(Author: Ellie Isserow, Vol. 73, No. 2, Rosh Hashanah 2018)
When the call went out from to Jews all over the Diaspora to help build and defend the new-born State of Israel, 810 South Africans volunteered. I was one of them. We formed the second largest contingent of Machal. South Africa provided almost a quarter of the 3500 volunteers.
The following three stories, seen through the eyes of a young man, aged 21, recount some of the incidents I experienced during this time.
The Biggest Blip
When I arrived in Israel in June 1948, I was posted to an airfield in the north, Ramat David. However, I was ‘hijacked’ before I could get there. For the first time in my life I had become a desirable object – a real live qualified fitter and turner.
A group of South Africans, Americans and local Israelis sequestered in Rehovot were engaged in building a radar set, using a set of drawings smuggled into Israel in the lid of a suitcase. The suitcase was the property of Max Barlin, an architect by profession, who had served in a radar unit in the South African army.
The departing British had either taken away or destroyed all vestiges of their previous radar installations. The intention was to withhold any information about radar from the newly established Israeli state, whose inhabitants the Arab armies had sworn to drive into the sea.
I found myself huddled over a confusion of drawings, under the directions of eight amateur former engineers and radio technicians, none of whom could be described as radar fundi’s. My task was to manufacture bits and pieces of whatever was lacking – a rather tall order, since everything was in fact lacking.
Our workplace was situated in what was to become the Weizmann Institute of Science. It consisted then of three buildings, destined to be laboratories, next to the Sive Institute of Agriculture. We were housed in one of these buildings. A second was a peculiar edifice with only one door, continually under guard, through which white-coated acolytes came and went. This building was wreathed in steam and smoke, and now and then seemed to be the cause of electricity blackouts in the Rehovot area. We subsequently discovered, after getting one of the acolytes drunk at 2 a.m., that the mysterious denizen of this building was “The Golem”. Our inebriated friend explained that this was a computer, which he said was a ‘breeder’, one of the few of its kind in the world. He proceeded to equip myself and Maurice Ostroff1 with white coats and escort us inside. There we saw cabinets with wheels, pulleys and wide ribbons of paper that jockeyed back and forth, apparently controlled by people punching keyboards. “The Golem”, our drunken guide told us expansively, was “a god of a million memories”.
After this encounter, Maurice explained to me that this monster consumed a considerable amount of electricity and created a great deal of heat, due to its use of banks of radio valves resembling light bulbs in all shapes and sizes. It required a large water cooling system, which was the source of the steam and smoke emanating from the building.
The third building was one to avoid. It housed gaseous experiments – gases such as a “tear-gas” derivative – and created the basic explosives for the Davidka, that enormous mortar whose explosive capabilities convinced the Arabs that the Jews were in possession of the atomic bomb.
In addition to our laboratory, we were given the use of the machine-shop of the Sive Institute. However, we were only allowed to use that at night. It was in that machine-shop that I met up with my nemesis – my mortal enemy – the acetylene producer. (No bottled acetylene was then available.) This ghastly device dripped water on to a container of carbide, producing the noxious gas which, when mixed with oxygen (at least that was providentially available in steel bottles), enabled me to weld an antenna designed by Maurice Ostroff. Maurice got his just desserts, because he had to help me cut hundreds of lengths of piping with a hacksaw. I welded these, continually hindered by that malevolent bastard, the acetylene producer.
After one continuous 24-hour working session, suddenly there it lay in all its glory – a mattress antenna, a porcupine of pipes. I could have sworn that Rumpelstiltskin was there somewhere.
It was my good fortune to have been trained by an Italian master tradesman, who taught me that a lathe is not only for turning. I was thus able to make a fair number of parts that surprised even me. In the mean-time, the technicians had created a ghoul that Heath Robinson would have been proud to own. It had a screen – where that came from, I have no idea. I fashioned a visor out of a piece of tin plate.
There the radar set stood, a series of valves, connections of wire, knobs that I had made and knurled on the lathe, and probably a bird’s nest or two. Up went the antenna onto a flat roof. The radar set was rolled into position. Max Barlin, the officer in charge, seated himself in front of the screen, surrounded by a haggard crew of newly-qualified radar experts. In an expectant silence, he glued his eyes to the visor and said “Switch on!”
We watched, waited and silently prayed that we were not going to be electrocuted or hurled into the gas and explosive laboratory. Max turned the bicycle pedals, chains and gears we had contrived in the absence of a motor to turn the antenna. He grunted something unintelligible, then turned and said, “It’s working!”[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row] Erecting the antenna The quivering graphic line representing a time and distance base blipped on the movements of various vehicles and aircraft. But when the antenna was turned to the north-west, a very large blip appeared and sat solidly on the screen, without movement. We checked, again and again, but could find no problem in the radar set. However, the blip stayed put. Mort Kaplan was an American whose presence in the unit puzzled the rest of us. His technical knowledge was nil, but he served as a comic to keep our spirits up. Mort appeared at this critical moment with a map of the Middle East. “Do you know,” he offered, with a courtesy that would have done justice to a Shakespearean court scene, “I fancy that could be the island of Cyprus!” It was. The British, with all their technology, had never been able to pick up Cyprus on their conventional radar. But the Weizmann Wizards had done it. “Baruch ha-bah!” Radar had arrived in the Jewish State. Radar is born in Israel “Hell!” said my neighbour Sam, the Officer in Charge of the Transport Squadron Maintenance at the airfield. “It’s Thursday and that means it’s the bloody Officers’ Night!” Our Commanding Officer at the airfield had picked up a few of the British customs. One was gym sessions which ended soon after they were started due to the reluctance of the participants. Airmen don’t drill or exercise – they fly. Another was the Officers’ Night on a Thursday, which was mandatory. Attendees were treated to a good meal and then subjected to a lecture of a military nature by some army personage of note. Sam and I travelled daily to the airfield in the comfort of a bus on the days when I didn’t carry him on the back of my motorbike. On this particular Thursday Sam and I had come to work by bus. We had no intention of attending the Officers’ Night as required, so I conjured up a story and went into the Adjutant’s office to deliver it, only to find a one-eyed man seated on the edge of the desk. His sitting on the desk was a sure sign that he was a ranking officer in the Israeli army. We greeted each other cordially and I proceeded to tell our Adjutant, Mordechai, that I would not be able to attend the Officer’s supper as the hydraulics of our one and only surveying-and-photographing plane, a Mosquito, was giving trouble. Mordechai agreed to excuse us and I informed Sam of the meeting’s successful outcome. We waited and watched from a hidden vantage point as our fellow officers trooped obediently into the mess. As soon as the last had entered, Sam and I hit the road, on foot, to Tel Aviv, some sixty kilometres away. We hoped to get a lift as the road was a passably busy one, but luck deserted us, and it looked as though we would have to walk all the way to Tel Aviv or return to our base. After hiking for what seemed like hours we were relieved to see slits of light approaching in the distance. These were the headlights of a car and they appeared this way because a black-out was being observed. We waved the vehicle down and I immediately saw that the driver was the gentleman who had been sitting on the edge of Mordechai’s desk, and whom, I presumed, was the lecturer for the night. He offered us a lift to Tel Aviv and was very affable, chatting easily with us in heavily accented English. He went out of his way to drive us to our apartment block and we expressed our profuse thanks as he dropped us off. As he drove away, Sam said “Do you know who that guy was?” “No idea,” I replied. “I think he was Moshe Dayan!” Eight years passed. I had returned to South Africa and was now living in Port Elizabeth. There was a great hubbub taking place due to the visit of none other than General Moshe Dayan and his wife. A meeting was organised in a large hall in the town, which was filled to capacity for the address by one of the heroes of the Israeli war. I naturally attended, with my wife, and applauded as Dayan, now Chief of Staff of the IDF, stood up to give his address. In conclusion he said how much he was enjoying his visit to South Africa and apologised for his poor command of English – which was undeniable. The Chairman thanked the honoured guest and then to my great surprise, requested that Mr Isserow and his wife meet with General Dayan at the end of the meeting. The audience was agog that I should be so singled out. After the meeting, as requested, I approached Dayan and his wife, Ruth, and introduced myself. To my surprise, it wasn’t he who addressed us but Ruth, who earlier that day had given a talk to the ladies of Port Elizabeth – an event which my wife had been unable to attend. Unbeknown to me, Ruth Dayan had been on close terms with my mother in Israel and had been commissioned with the task of passing on her greetings to my family while visiting Port Elizabeth. She had hoped to see my wife at her talk, and humorously berated her, saying, “You naughty girl! Why didn’t you come to my meeting?” The General had been observing me closely during this exchange. Without taking his eye off me he said to his wife, “Maybe she was having problems with a mosquito.” Our wives were understandably puzzled by that remark, but I was astounded. Moshe Dayan, the man of the time, indeed missed nothing. It is truly remarkable that after eight years he remembered, and with such clarity, a brief exchange that took place in an office – and the two young officers he met on a dark road to Tel Aviv. This is the story of the unknown war which took place between two wings of the Israeli Air Force on the largest airbase in the Middle East. Wing Four was the bomber squadron, reconnaissance and transport divisions of the air force based at Tel Nof. I was officer in charge of Ground Workshops for Wing Four. It consisted of eleven workshops including armaments and all services pertaining to the servicing of the aircraft. It started with an emergency call for Wing Four to move to the north and the fighter Squadron (Squadron 100) to the south, as there appeared to be a threat from Egypt. Once the danger had diminished, one of the two B17s, a large American Bomber, returned to base, and I was ordered to meet the plane in order to disarm it. I duly dispatched the bomb trolley, which was a large six squared unit, and stationed it beneath the bomb bay door. When it opened, to my amazement, a piano was loaded onto the trolley and driven, accompanied by cheers from a gathering of airfield personnel, to the mess hall. The piano had been stolen from Squadron 100 at Ramat David, and the instigator was one of our pilots, Milton Royce Botger – the mischievous and lively Puck of the Air Force. He had joined the volunteers [in South Africa], although he was not Jewish. By his own choice, he was known to all as “Butch Ben Yok” (Butch son of a Christian). Milton Royce ‘Butch’ Botger (1924-2008)
Dayan and the Mosquito
The Piano
To ceremoniously welcome the piano, the lid was lifted and a beer poured inside it. I played the tune ‘Sarie Marais’, which was applauded by the South Africans. The piano soon became the life of the mess in the evenings, the playing accompanied by raucous singing and some slightly off-colour songs. In the meantime the Squadron demanded the return of their piano which Wing Four, by this time, regarded as its rightful property. Butch insisted that it was legitimate loot. Constant harassment and many threats were ignored, but protests grew from another quarter too. The young Israeli pilots objected to songs they believed were unfit for the ears of the young ladies who accompanied them to the mess.
After many weeks, it reached the stage where Air Force HQ sent through an order that the piano be returned to its rightful owner. I, in turn, was instructed to load the piano onto a trolley so that it could be lifted through the bomb bay doors of the B17 and returned to Ramat David. As I did this, I was surprised to find, parked beside the aircraft, an open three quarter truck loaded with toilet paper. When I enquired I was told by a rebellious Butch that he intended bombing Ramat David with the toilet paper.
It took a tremendous amount of dissuasion to prevent Butch from loading the toilet paper, almost inviting intervention by our boss, Gidon Gordon, until he reluctantly desisted. I still believe it would have been a sight worth witnessing.
Without the toilet paper, the B17 took off. It landed at Ramat David, veered off the runway and drove through a fence onto a kibbutz which bordered the airfield. The kibbutzniks were amazed to see an enormous plane with its bomb bay doors open, gently lowering a piano onto the field they’d been harrowing. The plane turned round, taxied back onto the runway, took off and returned to our airfield,
Aware of our disappointment, and in some cases, seething resentment, Gidon reluctantly went into Tel Aviv and bought us our own piano. It was installed in the position of the previous one, but Butch was dismayed when one of my carpenters was instructed to install locks – on the lid over the keys and on the lid on top of the piano. This meant that the piano could only be played at the discretion of the young Israeli crews who could now entertain their young ladies in peace.
I returned to the base ten years later to find that it was now entirely different from the one which I left, and was now a very much up-to-date fighter base. The only thing I recognised was the piano which had been installed in a now modern mess hall – a reminder of the secret war between Wing Four and Squadron 100 of the Israeli Air Force.
Two Bombs
Morton Kaplan was something of a comedian who felt it was his duty to make us laugh. We used to walk to work and on the way we passed the police station. Mort thought it would be a good idea to show his family and friends back home how he spent his time in Israel. He led us inside, persuaded the policeman on duty to allow him into one of the cells and then asked Maurice Ostroff to take a photograph of him clutching the bars.
When Mort tried to make his re-entry into freedom he found the door was a self-locking one. When we made enquiries we were told that the key to this particular cell had gone on leave for the weekend in the pocket of one of the policemen.
The upshot of this caper was that Mort was confined to a weekend behind bars. He was subsequently more cautious when it came to practical joking.
Our unit had been fairly isolated from the war thus far, but we had a taste of it one morning as we walked to work. We heard the roar of an approaching plane and leapt into a ditch running alongside the road, where an American by the name of Shaul scrambled into a concrete water pipe which ran under the road. We were right to take cover. The plane, an Egyptian one, dropped a bomb, which I imagine was intended for the Weizmann, but missed significantly, and landed fairly close to us.
As the bomb exploded, we trembled as the ground shook, and when we climbed out of the ditch, we were accompanied by a very green Shaul. He was covered in algae which coated the inside of the pipe. He certainly wasn’t impressed at the laughter following what had been a fairly narrow escape. Shaul was henceforth known as the Green American.
Our second experience of being bombed was in Sarafand. It was a hot day in our workshop, a pre-war barn of corrugated iron held up by wooden beams. Our first aid kit was located on one of these beams, close to the corrugated iron wall. Among the first aid items was a large bottle of mercurochrome which glinted blood red when any light fell upon it. We were engrossed in our work when we heard the very angry sound of an aircraft. Knowing well that no plane would fly that low, we all dived to the floor and were rocked the explosion of a bomb that had dropped between the walls of a demolished cinema close to our workshop. These walls acted as a protective barrier and probably saved our lives.
As I said, it was a particularly hot day and the corrugated iron roof radiated heat, warming the bottle of mercurochrome up on the beam, which tumbled off the shelf. It landed with a heavy thud onto a recumbent Max Kangisser, who lay on his stomach directly under it. With the cork dislodged, the warm fluid spread over his back.
“I’ve been hit” cried Max putting his hand to his back where the bottle lay with its contents trickling through his shirt. He reached around, touched the warm wetness, and lifted up a red hand – shouting frantically “Help – get some help. They got me in the back”.
The four of us were convulsed with laughter when we saw what had happened. ”Are you guys happy to see me injured?” Max wailed.
Between guffaws one of the spectators said, “Max, why you don’t smell your hand?”
Incredulously Max shouted, “What? Smell my hand while I’m dying?” However, when he did so, he sat up, very relieved, and joined in the laughter.
For his bravery Max was rewarded with a nomination to the post of being in charge of all fire extinguishers on the base. He was known thereafter as the Fire Chief.
I sorely miss the Fire Chief. In an obituary for him, I asserted that Satan in hell would quiver in fear at the arrival of Max, the renowned conqueror of conflagrations, with his hands clutching a large bottle of mercurochrome.
Ellie Isserow served as a volunteer in the Israeli Air Force in the 1948 Israeli War of Independence, where he was instrumental in developing the first basic radar system. He has been writing for many years and has developed an extensive collection of poetry, essays, short stories as well as children’s books. His most recent writing is a collection of stories, entitled It Wasn’t All War, based on the lighter side of his experiences during 1948.
NOTE
- Also from South Africa, in later life Ostroff gained for himself an international reputation for his indefatigable efforts to counter anti-Israel propaganda in the mainstream and online media.
