Parshas Matos-Maasei 5784
- Torah Tavlin
- Aug 2, 2024
- 4 min read
וחצית את המלקוח בין תפשי המלחמה היצאים לצבא ובין כל העדה ... (לא-כז)
In early 1963, the new Mossad head, Meir Amit, consulted a number of military men to spell out Mossad objectives, and ask what they felt would be the agency’s most valuable contribution to Israeli security. An Air Force commander told him, to gain access to the Soviet plane Mig-21. The Russians began introducing the MiG-21 into the Middle East in 1961. By 1963, when Amit took over the Mossad, it was an essential part of the Egyptian, Syrian and Iraqi Air Forces arsenals. The Russians introduced the aircraft under maximum secrecy and security. Few in the West knew much about the MiG-21 - but feared its capabilities. The Israeli efforts to accumulate information on potential enemy plans and equipment was of course vital for her national defense. But the Mossad concluded that it would be best to try and persuade an Arab pilot to defect to Israel.
The Israelis got a free tip-off from an unexpected source without initiating a thing; an Iraqi Jew by the name of Joseph indicated that if Israel wanted a MiG-21, he could probably arrange it. Late in 1964 he contacted Israeli officials in Tehran and Europe. Israel soon made contact - through Joseph - with a Maronite Christian pilot in the Iraqi Air Force. The family felt disaffected with their lot. The father felt frustrated by the increasing pressure the Iraqi government was imposing on him and other Maronite Christians. He mentioned to Joseph that he would like to leave the country. Meir Amit contacted a top agent in Baghdad to draw out the Iraqi air force pilot who was a distant relative of Joseph’s family. Munir Redfa was a patriotic Iraqi, but he “found himself in violent disagreement with the current war being waged by his government against the minority Kurdish tribesmen in northern Iraq.” Plus, he had been passed over as commander of his squadron, he was stationed far from his home in Baghdad, and “was allowed to fly only with small fuel tanks, because he was a Christian.” The agent exploited the connection and “suggested that Munir fly to Israel where friends might be of service to him.” Munir wanted a million dollars and a guarantee that his family would be taken safely out of Iraq. When he got his guarantee, his mind was made up.
Mordecai Hod, the commander of the Israeli Air Force, met Munir when he arrived in Israel and went over the escape plan with him. He would have to pick a day when he would be permitted to go on a long-range flight. Munir Redfa set his date for August 16, 1966. He carried on his business as usual that day as best he could with his co-workers. He asked the Iraqi ground crew to fill his tanks to capacity, something the Russian advisors generally had to sign for. But the Iraqis disliked the Russian advisers, who seemed to hold them in contempt. This worked to Munir’s benefit. As a star pilot, they were happy to obey his orders, rather than those of the Russians. Munir took off. After heading out towards Baghdad, he veered off in the direction of Israel. The ground crew radar picked up a blip on the screen heading west and they frantically radioed him to turn around. He didn’t. They warned him they would shoot him down. He turned the radio off. Hundreds of miles away, Israeli radar picked up the blip on the screen. They sent up a squad of IAF Mirages to escort him. He went through his prearranged signals and they flew alongside him to a secret base deep in the Negev Desert. That same day, Mossad agents in Iraq picked up the remaining members of the pilot’s family, who had left Baghdad ostensibly to have a picnic. They were driven to the Iranian border and guided across by anti-Iraqi Kurdish guerrillas. Safely in Iran, a helicopter collected them and flew them to an airfield, from where an airplane took them to Israel. Newspapers all over the world carried the sensational story of an Iraqi pilot who had defected with his MiG-21 to Israel. The Russians were furious. Their air power secrets were seriously compromised. They threatened the Israelis ferociously and demanded the plane back. The Israelis, of course, did not return the plane.
For Israel the benefit of possession of the MiG-21 was even more immediate. In the June 1967 War, the Israeli Air Force commanded overwhelming air superiority over the Syrian and Egyptian MiG’s. Not a little had to do with the fact that a MiG had been flown to Israel less than a year earlier with the connivance of Israeli Intelligence. Munir Redfa came to Israel with his family and was given a new job and a new life. The Iraqi Jew Joseph did not come to Israel, preferring to remain loyal from afar in his native Iraq, both to the family he loved and the country on which he bestowed his new-found concern and affections.