Shechinah" was originally caught napping, what
given to His Divine Pres- problems resulted in the
ence. The later use of this Sinai because of political
term was broadened to th
generals and why the
e
the concept of the
United StateS forced Israel
Creator in all His manifes- to accept a cease-fire when
tations.
36 hours more fighting
Hyman Levy, 83,
Mathematician
NEW YORK — Prof.
Hyman Levy, British math-
ematician and Marxist who
was expelled from the Com-
munist party for criticizing
Soviet treatment of Jews,
died Feb. 27 at age 83.
Prof. Levy served four
years at the National Physi-
cal Laboratory in England
and later joined the depart-
ment of mathematics at
Imperial College, Lo'ndon.
In 1946, he became head of
the department. The college
later appointed him dean of
the Royal College of
Science.
Rabbi Heller,
of NY Center
NEW YORK — Rabbi
Abraham M. Heller, spirit-
ual director of the Flatbush
Jewish Center, died Feb. 27
at age 76.
Born in Lithuania, Rabbi
Heller was brought-here as
a child. He attended New
York University, the Uni
versity of Minnesota and
Columbia University. He
was ordained in 1924 at the
Jewish Theological Semi-
nary.
He was an organizer of
Young Judea, a Zionist
youth movement, and was
chairman of the general as-
sembly of the Synagogue
Council of America and on
the board of the Rabbinical
Assembly.
Under his leadership,
the Flatbush congrega-
tion, which began with 50
families, became one of the
largest Conservative con-
gregations in the country.
Rabbi Heller was a past
president of the New York
Board of Rabbis and a
leader of the Board of Jew-
ish Education of New York.
Among his survivors is a
son, Rabbi Zachary Heller,
of Temple Emanu-El, Bay-
onne, N.J.
would have given the Is-
raelis a great victory over
Egypt.
Their conclusion is that
Israel and the Arab nations
are pawns in a game played
by the two superpowers,
and that as long as that sit-
uation exists, there is little
hope for peace in the Mi-
deast.
Egypt began planning the
Yom Kippur War. in Janu-
ary, 1973 and only 14 per-
sons knew the full plan.
Among the "secret weap-
ons" the Egyptians used in
crossing the Suez Canal
were 100 German-made
water pumps which could
rip away the canal banks
with ease.
Israel was caught nap-
ping, according to the au-
thors, because Maj. Gen.
Eliahu Zeira, chief of intel-
ligence, told a General Staff
meeting 12 days before the
attack that the Egyptian
and Syrian deployments
were unconnected, that the
Syrian buildup was taking a
defensive form and that the
Egyptian moves were prepa-
rations 'for a "multi-arm"
exercise similar to maneu-
vers held every autumn for
several years.
On Sept. 30, a U.S. intel-
ligence report said war
was "unlikely." That very
Oil Threat Softened
NEW YORK — Secretary of
State Henry Kissinger's threat
of U.S. intervention in the oil
producing countries if a new oil
embargo threatened to
"strangle" the U.S. economy is
already having an effect.
According to recent reports,
the rulers of Saudi Arabia,
Kuwait and Abu Dhabi — pro-
ducers of two-thirds of all Arab
oil — secretly agreed that they
will continue to supply the U.S.
with oil during any new Mid-
east war.
They stipulated, however,
that a new embargo would be
imposed if the U.S. re-supplied
Israel during that war.
day, Egypt warned Syria
to be ready for action any-
time within five days of
dawn on Oct. 1.
On Oct. 3, Israel's top
leadership met, including
Golda Meir; Yigal Allon;
Dayan; Israel Galili, minis-
ter without portfolio; Chief
of Staff David Elazar; and
Brigadier Arie Shalev, dep-
uty head of intelligence.
Shalev said: "The possibil-
ity of an Egyptian-Syrian
attack, is not in my personal
view, likely because there
has been no change in the
Arabs' assessment of the
balance of forces in Sinai
such that they could go to
War." The buildup across
the canal, he said was "an
Egyptian exercise: low prob-
ability of enemy initiated
war."
Late on Oct. 4, the fami-
lies of Soviet advisors in
Egypt began to evacuate. On
Friday, Oct. 5, Syrians rede-
ployed into offensive forma-
tion.
By Friday morning, Oct.
5, new information came -
out. The Israeli Air -Force
had carried out its most
detailed reconnaissance
flights on the canal front.
Chief of Staff Elazar,
Defense Minister Dayan
and Gen. Zeira, head of in-
telligence went to Prime
Minister Golda Meier's of-
fice to discuss the new turn
in the crisis. Elazar told
Mrs. Meier that he had or-
dered the Army on Alert
State 3, the most intense
alert since the ending of The
War of Attrition and that he
had canceled the leaves of
those soldiers due to go
home for Yom Kippur —
though that was too late,
most of them had already
set off. But Zeira still said
that "war was of low proba-
bility" — even `•lower than
low."
The authors report that
Maj. Gen. Benjamin Peled,
air force commander, had
placed the Air Force on a
war footing, and was ready
to launch a preemptive
strike on Oct. -5, but that
Elazar told him to prepare
to strike the next day.
Around 4:30 a.m. on Yom
Kippur, Elazar was awak-
ened by the military intel-
ligence chief, Zeira, and in-
formed that Israeli agents
had finally obtained the
Arab plan: Egypt and Syria
would strike at 6 p.m. Ela-
zar phoned Dayan.
Elazar wanted full mobi-
lization and a preemptive
strike at least against the
Syrians. Dayan replied that
they needed Mrs. Meier's
authorization.
The Syrians began their
attack at 1:58 p.m. on Yom
Kippur; the Egyptian com-
mandoes at 12:05 p.m.
scrambled down the Suez
banks to launch their rub-
ber assault dinghies.
More than _700 Syrian
tanks attacked 176 Israeli
tanks, many of them obso-
lete. After an epic battle,
only a handful of Syrian
tanks returned. The authors
say: "The Golan battle was
one of the two most critical
battles of the Yom Kippur
War, and it made possible
the other, which was Gen.
Sharon's crossing of the
Suez Canal to disrupt the
Egyptian assaults and ulti-
mately to encircle one of
their armies."
The authors claim that
Secretary Kissinger
"wanted a limited Israeli
defeat. In pursuit of this
objective, Kissinger re-
fused arms supplies to Is-
rael." However, this has
been refuted by other
sources.
.
Kissinger was preoccu-
pied most of all with pre-
serving the detente with the
Soviet Union. He tried to
minimize the magnitude of
Russian's resupply of
planes, tanks and missiles
to Egypt and Syria which
began as early as Oct. 9.
Leonid Brezhnev, alarmed
by the "accelerating Israeli
blitzkrieg" west of the
canal. which was initiated
by Gen. Sharon's crossing of
the Suez Canal into
"Africa," on 04. 15-16, had
summoned Secretary Kis-
singer to Moscow. The So-
viet Union, Brezhnev told
Kissinger, according to the
authors, "would not" permit
a repetition of 1967.
By PAUL MASSERMAN
Kissinger and Brezhnev
reached agreement on a
cease-fire package to end all
fighting within 12 hours in
the positions now occupied
by Egypt and Israel; to start
implementation of Security
Council Resolution 242 and
to begin negotiations "under
appropriate auspices"
aimed at establishing a just
and durable peace.
The , Insight Team of the
London Sunday Times is
somewhat biased in its ap-
praisal of the so-called
"Jewish Lobby."
The writers claim that
The American Israel Public
Affairs Committee is a
propaganda and political
lobby organization for Is-
rael and that under I.L. "Si"
Kenen, its retiring executive
vice chairman, it has put
pressure on Congress, and
with the support of the 31
major Jewish organizations
in the United States, it has
great political clout ai'Alg
law makers in favor ,
For Sadat, who had
turned down two other re-
quests for a cease-fire (one
made on Oct. 10), this was
a reprieve. -For Israel "to
snatch equivocal compro-
mise from the jaws of im-
minent victory," this was
a bitter pill.
When Mrs. Meir phoned
President Nixon and asked
for a delay in implementing
the agreement for 24 hours,
she was turned down flat.
However, the shooting
didn't stop. Egyptian forces
opened artillery fire on Is-
raeli troops on the night of
-Oct. 22-23. The Israelis cut
the main roads from the
town of Suez to Cairo, and
the ring around the Egyp-
tian Third Army was tight-
ened as the fighting contin-
ued. By Oct. 23, the Israeli
Army had closed the trap on
20,000 men.
According to the authors,
Kissinger told Mrs. Meir
and told her that Israel's
"land grab" had gone far
enough and that she was un-
dermining his position with
the Soviet Union.
According to Dayan,
Kissinger even threatened
that, should Israel not ob
serve the cease-fire, the
U.S. would not stand in
the way of Soviet action to
enforce it. (Israeli sources
deny this.) -
The authors claim that"
Kenen co-ordinates the
power of the American Jew-
ish community for Israel.
They quote Former Senator
Fulbright approvingly.
-
The book puts the onus
on American policy to-•
ward Israel. for -the so-
called split between the
United States and Western
Europe and the tone is that
if Israel weren't in exist
ence things would be much
calmer in the world.
The book ends with the
following assessment: "The
enforcing of a settlement in
the Middle East seems, as
we write, to depend upon
the wills and efforts of the
superpowers, particularly
the United States. In the
short term, perhaps that is
the only way. But for the flip
ture, so long as the Arabs
and Jews are prepared to ac-
cept their role as proxies in
a struggle that, at bottom,
has 'nothing to do' with
them, then it is difficult-to
believe- that ther e'can be
enduring peace in the Mid-
dle East."
.
Israel's Diamond Industry
'4.
Israel Galili and Haim
Bar-Lev were in on the
meeting. Elazar was eager
to launch a preemptive
strike, but with Dayan's
backing, Mrs. Meier ve-
toed the plan. "How many
friends would we have left
if we did that," she said.
Mrs. Meir mmediately
notified U.S. Ambassador
Kenneth Keating, who
warned Mrs. Meir that if
Israel struck first the
United States would be una-
ble to furnish fresh equip-
ment.
E.M. Charles, left, director of the Diamond Trading Co. of London, and Gideon Lahav, chair-
man of the Israel Diamond Institute observe students in the inaugural Nagel diamond course at
the youth educational training center in Natanya. Cutting diamonds is one of Israel's largest
export businesses, and she is the world leader in cutting and polishing gem stones. The Israel
Diamond exchange in Ramat Gan is constructing a second 28-story building to be completed by
1977.
.