KADDISHEL
A Life Reborn
Seeking an approach into the Negev desert, which had been oc- cupied by Egypt, Commander Yigael Yadin studied archaeological guides and discovered the existence of an ancient Roman road, the Ruheiba Trail. The Israelis restored it secretly to avoid discovery by the enemy, removing great quantities of sand and laying wire netting over weak sections. This opened the way from Jerusalem to the northern Negev. Subsequently, several battalions of Israelis under Yigal Allon drove the Egyptian army out and captured the Negev. During this phase, a member of the Dror group from Yagur took the silver pistol that King Farouk’s cousin was carrying when he was wounded, and presented it to Elazar (Dado). The brigade then pressed on into the Sinai desert, where they shot down five British Spitfire airplanes. Sherman attested, “I was there. I saw the faces of the British pilots.” Yagur lost eleven people during the War of Independence and the commander of their unit, Motti Efrati, was killed. Kibbutz member Asaf Katz led a Bedouin Arab unit fighting on behalf of the Jews, but was killed by members of the unit during an argument, accord- ing to Sherman. By the time a ceasefire ended the war, Israel had secured the territories allotted to it by the United Nations and more than half of the parcel that the Arabs had previously refused (21 percent more than in the original partition). Jordanian forces occupied the West Bank and Jerusalem, and Egyptian forces occupied the Gaza Strip. The area connecting them was won by Israel. Israelis immediately began establishing governing institutions based on the existing Zionist institutions, elected the first Knesset, and wrote the nation’s first laws. Domestic programs for housing projects, industrial enterprises, health services, educational net - works, water systems, education, and a judiciary were organized and started. 4 Meanwhile, about 700,000 Palestinians had aban- doned the country, anticipating a quick victory against the Jews, and they now began filtering back in. Between 1949 and 1954, Arab saboteurs slipped into Israel and engaged in a program of destruction and murder, with ambushes,
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