David Elazar

David "Dado" Elazar (

Elazar remained in the army after the war, transferring to the armored corps following the 1956

After the war, Elazar served as the chief operations officer on the general staff. On 1 January 1972, he was appointed Chief of Staff.[4]

Chief of General Staff

The first months of his tenure were spent combating

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

Events leading up to the war

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

1. Dayan refused to approve Elazar's request for a general call-up of the reserves[11] (Elazar nevertheless eventually decided independently on a limited call-up, beginning on 5 October).
2. Dayan refused to approve Elazar's recommendation that the IDF engage in a pre-emptive air strike, planned for 11:00 a.m. on Yom Kippur (the airforce was ready for the strike, but its jets never took off).

The war

At 2:00 p.m. on Yom Kippur, the armies of Egypt and Syria launched a coordinated attack against Israel. In many ways, this came as a surprise to the IDF and its command.

After a series of fierce battles to block the invading armies, a failed counter-offensive in the Sinai, and heavy losses to Israel's airforce and ground troops alike, the incursion was finally halted. On 11 October, fighting in the north was pushed back across the Syrian frontier, and on 16 October, Israeli troops crossed the Suez Canal under the command of General Ariel Sharon.

In the early days of the fighting, Elazar was one of very few Israeli commanders who managed to keep his cool and even maintain an optimistic view of where events were heading. This was in especially sharp contrast with the political leadership, most notably Moshe Dayan, who spoke of the "destruction of the Third Jewish Commonwealth." At the same time, the war highlighted sharp personal differences among the top military brass, particularly along the Southern Front—some of these differences have yet to be resolved. At one point in the fighting, Elazar was forced to replace the Chief of the Southern Command, Major General

By the end of the war, the IDF had penetrated deep into Syrian territory. Mount Hermon, which had been taken from Israel at the start of the war, returned to Israeli control. On the Southern Front, the Egyptian Third Army was surrounded in the Sinai, and Israeli troops had occupied the southern sector of the west bank of the Suez Canal fighting with the unconventional tactics of General Ariel Sharon.^[12] Nevertheless, despite these military achievements, Israel paid dearly in casualties. The Egyptians still held some territory east of the canal, and none of the major cities were captured. Although Suez did come under siege, the Battle of Suez was ultimately an Israeli failure, costing 80 IDF troops killed, 120 wounded and 40 tanks destroyed.^[13]

The aftermath

The high casualty rate and the fact that Israel was caught unprepared, in terms of both intelligence and operations, led to a wave of public protests throughout the country.

On 21 November, as soon as the war ended, the Agranat Commission was set up to investigate why the IDF was so poorly prepared for the war. The commission met for several months. It held 140 sessions and listened to dozens of witnesses before releasing its interim report on 1 April 1974, calling for Elazar to be removed as Chief of Staff. The report stated that "Elazar bears personal responsibility for the assessment of the situation and the preparedness of the IDF" and recommended that he and the chief of military intelligence Eli Zeira be removed from their posts.

Elazar immediately submitted his resignation to the government, claiming that he had been mistreated, especially since the report suggested no sanctions against the country's political leadership. He also complained that his actions during the war were never considered. In his resignation letter, Elazar wrote:

It is not the job of the chief of staff to oversee all tactical details. I testify that as Northern Front Commander in 1967 I submitted a general plan to the chief of staff and did not receive detailed plans...I cannot comprehend why the commission thought that I should have concluded that reserves should be called on 5 October, and yet the

Minister of Defense could not have arrived at the same conclusion, while we had exactly the same information and there was no one on the general staff who thought or suggested that reserves be called.^[14]

On 15 April 1976, he died of a heart attack while swimming. He is buried on Mount Herzl, Jerusalem.

Legacy

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

• Agranat Commission
• List of Israel's Chiefs of the General Staff

References

Further reading

Wikimedia Commons has media related to David Elazar.

• Ḥanokh Barṭov; David Elazar (1981). Dado, 48 years and 20 days. Ma'ariv Book Guild.