dangers that threatened Tel Aviv and the whole state. It really was a miracle that the soldiers and officers were able to avert this danger. This is what happened:
* * *
"Hello - Hagar - Boaz - Shamir - one -five. Hello - Hagar - Boaz - Shamir - one - five ..."A monotonous voice over the radio. The operator at brigade HQ writes his report mechanically. "Urgent! ... the lookout reports ..." A young liaison officer delivers the report to the
office of the commander. One of many.
* * *
A man is sitting in the room in front of a table covered in maps. Blond, gray-blue eyes, a nose like the beak of a hawk - a fighter. His face looks
tired as he reads the report. "The lookout reports: two hundred Egyptian vehicles on the road going north ..."
The reports come one after another. Report from Nitzanim: four hundred vehicles have passed, six hundred, eight hundred, one thou-sand, one thousand five hundred Egyptian vehicles driving northwards. Gan-Yavne reports: three hundred vehicles spotted on the road north from Isdud, five hundred, eight hundred. Armored vehicles, tanks, Bren carriers. The commander covers his face with his hands. He doesn’t need the map. He knows the distance from Isdud to Tel Aviv is thirty-two kilometers as the crow flies.
The door opens. A short, roundish man with brown hair enters - the chief of operations of the brigade
"And?" asks the commander and raises his eyebrows.
"I saw them" answers the other. "Over a thousand vehicles north of Isdud. " He says it unemotionally, as though he is talking about getting a box of cigarettes from the quartermaster. He is not one to get excited quickly. In the morning he drove out to check the reports personally. Now he is back he can confirm the reports are accurate. A gigantic Egyptian armada is moving in the direction of Tel Aviv.
For a brief moment the two look at each other. They are two very different types, almost opposites. Shimon Avidan, the commander of the brigade, is a sensitive, quiet type. Introverted and a little nervous. A fighter with a lot of revolutionary experience. In Europe he led a resis-tance group against the Nazis, was a commando leader, member of the Palmach. His deputy, Me’irke Davidsohn, comes from a kibbutz, is cold blooded, athletic, and lively.