The only thing about me that has remained constant in the last one year has been the fact I have been reading regularly, irrespective of the extent of work load, the state of my mind and errm..my heart, the temperature, the migratory cycles of the local feathered population, the phase of the moon and other such variable factors. Since I would like to remember the details of some books that I have read recently, I have decided to blog about them for a while now.
The book “90 Minutes at Entebbe” by William Stevenson comprises of two main parts. The first and more significant part narrates the build-up to and the actual execution of one of the most well-planned and successful rescue missions carried out by a government in a foreign territory viz., the mission carried out by Israel in 1976 to rescue over a 100 of its citizens who were held hostage in Uganda by hijackers. The second part contains the transcript of the discussion that took place at the United Nations Security Council during the proceedings against Israel for alleged violation of Uganda’s sovereign rights in the course of the rescue mission.
The book states, while describing the process of planning the rescue mission, that there was one particular incident that convinced all the parties involved in decision-making that Israel must switch gears from diplomatic negotiations with the hijackers to direct military intervention. This incident involved the hijackers releasing all passengers of all nationalities on board the Air France plane that was bound to Paris from Tel Aviv but hijacked to Entebbe, Uganda, save the Israelis. Through this act of the hijackers, what had been an international crisis affecting several countries became solely Israel’s national concern. This act of the hijackers is said to have brought back to Israel’s collective consciousness, the memory of ‘Selekzia’- the term used by the Nazis to separate Jews from the rest of the crowd before sending the former to harrowing concentration camps.
This, the author seeks to establish, enabled the Israeli government to identify its immediate concern- that of saving the lives of its citizens, regardless of the consequences on its standing in the international community. The result was Operation Thunderbolt- an operation in which a fleet of 4 military aircrafts, in conditions of complete secrecy, took off for far off Uganda to bring back all the Israeli citizens on the midnight of 4th July, 1976 after a brief combat that left all the hijackers and some Ugandan troops dead. The deftness with which the mission was handled can be understood from the fact that the eccentric Ugandan dictator, Idi Amin, could not help praise the efficiency of the Israeli troops even as he was fuming about the loss of lives of Ugandan soldiers that this mission had caused. Incidentally, the exact role played by Idi Amin in this hijacking incident is not clear throughout the book,. There are parts where he comes across as sympathetic to the cause of the hijackers and others where he seems to have made a genuine effort at negotiating on behalf of the hostages.
There is a sense of irony that comes across towards the end because it is clear that Israel, through its meticulously planned and boldly executed rescue mission that lasted for only 90 minutes, made its stance regarding foreign policy and terrorism more eloquently than the Israeli diplomat could during the proceedings that lasted for days on end at the United Nations Security Council. While I was at my seat’s edge while reading about the mission and was taken aback by the precision with which it was executed, I was bored while reading the arguments put forth by the diplomat before the Security Council that come across as lukewarm and unconvincing (to me at least). On reading the entire transcript of the arguments, I could actually understand the cause for some of the ill-will that Israel had to face from other nations at the end of the hearings at the Security Council.
I completed this book in a little over a week while reading it in the morning in the bus on my tryingly long (sigh!) journey to work. Since I cannot help but think about work on my way there, I think this led me to look at the entire rescue operation from an efficiency of execution angle and left me admiring the planning skills of the Israelis. This does not, however, mean that I admire Israel’s military activism, since I have looked at things from an admittedly narrow perspective here. The book did make me wonder if, for a country to become exceptionally efficient militarily or economically, it takes the strong emotion generated by the memory of an incident (the Holocaust in this case) that has affected the individuals of the population at a personal level, only by dint of he or she being part of the bigger group. This also occurred to me when a colleague recently mentioned how it is widely believed that it was the shame of the memory of defeat in WW2 and the eagerness of the Japanese to wipe it out that contributed to Japan’s miraculous turnaround in the post-War years. This, too, seems to corroborate the notion that the psyche of a group is reflective of that of the individuals that constitute it. But then again, there could be a Fallacy of Composition at work somewhere here. It is possible that what may come across as a bold and domineering country in terms of its policies is made up of simple-minded individuals who can be satisfied with a good life and are not keenly ambitious for anything else. There must be millions of pages of printed matter out there about the role of the constituent individuals in influencing the mind of a group and I need to get my hands on some of it. Any recommendations will be deeply appreciated!
The book “90 Minutes at Entebbe” by William Stevenson comprises of two main parts. The first and more significant part narrates the build-up to and the actual execution of one of the most well-planned and successful rescue missions carried out by a government in a foreign territory viz., the mission carried out by Israel in 1976 to rescue over a 100 of its citizens who were held hostage in Uganda by hijackers. The second part contains the transcript of the discussion that took place at the United Nations Security Council during the proceedings against Israel for alleged violation of Uganda’s sovereign rights in the course of the rescue mission.
The book states, while describing the process of planning the rescue mission, that there was one particular incident that convinced all the parties involved in decision-making that Israel must switch gears from diplomatic negotiations with the hijackers to direct military intervention. This incident involved the hijackers releasing all passengers of all nationalities on board the Air France plane that was bound to Paris from Tel Aviv but hijacked to Entebbe, Uganda, save the Israelis. Through this act of the hijackers, what had been an international crisis affecting several countries became solely Israel’s national concern. This act of the hijackers is said to have brought back to Israel’s collective consciousness, the memory of ‘Selekzia’- the term used by the Nazis to separate Jews from the rest of the crowd before sending the former to harrowing concentration camps.
This, the author seeks to establish, enabled the Israeli government to identify its immediate concern- that of saving the lives of its citizens, regardless of the consequences on its standing in the international community. The result was Operation Thunderbolt- an operation in which a fleet of 4 military aircrafts, in conditions of complete secrecy, took off for far off Uganda to bring back all the Israeli citizens on the midnight of 4th July, 1976 after a brief combat that left all the hijackers and some Ugandan troops dead. The deftness with which the mission was handled can be understood from the fact that the eccentric Ugandan dictator, Idi Amin, could not help praise the efficiency of the Israeli troops even as he was fuming about the loss of lives of Ugandan soldiers that this mission had caused. Incidentally, the exact role played by Idi Amin in this hijacking incident is not clear throughout the book,. There are parts where he comes across as sympathetic to the cause of the hijackers and others where he seems to have made a genuine effort at negotiating on behalf of the hostages.
There is a sense of irony that comes across towards the end because it is clear that Israel, through its meticulously planned and boldly executed rescue mission that lasted for only 90 minutes, made its stance regarding foreign policy and terrorism more eloquently than the Israeli diplomat could during the proceedings that lasted for days on end at the United Nations Security Council. While I was at my seat’s edge while reading about the mission and was taken aback by the precision with which it was executed, I was bored while reading the arguments put forth by the diplomat before the Security Council that come across as lukewarm and unconvincing (to me at least). On reading the entire transcript of the arguments, I could actually understand the cause for some of the ill-will that Israel had to face from other nations at the end of the hearings at the Security Council.
I completed this book in a little over a week while reading it in the morning in the bus on my tryingly long (sigh!) journey to work. Since I cannot help but think about work on my way there, I think this led me to look at the entire rescue operation from an efficiency of execution angle and left me admiring the planning skills of the Israelis. This does not, however, mean that I admire Israel’s military activism, since I have looked at things from an admittedly narrow perspective here. The book did make me wonder if, for a country to become exceptionally efficient militarily or economically, it takes the strong emotion generated by the memory of an incident (the Holocaust in this case) that has affected the individuals of the population at a personal level, only by dint of he or she being part of the bigger group. This also occurred to me when a colleague recently mentioned how it is widely believed that it was the shame of the memory of defeat in WW2 and the eagerness of the Japanese to wipe it out that contributed to Japan’s miraculous turnaround in the post-War years. This, too, seems to corroborate the notion that the psyche of a group is reflective of that of the individuals that constitute it. But then again, there could be a Fallacy of Composition at work somewhere here. It is possible that what may come across as a bold and domineering country in terms of its policies is made up of simple-minded individuals who can be satisfied with a good life and are not keenly ambitious for anything else. There must be millions of pages of printed matter out there about the role of the constituent individuals in influencing the mind of a group and I need to get my hands on some of it. Any recommendations will be deeply appreciated!
