Milwaukee is to honor Israel’s victims of terror and fallen soldiers and veterans of the Israel Defense Forces and other Israeli security services, as well the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War.
Professor Yoram Eshet-Alkalai, who survived the Yom Kippur War, is to help mark the moment.
Eshet-Alkalai was a young paratrooper and father, suffering injury in a commando operation behind the Egyptian army lines. He suffered a head injury, leaving him paralyzed, blind and unconscious. When he regained consciousness, he discovered he had lost the ability to read and write, think clearly and orient himself.
His injury sent him on a journey of survival to reconstruct his memory and relearn how to do things.
About the war
The Yom Kippur War was Israel’s worst military disaster, bringing the country to the brink of destruction only six years after the 1967 Six-Day War, which established Israel as the region’s premier military power when it dispatched forces from Jordan, Syria and Egypt in a matter of days.
Thus, by 1973, Israel’s army had become relatively complacent, according to JTA. The Yom Kippur War gets its name from the fact that Egyptian and Syrian forces began their attack on the Yom Kippur holiday, when much of the country was fasting and praying. They quickly made threatening advances over Israel’s borders. And though Israel would eventually repel them to reach a ceasefire, both sides suffered heavy casualties.
JTA has reported that Israel’s pretense of military invincibility, and Israelis’ feelings that their country was finally secure, were shattered.
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How to go
What: Yom HaZikaron commemoration
When: April 24, 7-8:15 p.m.
Where: Harry & Rose Samson Jewish Community Center, Daniel M. Soref Community Hall, 6255 N. Santa Monica Blvd., Whitefish Bay.
RSVP at MilwaukeeJewish.org/Yamim.
Questions: Allison Hayden: AllisonH@MilwaukeeJewish.org.
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