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PURELY COMMENTARY

the enemy strike first. At 2 
p.m. sharp, Egypt and Syria 
launched a coordinated, all-
out assault throughout Israel, 
hoping to finally avenge the 
humiliation of 1967 and wipe 
the Jewish State off the map.

TIME TO PANIC
Golda Meir was in a panic. 
She called Secretary of State 
Henry Kissinger and begged 
him to convince President 
Richard Nixon to immediately 
airlift much-needed supplies, 
including approximately 100 
fighter jets. Kissinger failed to 
see the urgency. 
Meir finally tried appealing 
to Kissinger as a fellow Jew. 
“Henry, you’re a Jew!” she 
told him. According to Meir, 
Kissinger said, “Golda, you 
must remember that I’m an 
American first, the secretary 
of state second and a Jew 
third,” to which Golda Meir 
famously said, “Henry, in 
Hebrew we read from right to 
left.”
Soon thereafter, the 
weapons were released, and 
Israel was able to avert an 
existential disaster. Israel 
could publicly claim victory 
and indeed large territorial 
gains were made but, in 
reality, it also felt like a defeat. 
Israel had been punched in 
the gut like never before; its 
aura of invincibility forever 
shattered. 
But there was another key 
lesson that Israel learned from 
the Yom Kippur War. In 1967, 
despite its stunning victory, it 
faced a huge public relations 
backlash for striking first, as 
many countries — including 
many anti-Israel voices in the 
U.S. — claimed the strikes 
violated international law. 
The specter of that backlash 
loomed so large for Golda 

Meir that she was willing to 
accept initial Israeli casualties. 
But after Oct. 6, 1973, 
Israel would never again 
allow public relations to take 
precedence over Israeli lives. 
As Golda Meir herself later 
noted, “If we have to choose 
between being dead and 
pitied, and being alive with a 
bad image, we’d rather be alive 
and have the bad image.”
Since then, Israel routinely 
deploys preemptive strikes 
whenever it perceives a 
serious external threat, as 
evidenced in Iraq (1981), 
Lebanon (1982), Operation 
Defensive Shield in the West 
Bank (2002), Operation 
Breaking Dawn in Gaza 
(2022), drone strikes in Iran, 
Syria (2018 and 2023), the 
recent excursion in Jenin and 
multiple other times.
In 2023, it is unthinkable 
that Israel would learn that a 
massive attack against them 
is imminent and yet sit on its 
hands in the hopes of pleasing 
the world. 
Those days forever ended 
on Oct. 6, 1973, the Day of 
Atonement. 
Today, Israel’s enemies can 
celebrate their big victory 
on that day. They can name 
bridges and schools after 
the date, and they can lie to 
tourists about the meaning 
of the date. But they entirely 
miss the point of how that day 
forever transformed Israel. 
Fifty years later, the world 
fully understands that 
Israel will never again be so 
unprepared for war, and that it 
doesn’t give a damn about its 
public image when it comes to 
protecting the precious lives of 
its people. 

Mark Jacobs is the co-founder and 

chair of the JFS Legal Referral Service.

The Radomer Aid 
Society

C O R D I A L LY I N V I T E S Y O U 

T O A T T E N D I T S

“Centennial” Celebration Dinner

Wed. | Oct. 18, 2023 | 6:00 pm

Congregation Beth Ahm

5075 West Maple Rd., West Bloomfield, MI

$100/person 

Cocktails | Hors d’Oeuvres | Dinner

Guest Speaker
Professor Howard Lupovitch

Please RSVP by October 10, 2023

Sandra Tuttleman | 248.757.2349

Supports many local charities

Come celebrate the Jewish spirit with the 
descendants of Radomer!