Historical Background and Interviews
III. A New Beginning A New Beginning
declared an independent state, there was a call for everyone eigh- teen and over to mobilize and enter the army. The real fighting had started back in November 1947 after the UN declaration, howev- er. The Arabs had been attacking buses and villages, and we had trained as members of the Palmach. They took us to Tel Aviv to officially register, but most of us were sixteen or seventeen, and they didn’t want to register us. We sat there for hours until the bri- gade commander, Beni Marshak, came over and started screaming. Finally, at four or five pm, they registered us.” Rubinstein said, “Kalman Offir and I, and a sabra from Yagur were the first to join the army. Kalman was the tallest and strongest of the group and was sent to officers’ training school for paratroop - ers. He later became a high officer.” “Most of us were in the army together for nine or ten months, but a few went to different units,” added Sherman. “I was in the Palmach’s Harel Brigade under Joseph Tabenkin; this was part of the Storm Battalion, Battalion 4, which was under David Elazar or Dado. We sat up in the mountains, fighting Jordanians and local Arabs, to help open and secure the road to Jerusalem. Then we fought in the Negev and Sinai. We only had light weapons and three tanks constantly in need of repair, although at some point we got a few old French tanks left over from World War I.” “We didn’t even have uniforms, just colorful patches sewn onto our clothes,” said Rubinstein. “We were trying to cut off Egypt’s army. General Nasser was brazen enough to come into Israel and got all the way to the outskirts of Tel Aviv. I was one of the first to go into Eilat, which is on the Red Sea on the Jordanian border, under the command of General Moshe Dayan. It took us two weeks to get there because there was no road, and when we arrived, the town had been abandoned. Today it is a beautiful city with luxury hotels. I stayed in the Israeli army for two years.” The group participated in Operation Hiram, under General Moshe Carmel, recapturing the Galilee and an area of Lebanon that was later returned during peace negotiations. It was also active in Operations Yoav and Horev in the Negev.
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