David Elazar
David "Dado" Elazar (Hebrew: דוד אלעזר; 27 August 1925 – 15 April 1976) was the ninth Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), serving in that capacity from 1972 to 1974. He was forced to resign in the aftermath of the Yom Kippur War.
David Elazar
Chief of General Staff[edit]
The first months of his tenure were spent combating terrorism. On 30 May, the Japanese Red Army killed 25 civilians and wounded 71 more at an attack on Lod Airport, Israel's leading transportation hub (see: Lod Airport Massacre). On 5 September of that year, another group attacked Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich. The attack became known as the Munich Massacre. In response to these attacks, Elazar ordered what was, until then, the largest strike against Palestinian bases in Syria and Lebanon. Three Syrian jets were downed, and dozens of fedayeen were killed in a heavy artillery barrage. In Operation Spring of Youth, which took place on the night of 9–10 April 1973, dozens more Palestinians, including several key Palestinian leaders, were assassinated in Beirut by the IDF.[5][6]
One of the decisions made by Elazar during his tenure was the order to down a Libyan passenger jet that strayed into Israeli airspace and was suspected to be on a terrorist mission when it did not respond. The plane was shot down by the Israeli Air Force over the Sinai Peninsula under direct orders from Elazar, killing over 100 civilians. Only later was it discovered that this was a civilian aircraft that had made a navigational error.[7][8]
On 27 May 1973, the IDF announced a state of emergency and reserve troops were called up in response to a movement of Egyptian troops. The state of emergency was cancelled when it became clear that this was only an exercise. This event had a major impact on the General Staff, as it led them to believe that the Egyptian forces were not preparing for war, later that year, on Yom Kippur. After the war however, it became apparent that these frequent maneuvers carried out by the Egyptians were part of an elaborate ruse meant to induce complacency in the Israelis regarding the true intentions of Egyptian troop movements at the time the actual attack took place.[9]
On 13 September, Israel shot down thirteen Syrian fighter jets, which had attempted to down Israeli aircraft.[10]
The Yom Kippur War[edit]
Events leading up to the war[edit]
In 1957, Israel was forced, under American pressure, to withdraw from the Sinai which it had occupied since attacking Egypt the previous year. Closing the Tiran strait to Israeli ships by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1967 was one of the major causes for the 1967 war, during which Israel re-occupied the Sinai peninsula.
On 1 October 1973, the armies of Egypt and Syria were placed on alert. Due to an erroneous intelligence assessment and poor decisions by the Israeli military, the IDF responded with only limited measures, few reserve units were called up, and it was determined that war was "unlikely." In the early hours of 6 October (on Yom Kippur, the holiest of the Jewish holidays), Elazar finally became convinced that war would indeed break out that same day, even though the Chief of Military Intelligence Major General Eli Zeira and the Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan still believed that this was highly unlikely. Dayan's conviction had two major consequences:
Legacy[edit]
David Elazar, popularly known as "Dado," remains a controversial figure in Israel to this very day. The conclusion made by the Agranat Commission that he was personally responsible for the failure to prepare for war was not fully accepted by the public. The consensus today holds that Elazar was an extremely capable war leader who kept his cool in a crisis situation and made the correct strategic decisions.[15]
Israeli General Aviezer Ya'ari, head of the IDF's research department credits two specific decisions made by Elazar relatively early in the fighting as crucial to achieving Israel's eventual tactical victory in the war despite the significant setbacks it suffered initially. One was Elazar's decision to shift divisional reserve forces that were being held opposite the Jordanian border in the event Jordan was to enter the war to the Golan Heights sector instead. These forces then proved instrumental in first halting the Syrians' rapid advance, then turning the tide of battle against them. The second was his decision, despite vigorous objections from his field generals, to postpone further counter-attacks in the Sinai until the Egyptians, which had dug in defensive positions alongside the east bank of the Suez Canal, first started an offensive push eastwards from those positions. This led to the Battle of the Sinai, which was fought on terms better suited to Israeli tactics and which they decisively won, thus weakening overall Egyptian resistance and facilitating a hard-fought but eventually successful counteroffensive that allowed the IDF to cross the Suez Canal and trap most of the Egyptian Third Army on its eastern bank by the end of the war.