Monday, May 10, 2010
13 Days
Tomorrow night, Jews will celebrate Yom Yerushalayim, the day commemorating Israel's liberation of the Old City and the reunification of Jerusalem during the Six Day War. After 2000 years, for the first time, the Temple Mount and Western Wall were again in Jewish hands on the third day of the Six Day War, June 7th 1967 (celebrated, however, as a religious holiday according to the Hebrew calender).
The Six Day War snatched miraculous victory out of what seemed like certain defeat, a besieged and tiny Israel surrounded and invaded by Egypt, Jordan, and Syria (with some volunteers from other Arab countries). The Thirteenth Government of Israel, led by people like Prime Minister Levy Eshkol, Foreign Minister Abba Eban, Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan (previously Eshkol) and other now-immortalized names, guideded Israel through the turmoil of the Six Day War to permanently establish Israel as the most powerful state in the region. Jerusalem was reunified and the holy sites liberated. Read more about Israel's 13th Government here.
One of Israel's most elite military units (though one which, as of the Six Day War, was undertrained... not since!) is Flotilla 13, sometimes referred to simply as "Shayetet" (Flotilla). This is Israel's elite naval special-operations unit, comparable to Navy SEALs. One of its first operations was the daring raid on Beirut in 1973 (Operation Spring of Youth) which killed several members of Black September, the terrorist group which had massacred Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. In recent years, the group has conducted several flawless raids of ships full of weapons, including the recent Francop Seizure which found hundreds of munitions en route to Hezbollah, or the Karin A (A Palestinian ship smuggling weapons) during the recent Intifada.
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