Suddenly I hear a familiar sound and a moment later a gigantic explosion. A mortar shell. At least three inch. It exploded in the mid-die of the village. So the Arabs have reinforcements.
The feeling of being surrounded depresses us. We are dog tired. We have gone at least thirty hours without sleep.
We hear that we are to withdraw under cover of darkness. We imagine that we will be brought back with armored vehicles. And this idea encourages us. At sunset we assemble at the command post, talking and even joking. Freddy and Reuven, our fat mortar crew, keep a lookout. Their rifles are at the ready, just waiting for a sign of movement from the enemy. I feel like shooting. I go over to them and take a shot at the house on the hill. Freddy curses me in Russian -1 fired too close to his ear.
Our machine gun fires occasional long bursts so that the Arabs won’t notice that we are preparing to withdraw.
At last Bulli comes with the order to withdraw to company HQ. I remain a while to cover the rear. We fire off a few shots "to leave a good impression" and pull out.
Suddenly the order: "No retreat!" We are to hold the village overnight and will be relieved by another company tomorrow.
My comrades are speechless. Yet another night in this place. We are depressed. Yechiel allocates rooms and positions to the platoons. In the end we have given up part of the village in order to increase our hold here.
* * *
Completely dark. Joske has organized the lookout for the night. Two comrades each have two hours’ duty. The machine gun is in position. The positions are spaced out at ten-yard intervals.
We eat a slice of bread with sardines and lie down to sleep. The whole platoon in one narrow, stinking room. We are almost lying on top of each other. Someone wakes me. I feel I have just gone to sleep, but I have actually slept three hours. Shlomo and I go out. I can’t keep my eyes open. They keep closing. It is a great effort to keep opening them again.
* * *
They wake us up again. It is three o’clock in the morning. The relief company has arrived. But if we believed that we were going to be brought back to base in armored vehicles, a bitter disappointment