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Imprisoned by a “Concept”

Religious Reflections on

the Yom Kippur War

Rabbi Doron Perez

The destruction of the third temple – tripling its size and liberating its ancient Hussain’s secret arrival in Tel Aviv on
and holy city. How could the same Israeli September 25th to warn Prime Minister
he first 72 hours of the Yom military which mesmerized the entire Meir of an impending Egyptian attack was
Kippur War was the closest world fall so far from grace and get caught disregarded as an exaggeration. A huge
Israel has come, Heaven forbid, blindsided, coming within an inch of its build-up of Egyptian tanks and troops on
Tto destruction. That Yom Kippur, destruction so soon thereafter against the the Sinai border was seen as Egypt “flex-
which fell on Shabbat of October 6th 1973, very same enemies? ing muscles.” Reports on October 5th of
initiated the most horrifying few days in Russia calling all civilians to leave Syria
the country’s history. What went wrong? and Egypt was seen as an overreaction.
At 2pm on the most solemn day of the _ It turns out that “The Concept” was
year, Egypt and Syria attacked simulta- The Concept הָּי ִצ ְּ פ ֶסְנֹו ּ ק ַה already obsolete a full year before war
neously, catching Israel entirely by sur- The failure which led to the surprise attack broke out. Egyptian President Sadat had
prise. Israel’s Bar Lev defensive line on the was a devastating mistake in the realm of decided that although he did not have
Egyptian border in the south, thought to thought – a conceptual blunder. It was a the military ability to beat Israel, he was
be impregnable, fell within two hours. In mental paradigm embraced and believed going to attack anyway. And so he began
the north, hundreds of Syrian tanks were in blindly by Israel’s intelligence leader- an entire year of planning his surprise
rolling down the Golan Heights in what ship and hence by Israel’s top military attack. The Israelis missed all the signs
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would become the largest tank battle since and political brass, a type of conceptual along the way.
World War II. In those terrifying first three blindness which became known simply
days, Israel lost around 1,300 soldiers, half as “The Concept.” “The Concept” made Even when there was unequivocal evi-
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of all Israeli losses in the entire war. perfect sense to the leaders of the Israeli dence in the early morning hours of Octo-
ber 6th of a certain attack later that day,
So desperate was the situation that and American intelligence community at Israel did not preemptively strike or even
Prime Minister Golda Meir was handed the time. It went like this: Egypt will not call up the military reserves. Although
two cyanide tablets on the evening of initiate a war until they have the air power Chief of Staff Dado Elazar was pushing
October 8th, lest, G-d forbid, the State to overcome Israel’s air force. Syria will for this, Zeira and American intelligence
of Israel fall. Defense Minister Moshe never attack alone unless Egypt attacks were still not fully convinced. 3
Dayan believed that this was, perhaps, as well. Since Egypt clearly does not have
the “destruction of the third temple.” He the ability to defeat the Israeli Air Force, The lesson is clear: once we are convinced
convinced Golda Meir, using the desper- they definitely won’t attack and therefore of the veracity of our own logic, we can
ate codename ‘Temple,’ to have nuclear neither will Syria. In short, there is no way become imprisoned by it. Instead of chal-
warheads loaded onto jet planes at Tel Nof that Egypt and Syria will initiate a war lenging conceptions, we embrace miscon-
Airbase. If Israel was to fall then so would they cannot win. ceptions as a truth we cannot transcend.
Cairo and Damascus. Such was the Israeli General Eli Zeira, head of Aman – Israeli
leadership’s fear of the potential downfall Military Intelligence – was the greatest Challenging misconceptions
of the Jewish state, only 25 years after its proponent of “The Concept.” No amount “The Concept” came crashing down on
founding. of evidence could convince him otherwise, Yom Kippur, at the climactic moment of
How could this happen only six years as the logic of the concept was, so he and the Ten Days of Teshuva. When we examine
after Israel’s extraordinary victory in others thought, immutable. When the the process of teshuva, of genuine repen-
the Six-Day War? The 1967 war was one Syrians moved 800 tanks to the border, tance, it turns out that we must begin
of the most miraculous and shortest in it was interpreted as a defensive move by challenging our mental paradigms
history, with remarkable results for Israel against a potential Israeli attack. King and premises. If we don’t question our

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