by Roni Eliav
On the third day of mourning, in the evening after everyone had left, Lauren turned to Erez and said: “I’m going back to Germany, to my parents.” He stared back at her with a sealed expression, without uttering a word. “I can’t take this place anymore,” she said in broken Hebrew, “this country has sucked my happiness dry.” She switched to English, as she always did when she spoke emotionally: “There’s nothing left between us. You don’t need me and you don’t enjoy my company, while I loathe your love for the army and war, and this disgusting country.” She erupted into tears.
Erez wanted to hug her, but couldn’t. He felt as dry as a piece of plywood about to be cast into the fire. Deep inside, he wanted to tell her that they still had each other, and that love would prevail. But all he could muster was: “You’re right.”
The next day, she hugged him and kissed his cheeks. He inhaled the scent of her shampooed hair one last time, and she was gone.
That was the way she’d always been, independent and impulsive. Erez had loved her for those traits. They’d lived like two bachelors even after they got married. Having the kids forced her to somewhat settle her roaming spirit, prompting her to adopt some semblance of a schedule. Underneath all the sorrow, she’s probably breathing a sigh of relief, Erez bitterly thought to himself.
I should also feel free, he mused. But Erez didn’t want to be free. All he had ever wanted was a family, a house and kids, to feel rooted in place. Now I don’t even have a house anymore, he dejectedly thought to himself.
On his way to the bathroom he looked at himself in the mirror. He saw his reflection, red-eyed and unshaven. He became angry when he realized he felt sorry for himself, and looked away. A moment later, he turned back to face the mirror. His pupils constricted. He stared into the seeds of anger that had appeared in his eyes.
That day, soldiers from the company came to the house, walking in slowly and awkwardly, unsure whether to shake his hand or offer a hug.
“Did you get the bastard?” Erez asked.
“No, we called off the scan when you left.”
“That’s too bad. Intelligence was absolutely certain he was there.”
That afternoon he was visited by fellow officers, including the regiment commander and division commander. Erez felt warmly enveloped and safe. These were men he respected, who trusted and believed in him. In the absurd order of promotion in the reserve army, one of them had been under his command at one point, while another went to officer’s school with him. He felt at ease when speaking with them, taking comfort in the familiarity of comrades-in-arms. To his own surprise, he found himself opening up about his debts, about Lauren leaving, and how in a week’s time he’d be out in the streets.
“Why don’t you come back into the service?” Eitan suddenly proposed.
“Who’d take an old geezer like me?”
“We’re the same age,” the division commander protested.
“They’ll never take me,” Erez said, a small trace of hope lingering in his voice.
“You jackass, who’re you talking about? I’ll take you!” Eitan said. “I could use an officer to coordinate special operations.”
Erez stared at him, shocked to realize the offer was real.
“Well, mull it over…” Eitan retreated, clearly misreading Erez’s expression.
“There’s nothing to think about! You have your special operations officer,” he said, smiling for the first time in a week. “Wait, what rank do I need to be for that position?” he asked, immediately realizing how ridiculous it was to worry about that now.
“Well, you’ll have to be bumped up to lieutenant colonel. But I think you’re due for a promotion anyway,” Eitan replied.
Chapter 2
ORIENTATION
It seems I had gotten used to the idea long before I was drafted to the army.
I think the moment I realized I would like being a soldier was when I read the novel Battle Cry by Leon Uris. I was about 15 years old. I enjoyed the book so much that as soon as I finished reading it, I immediately went back and read it again. I read it over and over, practically memorizing it. I absolutely loved that book: a diverse group of young people coming together to fight for a cause they believed in. Being a young kid pumped with hormones and a Zionist education, I bought into that wholeheartedly. The concepts of fraternity and camaraderie-in-arms struck a deep chord with me.
Israel experienced two significant wars when I was growing up. The first was the heroic Six Day War. The fear and anxiety that had gripped the country before the war broke out were replaced with an adoration of the army and soldiers. I was nine years old and easily impressible. A couple of years later, during the Yom Kippur War, my experience was totally different. I was 15 years old, and enlisted along with other kids my age to help in hospitals and other essential services. We did everything from collecting garbage in the mornings, helping farmers in their fields, and digging trenches which turned out to be completely unnecessary. But what all of us really wanted was to be out there on the front lines, where the soldiers were throwing themselves into the fray to protect us. During that war, we encountered grief and bereavement for the first time. It scared us, but at the same time made the whole thing all the more heroic.
I grew up in Ashkelon, a poor peripheral city on the southern coastline near Gaza, a city which, despite its troubles, is blessed with a long beachline, sprawling sand dunes, and bountiful, raw, untamed nature. My parents were Holocaust survivors, a fact they vehemently denied. My grandfather fought in the German army during World War I, where he lost both his legs. After the war, he somehow made his way to the Jewish community in Romania, where the cripple was married off to a mute. Subsequently, my father grew up with the harshest contempt towards any display of weakness, a trait he passed down to us. My mother’s story remains shrouded in mystery; we know that she originally came from a Jewish-German family, but we don’t know much more than that, other than the fact that her whole family was wiped out in a concentration camp. She somehow managed to survive and was later adopted by a Jewish-Hungarian family. She instilled in us a need for survival.
I was the middle child between a bright and talented older sister, and a brilliant younger brother, smart as a whip. They both excelled in their studies. I, in turn, played basketball and soccer, I ran, I climbed, and I fought. At best, teachers said I had “potential.” Dyslexia was not a term anyone used back then, but in hindsight it played a decisive role in my childhood.
In the summer before the Yom Kippur War, I went on a one-month squad-commander’s course in the Gadna – a military-preparation program for Israeli youth operated by the Israel Defense Force. The course was held in Sde-Boker, a kibbutz deep in the southern Negev Desert. Lines of tents were pitched along the edge of a cliff commanding a majestic view of the Zin River. They treated us like soldiers, but with a slightly softer touch. It was there that I realized I was a pampered boy: it was my first time not having my mother around to do my laundry for me, iron my clothes, and cook my meals; my first time without the comfort and safety of my house, my room, my bed… Nothing. It was just me and my knapsack. I found out that I didn’t do so well in structures, and that I really didn’t like being told what to do. At the same time, I discovered the intoxicating smell of the desert at night, and the joy of being part of a group. I was a bit shocked to learn there were stronger and fitter boys than me. Eventually, I also experienced the unbridled joy of returning home and resuming my daily routine.
I started training. I didn’t know too much, but I was motivated. I ran in the soft, loose sand on the beach, over the dunes, through thicket and brush, across fields, in water, uphill, downhill. I ran in the mornings, in the afternoon heat, in the evenings, and at night. I ran until I couldn’t go any further, and then carried on anyway. I did pushups and sit-ups every day, all day. I did 500 pushups a day, a figure that sometimes rose up to 600 and even 800.
I
got stronger. My endurance grew, and my confidence followed. I became leaner and taller. 6 feet tall, packing 168 pounds of pure muscle. I played every sport I could: I practiced judo with judokas, played basketball with basketball players, ran track and field with athletes, did karate, and played soccer. I looked for people to challenge me in the streets, at school, and in the youth movement – resulting in brawls more than once. More often than not, though, things were settled amicably. I adopted a hardline approach to life – nothing was too difficult, no challenge beyond my reach. I failed often, sure, but I picked myself up, dusted myself off, and tried again – persisting until I succeeded, or at least until I reached a satisfactory point.
I read a lot, mostly adventure stories, but not exclusively. I read adventure novels set in the American Wild West by Karl May, historical novels by Mary Renault about Alexander and Theseus, Graves’ “The Golden Fleece”; Howard Fast novels like “My Glorious Brothers” and “Spartacus”; Defoe’s “Robinson Crusoe” and Edgar Rice Burroughs’s “Tarzan”. In those years, science fiction books were just starting to come out in Hebrew: I gobbled up Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, Bradbury and Bester, and of course Roger Zelazny and his mythical characters, and Larry Niven’s masculine heroes.
I developed a classical-romantic worldview without actually having received a classical education. I yearned to live a warrior’s life, but pretty early on I understood there was a difference between being a fighter and merely being someone who fights. I gradually came to realize that without a value system to guide you, you’re not a warrior – you’re simply a rabid dog on the loose.
I came to understand that combat was a choice rooted in one’s character, one that had to be undergirded by a coherent set of values and a moral code. This was a long process, with at least as many downs as there were ups. But as my conscription drew closer, my values and priorities began to crystalize: I believed in integrity, honesty, justice, and in defending the weak; but also in defending and pursuing what was mine – such as self-respect, competitiveness, and self-discipline, alongside independent and critical thinking. More than anything, I believed in taking accountability for my decisions and actions and those of the group to whom I belonged. Perhaps at the time these thoughts weren’t finely articulated, but even in their raw form – they were very clear to me.
There were many events and occasions where I honed my worldview: field trips, sporting competitions, true and not-so-true friendships, little betrayals, and teenage rebellions; summer jobs, sports classes, youthful romances, getting piss-drunk for the first time, and partaking in all manners of unruly behavior; navigating through structures and institutions that didn’t get me in the slightest, winning and losing.
At some point during high school I came across the name of a mysterious unit in the army. The name was unclear, but what was certainly clear was that this unit represented the cream of the crop – the most elite unit of them all, and it was top-secret. I read about special operations carried out in North Africa during World War II, and the pre-independence Palmach unit of the Jewish underground army. My imagination ran wild. There was almost no information available about it, which made it all the more appealing for me. I tried to find out how I could join it, but all I could find were bits of contradicting information and a lot of fake rumors. Eventually, I learned that I would need someone to recommend me. I had trouble finding recommenders – wherever they were, they weren’t in Ashkelon. After conducting extensive research, I managed to locate three such recommenders. Later, I found two more. That miniscule number was due to the fact that the unit was mainly associated with people from the labor settlement movement, namely from the Kibbutzim and the agricultural settlements. Some hailed from cities, mainly Jerusalem, but not very many from Ashkelon.
I managed to find a potential recommender nearby, a brother of a friend who also wanted to join the unit, but he refused to recommend me. My dad told me he knew someone whose son could be a recommender. To my great surprise, that information turned out to be true. So we went over to his house, and he agreed to recommend me. I immediately found another one, a friend of my sister. I had two recommendations, now all I had to do was pass the examinations.
I found out everything there was to know about the examinations. I was told we would fill sandbags and carry them up a hill – so I filled sandbags and carried them up a hill. I was told we would run on loose sand – so I planned a crazy track that included running through the ruins of an old Arab village, scaling the imposing sand dunes, and running through their soft sand for two miles – all in all three miles one way, and then three miles back. I ran that track three times a week.
Finally, I received my summons to the examinations. I got up early in the morning and took the two-hour bus to the Wingate Institute – more specifically, to the military base adjacent to the national sport institute, overlooking the sandstone bluffs above the Mediterranean Sea. I didn’t know it back then, but that military base was the army’s main fitness center, where I was destined to spend weeks upon weeks in grueling and highly gratifying training.
About 300 people from all corners of the country arrived with me. I saw the occasional familiar face, whether from the youth movement or the Gadna, but I was mostly just by myself – except for one person who had come with me from Ashkelon, but quit pretty early on. We were divided into groups. The gist of it was simple: we were assigned tasks and exercises, and the examiners watched and took notes. The first task was to lug sandbags, of course. I happily filled a sandbag and was the first to reach the hilltop with it slung over my back. As I ran down, I passed the other examinees huffing and puffing as they labored their way up. I realized I could carry two bags at once – a combined 110 pounds. I filled two, tossed them over my shoulder, and started running up. Within an hour, I had amassed an impressive heap at the top of the hill. During one of my rounds, I noticed someone trying to steal one of the bags from my pile. I immediately pounced on him, and he bolted. Another time, as I was running up, I could hear the other guy from Ashkelon asking one of the examiners: “What does it take to pass?” The examiner pointed at my pile and said: “That, to start with.”
Later, we were egged on by the examiners to quit, and some did just that. The next exercise was a run in the loose sand. I had a blast. Training in the soft-sand dunes in Ashkelon had built up my calves and quads. The track was challenging, but not as much as the one I was used to running at home. I came in first by a wide margin. The examiner asked me where I was from, and I could see the look of surprise on his face when I answered Ashkelon. The city was renowned for crime, violence, and backwardness – not exactly a place you’d associate with excellence.
The tasks and exercises carried on until dusk – I had excelled at them all. To my surprise, my energy levels never dropped: I was tired, but ready for more. At that time, I didn’t yet appreciate the electrifying power of motivation. At the day’s end, they called eight names – mine included. They told us to go home and come back the next day, to a green shack next to Army Headquarters in Tel-Aviv.
I wasn’t sure how to react. Going all the way back to Ashkelon only to make the long journey back early the next morning seemed like too much of a hassle. I considered just spending the night on a street bench in Tel-Aviv, until a group of four friends from a kibbutz in the south offered me to stay with them in an apartment their kibbutz owned in Tel-Aviv. It was my first encounter with the kind of military camaraderie that would become my way of life over the course of the following years.
The next morning, we located the green shack. They asked us many questions, and we had to fill out a bunch of questionnaires and personality tests. Then each of us was interviewed by a psychologist.
“Close the door,” he told me as I sat down.
“I closed it when I came in,” I replied without turning around. I was tipped off they would play that trick, so I took it in stride.
“What will you do if you don’t get accepte
d to the unit?” he asked.
“I believe I will be accepted,” I replied with a feigned air of self-assurance.
“And if you won’t?” he insisted.
“Then I’ll try again.”
“And then?”
“Again and again.”
“It says here that you’re a candidate for pilot’s training. That’s very prestigious.”
“If you have the forms here, I’ll waive my candidacy right now.”
“You’re going to have to do that at the Air Force’s office. But don’t you want to be a pilot? With the winged pin and the hat? That’s every Israeli’s dream.”
“I want to be a fighter.”
“And a pilot doesn’t qualify as a fighter?”
“Maybe. But not the kind I want to be.”
“And what kind is that?”
“I want to be a field soldier, a shadow warrior. I want to do things with my own hands, not through machines…”
He looked at me and said: “You’ll have the opportunity to do that, I believe, but not necessarily here.”
The interview concluded. I went home a bit confused: on the one hand, I felt I’d fared well, but on the other I didn’t really know what they were looking for. Two weeks later, the phone rang, and it just so happened that I answered. The girl on the other side of the line asked to speak with me. When I confirmed it was indeed me speaking, she quite dryly informed me that I was invited to the unit’s Gibush – its advanced selection process – and that I would receive a draft warrant by mail. I hung up the phone and stared at it incredulously, half-expecting it to ring again and for someone to tell me it was all a prank.
I was absolutely elated. I wanted to shout from the rooftops, but I was warned that I wasn’t allowed to say anything to anyone. So I only told my parents and my girlfriend. They didn’t see what all the fuss was about.
After that, I had my high school matriculation exams. One day, on the bus ride over to school, we heard that a special unit of the army had rescued the Israeli hostages who’d been held in Uganda, and that they were flying back home. Suddenly, everyone was talking about this special unit. I didn’t dare say that I was halfway there.