{"id":146238,"date":"2023-12-20T13:24:49","date_gmt":"2023-12-20T11:24:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.nli.org.il\/?p=146238"},"modified":"2023-12-20T13:24:57","modified_gmt":"2023-12-20T11:24:57","slug":"hoi_givati","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blognli2026.moonsite.co.il\/en\/hoi_givati\/","title":{"rendered":"Those Who Dream of Givati: The Many Lives of the Purple Brigade"},"content":{"rendered":"

On November 29, 1947, the UN adopted the resolution creating a Jewish state alongside an Arab state in the lands of the British Mandate of Palestine. The Jewish population, collectively known as the Yishuv, <\/em>as well as Jews around the world, finally had good reason to dance in the streets. In Rome, Jews even celebrated in front the Arch of Titus, with its engraving of the tragedy of the last Jewish exile, two thousand years before.<\/p>\n

But as is always the case in Jewish history, happiness became mixed with sadness. Mobs of angry Arabs who resented the UN decision, both in the country and in neighboring lands, did not wait for the celebrations to subside. On the day after the resolution was passed, seven Jews were killed in retaliation.<\/p>\n

This was the start of the War of Independence. Fighters and members of all the Jewish underground movements, alongside new immigrants drafted right off the boats docking at Haifa port, got together to begin building and organizing the young army that would soon be fighting five larger ones.<\/p>\n

Shimon Avidan was a veteran fighter in the Palmach, a branch of the Haganah which was the Yishuv<\/em>\u2019s best-trained force. He was commander of the company in which Yitzhak Rabin got his start as a young officer. Avidan was tasked with establishing a trained infantry brigade to protect Jewish settlements from attack. In early December 1947, the 5th<\/sup> Brigade was officially launched and given the name \u201cGivati\u201d, which was Avidan\u2019s underground code name.<\/p>\n

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Maj. General (Aluf) Yitzhak Sadeh (right) and Shimon Avidan, Givati Brigade commander, 1948. Photo: Nadav Man, Bitmuna, the Yitzak Sadeh Collection. Collection Source: Yoram Sadeh, the Pritzker Family National Photography Collection, the National Library of Israel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The soldiers of this new brigade had no time to celebrate. The situation was dire. Fighting began immediately and once the Arab states invaded in May of 1948, the Jewish Yishuv<\/em> was under attack from all sides. The 5th<\/sup> Brigade was sent to the most difficult fronts, taking part in some of the most significant battles in the War of Independence, such as Operation Yoav in October 1948, the conquest of Julis, as well as the famous battles for Kibbutz Nitzanim and Kibbutz Negba.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Battle for Negba<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Kibbutz Negba member at work, 1947. Kibbutz buildings visible in the background. Photo: Nadav Man, Bitmuna. Kibbutz Negba – Early Days Collection. The Pritzker Family National Photography Collection, the National Library of Israel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In 1939, a new kibbutz was founded by settlement groups formed by the Hashomer Hatza\u2019ir movement. At first it was called Givat Ganim. A year later, the name was changed to Negba. At the time, Negba was one of the southernmost Jewish settlements, between Kiryat Gat and Ashkelon. It sits near the border with Gaza, and it was across this border that the Egyptian forces came, reinforced by mercenaries from Sudan and militia fighters representing a new religious-political movement, the Muslim Brotherhood.<\/p>\n

Michah Netzer, a soldier in the Givati Brigade\u2019s 54th<\/sup> Battalion, recalled: \u201cNorth of Negba was Ibdis Hill, on which there was a large outpost belonging to the Egyptian Army. From this hill, on a clear day, you can see across the country, at least as far as the Gederah area. On the night the soldiers of the 53rd<\/sup> Battalion raided Ibdis, they surprised the Egyptians. And despite the surprise, fewer than half the soldiers made it back on foot. There were many wounded and dead. But they succeeded. They succeeded in conquering the hill and also seized a lot of equipment.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Soldiers of the Givati Brigade\u2019s 51st<\/sup> Battalion seize Egyptian military equipment at the abandoned Ibdis outpost, 1948. Photo: Benno Rothenberg. From: Benno Rothenberg Archive, the Israel State Archives, the Meitar Collection, the Pritzker Family National Photography Collection, the National Library of Israel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cWhen we arrived the night after to replace them, we established ourselves on the ground and many volunteers arrived from settlements in the area at lightning speed and began helping us dig communication trenches and defensive positions protected from shells and artillery. That night, Yisrael Galili, who was the Deputy Defense Minister, arrived and he told us – \u2018I saw the thin ranks, but the spirit fills in the breaches. That spirit is the spirit of Givati.\u2019 Thanks to that nighttime operation, my platoon suffered fewer losses.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Yisrael Galili, volunteering to help dig trenches along with civilians and soldiers, 1948. Photo: Aryeh Peck. From the Aryeh Peck Collection, Kibbutz Na\u2019an. The Pritzker Family National Photography Collection, the National Library of Israel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Despite the fighting spirit and overall effort of the Yishuv<\/em>, the young State of Israel suffered many losses, including soldiers and civilians. Some 6,000 were killed in the war, a full percent of the total Jewish population of the country in 1948.<\/p>\n

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Ezra Hirschfeld, a soldier in the Givati Brigade\u2019s 54th<\/sup> Battalion, who died at the age of 18. Photo courtesy of the Haganah Heritage Organization website<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of the fallen was Ezra Hirschfeld, who was working as a young journalist for the Al Hamishmar <\/em>newspaper when he was called to enlist in the Givati Brigade. He was barely 18. During the fighting, he kept a diary describing his feelings as well as the battles themselves. Here\u2019s what he wrote on July 13, 1948:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cI don\u2019t remember any other moment in my life in which I felt the insignificance of man. His incapacity and glaring helplessness. Over there, a kilometer and a half from me some Egyptian artillerist is adjusting the targeting device, coolly calculating the shift in wind, degrees, and distance, and operating the mechanism. Now the firing process begins: a cap is punctured, gunpowder set alight, gasses create pressure, the shell is released. 5 seconds later it will explode into 1000 sharp fragments, each of which alone can bring death, floating in the air. And all that time sit I, Ezra Hirschfeld, a civilized man more or less \u2013 \u2018the apex of creation\u2019 homo sapiens anyways, bent over in my trench with no influence whatsoever on the flight path of the shell, not even by so much as a millimeter, no ability to evade it, or defend against it, all I can do is bow my head covered in a thin steel helmet and\u2026wait for the shell to explode. Whether this shell falls on my head and tears me into dozens of pieces or explodes at a distance of five meters from me and eliminates my friend without my being harmed at all, or explodes out there in the field without causing harm to anyone, or doesn\u2019t explode at all \u2013 all these questions hang in the air, dependent on the wind.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

On July 28, 1948, Ezra was seriously injured on the battlefield, dying a few hours later. He was 18 years old.<\/p>\n

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A report on the death of Ezra Hirschfeld, a soldier and reporter for Al Hamishmar<\/em> newspaper. Hatzofe<\/em>, August 2, 1948<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

<\/h3>\n

After 1948: Samson\u2019s Foxes in the Field<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Givati soldiers in training. Photo: Tzvi Redlich Collection. This item is part of the Israel Archive Network and is made available thanks to the collaboration between Yad Yitzhak Ben Zvi, the Ministry of Heritage, and the National Library of Israel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Despite the heavy loss of life, Israel succeeded in defeating the five armies that besieged it by the end of the War of Independence and even expanded its borders beyond the territory assigned it in the UN Partition Plan. In October 1948, Israel succeeded in conquering the southern Negev region from the Egyptian Army in Operation Yoav, after it had been cut off from the rest of the country, thus securing a significant military advantage for the remainder of the war.<\/p>\n

Following the 1948 conflict, the Givati Brigade continued to serve as a significant force within the IDF. Its character was changed slightly and its activity, as a jeep patrol unit among other things, was expanded after the war. The brigade’s name was also changed and the unit now became known as Samson\u2019s Foxes. This name was coined by Abba Kovner<\/a>, then the brigade\u2019s education and cultural officer.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe soldiers of Givati are the successors of Samson”, Kovner wrote, making reference to the biblical hero who perished when he collapsed the Temple of Dagon upon himself and his captors, declaring: “Let\u00a0me\u00a0die with the Philistines”. Kovner continued – \u201cAnd just as the Egyptians of today are not just the successors of the ancient Egyptians, but also the successors of the Philistines, so are the Givati soldiers the descendants of David and Samson and they must fight an uncompromising war against them and the company of jeeps at their head must be called \u2018Samson\u2019s Foxes.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But over the years the brigade was significantly pared down. A major change came in the mid-1980s. As part of the lessons learned from the First Lebanon War, Givati was reestablished as the brigade with the purple berets we know today.<\/p>\n

In this second incarnation, especially since the early 1990s, Givati stood out as a unique infantry brigade, specializing in the Gaza Strip region. In the late 1990s, its popularity reached a peak thanks to the Israeli TV drama Tironut<\/em> (“Basic Training”), which was a huge hit and which told the story of soldiers in a Givati Battalion.<\/p>\n

The Givati anthem became well-known in Israel as a result of the TV show. In one famous scene, the trainees are asked by their sergeant to sing the song, with one of the soldiers changing the lyrics at whim and, of course, being punished for it. The anthem was written by Amos Etinger and put to music by Effi Netzer:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cAt the sight of the sun rising, the sunsets of spring<\/p>\n

I heard the voice of the spirit<\/p>\n

A spirit which wanders about<\/p>\n

A spirit we call Givati<\/p>\n

Those who dreamed of Givati, those who breathed Givati<\/p>\n

Those who walked the paths along with us\u2026”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n