[Aspaqlaria] Aspaqlaria

Thu Jan 25 02:28:51 PST 2007

Aspaqlaria

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35

Posted: 24 Jan 2007 05:30 AM CST
http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2007/01/35.shtml

58 years ago today, 5 Shevat 5708 (Jan 16, 1948), 35 Hebrew University students set out to the besieged settlers of Gush Etzion. A previous convoy had been attacked a month before, and the settlers of Ramot Rachel themselves were attacked twice in the previous week. So, at an age when most of us dont have bigger worries than keeping our grades up or finishing the next paper these youths volunteered with the Haganah and chose to head into danger. Under the leadership of Danny Mas, they each took a 60 lb pack and headed into the Judean Hills.

We dont know exactly what happened next, but there were enough messages intercepted by the British police to reconstruct some detail. (Not that the British tried to use this information to save lives.) The group passed an Arab shepherd outside the town of Suref, and rather than kill him to ensure his silence, they compassionately chose to simply lie about their intent. The shepherd informed an armed group, and this troop was attacked twice, involving hundred of local Arabs.

Dr Solomon Bloom tells his part of the story in an open letter to his daughter:

The settlement Ramat Rachel, slightly south of Jerusalem, was being besieged by the Arab Legion. The Haganah decided to send a small force of thirty-five soldiers, most from the Pal Machs best veterans, plus a few from our group of American recruits, to try to lift the terrible threat at Ramat Rachel. I was one of the Americans selected to join the thirty-five. During the final determination of who was to go, I was on my bunk listening to the officers of our battalion discussing those to be sent. One said; Well we cant send Shlomo Bloom, hes married. The other officer asked; Why not? The reply came back; Well suppose Shlomo becomes a casualty and doesnt get back here after this action. Then we have his American wife sitting, grieving alone here in Jerusalem. We cant handle all the problems that would come up. There will be too many diplomatic and political problems if that happens; we just cant be concerned with such a problem. So I was struck from the list and Moshe Pearlstein, whom I had trained with but had no previous U. S. army experience, was selected in my place to join the thirty-five.

I will always remember how formidable - yes, how heroic - the 35 appeared in all their battle gear, as they assembled on the edge of Beit Hakarem. They were the Yishuvs best and seemed invincible in my eyes. The group went out to reach Ramat Rachel, but never made it through the Judean hills. Twenty-four hours went by and no word from the 35. Then our officers assembled a further group, I among them, to seek them out. Just before we started, the officers were listening to the news and there was this British bulletin stating that the 35 had been caught in an Arab ambush and there were no survivors. This tragedy was a terrible blow to the Haganah, the kibbutz fell to the Arab Legion a few days later and its surviving members were taken prisoner.

My dear daughter Ruth, I write this story forty-seven years after its occurrence. Being married to my first wife Helen in January of 1948 was my salvation. And what eternal gratitude I have for that Haganah officer who decided not to send me because of my marriage. That sweet soul Moshe, my good friend from training days and life together in the Haganah, became, as far as I know, one of the first Americans to fall in the war of independence for Israel. His sacrifice has given me a long eventful life - baruch Ha-shem. And it was just that twist of fate that I was luckily married at that time.

Ruth, if you should ever visit Israel again, be sure to ask the location of the Forest of the Thirty-five. Yes, there is today a forest planted to memorialize those 35 hero soldiers of Israel.

Moshe Pearlstein, the person who volunteered in Dr. Blooms place, was my grandfathers cousin. Surviving relatives t gathering every year at Netiv haLamed Hei on the yahrzeit which my grandfather would attend. I recall the last time I visited my grandfather, a few weeks before the yahrzeit, expressing his frustration that he no longer healthy enough to make it to the annual gathering at Netive haLamed He. His worries that he would take with him a piece of the past were justified. I wish I had asked my grandpa when he was still alive more about Moshe Pearlstein so that I could draw for you a better portrait. (More about many things.)

None of them survived. They were so brutally beaten, Rav Aryeh Levin ztl had to rely on a Goral haGra, a lottery system attributed to the Vilna Gaon, to identify the last 12 bodies.

Danny Mas, the leader, was an amateur cartoonist. He drew the pictures on the right. Were not talking of hardened soldiers, anonymous troops. Were speaking of young people who put the lives of those at Ramat Rachel, ahead of their own. Men who risked, and ultimately gave, their own lives rather than risk killing an enemy civilian needlessly.

The names of these 35, the Lamed Hei, were:

Yisrael Alonai (Marzel)
Haim Engel
Benny (Sailor) Bogoslavsky
Yehuda Bitansky
Oded Binyamin
Ben-Tzion Ben-Meir
Yaakov Ben-Atar
Yoseph Baruch
Eitan Gaon
Sabo Goland
Yitzchak Gintzburg
Yitzchak HaLevi
Eliyahu Hershkovitz
Yitzchak Zvuluni
David Tash (Tur Shalom)
Alexander Cohen
Yaakov Cohen (Jordan)
Yechiel Kalev
Yaakov Kaspi
Yona Levin
Alexander (Avraham) Lusting
Eliyahu Mizrachi
Amnon (Mischel) Michaeli
Danniel (Danny) Mas
Shaul (Sully) Pnoali
Moshe Pearlstein
Binyamin (Benitzky) Persitz
Baruch Pat
David Tzabari
David Tzovner (Shag)
Yaakov Koting
Yoseph (Yup) Kopler
Tuvia Kushnir
Danniel (Chichu) Riech
Yaakov Shmueli

Its strange to think, but they would have been, should have been, grandparents by now.

But its inspiring to think of  the human potential. Mans ability to place others ahead of his own very survival.

Yehi zichram barukh.

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