October 6 1972: How could they have attacked on the Day of Atonement, our holiest day of the year? By Syria from the North and Egypt from the South with the bulk of the IDF in reserves and few men on duty. When the Syrians attacked the Golan Heights they brought with them 1,400 tanks against our 180, and during Egypt's attack along the Suez Canal there were 800,00 Egyptians to our 437 men guarding the border. Due to their surprise attacks, on Yom Kippur, both were able to cross the cease-fire lines, Egypt crossing the Suez and Syria capturing Mt. Hermon, the primary intelligence-gathering center in all of Israel.October 16 1972: Since my last entry, a lot has transpired in the war effort. I was posted in the North to defend and recapture the Golan Heights. The majority of the soldiers, including myself, believe that many of the IDF reserves were sent theres because of how outnumbered we were on the Northern front. This is what makes it so much more impressive that we recaptured the Golan Heights,except for Mt. Hermon, on the tenth. Then four days later, we pushed the Syrian forces back beyond the cease-fire line and stopped a troop transport heading to assist their soldiers. Finally, today my commanding officer told me that there was a counter offensive by us in the south. Although it was unsuccessful, the effort still managed to destroy two hundred Egyptian tanks. On the second attempt at the attack, we pushed the Egyptians back over the cease-fire line.
October 24 1972: With the EgyptianThird Army surrounded by our Southern troops, a cease-fire with Egypt came into place. On the same day, the group of soldiers I was with crossed the old cease-fire lines into Syrian territory, while Syria made no other advances. Today marks the end of the Yom Kippur War, and once again shows the strength of my people's perseverance in the face of antagonism. What we as Jews have learned from this war is since we are so close to so many enemies we must increase the size of our army and weaponry; not with the idea of attacking our neighbors but to defend the promised land.
