By EFREM SIGEL (??)
1. Ralph in Tent Camp -- Camp a few miles below Nahariah, November 1948 2. Ralph & his Halftrack - St. Jean, near Akko, August 1948
3. Fortress Malkiya - Ralph with the soldiers in his halftrack, just after the capture of "Malkiya Fortress, a former British police station on the Lebanese border. This was virtually the end of Operation Hiram, which captured the northern Galilee for Israel in the last week of October, 1948. Ralph is soldier standing on left end. Soldier standing second from right is Morton Levinson of Boston, Massachusetts. Mort was youngest American volunteer in Israeli army; Ralph was second youngest. Both ended up on same halftrack.
"Soldier kneeling, center, is Ivan Goode, 20 years old, from Chicago. All other soldiers shown (infantry troops carried on Ralph's halftrack) are Palestinian Jews or new immigrants (Holocaust survivors).
"Malkiya was last major battle in Operation Hiram, although the 79th Armored Battalion, did sweep to the east for another day and stopped at a tiny village along the border called Kadesh (mentioned in the Bible) - it was one of the two or three cities of "refuge" mentioned in the Tanach. Operation Hiram was the last major battle of the Israeli army in the north, and the last one of the war involving the 79th. The entire northern Galilee now belonged to Israel. I am proud that I played a role (though very, very minor) in that legacy."
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