FROM OUR ARCHIVES
50 YEARS AGO
On October 13, 1966, The Jerusalem Post reported that Israel asked for the UN Security Council to meet in emergency session to discuss the Syrian latest acts of aggression. Foreign minister Abba Eban said he would address the council when it is convened to present Israeli charges.
Syrian chief of staff Maj.-Gen. Ahmed Sweidani said Syria would begin arming civilian volunteers “within a few days” to make “the Syrian people one army from the Israeli to the Turkish border.” He indicated that Arab terrorist raids on Israel were carried out by “Palestinian” refugees. He called such raids legal actions by destitute Arab citizens, and added “it is our duty to support these actions, not check them.” According to Le Monde’s Beirut correspondent Syrians were impatiently waiting for a “renewed version of the 1956 Sinai campaign” after their latest attacks on Israel.
An Israeli patrol, mistaking its way in heavy mist, crossed the Jordan border and came under Jordanian fire. One soldier was lightly wounded. In Amman, a Jordanian military spokesman said that its forces suffered one casualty.
The season’s first heavy rain ushered in a “winter look” from Metulla to Eilat.
25 YEARS AGO
On October 13, 1991, The Jerusalem Post reported that US secretary of state James Baker and the Palestinians reached a compromise agreement, which defused the explosive issue of an east Jerusalem delegate at the opening of the Middle East peace conference, in a way that would apparently be acceptable to Israel. It was agreed that while Israel that it would not accept a Palestinian with an east Jerusalem identity card, the Abu Dis and Eizariya residents would be eligible.
King Hussein of Jordan said the US had assured him that Palestinian self-government might be achieved one year after the opening of Arab-Israeli peace talks.
Two soldiers were killed and 11 wounded when an Arab terrorist crashed a stolen van into a crowded hitchhiking post at the Tel Hashomer junction. The suspect, a 25-year-old from the village of Kibya, near Ramallah, planned the act “as revenge for the events at Temple Mount a year ago.”
A 15-year-old Swiss tourist was killed by a lightning bolt in the Gulf of Eilat, as he swam near Coral Island.
10 YEARS AGO
On October 13, 2006, The Jerusalem Post reported that a special ministerial meeting endorsed Israel’s diplomatic approach to halting the Iranian Islamic republic’s quest to become a nuclear power. Prime minister Ehud Olmert, who convened the discussion, stressed that efforts against Iran were being led by the international community. “Israel supports the UN Security Council’s measures against Iran,” he said, backing the strategy of sanctions and a compromise that would have allowed Iran to continue to develop its nuclear capabilities.
Sources close to Olmert accused defense minister Amir Peretz of ordering the immediate evacuation of some 80 illegal outposts in an attempt to prevent the addition of Avigdor Liberman’s Israel Beytenu party to the coalition.
Former Indian defense minister George Fernandes told the Post in an interview that he had approved the $268 million deal from Israel in 2000 because he feared an immediate war with Pakistan.
The dream of “black gold” was revived by spurts of oil near the Dead Sea. There was significance in the new find by Ginko Oil and Gas Exploration and its partner Lapidoth Israel Oil Prospectors, which reactivated an old drilling site to reveal a minor pocket. It showed that oil does flow there.
—Alexander Zvielli