The Miraculous Rise of the Jewish State: From Concentration Camps to The Merkava 4.

By: Elisha Kramer

Introduction "The Political War"

Do a google search "Palestine" and these are the images you will see. Do a google search "Israel," or "IDF" and again, you will find anti-Israel propaganda. This war does not end on the internet. On college campuses across the world Professors and student groups spread the same anti-Israel messages, and their voices are heard and felt. We, at the IDF's Latrun Hasbarah Unit cannot hide from this reality. On the contrary, we need to understand exactly what Israel is being accused of, and with that knowledge as our basis, plan exactly how to tell our side of the story. The Latrun Museum and Memorial site is a unique center for pro-Israel Diplomacy. The story of the rise of the Jewish state has served as an inspiration to minorities across the world who have felt the pain of oppression and inferior status. Not in vain do thousands of tourists arrive at Latrun every year to see the IDF tanks and pay respect to those that fell so that the country could stand. One of the most frequent visitors to the site are bar/bat mitzvah groups. Even if these kids come to Israel only once in their lifetime, and even if they are exposed to anti-Israel propaganda in the news, as they're growing up, and in their college campuses as they mature, the Latrun team can proudly say: We did our best to instill in these youth a national pride for the State of Israel. The truth is that most groups from outside of Israel do not have the basis for understanding and appreciating the sacrifice of the IDF's fallen soldiers. What did they help accomplish?

Tour Content

The standard tour at Latrun focuses on the Arab siege around Jerusalem in 1948 and Hativa 7's brave attempts at opening up a new road to Jerusalem. This is a great tour. I have personally delivered it many times, and have witnessed first-hand how tourists have found the experience deeply moving. Alongside the standard tour, I have also developed a new tour so that the Museum has new content to offer their visitors. The new tour is entitled: "The Miraculous Rise of the Jewish state: from Concentration Camps to the Merkava 4." This tour zooms out of the 1948 War to discuss the events which led up to the war, and the events which followed the war (including the Jews on The SS Exodus Boat, 1947. opportunity to go into more depth about the wars of '67 and '73). The most important thing in the Tour-Guide Department is to keep alive the fire of curiosity regarding history, and this tour has been written to give the tour-guides opportunities to enhance their knowledge of Israeli history from 1948 up until today.

Putting the Memorial Section in a new light Of course, historical education is not the only aspect of Latrun. The center of this new tour is still the Memorial Wall. As soon as I started planning where to insert more history, I took out a map of the site, and asked myself: what is the visual experience that the tourists encounter as they walk through the site? There is a Tigart Fortress, films for viewing, many tanks (including Israeli-made tanks, Captured tanks, and donated tanks). There is the Wall of Names, The Michlol (including the Tower of Tears). How do we use these exhibits to tell our story? I have based this new script on these very same exhibits. But I have put each exhibit in a different order so as to serve the new story, which is: "The Miraculous Rise of the Jewish state: from Concentration Camps to the Merkava 4."

This script is built on the idea that in order to appreciate what the fallen soldiers sacrificed themselves for we need to understand what they achieved for the Jewish state. It is no exaggeration to say that their contribution to the Jewish people is enormous. They fell so that the country could stand. And indeed, thanks to them the country is standing strong today.

Usage of Maps + Erasable Markers This tour also necessitates that each guide be equipped with a modern-day map of Israel. These maps will be laminated with plastic wrap allowing the tour-guide to draw on the map with erasable marker, and then erase, and draw again. In this way it is easier for the guide to captivate the audience, while also showing the audience exactly what the exterior threat to Israel was, and how the wars were fought and won.

Chronological Order: By putting the stations in chronological order the tourist goes through a journey through time. The first station deals with the 1948 war. As the tourists walk to station Number 2, the information from station 1 can sink in. In station 2, The Six Day War of 1967 is discussed with the use of a map. In stations 3-4, we review the sacrifices of these wars. And in the final station, we zoom forward to the modern-day weapon. In this way, the Audience is put into the front of row of Israeli history and is able to feel, emotionally, what it felt like to live through the struggle of the rise of the Jewish State and where we stand today.

1: Humble Beginnings: the War of Independence

In the late 19th Century, the movement of Zionism began. Theodor Herzl, its leader had a very clear message: "We're tired of being a religion for an exiled people whose only place is in the synagogue. We want to be an independent nation again. We want to have a place we can call our own. Jews started buying land in Israel and building communities. But they quickly realized: if they want to be able to build thriving cities, they're also going to need a defense force to protect those cities. And that's how the IDF was born. In 1917, Zionism got a boost with the Balfour Declaration. The British government had captured the holy land in WWI, and now declared: "His Majesty's Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people." For hundreds of years beforehand, the Ottomans had controlled the territory known as Palestine. Under Muslim rule, the Jews had been considered second class citizens. They couldnt ride horses, carry weapons, testify against Muslims in court, and so on. Now, all of a sudden, the Jews were being promised their very own state. The first major war in Israel was in 1948. A day before the Israelis declared Independence, there were 5 hostile armies mobilized on Israel's borders; Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. The Israelis, led by Ben-Gurion, figured: we waited this long, its now or never, and miraculously they survived the war. But, it was at a very heavy cost. The Israelis lost one percent of their population. Out of 600,000 Israelis, 6,000 died in that first war. Thats one percent. But by the end of the last shot, the Jews finally had their own state again. The Israelis called it "the war for Independence." If youve ever seen the movie Exodus, then youll know why the Jews wanted independence so badly. In the 1940s there were many cases of Jews that had survived the Holocaust, and arrived at the ports of the Mediterranean, before the British evacuated. They got all the way to the shore, only to be turned back by the British due to the limit on immigration. Once the Israelis stood their ground in that first war, they finally had control over immigration, and that means they were able to open up the gates. All those Jews that had been waiting to get in were finally allowed in. By 1952, 4 years after the establishment of the state, the Jewish population had doubled from 600,000 to 1.3 million. The new state was blossoming.

The IDF had 10 tanks in 1948. 5 of them were the French-made Hotchkiss Tank.

2: The Stalin Tank

As soon as WWII ended, Russia and America fell into a period called the Cold War which would last for many decades. It is important to understand the global situation in order to understand what was happening in Israel. This was the war between Democracy and Communism. And it was also a war for who would be the next super-power. The British Empire had begun sinking and that left the position open. As opposed to fighting each other on the battlefield in direct conflict, Russia and America would make allies around the world, and they would support opposing sides of regional conflicts. This was called proxy warfare. In the Middle-East region, in 67 and 73, the Arabs had aligned themselves with Russia, while the Israelis aligned themselves with the Americans. Preceding the Six-Day-War was an arms-race between Israel and its neighbors. This tank was purchased by Egypt. Its called the Stalin Tank. It was captured by the IDF in 1967 and brought to the Museum.

3: The Little Ninja of the Middle East: 1967.

In the 60s the main villain for Israel was a leader named Gamal Abdel Nasser. He was the leader of Egypt and before 1967, he made it his mission to unite Israels neighboring countries against Israel and finish the job started in 1948. If you do your research youll see, Nasser had been speaking to huge crowds, and being very straightforward. This time were really gonna do it. Were gonna destroy the Jewish state, and push the Jews into the sea." So, again, Israel is surrounded by Arab armies calling for its destruction. In 1967, the Israelis finally figured: well, if we're outnumbered, and outgunned, the least we could do is have the element of surprise on our side. The Israelis had been researching when would be the best time to attack the Egyptians. When would most of their planes be on the ground, and when would the Egyptians be on low alert? They discovered 7:45 in the morning was the perfect time. And that's what they did. They flew over the Mediterranean, and swept in from unexpected angles. Within the first 2 hours they had destroyed 300 Egyptian aircrafts. As they began the initial bombing, they also bombed the runaways so that even if pilots had found their planes, they wouldn't be able to take off. This gave the IDF air superiority for the remainder of the war. By the end of six days not only were the Israelis still standing, they had actually captured a good amount of territory from their neighbors. They pushed the hostile Jordanian army to the other side of the Jordan River, the Egyptians to the other side of the Suez Canal, and the Syrians past the Golan Heights Hills which overlooked Northern Israeli cities.

4: Yom Kippur War (1973)

Like we said, 1967 is a big war for Israel. They conquer a lot of land and the neighboring armies are totally demolished. Egypt and Syria spend 6 years rebuilding their armies. They attack on Yom Kippur, 1973. Yom Kippur is one of the hardest fasts of the Jewish calendar. Even most secular Israelis fast on this day. The Egyptians and the Syrians coordinate the attack, Egypt coming in from the South, and Syria coming from the North. The IDF is forced to divide up the army and fight a two-frontier war. For the first 3 days of the war, the enemies begin penetrating into Israeli territory, and the Israelis struggle to hold them back. Meanwhile, it's Sukkot time, the festival of huts, and people all over the world are tuning in to their radios to know: 'is this going to be the end of the Jewish state?'" The war lasts 18 days, and by the end of it, the Israeli tanks have not only pushed the enemy back. They've reached 40 Kilometers outside of Damascus, and 100 kilometers outside of Cairo. Seeing as their capitals are threatened, Egypt and Syria are forced to give up the fight. So it's technically a victory for the Israelis, but it comes at a very heavy cost. 2,500 soldiers die in 18 days, and 1,500 of them (over half) are from the tank division. This war is remembered with a heavy heart by Israelis. This bridge that we're standing on is called in Hebrew Gesher HaGlilim, the bridge of tubes. It's an amphibious piece, meaning, like a frog, it's comfortable on both land and water. When the bridge is on the ground, the tubes serve as wheels. You attach the bridge to a couple of tanks, and that's how they rolled it across the Sinai Peninsula, into the Suez Canal. Once they rolled it into the water, they filled the tubes with foam, and the tubes float. As you can see, the bridge can hold a lot of weight [point to tank and vehicles on the bridge]. And this is how the Israeli tanks started making their way to Cairo. A lot of people say "this bridge won the war for the Israelis'." This year marks the 40th Anniversary of the Yom Kippur War. In this war, as in previous wars, the Israelis proved to the world and to themselves that they have the ability to defend themselves against the neighboring armies. Nowadays the threat to Israel is mainly Hamas and Hezbollah, which are underground terror organizations. The Israeli army has only been building itself up since '73, so you can bet that today, Israel is standing more secure than ever.

5: Tower of Tears: The Price of Freedom

There have been many who have been injured in the wars. There have been many that have fallen in the wars. Here we memorialize those that fell while serving in the Israeli army. There have been 23,000 grand-total IDF casualties. Tragically, a lot of these guys fell at a very young age. This room is called the Tower of tears. Originally this room was one of the two lookout towers of the Latrun Tigart Fortress. The inside has been redesigned but a couple things have remained the same. The holes along the walls are windows with shutters that open and close. You'll understand why the troops inside the fort have the advantage to troops trying to storm the fort. You can stick your gun out the little windows here, and shoot under cover at those trying to storm the building. Youll also see little water droplets falling on the walls. These symbolize the tears that have been wept for those that fell in battle. There's a quote on the outside from the Talmud. Though at times the gates of prayer seem closed, the gates of tears are never closed." The tears, little water droplets, fall and are gathered beneath us in a body of water. In Judaism, the water is a symbol for life. The Hebrew word for water is Mayim, and the Hebrew word for Life is Chayim. Theyre very similar words, and the prayer is that the tears that have been wept will allow better lives for future generations.

6: Merkava Generation Four: New Borders, New Technology

We're in the very center of Israel right now. You see in the distance those skyscrapers. That's the city of Tel Aviv, a half-hour drive from here, and it's on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. You keep going in that direction (West), you'll hit the beach. A half hour drive in the other direction (East) is the city of Jerusalem and the Jordan River. Up until 1948, the Israeli border was right here at Latrun, with Jordanians controlling this hill up until the Jordan River. Part of the Security issue before 1967 was the fear that the neighboring countries would gather up the forces in this territory, pave their way to the Sea, and cut Israel in half. It's also important to note, that even with the territory captured in '67, its only about a 1.5 hour drive, from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River. Length-wise, Israel is an eight hour drive from top to bottom, Tzfat to Eilat. About the tank: It's made in Israel. This is the tank the IDF uses nowadays to patrol their borders. Each one costs about 5 million dollars to make. I'm sure on your airplane ride here you each had LCD screens attached to the front of your seat. Each of the crew members in this tank has the same thing. But, instead of watching films, they get a live feed from the cameras on the outside of the tank. The cameras have day-vision and night-vision, so that they can remain alert at all times. That just about wraps up our tour. Thank you everybody for coming to the Tank Museum. Feel free to climb on any tanks that have staircases and take pictures of whatever you wish. G-d Bless!

(photo credits: Latrun website.)