On the 30th anniversary of the first Gulf War, the web is buzzing and the media is filled with articles and analyzes looking back at one of the strangest wars Israel experienced, which left a long-term strategic mark even without being involved in it at all. Officially, 77 victims were recorded, only 3 of them as a result of the landing of 43 missiles from western Iraq, and the rest from heart attacks, anxiety, suffocation and a mistaken injection of atropine.
For the residents of Haifa, this was a rather symbolic Gulf War, since the most famous missile that landed in its gates was indeed in the Gulf, in the heart of the Gulf mall that Ototo was about to open its gates to. Haifa and the Gulf were classified as Zone B in terms of the risk of falling missiles, after Tel Aviv which was in Zone A.
The Gulf War - 42 days of embarrassment
During the war, only 8 missiles fell in Haifa and the Gulf. In fact, as if 'nothing happened', neither to Israel nor to Haifa and the Gulf, but that's not how things looked in those 42 days of embarrassment, paralysis of activity, also anxiety, and the suppression did not help much to understand that it was a hint of the terrible exposure of the city and the Gulf to a strategic reality for which one must prepare .
The repression and its results in the Second Lebanon War
The results of the suppression were clearly visible, when Haifa and the Gulf became the direct and available target of a much more dangerous enemy - in the Second Lebanon War. What was clear that had to be done after the symbolic Scud, which landed in the heart of the Gulf in 1991, was not done until the summer of 2006, neither by the state authorities, nor by the local authorities, and the photos of the 'defection' who leave the city every evening] where, this time from north to south.
What were those experiences and insights that occurred during the war and which were pushed aside immediately after it in the rush to return to normality?
the embarrassment
First and foremost was the embarrassment: what is expected, will Israel be dragged into a war 'not hers', should she participate in it, and above all: how do we prepare for it?
From the summer of 1990 until the night of January 17, 1991, Israel was in an embarrassment and in endless debates about its place in the expected war and the preparation of the home front for it. The majority of the public did not believe that Israel would be attacked, and likewise the top of the IDF, including the intelligence, the General Staff and the government. There were endless debates surrounding the distribution of the protective kits that included gas masks, injections, and a wonderful invention from outer space called a 'hood' for babies and small children. The embarrassment was only deepened when the recommended protection was wet floor rags on the door frames and doors, and cello tape to prevent the windows from breaking... The housewares stores celebrated, and the residents felt exposed and humiliated, the words Jews and gas flooded hard feelings.
The shock and paralysis - missile attack on Israel
When the 'booms' were heard and echoed all over Israel [on the first evening Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Dimona and more were also attacked...] there was shock and silence: he really was the goat, Saddam. The shock that Israel and its soft targets like the Haifa Bay are exposed without any protection, and without significant means of protection, was enormous.
No one had any idea what to do: not the government, not the IDF, not the local government. The home front became a front without a commander, command or organizing system. The only one who gave 'good advice' was IDF spokesman Nachman Shai, who recommended drinking a lot of water.
The next day the paralysis prevailed: what is open and what is closed? Is it allowed to go to kindergarten and school and how? Who will look after the children on the way there and back? Do they study at the university or close? The solutions were local, spontaneous. Within days it became clear that the shooting is mainly at night, and the days are calm. The convoys leaving in the afternoon and returning in the morning to Gush Dan were also seen in Haifa and in the bay. From five in the afternoon everything was closed and the residents gathered in their homes, waiting for the sirens to be pushed into the 'sealed room' surrounded by floor rags. And the wait after the fall: Do you open a door and a window? Is there gas in the air? What fell and where? Is it the Scud or the parts of the 'Patriot' that the Americans placed in the French Carmel to calm the residents of Haifa and tie the IDF's hands from intervening in the war?
Most of the Patriot missiles missed, some broke apart and made more noise than the Iraqi Scud. And how do you call? There are no social networks, no internet, there is only a phone and Nachman Shai offers to drink water, more water.
Where is the IDF and who is the manager?
Added to the embarrassment was the frustration. Where the hell is the IDF?
After all, we got used to the war being on the front and the men going to it... and here are the men at home, the heroes are wearing masks like the little ones, and they have no answers to their questions. Little by little it became clear that the IDF had no answer either, nor would it have one - because Prime Minister Shamir rightly insisted on panic as a strategic principle of the first order. But if there is no IDF on the front - maybe in the rear?
But in 1991 a rear command had not yet been established, so bold division commanders became commanders of urban 'sectors', when they have no idea how to manage civilians under missile attack... so who is the manager? nothing…
The lessons from the Gulf War, their suppression and the trauma of 2006
On the morning of March 1, 1991, only a few took the time to analyze the trauma and the insights related to it. The IDF made profound changes in the concept of security, in the offensive sense, and the concept of MMD was born to the delight of contractors and manufacturers of concrete and iron. But overall a comprehensive strategic insight and understanding of the future shift from the front to the rear - did not arrive.
The Haifa Bay and its vulnerability potential were not handled properly, the Home Front Command that was established, as a major lesson - remains marginal, embryonic and lacks a theory of work vis-à-vis the authorities. The authorities were not in a hurry to set up SLTs and HMLs of urban complexes, no plans were prepared for routine life under missile attacks, for policies towards educational institutions and public service, and the protection of the public was dropped on the public itself: the duty of the MMD at its own expense, an ineffective and insufficient public shelter For a reaction given the speed of the missiles' arrival, improved alarm systems and more.
And all this fell on our heads in Haifa, earlier than expected, in the summer of 2006, *And by the way, cheap and finished...
(* you will figure out the rest yourself)
The Gulf War was headed by a prime minister,
who acted against the State of Israel in general, and against a Jewish state, in particular.
The Patriot Battery was placed at the entrance to Lordia, which began to be built at the time. It was a novelty for me that there was a battery in the French Carmel.
Professor Yossi Ben Artzi, those who suppress the geopolitical reality of our region, and live in their own cloud of denying the reality on the ground and the surrounding threats, are you. The Academic Ivory Tower, and "re-education" institutions for IDF soldiers as a "unit for cooperation and coordination with the PLO, victims of peace...". As soon as Rabin was forced to return 400 Hamas terrorists who were deported to Lebanon, by Dorit Beinish who refused to defend the decision, and academics and jurists who shouted false slogans against the government and against Rabin's just decision (yes, the left threatened to topple Rabin by force...) the former chief of staff was forced to fold and return 400 Terrorists who have since created over a thousand terrorist attacks that have killed 1500 and injured many thousands. What lessons were learned from this action? nothing! The army forgets its involvement in bringing security disasters and aid to the enemy, directly and indirectly. The University of Haifa was emptied of Jewish students during the Yom Kippur War, with the Arabs whispering in the ears of the frightened lecturers who remained in the offices "Soon it will be the end of the Jew...". Such coexistence. That's how Saddam also shouted, and brought the 48 Arabs to the rooftops to distribute sweets and cheer for the doomsday weapon that Saddam promised was aimed at Haifa. This practice of Yom Kippur and the Gulf War returned in 2006. Even then, when they were flailing in dimensions, they heard the growls of Nasrallah in Ada Ada Haifa and clapped their hands. It is their coexistence. Their sons and their children are sitting in your classes, with the diaries of Balad's martyrs, with the inciting slogans of the joint list, waiting to applaud and hand out candy in the next round. As my neighbor told me - on Thursday night when the first missile fell in Stella Maris, a neighbor in the apartment below opened the door to his friend and said in Arabic "Inshallah another thousand of these and they are running away."
We ran away and we will not run away, and your coexistence, the cries against the Nationality Law, or the slogans of these instigators in Nazareth or on Ben Gurion Sed. , and it's here to stay. It's not good for you - join all the good that Assad is showering in Syria, or Nasrallah in Lebanon.
Those who want peaceful partnership and mutual trust will receive such a hand from us. Whoever thinks that we are stupid and weak as implied by the petitions of the lecturers at Haifa University who do not remember what Amalek did to them - will lose his hand.