164
CAIRO TO DAMASCUS
Not far from Beersheba I saw my first Jewish communal settlement, Kibbutz Beit Eshel. With its well-tended orchards
and green trees, Beit Eshel rose like an oasis from the bleak,
dust-packed Negev desert around it. A kibbutz was always
conspicuous by its water tower, silo, and modern farm buildings, and contrasted sharply with the squalor of Arab villages.
Moustafa pointed at Bert Eshel with awe. "We have attacked it, but the Jews are well armed. They have built a
Maginot Line around their place and fight you from under
the ground. They are cowards." Later, I was to see astonishing
examples of Jewish ingenuity—and understand exactly what
Moustafa meant. "After May 15 Beit Eshel will be ours. The
Egyptian army will make it one with the desert."
"Insh'allah! Insh'allah! With God's help," I said.
Surrounded by Arabs and desert, a lone sentry in the
wilderness, I could not imagine how Beit Eshel could ever
hold out against massed troops and heavy artillery.1 Inquiring
discreetly, I learned that the kibbutz had already taken a toll
of attacking Arabs. It was supplied by a daring airlift and
sometimes by food and ammunition convoys that boldly ran
the gauntlet of Arab soldiers all the way from coastal Tel
Aviv, seventy miles across the desert.
I don't know how our boys arranged it, but next day 6