Meir Har-Zion

Meir Har-Zion, 1956

Meir Har-Zion (Hebrew: מאיר הר ציון‎; born 1934) is a former Israeli military commando.

As a key member of Unit 101, he was highly praised by Chief of Staff Moshe Dayan who described him as "the finest of our commando soldiers, the best soldier ever to emerge in the IDF".^[1] Ariel Sharon described him as "the elite of the elite."^[2] His three-year military career was ended by injuries sustained in battle.

Youth

Born in 1934 in Herzliya,^[3] to second generation Sabra, Har-Zion and his father moved to Ein Harod in 1947.

In 1949 he was briefly detained by Syrian authorities together with his 13-year-old sister, Shoshana, after being caught in Syrian territory east of Beit She'an.

In 1951, two years later, they were both captured by a shepherd while on the Syrian side of the border. This time they were held prisoner in Damascus, and the two children were only released by the Syrian government after a month of negotiation by the UN and the governments of both countries, making international headlines.^[4][5]

As the children of divorced parents, Meir and his younger sister Shoshana had developed a deep emotional bond with each other, and had become extremely close, often illegally crossing into neighbouring Arab countries together.^[6]

During the 1950s around a dozen Israeli teenagers were killed attempting to illegally reach the ancient city of Petra, which is located 40km inside Jordan. Such cross-border treks were considered a rite of passage for elite youth. The song "HaSela HaAdom" (The Red Rock), which praised a group killed attempting the trek, was banned.^[7]The song is available online at http://savethemusic.com/bin/archives.cgi?q=songs&search=title&id=Hasela+Ha%5C'adom

At the age of 18, Meir and his girlfriend managed to reach Petra at night, after three days of hiking, and crossing the Wadi Musa and climbing Mount Hor and bypassing an unpassable waterfall: they apparently slipped into the ancient city unnoticed, under the cover of darkness, before exploring the Nabatean palaces. This feat made them legendary figures amongst the Israeli youth of the time, for whom Petra had represented an impenetrable citadel.^[8]

Unit 101

In 1953 he was one of the founding members of Unit 101. He took part in the unit's first operation at the end of August 1953. Sixteen men with two jeeps, two command cars and a reconnaissance aircraft attacked the 'Azazme bedouin camps around the wells at al Auja. Their tents were burnt and anything attempting to reach the water was shot at.^[9]

On the night of 14–15 October 1953 around 65 men from Unit 101 joined a larger IDF force in an attack on the village of Qibya. Har-Zion commanded one of three squads sent to ambush any reinforcements coming from Ni'lin, Budrus, and Shuqba.^[10] In another night time attack, 18–19 December 1953, two Unit 101 squads led by Har-Zion ambushed a car on the Bethlehem to Hebron road. A Lebanese-born doctor serving in the Arab Legion, Mansour Awad, was killed. The Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett was annoyed that he had not been informed about the attack beforehand. Three nights later Har-Zion led a four man squad on a 21-kilometre march to the outskirts of Hebron, where they placed a bomb outside a house chosen at random. Two men and a pregnant women were killed.^[11]

890th Paratroop Battalion

Meir Har-Zion, 1954

The following year, 26 May 1954, Har-Zion was amongst a ten-man squad from the newly formed 890th Paratroop Battalion, led by its commander Ariel Sharon, which carried out a raid near Khirbet Jinba, south west of Hebron. Two National Guardsmen were killed in an ambush as well as two farmers and two camels. Sharett once again complained about not being informed and suspected that Minister of Defence Pinhas Lavon had not been consulted either.^[12]

On 27–28 June 1954 Har-Zion was in a seven man squad led by Major Aharon Davidi that launched a surprise attack on an Arab Legion camp at Azzun, 13 km east of Qalqilya. Three Legionnaires were killed as well as a farmer, Rafi'a Abdel Aziz Omar, who was stabbed to death by Har-Zion to prevent him raising the alarm. On their return to Israeli lines one of the team who had been wounded, Sergeant Yitzhak Jibli, was left behind.^[13] On discovering that Sergeant Jibli had been taken prisoner Chief of Staff Moshe Dayan approved a series hostage taking raids.^[14]

On 31 July – 1 August 1954 Har-Zion led a group of ten raiders who attacked two policemen near Jenin, taking one of them prisoner. On their way back they killed a farmer watching his fields.^[15] On the 30–31 August 1954 Har-Zion took part in Operation Binyamin 2. This operation was approved by Prime Minister Moshe Sharett and was commanded by Ariel Sharon. The attackers were divided into four groups. The first attacked a school building in the village of Beit Liqya. The other three set ambushes for the expected arrival of reinforcements. Only Har-Zion's group were successful. They had strung a wire across the road with cans of petrol at each end. A car full of soldiers from the Arab Legion drove into the trap. Two were killed, one wounded and three taken prisoner.^[16] Jibli was released on 29 October 1954.

The Har-Zion Affair

In the middle of February 1955 Har-Zion's sister, Shoshana, along with her boyfriend Oded Wagmeister, both 18, were captured, abused and murdered by Bedouins tribesmen from Wadi al Ghar^[17] while on an illegal cross-border hike across Jordanian territory. When he heard of her death, Har-Zion was inconsolable and vowed revenge. On March 4th, he and three ex-members of the 890th Battalion drove to the Armistice Line with Jordan. In Wadi al Ghar, 9 km from the border, they captured six bedouin from the Jahaleen and 'Azazme tribes. The prisoners were interrogated and five of them killed, four with knives and the fifth was shot. One of the dead was 16 years old. The sixth was sent back to his tribe to tell what happened. The men probably had nothing to do with the killing of Har-Zion's sister, and had merely belonged to the same tribes as the murderers. David Ben-Gurion told the cabinet that the Israelis did not know enough Arabic to understand what their prisoners were saying. Sharon wrote that it was "the kind of ritual revenge the Bedouins understood perfectly. But the repucussions of what Har-Zion had done were very 20th century. The Jordanians made a formal complaint to the UN."^[18]

On their return, Har-Zion and three of his companions, were held in custody for 20 days. They were released without charge, as a result of protection and stonewalling by them and their colleagues in the army, and soon rejoined their old unit. Sharett, who suspected that Dayan had advanced knowledge of the raid, and who deplored such actions, noted critically in his diary: "The dark soul of the Bible has come alive among the sons of Nahalal and 'Ein Harod".^[19]

End of career

Operation Jonathon, 11–12 September 1955, was an attack by two paratroop companies on Khirbet al Rahwa police fort, on the Hebron–Beersheba road, in which over 20 Jordanian soldiers and policemen were killed. During the fighting Har-Zion was wounded in the throat and arm. His life was saved by an army doctor who performed a tracheotomy while still on the battlefield.^[20][21]

His injuries left him unable to continue his army career. He was awarded Medal of Courage. He had attained the rank of Captain.

1967 and 1973 Wars

During the 1967 Six Day War, Har-Zion was called up as captain in the reserves, and despite the use of only one hand, took part alongside the paratroopers in the battle for the Old City of Jerusalem. In one important exploit in the battle, he killed a Jordanian sniper who had been holding up the Israel advance: after stalking the sniper across a roof-top, he killed him with hand-grenades.^[22]

Har-Zion served again as a captain during the Yom Kippur War, on the Golan front, in which he fought deep inside Syrian territory and rescued injured soldiers behind enemy lines.

Writing career

In 1969 he published his diaries which gave an account of his time as a paratrooper.^[23]

Of one of the early attacks he wrote:

"Once again I am beset by this strong feeling of discord... the feel of battle, the will to victory, the hatred towards one who wishes to take from you what is most precious of all – your life. These first victories have been too easy."^[24]

He also gives an account of the killing of Rafia Abdul Aziz Omar:

".... A telephone line blocks our way. We cut it and continue. A narrow path leads along the slope of a hill. The column marches forward in silence. Stop! A few rocks roll down the hill. I catch sight of a man surveying the silence. I cought my rifle. Gibly crawls over to me, "Har, for God's sake, a knife!!" His clenched teeth glitter in the dark and his whole body is tight, his mind alert, "For God's sake," ... I put my tommy down and unsheath my machete. We crawl towards the lone figure as he begins to sing a trilled Arab tune. Soon the singing will turn into a death moan. I am shaking, every muscle in my body is tense. This is my first experience with this type of weapon. Will I be able to do it?"

We draw closer. There he stands, only a few meters in front of us. We leap. Gibly grabs him and I plunge the knife deep into his back. The blood pours over his striped cotton shirt. With not a second to lose, I react instinctively and stab him again. The body groans, struggles and then becomes quiet and still.^[25]

In 2005, he was voted the 15th-greatest Israeli of all time, in a poll by the Israeli news website Ynet to determine whom the general public considered the 200 Greatest Israelis.^[26]

Current life

Currently, he lives in "Ahuzat Shoshana", a farm built on land on a mountaintop above the Jordan Valley. The farm is named after his sister and her name is written on the gate to the farm. In 2005, he published criticisms of his former colleague Ariel Sharon for his policy of disengagement from Gaza.

References