The Yom Kippur War

The war, which started on the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, the Day of Atonement, was the fiercest Arab-Israeli war since the 1948 War of Independence. Egypt and Syria attacked Israel, catching Israel off guard. The war was so called the Yom Kippur War because it started on the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, the Day of Atonement, October 6, 1973. It came almost as a complete surprise and warning notice was given too late for an orderly call of the reserves, but was it all worth it?

Egypt, which at first had refused a cease-fire, now accepted it avidly, as did Syria. Considering the adverse circumstances, the speed and the thoroughness with which the IDF, or Israeli Defense Force, had been able to reverse its fortunes was remarkable. The Yom Kippur War went down in Israel's history as a qualified failure. The surprise failed and the cost was heavy, 2,688 soldiers fell.

Intelligence was faulted for failing to sound the alarm in time. The Chief of Staff, David Elazar and his Chief of Intelligence had to resign. Too many airplanes were lost to Russian made missiles. Some experts reached the conclusion that the tank had seen its day because of its vulnerability to missiles and infantry operated RPG's. Of the 265 Israeli tanks in the first wave of troops, only 100 survived.

The branch that mostly distinguished itself during the Yom Kippur War was the Navy, which only now just of age. Without a single loss of its own, it had sunk 34 enemy vessels, secured the coasts of the country, and had succeeded in restricting the enemy to his bases. This was indeed the Navy's War.

The IDF deterrent capacity had been weakened as a result of the war. However it was partially restored in a spectacular and successful operation, the Entebbe Raid of 1976, renamed Operation Jonathan, after the young commander of the ground forces who was its only military casualty. The Jewish and Israeli passengers of a hijacked Air France liner carefully selected by the hijackers were rescued from the hands of a German group of terrorists, in far away Uganda. The resourcefulness and daring of the operation down to the transportation by plane of a black Mercedes of the sort used by Uganda's dictator to confuse the enemy, aroused the imagination of the world.

The Yom Kippur War was followed by a series of Separation of Forces Agreements with Egypt and Syria. These created a strip of territory in which no troops would be allowed, backed by another strip, where the presence of troops were carefully restricted.

The agreement with Syria is still in force and UNDOF, the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, is still there to supervise its implementation. The agreement with Egypt has been replaced after lengthy negotiations which began with the dramatic visit to Jerusalem of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in November 1977 by the Egypt Israel Peace Treaty of 1979. This was first to be signed between Israel and one of its Arab neighbors. It was based on the withdrawal of Israel from the whole of the Sinai peninsula and its demilitarization in return for full recognition of Israel by Egypt and establishment of embassies and full trade and tourist relations.

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