Review
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Title: Heroes and Spies of Zichron: An Untold Story Behind Building the Nation of Israel
Authors: Vicki Jo Anderson
Publisher: Not yet published
Genre: Non Fiction
Year Published: N/A
Number of Pages: Approx 71
Binding: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Price: TBD
Reviewed by Trudy Thompson for the Association For Mormon Letters
[Editor’s note: Vicki Jo Anderson will be known to some readers as the author of *The Other Eminent Men of Wilford Woodruff.* She brings to her task a wonderful talent for writing and observing the flow of history. This current draft was received by us electronically, and thus no publisher information is available yet. I thank Trudy Thompson for taking this on. She did a fine job giving us a sense of this effort. We send this out to you in the hopes that Anderson will soon find a publisher for this insightful work. JN]
Vicki Jo Anderson has once again used her expertise as an author, educator, lecturer, and serious student of the Old Testament, and Hebrew and Jewish cultures, to write a masterful book on the topic of the history of Israel, its long struggle to become a nation, and the unwavering bravery, dedication, and heroism of ordinary people, whose deeply-held convictions led them to willingly undergo extreme personal sacrifices, to advance the cause of Jewish freedom.
*Heroes and Spies of Zichron* ( prounounced “Zee-kron”) covers multiple stories concerning WW I Jewish Spies, the brutality of the Turks, the British role in the establishment of a Jewish nation, the Six Day War, and other events leading up to the establishment of Israel. The book can be considered a story within a story, as Ms. Anderson skillfully weaves an account of how and when she met and became friends with a woman named Dorit Hackett, who was raised in Israel, but came to live in Arizona for several years as a married adult woman, sharing the history and struggles of the Jewish people.
Ms. Anderson began attending a Hebrew class offered at a local Christian church, being taught by Dorit, in a small town in Arizona. Dorit would often offer the students different things to read, and loaned Ms. Anderson a historical fiction novel, “No Time for Tears,” by Cynthia Freeman. There was one non-fictional family in the book by the name of Aaronsohns. Ms. Anderson is fascinated by the Aaronsohns and feels a strong bond with them, and wants to learn more about them.
A life-long bond between Vicki Jo Anderson and Dorit is formed, as Dorit shared stories of her homeland and remembrances of her life there. From this association came an invitation by Dorit’s parents, Asher and Sarah Dekel, to celebrate Passover with them in Israel.
While sharing the Passover meal in Israel, the author learns that the Dekels had not only heard of the Aaronson family, but that both Sarah and Aaron Aaronson were national heroes of Israel, and their childhood home was in the same village where the Aaronsohns had lived and helped settle the village of Zichron.
Sarah was born in Zichron, Israel , which at the time was a province of the Turkish-ruled Ottoman Empire. She briefly lived in Istanbul until 1915, when she returned to Zichron to escape an unhappy marriage. On her way from Istanbul to Haifa, she witnessed and testified to the atrocities of the Armenian genocide. She told of seeing hundreds of bodies of men, women, babies, and sickened Armenians being loaded onto trains, and up to 5,000 Armenians massacred by being bound to a pyramid of straw, then set alight.
After witnessing these atrocities and more, Sarah and her brother Aaron Aaronsohn and their siblings were prompted to act. Sarah and Aaron formed and led NILI, a secret, pro-British spy ring, which operated under Turkish rule in Palestine during World War I. They hoped to aid the British in their invasion of Palestine from their base in Egypt, ease the suffering of the Jewish population, and inform the world of the Turkish oppression of local Jews, all in the hopes of advancing the Zionist cause for a Jewish homeland in Palestine.
The small group set about the daunting task of secretly gathering intelligence, and getting it to the British by any means they could. One of these involved the use of carrier pigeons, which Sarah would use to carry coded messages to the British.
However, the time soon came when one of those carrier pigeons was caught by the Turks and they were able to decrypt the NILI code language. This gave them enough information to round up members of the spy organization, and as they tortured some of the members they learned the names of others. Word soon came to Sarah that the Turks had found out who they were. She sent word to as many as she could to escape while they still could. But, she chose not to leave. No one knows why she chose to do this, and the speculation for her doing so continues today.
Asher recounted the villagers’ stories of how Sarah knew that torture awaited her after being caught. Her torture began by her having to witness them beating her aged father brutally before her own eyes. Villagers told of hearing Sarah’s tortured screams over four relentless days, but even in all that agony, she never broke or divulged any information.
What happens next clearly shows the unwavering bravery and faith of Sarah. Her determination, courage and example to all is legendary, and she will forever be seen as a Jewish war hero. To this day, school children are brought to her grave every year to pay their respects.
Sarah Aaronson died on October 7. 1917, and twenty-four days later the British Foreign Secretary signed the Balfour Declaration, declaring a homeland for the Jews and less than a month later the British controlled Israel. The NILI spy organization had helped change the history of the world in just eight short months of operation.
The book continues on with the story of the new nation under British rule and of life there in pre-World War II times. A brief explanation of the influence of the League of Nations, and the resolution calling for an independent Arab state and an independent Jewish state, is given. The history of the Jewish people during the Second World War is well known and is not expounded upon in this volume.
The struggle between the Jewish population and the Arab nations in post WW II years is told, and once again the bravery and fortitude of the Jewish people are laid out by Asher’s first-hand account of those challenging times.
In 1967, the president of Egypt had gathered the Arab nations to once again go to war against Israel. He had promised to drive the Jews into the sea, and did everything in his power to goad Israel into starting the war.
Kuwait, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq were sending arms and troops to strengthen the Arab position. Russia was the main supplier of airplanes, tanks, and arms. Israel was aware that thousands of soldiers and military equipment were poised to attack them from all sides. They could not wait to be attacked, or they would not survive, so they went on the offensive.
At this time, the rabbis of Israel had begun to prepare for mass casualties by preparing city parks as mass cemeteries. They were expecting as many as 10,000 deaths.
On June 5, 1967, Israeli airplanes took off early in the morning to preemptively strike Egypt, to keep the Arabs off Israeli soil. Within forty-five minutes Israeli pilots had destroyed eighteen Egyptian airfields and 400 Egyptian aircraft. Within twelve hours the entire Egyptian Air Force had been wiped out. Israeli’s Air Force also destroyed two thirds of the Syrian Air Force.
In six days, Israel had won the greatest military victory in the history of the world. The Jewish people knew that Divine intervention had saved them. Even their enemies witnessed many miracles, like the time two paratroopers captured an Egyptian tank with 18 soldiers on it. When the commander of the tank was asked why he didn’t shoot them, he said his hands had been paralyzed and he couldn’t move. Egyptian troops were met with dust storms in addition to well organized blitzes by Israeli tanks. Arab tank commanders reported seeing tanks where there were no tanks.
By the end of six days, Israel had not only won the war, but had quadrupled their land size, captured two billion dollars worth of Russian military equipment and two train loads of poisonous gas.
These events were the fulfillment of prophecy by ancient Jewish prophets. Isaiah proclaimed in the 8th century B.C.. ” In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a second time to bring back the remnant of his people…..” ( New Living Translation)
There is so much more to this short book than what I have been able to outline here. It is a marvelous, and at times miraculous and touching, account of ordinary people rising to the occasion before them, to perform above the ordinary acts of courage and heroism and sacrifice made for the cause of Jewish freedom.
Will Durant stated it perfectly when he said of the Jews: ” No people in history fought so tenaciously for liberty as the Jews, nor any other people against such odds.”