Exodus - Leon Uris [305]
Frontal attack from Gan Dafna on Fort Esther was ruled out without the artillery. Kassi still had some four hundred men in the area and superior arms at Fort Esther plus better strategic position. Ari also knew that Kassi’s men would give a better account of themselves fighting a defensive battle inside the concrete barricade.
Ari had three Arab villages to worry about. Abu Yesha was the first on the road to Fort Esther. High up in the mountains on the Lebanese border a pair of villages flanked the entrances to Fort Esther. Kassi had men stationed in both of these. Ari planned his battle to get around to the rear of Fort Esther. In order to do it he had to get past the two flanking villages.
The move on Fort Esther was planned to involve three columns. Ari took the first unit out. At darkness, they went up the mountainside by goat trails to the Lebanese border with the Davidka and its ammunition. His objective was to get near the first of the mountain villages. The going would be hard and tricky. He had to swing wide and travel many extra miles to be able to get at their rear without detection. He had the mountain, the darkness, and the weight of the mortar and ammunition to contend with. Thirty-five men and fifteen girls carried one round of ammunition each. Another fifty men acted as cover.
Ari’s leg still gave him trouble but he pushed his column up the mountain in a brutally paced forced march. They had to make their objective by daylight or the whole operation would fail.
They reached the top of the mountain at four o’clock in the morning, exhausted. But there could be no rest now. They continued at a murderous pace along the mountaintop toward the first village. They swung wide of it and made a rendezvous with a patrol from a friendly Bedouin tribe which was acting as a watch on the village. The Bedouins advised Ari the area was clear.
Ari raced his outfit into the ruins of a small Crusader castle two miles past the village. As dawn began to break they scrambled for cover and collapsed into a heap of weariness. All day they stayed hidden, with the Bedouins standing guard.
The next night the two other columns moved out from Ein Or headquarters. Major David Ben Ami led his men up the face of the mountain on the now familiar route into Gan Dafna. He reached the village by daylight and went into hiding in the woods.
The final column led by Major Joab Yarkoni traced Ari’s steps in the wide circular route on the goat trails. His men were able to move faster because they did not have the weight of the Davidka and its ammunition. However they had a greater distance to travel as they had to pass the first village where Ari hid, pass Fort Esther and get near the second of the villages. Again the Bedouins met Yarkoni’s column on the mountaintop and led them undetected to their objective.
At nightfall of the second day Ari sent the Bedouin leader to the near village with a surrender ultimatum. Meanwhile Ari moved his men out of the Crusader fort and crept close to the village. The muktar and some eighty of Kassi’s soldiers thought it was a bluff: no Jews could have got up the mountains and behind them without detection. The Bedouin returned to Ari with the report that the village needed convincing, so Ari had two rounds of the Davidka fired.
Two dozen of the mud huts were blown to pieces. The Arabs were convinced. With the second mortar shot the officers of the irregulars were leading a stampede across the Lebanese border and an array of white flags was going up. Ari acted quickly. He dispatched a small part of his column into the village to guard it and sped on to the second village where Yarkoni had already opened an attack.
Twenty minutes and three Davidka rounds after Ari arrived, the village fell and another hundred of Kassi’s men fled to Lebanon. The awesome Little David had again done its job of inflicting terror and destruction. The two villages had fallen so quickly