commander in the vehicle ahead of ours, the second in the column. "At them! Wipe them out!"
Without thought, without hesitation, the jeeps drive into the illu-minated area. Ephraim Regenstreif, the driver of the first jeep, notices figures moving just next to the jeep, no more than two paces away. We have stumbled right into the middle of the enemy position! Both sides are surprised by this sudden encounter. Ephraim leaves the road, drives over trenches and positions, notices that the wheels are running over human bodies, puts it into reverse and returns to the road. Ahijah HaShiloni, the twenty-year-old squad leader, fires continuously with the machine gun pointed down into the trenches.
I am no longer aware of the world around me. I shoot and shoot and shoot. This feeling discharges the tension of the last five days, the days of the battles for Beit Daras, Ibdis, and Negba.
* * *
In the confusion around us I suddenly notice a big black something directly in front of our jeep, only about five yards away. An enemy tank? I turn the machine gun and shoot and shoot. "Hold your fire!" shouts Aryeh. "That is one of ours." I stop immediately. Have I hit any comrades? (Only the next morning do we learn that it was an enemy vehicle after all, a half-track that got left behind.)
Aryeh Spack gets out of the jeep and finds two of our wounded at the side of the road. We load them in and race to the collection point. I can’t recognize who they are in the darkness. One is moaning piti-fully. In Julis we try to bandage them up. I cut off their clothes with my knife. One of them has had a bullet through his arm. He is bleed-ing heavily. The blood drips on the floor of the jeep. I also get blood all over me. The other has a shrapnel wound in the belly.
* * *
We bandage them up as best we can and drive at one hundred kilometers per hour to the medical center at Sawafir. It is a dangerous drive, but the lives of the wounded depend on every minute that passes.
The medics at the station are prepared. The doctor opens the ban-dages. We don’t wait for the result, but race back to the collection point at Julis. More wounded and the other jeeps have already arrived. Two of the vehicles are damaged.
Unbelievable happenings are recounted. The quiet Amnon