Fifty Years, A Story in Four Chapters

By Ari Bussel

Translated by Peloni

Photo courtesy of the author.

Chapter 1 – June 30

My uncle was entrusted with many military secrets—some from his combat service over the decades, and some from his work in a unit that developed weapons. I remember one particularly closely guarded secret about which he waited 50 years so that he could tell it, identify it, acknowledge it (of course I do not know the details of the secret). When that period passed, my uncle was still here—and we are now celebrating his 91st birthday—but his memory is gone, and those things remain buried in the past, as though they had never been.

It seems to me that the younger generation in Israel has gone through an accelerated course in my uncle’s life—from surviving the Second World War, to serving in the Israel Defense Forces as an officer and performing one of the longest annual reserve services, which included covert operations outside Israel’s borders, and later volunteering, both in a special unit where new means are developed, and years afterward in helping others. I do not remember a single time that he complained; on the contrary—he was always grateful that we have the State of Israel and sacrificed everything for it.

The younger generation, born into an existing and strong Israel, into the illusion that we are a superpower capable of anything, and above all into a life of comfort and abundance, did not expect that Saturday morning in October 2023, and since then its world has been turned upside down. During these three years it understood, firsthand, what a multi-front existential threat is, and it also rose and volunteered to fight in order to protect its parents, its family, and its people. It fought like lions, enlisted, and did not complain. It was filled with conviction in the justice of its cause. It cast off all fears and vanities and focused on what mattered. It served hundreds of days in the reserves, and they supported one another. The people of Israel are united, together—the beautiful people of Israel. There are those who claim that the younger generation suffered even more than it deserved. But God places before us only trials that He knows we can overcome. I argue that the younger generation has been forged and shaped, and from now on it knows that we live by right, and that only a strong Israel will survive, only a united Israel.

That same generation will yet teach us, the older ones, who go out to demonstrate and run wild, who expect miracles and are quick to assign blame, a most important lesson: what we managed to forget, that generation experienced intensely, and like the generations before it, it will rise above and overcome every difficulty, because living in a land of our own is a special privilege, and living in the land of our forefathers, the Land of Israel, is an even greater privilege.

Dual passports will not help, nor properties and money in the bank, nor vacations abroad, nor all the very, very tempting incentives. The younger generation has acquired the understanding that no one loves us, and that the entire world is working to destroy us. In order to survive and flourish, we can rely only on one another, and all of us on the Holy One, blessed be He. A chosen people. The children of God.

Chapter 2 – July 4

Photo courtesy of the author.

Exactly fifty years ago, Operation Entebbe, or Operation Yonatan, was carried out. On Saturday night, the Israel Defense Forces set out on an operation that will still be told about over the coming jubilee. I do not know whether it is politically correct today to mention the Prime Minister’s brother, who fell in that operation, because the people are divided and its vocal segment has been blinded by the hatred of “Anyone but Bibi.” But I will indeed mention him, and I will do so with boundless gratitude.

People did not fly much in those days—it was not like today, when one can jump on a flight for a few hours, for dinner or a short stay for entertainment. But terrorism was then as cruel as could be, just as in our own time, and terrorism against Jews was not even defined as such. If so, the essence has remained; only the method has become easier, faster, and cheaper.

Aside from the operation itself, the heroism of the Israel Defense Forces and of the entire people, what else do we remember from those days? Seventy-four-year-old Dora Bloch, who was evacuated for medical treatment and murdered, and Captain Michel Bacos, who refused to part from his Jewish passengers, thereby serving as an example and model both to his crew and to the world.

Operation Yonatan is an important chapter in every counter-terrorism course, as well as a demonstration of how the world split into two parts—one that distinguishes between good and evil, and one in which everything has become confused.

Fifty years have passed. Terrorism still leads and still surprises us, and against it stands one tiny and remarkable country that still does impossible things, things no one expects at all, simply because it is hard to imagine that they can be done. Sometimes we respond, and sometimes we take the initiative, but either way, we always do the impossible.

What, nevertheless, has changed from then until today? Self-hatred has grown and swelled until it blinds us, and division works against us. So too has the world’s hatred toward us, which no longer distinguishes between evil and good, between what should be done and what should not be done. Israel is accused of genocide and of its soldiers being the new Nazis, and the world longs for the day when it will rid itself of all the Jews—in the sense of the final-final solution to the Jewish problem.

Operation Yonatan is one of the most brilliant operations, about which books are written and films are made. Yet nowadays the younger generation consumes only very short messages, and it seems that it has already undergone a diabolical brainwashing, according to which everything connected to Israel, the Israel Defense Forces, and the Jews is sick, cancerous, forbidden, and repulsive, and therefore must not be watched, lest one be exposed to terrible cynical Zionist propaganda.

It is good that at least among us the essence remains, radiant as always, the spark in the darkness, the goodness from within, and the ability to use the mind that was given to us—a chosen people among all nations, a light unto the nations, a guide to the straight path.

Chapter 3 – June 7, 1967

Photo courtesy of the author.

For the jubilee celebrations of the liberation and reunification of Jerusalem, we held several activities in the city of angels as a tribute to the city of God. All the activities were etched in the memories of many as “Jerusalem of Gold,” and although almost a decade has passed, that steadfast standing together, that common denominator, and those celebrations accompany us to this very day with the same intensity, as though it were only yesterday.

Photo courtesy of the author.

This year, marking 59 years since the stirring declaration, “The Temple Mount is in our hands,” for some reason there was not much discussion of it on the radio or television. Of course we were occupied with a war of survival against Iran and its proxies, as well as with the wars among the Jews (our enemies really ought to leave us alone, because we are our own greatest enemies), but precisely because of that we should have devoted ourselves all the more to the reality that the Temple Mount is in our hands, with even greater joy.

I wondered why the lack of interest. Is it because this is Jerusalem and not the State of Tel Aviv? Because the Temple Mount is associated with religious people, and in this country all religious people are called “Haredim,” and therefore it is permitted, necessary, and obligatory to hate them? Or perhaps because the international effort to separate us from the Holy City, the city of God, has also seeped into us.

The so-called UN has long since declared the Temple Mount to be solely a Muslim heritage site—there is not and never was there the Way of the Cross of the Jewish rabbi who was crucified, and for two thousand years afterward we—the Jews—were accused of murdering God. But more than that—there is not and never was a First, Second, or Third Temple (which will yet be built and stand); it is all the product of the sick imagination of the Jews, who dispossess an ancient people (which did not exist; A.B.) and conquer and oppress that people, while simply refusing to pack their suitcases and return to the countries of origin from which they came.

The capital city. A united city. A city that continues to be built and yet preserves its character forever and ever.

And we, to whom the city was given once again, through much blood and great miracles, simply do not appreciate what we have in our hands.

Chapter 4 – A Story Woven Together

For the fiftieth anniversary of the Yom Kippur War, in which we were nearly destroyed, I came to Israel with my father. A Holocaust survivor. An officer in the Israel Defense Forces. He fought in Israel’s wars. And he came to the jubilee ceremony of the Electronic Warfare Corps (electronic warfare—those were the days before computers and smartphones) for that accursed war. And yet, it seems that the promise of “Never again” and “I promise you, my little girl, that this will be the last war” disappeared, along with all the government ministries and the army and the Shin Bet and the Mossad.

On that very same day, exactly 50 years later, they invaded the country, captured communities and military posts, raped, murdered, looted, and took captives. We simply learned nothing. The main thing was that we made promises with no basis.

We found ourselves in Israel, and during the first two weeks my father refused to leave. Until the third time we came to the Western Wall, for a personal meeting with the Holy One, blessed be He—for no one was there at that time. Only then did my father feel that it was permissible, and although because of advanced dementia he could not express it in words, he agreed to fly.

Chapter Four: A Visit to the Western Wall, ten days after October 7, 2023. Photo courtesy of the author.

Chapter Four: A Visit to the Western Wall, ten days after October 7, 2023. Photo courtesy of the author.

Photo courtesy of the author.

Like a lion—the lion’s roar—the wonders of God, all the great and small miracles of the past three years. How good it is that the State of Israel exists, and how pleasant it is that we have our people, the Jewish people. And we must weave ourselves together and conclude with “brothers dwelling together.” Like the heroes of the Israel Defense Forces who fight shoulder to shoulder, religious and secular, city dwellers and those from the periphery, left-wing and right-wing, rich and poor, so too must we as a people conduct ourselves—and only in this way will we succeed.

Be strong,
be strong,
and let us be strengthened!