Page 484 - Conflitti Militari e Popolazioni Civili - Tomo I

484 XXXIV Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

pulled until the handle snapped. At 40 meters from the minesweeper he jumped, still attached
to his boat. Finally at 30 meters from his target he jostled free - just a few seconds before his
boat scored a direct hit on the minesweeper, severely damage it. 21
The sinking of the Farouk was Israel’s most dramatic naval victory in the War of Inde-
pendence. Some five hundred Egyptian sailors perished, many from that nation’s upper class.
However, the event received little formal publicity at the time: Israel wanted to draw no at-
tention to its new-secret weapon, the Egyptians hoped to keep the Israeli triumph a secret.
Nonetheless, news of the enormous loss reached the Egyptian public and for nearly a year the
Egyptian navy had difficulty recruiting new sailors.
Ben-Nun and his four-man crew were picked up in the water and taken safely back to
base. They had accomplished an incredible mission. The IDF General Staff was ecstatic
about the sinking of the Emir Farouk, though they only authorized the press to release word
about the ship’s sinking - not how it was accomplished. Israeli Naval special warfare was
now on the map. It had scored a remarkable victory. This unit, soon to be called “Shayetet
13” or “Flotilla 13” would be heard from again and again in the years to come. It becomes
th
the direct predecessor of the Italian 10 Flotilla. For the time being, however, “Ben-Nun and
company were secretive celebrities in the upper echelons of power in the State of Israel. Ben-
Nun and his warriors were granted a private audience with ‘The Old Man”, Prime Minister
Ben-Gurion, who was adamant about hearing every little detail about the raid…
Yochay Ben-Nun was awarded Israel’s highest award for courage under fire for com-
manding the sinking operation of the Emir Farouk, the flagship of the Egyptian Navy.

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21 alex tal, Naval Operations during the Independence War, Tel Aviv, 2002, p. 169-171.