Moshe
Digging It With Dayan

Meet Mr. Moshe

It was on October 4, 1939 that Moshe Dayan first broke into the news. That was when he was thrown in the slammer.

What? Moshe Dayan?

Thrown in the slammer????!!!!????

Yes, Moshe Dayan, the iconic Israeli soldier, war hero, and statesman was thrown in the slammer.

You see, it seems that Moshe and some of his friends had been arrested while patrolling the Galilee as members of the Haganah (הֲגָנָה; pronounced hah-gah-NAH). The Haganah was an unofficial security force that was formed in what was then called the British Mandate of Palestine. At that time Palestine was bordered by Lebanon on the north, the Jordan River on the east, the Sinai Peninsula and the Mediterranean to the west, and on down through the Negev Desert to the Gulf of Aqaba in the south.

Since the early 1920's the Haganah had been patrolling around the Jewish settlements of Palestine. But it was the British who were actually in charge of maintaining order. And they did not look favorably on do-it-yourself policing in a country with an increasingly evolving and divergent population.

Demographics with Dayan

As for determining what that evolving population was, studies of Palestine demographics have been confusticated by inaccurate data obscured by various political and philosophical agendae. Still, a number of scholars have attempted to provide objective and honest estimates. One of the most comprehensive investigations was by the Israeli statistician Roberto Bachi. Roberto was born in Italy but left in 1938 after Mussolini began enacting anti-Jewish legislation. Roberto emigrated to Palestine and was later professor at Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

The causes of the shifts in demographics in Palestine is something about you could (literally) write a book about. Today most people see changes in terms of the Arabic and Jewish inhabitants. What most people forget is that from AD 330 to about AD 600, the Byzantium Christians moved in. During this time at the least there was widespread discrimination against the Jews. They could not hold public office and could not construct new synagogues.

That was at the least. As for the worst, in 600 AD the Emperor Heraclius forced large-scale Jewish conversions to Christianity. It was literally convert, leave, or die. About a hundred years later there was the Muslim Conquest which retracted the Byzantine borders back up toward modern Turkey. Then followed the Crusades. Ultimately the Christians were also shoved out and by 1500, the Muslims were a strong majority.

However, throughout all the trials and tribulations, there were always some Jewish inhabitants in Palestine. But Professor Bachi estimated that by 1700, their population had plummeted to less than 1 % of the total. At the low point he lists only about 2000 Jews in all of Palestine.

By then Byzantium had fallen to the Turks (in 1453) and Palestine became part of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. And the Ottoman Empire was huge. It once stretched west along North Africa from Egypt to Tunisia, over to Greece and up the Balkans, around through the borders of the Black Sea, along down the western coast of the Arabian Peninsula (called the Hijaz), and as we said, through Palestine.

By 1800 the Jewish population was still less than 6000, or about 2 % of the total. But in the next 50 years, there was a strong recovery, largely because of immigration. By 1850, the numbers had risen to about 15,000 which was 5 % of the population.

Then in the late 19th and early 20th Century anti-Jewish pogroms broke out in Russia. Not coincidentally these persecutions also corresponded with the formation of the Zionist movement by Theodor Herzl. Many Jews fled Russia (or were driven out). Most went to Europe or America, but others moved to Palestine. By 1890, the Jewish population had increased to 40,000 and by 1914 - the start of World War I - it was close to 100,000 - about 14 %.

The War (Temporarily) to End All Wars

Unfortunately the increasing immigration, as is too often the case, resulted in tensions between the newcomers and the majority citizens. By 1914 the percentage of Arabs - including Christians - was about 85 %. Incidents between the Arabs and the Jewish settlers grew in number and intensity.

Inevitably many of the Jewish immigrants in Palestine took up agriculture, either joining established Jewish communities or buying land to create new ones (the Ottomans were always happy to pick up extra cash by selling tracts of land). But agricultural work was difficult. In some places water was scarce and in others there was too much. Disease - particularly malaria - was endemic in the swamplands which, because of the water, were areas that were popular for land reclamation.

Eventually the Jewish farmlands became the most productive in the land. In 1909, a young archeology student from Oxford named Thomas Edward Lawrence was touring the area to gather information for his thesis on crusader castles. He was particularly impressed how the Jewish settlements had created oases in a largely arid landscape.

But in 1914 came the war, and the Ottomans sided with Kaiser Bill. So when the Germans lost, so did the Turks.

Even before the war, the Ottoman Empire had been much reduced in size. They had lost Egypt largely because the French and British set up the Suez Canal Company in 1859. Greece and the Balkans had also won their independence. So the once mighty Ottoman Empire was now pretty much Turkey, Palestine, Mesopotamia, and the Hijaz.

Then after the War and to their chagrin, the Turks learned that the British, French, and Americans were not just going to shake hands and let bygones be bygones. Instead the Allies were going to divvy up what was left of the Ottoman lands amongst the victors.

And amongst the victors were the Arabs. During the war they opted to join the Allies, and we must add, greatly at their peril. As Ottoman subjects any Arabs fighting with the English would have been denounced as traitors and dealt with most severely.

Naturally being on the winning side, the Arabs expected something in return - particularly since the English had come to them in the first place. In 1916 the British High Commissioner to Egypt, Sir Henry McMahon, had written the Sharif (hereditary ruler) of Mecca, Hussein bin Ali. Side with us, said Sir Henry, and the Arabs would be given independence.

Sharif Ali agreed and sent his son Feisel to lead the Arab Army. The British liaison was young Ned Lawrence - the same T. E. Lawrence that had toured Palestine for his Oxford thesis. Eventually as the famous Lawrence of Arabia, Ned was seen - at least by the British and Americans - as the liberator of the Arabs although Ned himself claimed nothing of the kind. The revolt was, Ned said, one of Arab armies staffed and led by Arab officers.

So once the Arab armies reached Damascus, they saw nothing amiss in declaring the Arab Kingdom of Syria (المملكة العربية السورية, 'al-MamlakatulArabiyyatusSuriyya). The kingdom was to be a fully sovereign Arab nation and would encompass both Syria and Palestine. This, the Arab leaders felt, had been part of the deal.

Unfortunately, there was just one wee little detail that Sir Henry had neglected to tell Sharif Ali. That was that Britain and France had signed the Sykes-Picot Agreement.

Briefly the Sykes-Picot agreement stated that Britain and France would allocate the Middle East between them. England was to keep Egypt and get Palestine. France in turn would get Syria and the Levant (ergo, modern Lebanon). As what to do with regions further west in Mesopotamia, well, they'd decide later.

The Arab Kingdom of Syria lasted about a millisecond. It vanished as soon as France and England called in the Sykes-Picot Agreement. To the Arabs' surprise, they now learned that independence really meant living in British and French colonies. In other words, they had fought for independence and put their lives on the line only to become second class citizens of the British and the French Empires.

More surprises were on the way. It seems that when the English were wooing the Arabs, Sir Arthur Balfour, the British Foreign Secretary, had written the Jewish leader Henry Rothschild. Sir Arthur cheerfully informed Henry about what was commonsensically called the Balfour Declaration. Sir Arthur said Henry could tell his friends that:

His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

You have to hand it to the British. Despite their penchant for minor grammatical errors, they were masters at making assurances upon which they could later equivocate. But most of all they were strong believers in tell-everyone-what-they-want-to-hear-and-hope-things-will-go-away school of diplomacy.

However, the Jewish leaders took the British at their word. They began to push for increased Jewish immigration into Palestine. The Arabs were opposed, and violence became part of daily life. Deadly riots broke out and over two days in August 1929 over 60 Jews were killed in Hebron and about 20 died in Safed.

Almost at once a group of the Haganah split off to form Ha-Irgun ha-Tzvai ha-Leumi,, (הַאִרְגוּן הָצְבאַי הָלֵאוּמִי, pronounced hah-eer-GOON hah-tzah-VAHEE-hah-Lay-oo-MEE), or The National Military Organization. As the name was a little long, colloquial usage transformed it simply to the Irgun or less often to its anagram Etzel.

The Irgun was led at first by Ze'ev Jabotinsky, and later by a young Russian-Polish lawyer named Menachem Begin. The Irgun vowed an eye-for-a-tooth retaliation and didn't hesitate to respond with random attacks on Arab civilians. Sometimes they would drive cars though Arab marketplaces and toss bombs into the crowds.

In the 1930's an organized Arab revolt broke out where the leaders demanded cessation of Jewish immigration, renunciation of the Balfour Declaration, withdrawal of the British from Palestine, and the re-establishment of an independent Arab state in "Greater Syria" (which included Palestine). Of course, the British rejected these demands and tit-for-tat cycles of violence grew.

The British tried to keep things in check and instituted some tough laws. For instance, if anyone was caught with unauthorized firearms, they could get the death penalty. But bowing to the reality of the situation, the soldiers might just confiscate the weapons and let the gun owners go free. So when the Haganah patrol of Moshe and his friends were stopped, they expected no more than a brief detention.

Unfortunately there had been complaints from the Arab leaders that the British were treating Jewish offenders with disproportionate leniency. To demonstrate a more even hand, the judge decided that Moshe and the others weren't going to get off easy. He slapped them all with ten years.

After much brouhaha back and forth, the Jewish leaders convinced the British to reduce the sentences to five years. But Moshe and the others were still going to be sitting in Acre Prison until 1944.

Moshe's Mainsprings

Moshe was born in 1915 on a kibbutz near Lake Kinneret (Yam Kinneret, יָם כִּנֶּרֶת‬ (pronounced yahm kin-ner-ETH and better known to Americans as the Sea of Galilee). Specifically Moshe's birthplace was Kibbutz Delania and was the first kibbutz in what later became the State of Israel.

Organized along the lines of strict socialism, kibbutzes held their land collectively. All money earned was pooled for the community. But although there was little private property, there was some privacy. The children slept in dormitories well away from their parents.

Kibbutzes could be surprisingly secular. Some had no synagogues and were not even kosher. But because the kibbutzes were controlled by workers who knew what they were doing, they were usually prosperous and did not suffer the misfortunes of agricultural collectives in other countries where the planning was by politicians who lived thousands of miles away and had never touched a farm implement in their lives.

Moshe's childhood, though, was not spent in pastoral idleness. His dad, Shmuel, had difficulties with the other kebbutzim and left the settlement with considerable rancor. His moving around necessitated frequent separations from his wife, Dvorah, and young Moshe. Finally in 1921, Shmuel, Dvorah, and Moshe settled in Nahalal about eight miles east of Nazareth.

Nahalal was not a kibbutz but a moshav (מוֹשָׁב, pronounced moe-SHAV). In moshavs the farmers live in a central village, but owned their own fields.

Once he was out of school, Moshe and his young wife, Ruth, took over the family farm. With the rising tensions (and violence) between the Arabs and the Jews, Moshe became part of the defense force which, as we saw, eventually landed him in jail.

Good Citizen Moshe

But now there was another war on. World War II, that is. The British needed experienced soldiers, and so a year and a half after his arrest, Moshe and the others were released. The Haganah was then accepted by the British as an official force to protect the Jewish settlements.

Moshe, though, was asked to join a regular British army unit - Australian, actually - for an operation in Lebanon. Remember that after World War I, France had taken charge of Lebanon, and in the early days of the blitzkrieg, Germany had conquered France. In addition to resulting in horrible jokes favored by British and Americans (which we will not repeat here), the occupation also established a - quote - "independent" - unquote - but decidedly pro-German French government operating from the town of Vichy. So the French soldiers in Lebanon were officially fighting alongside the Germans.

The details of how Moshe lost his eye differ as do all accurate accounts of true history. One story is that while on patrol, Moshe and the others encountered opposition. During the fighting, Moshe was hit in the arm. Thankfully, the bullet lost enough energy that although it entered the left side of his eye, it lodged in the socket. The bullet was removed in the field and Moshe taken to a hospital.

Another telling is that Moshe was scouting the enemy positions. As he peered through his binoculars a bullet slammed into the left lens, and the glass was driven into his eye.

Of course, the two stories aren't necessarily exclusive. When Ruth described the accident years later, her account indicated that like a doctor's prescription a combination of ingredients serves best.

In any case, Moshe lost the eye. According to some tellings Moshe elected to wear his trademark eyepatch in lieu of a glass eye. Others say attempts to fit an artificial eye were not successful. And like a doctor's prescription ...

Moshe was off active duty for seven years. By then the war was over, yes, but not the situation in Palestine.

Britain Bows Out

After the war and with the atrocities and genocide of the Holocaust revealed, the Jewish citizens in Palestine were not going to take the Balfour Declaration as just one more of Britain's equivocated promises. The leaders began pushing even harder for the relaxing of immigration quotas to Palestine.

The British, mindful of Arab objections, were reluctant to raise their imposed limits. Soon illegal Jewish immigration became rampant and a number of unauthorized ships attempted to land. Most of the ships were intercepted and detention camps were set up in Cyprus.

Violence between the Arabs and Jews increased. The Irgun not only insisted on unrestricted Jewish immigration but demanded that the British get out of Palestine altogether. Attacks by the Irgun became so extreme that the Haganah actually sided with the British.

But for some, even the Irgun was too restrained particularly when they had declared a moratorium on any violence during World War II. So Avraham Stern organized the Fighters for the Freedom of Israel, Lohamei Herut Yisrael, (לוֹחָמַי חֵרוּת יִשְרָאֵל, pronounced loh-hah-MAYEE her-OOTH yis-rah-ALE). Again for brevity, the group was called Lehi, (לֵהִי, pronounced lay-HEE) or more commonly the Stern Gang.

The Stern Gang was, to put it mildly, nuts. They considered bizarre political alignments, had absurd ideas about the government of the future Israeli state, and were responsible for the assassination of Lord Moyne in Cairo in 1944. Lord Moyne, whose "real" name was Walter Guinness, was seen by many as responsible for Britain's restrictive immigration policy.

After the war, though, the Irgun went back into action and on September 27, 1945 - three weeks after V-J Day - Britain declared a state of emergency throughout Palestine. Thousands were arrested and when the British executed three Irgun members, the Irgun responded by kidnapping and killing two British soldiers.

Then in 1946 the Irgun planted a bomb in the King David Hotel which housed the British headquarters. The explosion killed 91 people including 17 Jews. The Irgun claimed - evidently correctly - that they had phoned in warnings before the explosion, but the British just ignored them.

Then in 1948 a combined force of the Irgun and the Stern Gang attacked the Arab village of Deir Yassin about 10 miles east-northeast of Tel Aviv. Although Haganah units did not actually take part in the action, some of the officers were involved.

Over 100 Arabs were killed and many were women and children. The Irgun and the Stern Gang later claimed they met fierce resistance - no real surprise under the circumstances - but most Jewish leaders denounced the attack. Strangely, King Abdullah of Jordan took an unusually mild stance and only warned against further occurrences of such an event.

As the mid-century approached, the British finally admitted it couldn't resolve their contradictory promises. They punted to the new United Nations, and on November 29, 1947, the General Assembly voted to "partition" Palestine into Jewish and Arab sections. The boundaries were drawn and Russia - seeing an Israeli state as a new bastion for socialism - was a strong supporter of partition. The British, though, abstained. But in the end, the Ayes had it.

Moshe's Mêlées

On May 14, 1948, the British Mandate of Palestine officially ended. The same day, David Ben-Gurion and other Jewish leaders met in Tel Aviv and declared the State of Israel. Three days later Russia became the first country to recognize Israel by law. The United States, though, had earlier accepted the de facto authority of the Ben-Gurion government.

Now the whole idea behind the United Nations was to resolve disputes peaceably. So if there were problems, you'd put it to a vote. If you agreed to participate in the voting but lost, it was expected that you would graciously accept the verdict. The former adversaries would then shake hands, and the world would move along as One Big Happy Family.

Of course that didn't work back then any more than it does now. All Arab countries voted against partition and after the vote refused to recognize Israel. War broke out between the Arabs and Israelis.

During the War of Independence (as the Israelis call it), Moshe fought first in the Jordan Valley. He showed his skill as both a commander and a negotiator and was able to reach an agreement which established a cease-fire in Jerusalem. But his dealings with his fellow commanders were often rocky, and he was once even accused of withdrawing his command leaving others to face an Arab attack.

But by the summer of 1948, Moshe was a major general. If he hadn't been known to the average Israeli before, he was now. He may have even been the model for General Teddy Reich, the character in James Michener's 1964 novel, The Source, although Teddy lost an arm not an eye.

With 25,000,000 Arabs against 700,000 Israelis, many people predicted that this "First Arab-Israeli War" would be the Last Arab-Israeli War. How the unexpected happened has produced the usual scholarly discord, but there has also been a surprising amount of agreement.

First although there were many more Arabs than Israelis, the number of soldiers on the two sides was not that lopsided. Nor were the weapons that disproportionately apportioned. But in the end it boiled down to - as objective Western and Arab historians both agree - high unity on the part of the Israelis and factional divisions within the Arab forces.

Finally true students of military history might take time to explore similarities of the Israeli victory with the logistics that helped the Union win at the Battle of Gettysburg. Success in battle is not necessarily just being in the right place at the right time. Instead it's how you are in the right type of place at the right time. Further analysis, though, will be left, as the mathematical textbooks say, as an exercise for the reader.

And of course there was the United Nations. From the start they began working for a ceasefire. Count Folke Bernadotte of Sweden - a major executive of the Red Cross and humanitarian during and after World War II - went to Israel and suggested a number of proposals. Concerned about Bernadotte's proposals, some of the Stern Gang ambushed his car as he drove through Jerusalem.

Today virtually all historians agree that Yitzhak Shamir, the bushy-browed, physically diminutive but intellectually formidable future Israeli prime minister, was involved in Bernadotte's assassination (Avraham had been killed - quote - "while attempting to escape" - unquote - in 1942). Yitzhak, though, never commented on the matter. But when two members of the assassination squad admitted their guilt - 40 years after the event - one of Yitzhak's assistants said:

Mr. Shamir looks forwards, not backwards. I am sure he will not say anything about this, but he did not take part in either deciding the operation or carrying it out.

But as far as the assassination of Lord Moyne, that was something else again. Yitzhak readily admitted he and others of the Stern Gang planned the attack. He also had many and uncomplimentary remarks about Lord Moyne.

The fighting in Israel went on for nine months. Then in March, 1949, a truce was finally agreed to.

But a truce is not a treaty. Moshe stayed in the army and eventually rose to be Chief of Staff. He was always in the news as the Israel military had much more of a daily presence than is typical in other countries. But that's to be expected. No Arab government recognized Israel and their official position remained quite bellicose. Gamal Abdel Nasser, president of Egypt, the most populous Arabic country, spoke of destroying Israel and showed no hint of compromise.

The countries were, after all, at war. Soldiers from both sides made raids into the others' territories, and there were considerable casualties which included civilians. If you read modern books on the conflicts, Moshe seemed to have no problem in adopting a Machiavellian approach to his military philosophy.

The Second Time Is Not the Charm

But if there was a First Israeli-Arab War, that means there was a Second Arab Israeli War. And that was in 1956.

There were two general causes for the war, one general and one specific.

The general reason was the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union had ramped to full swing. Russia, although originally a strong supporter of Israel, became disgruntled when the Israelis became increasingly capitalistic and aligned themselves more and more with the United States. So it was inevitable that the Russians would side with the Arabs.

As for the specific reason, the Egyptians had decided to call in the century-old lease on the Suez Canal.

You see, for thousands of years Egypt had to deal with the inundations of the Nile River. With increased rainfall in the late spring in the African interior, the runoff increased the height of the Nile to where it would flood Egypt's farmlands. The river crested in September.

Having a river spill over the arable land was fine for an ancient civilization as it would bring down fresh nutrients to cover the fields. But the inundation was not reliable. Sometimes the flooding was so little that the fields were not replenished and you had famine. Then if the floods were too high, the towns were washed away. And in a modern country with growing cities, having unreliable floods every summer could be a disaster.

So Gamal, with visions of establishing a pan-Arabic United Arab Republic throughout the Middle East, had sought out funding for building a new dam at Aswan (yes, there was already one there before). A "high dam" would back the river into a massive lake and the water flow could be controlled to keep the downstream level more or less constant.

But of course building massive dams requires massive money. So Gamal turned to the countries with the massive pockets, Britain and America. At first the two massive powers said, certainly, they'd be glad to help.

But when they saw that Gamal was also getting chummy with the Commie Countries, they backed out of the deal. Miffed at the tightwad Westerners, Gamal said he would go to the Russians for the dough.

The Suez Canal runs from Port Said (pronounced "sah-EED") in the Mediterranean Sea to the Gulf of Suez which enters the Red Sea and on to the Indian Ocean. The Canal was dug 1859 to 1869 with France's financing and forced Egyptian labor. Today it's one of the most traveled waterways in the world and arguably one of the most important. Using the Suez Canal, ships can travel from the Mediterranean Sea to the Indian Ocean without making the long and time consuming trip around the southern tip of Africa.

The original idea had been that after 100 years the British and French would hand over the Canal to Egypt. But in 1882 Britain invaded Egypt. The reasons are among those that historians love to debate but when you get down to it, England decided they wanted a piece of the Suez Canal. Although in name the Ottoman's were still running the country and France was operating the Canal, Britain was now dictating what happened for both.

It was also convenient for the British that the ruler of Egypt, Tewfik Pasha, had fallen so far into debt trying to modernize his country that he couldn't pay back the banks. So he sold his interest of the Suez Canal to the British. France, although still a shareholder, now had little real say in the Canal's operation, and from 1882 England was - ah - "influential" - in Egyptian politics.

Officially Egypt became independent in 1922 but England still kept soldiers stationed throughout the country and would shut down the government if it felt it was necessary (like the Egyptians getting a bit too independent). It wasn't until 1952 with the coup-d'état that booted the rather feckless King Farouk out and to the Riviera and put Gamal in charge that Egypt really became independent.

Then in 1954, Gamal negotiated a treaty for the British occupation of Egypt - including the Canal - to end within two years. But the Canal Company would remain in place as a multi-national enterprise.

In 1956, the last of the British troops pulled out. Then Gamal declared martial law in the Zone. The Suez Canal, he said, was now Egypt's and the Canal Company no more. But he magnanimously allowed that the stockholders would be paid off.

But the big shock was when Gamal said Israeli ships would no longer be allowed through. This action violated all agreements which said that no ship would be denied use of the Canal at any time.

After the obligatory attempts at UN negotiations, England and France decided the only thing to do was to send in the troops. Then they could recapture the Canal and replace Gamal with a more obliging Egyptian president.

England and France knew that Israel was already in a state of preparedness and mightily ticked off at not being allowed to use the Canal. They were sure the Israeli's would be willing to help.

The idea, then, was the Israelis would invade the Sinai and take the Canal. At that point the French would be shocked! shocked! at the use of violence and demand both the Egyptians and Israelis remove their troops. The French would then ask for help from the British who would send its own army. France and Britain would then hold things down until the United Nations could give the Canal back to England and France in the guise of a multinational operating company.

Alas, things did not quite work out as planned. Gamal sunk 40 ships in the Canal blocking it from any traffic. Then surprisingly, the Americans seemed irritated and pushed through a Security Council resolution that the British, French, and Israelis would "git". Which they did. Egypt got their Canal back.

The whole thing had been one big בלגן. Instead of deposing Nasser, the war made made him a hero throughout the Arab world. He quickly emerged as a leader of what were called the Non-Aligned Countries and became a master at playing the US and Russia against the other.

With Moshe as Chief of Staff the Israeli army had performed well. But in the end they gained nothing. From a historical standpoint, it was worse for the French and the British. It was the Suez Crisis (as it's sometimes called) that effectively put an end to their control in the Middle East. The two countries' long held empires were now pretty much shot.

The Third Time ...

Two years after the Suez War, Moshe left active duty. He took the job as Minister of Agriculture with Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion (unlike most American Secretaries of Agriculture, Moshe had been an actual hands-on farmer). When a new prime minster was elected in 1964, Moshe left the government and was elected to the Knesset (the Israeli Parliament).

Although he was a major celebrity in Israel, Moshe was still little known in the United States. His first mention in Life Magazine - the major weekly (yes, weekly) news and photojournalism magazine - was in 1959 but only for being the father of his daughter, Yaël (יָעֵל; pronounced yah-ALE). Yaël had been serving in the Israeli army and had written a "provocative" and "sexy" novel about military life. It took another war for Moshe to become an international celebrity.

We said that truces are not peace treaties, and Israel was still at war. But by the 1960's the logistics had changed. Egypt and Israel now had jet fighters - Israel from the Americans and Egypt from the Russians. The next war, if it came, was not going to be just armies moving along the ground.

And there was little hope for any kind of peace. The leaders of the neighboring Arab countries still took the position - or at least advanced the rhetoric - that the only solution to the Middle East conflict was the total destruction of Israel. So there were no points even to begin negotiations.

In 1967, Moshe was appointed Minister of Defense by the new prime minister, Levi Eshkol. Then in early 1967, Israeli intelligence started getting information that Egypt was planning an attack. As Defense Minister, Moshe said they couldn't wait. The Israeli Air Force attacked and destroyed almost all Egyptian fighters on the ground. With no worry about air strikes, the Israeli Army once more punched into the Sinai.

When Jordan and Syria responded with artillery fire, Israel sent tanks into the Golan Heights (held by Syria). Israeli troops also moved in to occupy the West Bank including the Arab section of Jerusalem.

Seven days after the first Israeli attack, there was another UN brokered ceasefire and the "Six Day War" came to an end. But again there was no real treaty. A journalist asked Moshe what could be done to produce a lasting peace in the Middle East. Would Israel make the first approach?

Moshe had an answer which pretty much summed up the Israeli position:

Moshe:	I don't see anything wrong with the present situation. I don't know why it should be approach anyone about anything. As far as I'm concerned we are just happy as it is now. And if the others are happy, so that's it.
Interviewer:	But the others aren't going to be happy where they are, are they?
Moshe:	Well, then let them ring us up.

Moshé Distingué

In the eyes of the Western world, Moshe had emerged as the invincible soldier. But the Arabs on the West Bank found themselves in an uneasy situation. Many of them had been refugees from the 1948 war. But now the Israeli's were in charge after all. What was going to happen?

But suddenly - and almost on the spur of the moment - Moshe allowed access back and forth between the West Bank across the bridge to Jordan. A lot of people thought he was nuts.

Then he permitted the Palestinian Arabs - referred to as Palestinians by the United Nations Security Council as early as 1946 - unrestricted travel into Israel proper. If anyone wanted to go back and forth to visit or to work, all well and good. There weren't even checkpoints. Moshe's actions went a long way to defuse tensions. He was now seen not just as a soldier, but as a skilled negotiator, administrator, and diplomat.

Clearly Moshe knew the importance of public relations. He would sometimes even go over into the West Bank by the Dead Sea and mix with the crowds taking their ease on the beach. News films broadcast the image of the gregarious Moshe surrounded by friendly smiling Palestinians.

Moshe became an international symbol of the new Israel - willing to talk with others and live in harmony, but remaining ready for battle. His eye patch became an item of fashion. Hot babe Parisian glamour models would appear in the magazines wearing a Moshe Dayan eye patch, for crying out loud!

In 1969, Levi Eskhol died of a heart attack. In the elections the following month Golda Meir, the Foreign Minister from 1956 until 1966, was elected Prime Minister. Almost inevitably she kept Moshe as Minster of Defense.

Naturally as with any celebrity there were stories that Moshe did not always adhere to traditional Hebrew family values. One Israeli officer mentioned to a rabbi that there were, well, "stories" about Moshe and the ladies. Should good Israeli citizens be concerned?

"Look", the rabbi snorted, "there were stories about King David, too. And the Bible didn't hide the stories about King David."

From the first the Egyptians had demanded the return of the Sinai. Even after Gamal died in 1970 and Anwar Sadat took his place, the demands didn't change. And of course, Syria wanted the Golan Heights back.

Although Moshe was open to a gradual return of the land, the Golan was too strategic a position to give up without a real peace treaty. And having a buffer zone the width of the Sinai was quite comforting. The stalemate ran on until Yom Kippur on October 6, 1973.

The Later Adventures of Moshe Dayan

To this day many in the United States think the Yom Kippur War - if they remember it at all - was just a replay of 1967. The Arabs attacked, the Israeli's responded, and ho-hum, in a matter of days, they drove the Arabs back further than before. Such beliefs were reinforced when the famous anchorman and television correspondent Harry Reasoner gave American viewers a man-on-the-spot report west of the Suez Canal. Harry, smiling into the camera, mentioned he had not bothered to get an Egyptian Visa for this assignment. But here he was, he said, broadcasting from inside Egypt.

The truth is when Egypt and Syria launched their attacks, Golda, Moshe, and everyone else were caught by surprise. There had been rumblings that the Arab countries were preparing some action, but no one thought it would be a full-fledged attack.

So when the Egyptian forces crossed into the Sinai, they destroyed virtually all of the Israeli bunkers. Syria pushed in from the north. In the first two days alone, there were 1000 Israeli casualties, and news films showed captured Israeli soldiers with raised hands. Moshe was so worried that Israel might be defeated that he began to talk of using tactical nuclear weapons.

However, within the first week, the Israeli Army was able to gain back lost territory. They then moved further into Syria and Egypt (that's when we saw the clip of Harry). Although most fighting had ceased by the end of October, periodic action continued until early 1974.

Anwar Sadat, though, always maintained that the real reason the Egyptian army didn't drive on into Israel was that American Secretary of State Henry Kissinger told him that if Egypt continued its attack, the Egyptians would end up fighting the United States. That was something Anwar said he was not willing to do.

The Israeli public certainly didn't see the Yom Kippur War as a repeat of 1967. There were 2500 Israeli soldiers killed - about the same number as the Allied troops killed on D-Day in 1944. The people demanded answers on how a surprise attack reached the point where even Moshe was worried Arab armies would be rolling along the road to Tel Aviv.

An official inquiry was held and the findings were as wishy-washy as you could expect whenever a government investigates itself. The report blamed - quote - "the military" - unquote - but said the leaders - ergo, the politicians - did not bear personal responsibility.

There was a lot of backlash. Students prevented Moshe from speaking at universities, and crowds chanted for him to resign. The demonstrations didn't abate and the Labor Government - the Labor Party had been running Israel since the country's inception - resigned. The Likud - the hardline "right wing" party - came to power, and except for a few hiatus they've been in charge ever since.

Moshe retired to his home. Then three years later in 1977, the Likud Prime Minister, Menachem Begin - yes, the former head of the Irgun - asked Moshe to join his cabinet as Foreign Minister. Moshe did so although he became the butt of satirical sketches on Israeli television. Moshe? The war hero? Now a fence-straddling political opportunist?

Say it ain't so, Mo!

Actually the response wasn't really fair. Israel has a parliamentary system and bringing in former political opponents as part of a government is pretty routine. We also hear that Moshe laid down some pretty strict conditions for his participation. First as long as he was in the cabinet, Menachem would not annex any of the occupied territories (Menachem had once referred to the territories as having been "liberated"). But most of all, Moshe would be given a free hand to seek a treaty with Egypt.

We know the rest of the story. Anwar Sadat announced - and it was a shock - that he would travel to Israel to speak before the Knesset. It took some time and wasn't always smooth sailing, but Anwar, Menachem, and the US President Jimmy Carter eventually hammered out the Camp David Accords which led to the Egypt-Israeli Peace Treaty in 1979.

Anwar immediately became persona non-grata in the other Arab countries who immediately slapped an oil embargo on the United States. US gas prices, then typically 30¢ a gallon, quadrupled. Having to pay a price for gas that most Europeans had been paying for years was outrageous and sent most Americans solidly into the Israeli camp.

There was one consolation after the 1979 treaty. It was unlikely that there would be massive armies rolling toward Israel. So there was a lot of hope that other Arab countries would soon see that making peace with Israel would be the only path to recovering the occupied territory.

Unfortunately, 1979 was also the year of the Iranian Revolution. This totally reshuffled the deck.

Iran, a non-Arab but predominantly Muslim country whose people speak an Indo-European language, had been a long time ally of the United States. More importantly they had established full diplomatic relations with Israel. But now internal turmoil became so pronounced that Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was - ah - "persuaded" - to leave the country for Egypt. The US hoped this would quiet things down, and boy, were they ever wrong.

The same year forty-four Americans at the US Embassy were taken prisoner, and under the iron religious hand of the Ayatollah Sayyid Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran established what they called an Islamic Republic. The government rescinded its recognition of Israel and called for its destruction. Together with what was once referred to as the "refugee problem" but is now called the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict, things have remained ever since.

Eventually, though, both the embargos of oil and Anwar Sadat ended. Egypt rejoined the Arab League. Then after considerable negotiation, in 1994 Israel and Jordan signed a peace agreement.

Sadly Moshe did not live to see the last treaty. He had died in 1981 of a heart attack.

The Iconic, Incomparable Moshe Dayan

So there you are. Moshe Dayan, photogenic and charismatic, who would ever forget him?

Or as an Israeli historian said:

A large percentage of the Jewish population doesn't know who Dayan was. He belongs to a past that only the older generation knows.

Ha? (To quote Shakespeare).

Moshe Dayan?

A large percentage of the population doesn't know who he was?

Except for the older generation??!!??!!

Actually, things are even stranger. Whenever Moshe is mentioned, it's not just in stories reminiscing about the good old days for the old fogies - sorry, that's the "older generation". Instead, we end up reading stories like:

Digging Up the Dirt on Dayan

The Shattered Myth of Moshe Dayan

The Pictures That Prove the Guilt of Moshe Dayan

Why, we wonder, is it now so popular to trash a once iconic figure?

Well, for one thing it's always popular to trash an iconic figure. After all, if you are able to trash a celebrity like Moshe Dayan, doesn't that mean you have elevated yourself above a celebrity like Moshe Dayan?

Besides much of the new criticism has nothing to do with Moshe, the military leader and diplomat. It's because of Moshe, the amateur archeologist.

With all his travel through the country and to out of the way spots, Moshe would sometimes come across ancient artifacts. He would take them back home and soon had a collection of relics that went back even to the Stone Age. Later he started actual excavations and used government personnel - usually soldiers - to help him out.

And we're not talking about just picking up a few potsherds or spear tips either. Moshe's excavations involved major finds of historical importance. He found stone masks that stretched back to the Neolithic Period, and he amassed an impressive collection of anthropomorphic Canaanite coffins.

There was just one wee little problem with Moshe's passion.

All of the artifacts were taken illegally.

Well, you ask querulously, if Moshe obtained a huge archeological collection from illicit digs, how did he hide his activities for so many years?

Simple. He didn't. He was, after all, Moshe Dayan. If anyone pointed out his questionable actions, he just shrugged his shoulders. They were always welcome, he said, to report him to the authorities.

Scholarly Interlude

Note:

The following section has a high nerd content. So those with nerd-o-phobia can skip this section by clicking here.

As to why Moshe was so interested in Canaanite archeology, that's pretty easy to explain. For one thing, most of the really old artifacts in Israel are Canaanite. And it was the Canaanites who developed what was a sophisticated urban culture. To them the early Israelites - living in their tents outside the cities - were the country bumpkins.

Canaanites and Israelites

And besides, the Canaanites are just really, really interesting.

Today you'll read how scientists are doing genetic tests to find out - quote - "what really happened to the Canaanites" - unquote. On the other hand, if the Bible tells us that Joshua and the Israelites wiped them out, that's pretty much that, isn't it?

Well, you do wonder how a people that were - quote - "wiped out" - unquote - kept showing up for the next fifteen hundred years. Not that we're saying that the Bible is incorrect! Heaven forfend! After all we do have correspondence - not just copies - that Canaanite rulers wrote to the Pharaoh of Egypt in the fourteenth century BC. At that time Canaan was part of the Egyptian Empire which extended well north and encompassed modern Lebanon and western Syria. In exchange for sending tribute to Egypt, the Canaanite rulers expected help from the Pharaoh in defending their towns.

And sure enough, the rulers kept complaining about a troublesome group of people that showed up about that time. These people, so say scholars, were called the Habiru.

Even ignoring the fact that the cuneiform writing of the name is the Sumerian sa-ga, many people think the Habiru were the early Hebrews. The ruler of the Phoenician (Canaanite) city of Byblos, Ribhaddi, complained repeatedly that the Habiru would even join with other Canaanite cites who were attacking Byblos.

However, some scholars point out that it's a bit shaky in equating these desert ruffians with the Hebrews. The word "Habiru" seems to refer to a social class, not a specific people. The arguments go on.

But whoever the Habiru were they did not "wipe out" the Canaanites. There were later records of Egypt that prove that Canaanite cities still flourished well after Joshua's - quote - "Conquest of Canaan" - unquote.

So just how long did the Canaanites survive as a distinct people? Well, quite a while. For those who have forgotten it, in the Book of Mark there is a story about a Canaanite woman who Jesus rather airily refused to help because she wasn't a Hebrew. But she kept pestering him until he finally gave in.

So Canaanites as a distinct population lasted well down into the Common Era. As for recent studies, one headline has trumpeted that DNA analysis proves the Canaanites were never wiped out. They just all up and moved to Lebanon. So I guess we're to believe that the Canaanites of the 14th century BC somehow knew where the northern border of modern Israel was going to be drawn.

So why do we read that the Israelites "wiped out" the Canaanites? We'd really like to know this.

I thought you would as Captain Mephisto said to Sidney Brand. Well, like the Lord High Executioner, we have a little list:

Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.

These were the people that Joshua was commanded to kill, but not just the men. He was ordered to go into their towns and to not allow to live all that breathes (לֹא תְחַיֶּה כָּל-נְשָׁמָה). That would include men, women, children, and animals (Deuteronomy 20:16-18).

Yes, even puppies, kittens, and bunnies!

First of all, we have to remember that some of the people mentioned did not live only in Canaan. The Hittite civilization was centered in Turkey and vanished due to attacks by the Assyrians and the ancestors of the Greeks. The people were assimilated into the culture of their conquerors. The Amorites also lived in areas well east of Canaan and largely disappeared by being absorbed by the Assyrians.

But there's another problem with taking this list as a historical affirmation that the - quote - "Canaanites" - unquote - were wiped out. The actual passage says nothing of the sort.

Instead the verses tell us that these were the people that God ordered Joshua to wipe out down to the last bunny. But that doesn't mean the Israelites always obeyed such orders. Shoot, they ignored God's commandments with élan. Just ask Moses.

Also we have to be honest. Like other heroes and politicians, Joshua may not have been above stretching the blanket a bit. Out of 20 towns Joshua says were destroyed, archeology has shown only two cities that had levels of destruction.

But the most important point that is almost never mentioned is that talking about Perizzites, Hivites, Jebusites and, the Canaanites is redundant. That's because the Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites were Canaanites. As one professor said, the Canaanites "... consisted of a population whose diversity may be hinted at by the great variety of burial customs and cultic structures".

This, though, brings up a new question. Just what do we mean by an ethnic group.

Well, isn't this just the same thing as a race?

Well, not really. Remember that race itself is an arbitrary human construction crafted from a continuum of cognitive perceptions. And despite what most people think, use of DNA analysis to identify races will also create arbitrary groups.

So what to do? Well, first let's turn to an absolute and infallible authority of which no reasonable person can doubt. We mean, of course, the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. And what this respected tome says is:

eth·nic (ĕth'-nĭk): adj. Of, relating to, or characteristic of a group of people sharing a common cultural or national heritage and often sharing a common language or religion.

Hm. Nothing at all about genetics, much less about "race".

But religion? Well, we certainly know a lot of people of one "ethnic" group that don't share the same religion. After all, look at Randall Thomas Davidson and Bertrand Russell.

So that leaves us to ponder language.

And in fact, it turns out that when people started talking about races, they were really talking about language. After all, when asked to name some "races", the old school anthropologists would use terms like Caucasian, Semitic, Nordic, Polynesian, Anglo-Saxon, and Aryan.

But these terms have nothing to do with genetics. Instead, they are linguistic families. One historian mentioned that when trying to interpret the history of a population, when you try to use the concept of race you make a total מניאק out of yourself. But if you stick with populations defined in terms of linguistic families things make much more sense.

And for all the genetic testings on modern populations and ancient skeletal remains we can say that the Hebrews and the Canaanites were indisputably members of the same linguistic family. And a close-knit linguistic family at that.

We can best illustrate this point by looking at a passage in Hebrew and the same sentence in Moabitic which is a - quote -"Canaanite language" - unquote.

Suppose you say in English:

My father was king over Moab thirty years, and I was king living after my father.

Let's take a look how a Moabite - a Canaanite - would write it. Of course we will use the Modern Hebrew alphabet:

אבי מלך על מאב שלשן שח ואנך מלך חי אחר אבי

(Remember the script is right to left.)

He'd say something like:

Ahvee melekh ahl Moahv shlohsheen shaht ve-ahnokh melekh khay ahkhar ahvee.

And a Hebrew would say:

אבי מלך על מואב שלושים שנה ואנוכי מלך חי אחר אבי

... which is (sort of):

Ahvee melekh ahl Moahv shlohsheem shanah ve-ahnokhee melekh khay ahkhar ahvee.

So with the exception of a few letters in a few words and making allowance for using older versions of a word or two, it looks like the same language. And if you know someone who is fluent in Hebrew, just give them a passage of the various Canaanite languages, Moabitic, Phoenician, Edomite, or Amorite. It's a good bet they'll read the texts with little difficulty.

It ain't necessarily so.

Although Sportin' Life warned us that things that you're liable to read in the Bible ain't necessarily so, it's actually the Bible that tells us that different "languages" in Canaan, including Hebrew, could be essentially the same. They could be so close that there was little discernable "accent" and the people themselves couldn't tell who was who.

You'll remember that the Gileadites, a Canaanite people from what is now modern Jordan, could barely distinguish their language from that of the Hebrew tribe of the Ephraimites (Joshua's tribe). The only real difference was the Ephraimites didn't have the "sh" sound. It was only after an Ephraimite said "sibboleth" (שִׂבֹּלֶת) and not "shibboleth" (שִׁבֹּלֶת), that the questioner knew the man was not a fellow Gileadite.

But here's the kicker. Other Hebrew tribes said "shibboleth" just like the Gileadites. So our only conclusion can be that the languages of at least some Hebrews and Canaanites were not just mutually intelligible, but indistinguishable.

But if they spoke the same language, what, as Flakey Foont asked Mr. Natural, does it all mean?

Remember in the olden days, travel was slow and difficult. If people spoke the same language in a limited but contiguous region (Israel is smaller than New Jersey), there was ample opportunity for congress of all sorts. After all if different groups could easily communicate, then they would enter into commerce, make friendships, and, yes, get hitched.

But you say, the Hebrews and Canaanites could not intermarry. It was forbidden.

Well, the forbiddeness seems to be pretty flexible. In the Book of Ruth, we learn that the great-grandmother of King David was in fact a Canaanite, specifically a Moabite. That Boaz, a Hebrew patriarch, would marry a Canaanite woman as a matter of course - although Ruth certainly gave him a lot of encouragement - indicates that intermarriage between the indigenous people was common and that the genetics of both populations would indeed become amalgamated.

Boaz was no exception. Naomi and her husband Elimelech were Hebrews who moved to Moab. Both their sons, Mahlon and Chilion, though, married Moabite women (Mahlon was Ruth's first husband). And when Mahlon got sick - his name in Hebrew, מַחְלוֹן, means "sick" - and died, Ruth and Naomi returned to Judah. Then with a bit of prodding from Naomi, Ruth married Boaz. So in one family we see three Hebrew-Canaanite marriages.

Now some Biblical experts might see the marriages in this one family as an exception to the prohibition. After all the Bible does say the marriages were forbidden, doesn't it?

Well, not quite. Recently a scholar pointed out that if you go by the grammar, the Bible may forbid the Israelite women from marrying Moabite men. But it does not (specifically) prohibit Hebrew men from marrying Moabite women. So if it's not forbidden, as Tevye told the Rabbi, then it must be all right.

Such an nit-picking approach seems dubious to many people. After all the actual construct in the passage "forbidding" marriages between Hebrews and Moabites and Ammonites (not to be confused with Amorites) is:

English	Hebrew	Pronunciation
Of the Ammonites and of the Moabites	עַמּוֹנִי וּמוֹאָבִי	Ammonee oo-Mohavee

And the ending י ִ (pronounced -ee) is indeed the masculine plural ending of the genitive (i. e., possessive) case. That is, it refers to Canaanite men.

For those who point out that the masculine possessive in Hebrew can also refer to groups of men and women, we must point out that the passage is almost certainly only about Hebrew men not marrying Hebrew women.

First of all, look at the actual passage, Deuteronomy 23:3. It doesn't mention marriage at all. Instead what you read is:

לֹא יָבֹא עַמּוֹנִי וּמוֹאָבִי בִּקְהַל יְהוָה גַּם דּוֹר עֲשִׂירִי לֹא יָבֹא לָהֶם בִּקְהַל יְהוָה עַד-עוֹלָם

... which you pronounce as:

Loh yahvoh Ammonee oo-Mohavee beeqhahl Yahwah gam dohr aseeree loh yahvoh lahhem beeqhahl Yahwah ahd-ohlahm.

... and it means:

No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the gathering of Yahweh and even to the tenth generation none of them may enter the assembly of Yahweh forever.

So it says that no Ammonite or Moabite shall enter into the gathering, congregation if you will, of the Hebrew God, Yahweh. That is, the verse forbids conversion to Judaism of the Ammonites or Moabites men.

Although today, conversion of men into Judaism is accepted - more on that later - in the ancient days it was just too risky. Men were the heads of their household. So they might continue to surreptitiously worship the old gods within the confines of their family. Naturally the other family members would end up worshipping the Canaanite gods as well.

The women, on the other hand, were supposed to follow the religion of their husband. So a woman who married a Hebrew man would worship the Hebrew God. The danger, then, of the spread of the Canaanite worship within the Hebrew congregation was much less. So both conversion of Canaanite women to the religion and their marriage to Hebrew men became acceptable.

There have been some who dispute that the Hebrew and Canaanite languages were really the one and the same and so deny that the Canaanites and Hebrews were of the same family. But we might be able resolve that issue if we look at two passages of English that everyone agrees differ only in dialect. If the English dialects differ more so than the Canaanite languages and Hebrew, then we'll have to call Hebrew and Canaanite the same language and the two people as one linguistic family.

First one dialect:

Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their party.

...and its rendering into another English dialect:

Na is the nickel for aw Robin blokes ter come ter tha aid of their Moriarty.

Well, it's pretty obvious then that the Hebrews and Canaanites were one big, albeit not always happy family. So with easy communications and not too far to go, we now see that despite the nominal prohibitions, there was a whole lot of mixin' goin on. So if we were to find ancient burials of Canaanites and Hebrews and compare their DNA we would surely find ...

Well, enough of this scholarly exposition. We are, after all, writing about Moshe Dayan.

(To return to the start of the nerd content click here.)

When Sammy Met Moshe

We'll end up with a story about Moshe that was told by one of the participants.

Everyone knows that Sammy Davis, Jr., had lost an eye in a car accident in 1954. And, yes, Sammy also converted to Judaism in 1961. He visited Israel in 1969 where he met with Moshe and other Israeli dignitaries.

Sammy told everyone that he was happy to meet Moshe. After all, he said, they had always seen eye-to-eye.

The whole room came to a shocked silence - except for Moshe. He doubled up with laughter.

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