Yom Kippur War battle site now hosts 'bunker challenges'

For 36 hours in October 1973 in the southern Golan Heights, 28 Israeli soldiers hid in a small concrete bunker, surrounded on all sides by Syrian forces, anticipating rescue or death. They had no food or water or medical supplies, and most were wounded. Their only ammunition was a hand grenade that each one held.

The dormant volcanic mound called Tel Saki, 1,300 meters from the Syrian border, was the site of one of the most critical battles of the Yom Kippur War, and one of the most dramatic sagas.

Beginning October 6, Yom Kippur, Syria launched a well-planned attack to retake the Golan Heights, the rocky plateau north and east of the Sea of Galilee that Israel had captured in the 1967 Six Day War. In the initial stages of the 1973 war for which Israel was inexplicably unready, Israeli troops were completely unprepared. Vastly outnumbered, Israeli forces fought bloody battles throughout the Heights in an attempt to delay the Syrian advance so reserves could mobilize.

After a long day of intense battles, the troops were out of ammunition, had no night vision equipment, and had suffered heavy casualties; 32 soldiers lost their lives, and almost everyone else was wounded. Then, 28 survivors – paratroopers and armored brigade soldiers – made their way to the small concrete bunker on Tel Saki, where they were soon trapped.

One of the soldiers volunteered to surrender to the Syrians. He emerged from the bunker claiming to the Syrians that he was the last soldier alive. Thinking that he was a pilot and thus a valuable prisoner, the Syrians took him to Damascus. When a severely wounded soldier inside the bunker began to moan, the soldiers were ordered to strangle him so the Syrians outside would not hear him. How this order was ingeniously defied is one of the many startling stories in the Tel Saki saga.

Twice convoys of reserve units were sent to free the trapped soldiers but both attempts were stymied by enemy fire that killed most of the troops. The third liberation attempt succeeded.

(A 2020 fictionalized TV version of the story of Tel Saki is portrayed in the HBO series “Valley of Tears” – [Sha’at Neila in Hebrew, the name of the final prayer recited on Yom Kippur before the fast ends]. A two-part Israel Story podcast deals with the events and their aftermath.)

FIFTY YEARS later, vestiges of the war are still visible around the small but strategically positioned hill. On the approach road to Tel Saki, there are wreckages of the destroyed tanks and personnel carriers. Some are Russian-made vehicles that had been captured from the Syrians in the 1967 Six Day War, then overhauled for Israeli use. (One of the stranger parts of the battle is that the Israelis and the Syrians were using the same type of armored vehicles.) At the site there is a remnant of the original bunker; a large stone memorial to the 32 soldiers who lost their lives in the battle; and a high flagpole flying a huge Israeli flag that is visible from afar in all directions.

One of the paratroopers in the special operation liberation force that managed to stem the Syrians’ progress in the Golan was Dan Almagor, then a 19-year-old explosives expert. Today a 70-year-old investment banker living in Florida, Almagor established the US non-profit Friendship and Heritage Foundation of the Tel Saki Warriors, through which he has financed most of the site renovations and the impressive stone monument.

“At the end of the battle, I made a promise to my fallen friends that I would make sure that their story of incredible courage and strength and friendship will be remembered,” Almagor declared in a telephone interview. He underwrote the 2009 production of the documentary about Tel Saki, titled “The Battle Over the Soul”.

Telling the story of Tel Saki on site

On the site, relating the painful drama of the battle of Tel Saki and the nearly miraculous story of the survivors, is 35-year-old Maj. (Res.) Yaakov Selavan. An active reserve-duty officer in the 188th Armored Brigade, the same IDF unit stationed on the Golan in 1973, Selavan is the founder of a company that annually hosts tens of thousands of visitors to Tel Saki.

In engrossing detail, he takes participants into the bunker, explaining the dilemmas and ethical issues soldiers might face – then and today. “I’ve learned that a personal story is the greatest tool to inspire and open the doors to people’s hearts – that is what we do with our army experiences,” he states.

Selavan carries out the program for the soldiers as part of his army reserve duty, and for non-military visitors via his own company called Slingshot, that includes other staff members. The educational initiative offers a full range of experiences, including an escape room and laser tag. Often veterans of the 1973 war join in the briefings to participants.

The activities take place in a reinforced bunker that was built after the 1973 war opposite the original bunker. Shaped like a mound with a system of connecting tunnels, it served as an IDF military base for many years until it was abandoned and neglected. Selavan convinced the army to renovate it to be used for educational purposes.

After his introductory lecture, participants take part in two types of Bunker Challenges.

“Escape room games became very popular a few years ago, but no one else has an escape room in a real military bunker,” he explains. One activity involves the use of flashlights; and another, for larger groups, is carried out in total darkness. The goal in both is to reach a certain point in the bunker, a memorial room, and both involve teamwork.

“We understood that we can’t just talk to people,” Selavan explains. “You need to give them an experience they’ll remember, especially the young generation, something they can take with them: dealing with the unknown and overcoming fear. A lot goes on regarding group dynamics and leadership,” he adds.

An activity tailored to college students and similar to Israeli army exercises, takes place in an urban warfare training zone. A complicated and challenging exercise, it involves ethical dilemmas as much as anything else. “Their mission is to shoot down rocket launchers that are firing into Israel, and suddenly they’re being shot at from a hospital,” Selavan says. “This is still a game, these are lasers not real weapons, but still there is a mission. What do you do?”

To complicate matters further, a woman with a baby suddenly appears, as well as a journalist filming a video.

“We don’t have the right answers; the goal is to ask the right question. We’re not trying to depict the Israeli army as full of angels that make no mistakes; we’re saying that if you criticize, please understand the point of view, the circumstances, what it means to be under pressure,” explains Selavan.

YAIR JABLINOWITZ, marketing manager for the Israel Destination travel agency which brings many groups of North American teenagers to Israel in summer-oriented programs, admits that when they first considered taking young people to Tel Saki, they weren’t sure how they would react.

“It’s their first time in Israel, they’re young, perhaps some of them would freak out. But it proved to be exactly the opposite. Part of it is Yaakov’s charisma, tailoring his presentation for every type of audience,” says Jablinowitz.

The experience is especially challenging when participants are re-enacting what the soldiers went through, who were only slightly older than them at the time, some still teens themselves. “You’re walking through this bunker in the dark, you don’t know where you are, it’s scary, you have no idea if there are Syrian soldiers on the other side. He really makes this history alive and interesting and inspiring,” adds Jablinowitz.

Selavan does 80 days a year of army reserve service as a motivational speaker. For soldiers and draftees, there is a somewhat different approach. “The activities are the same, but it’s a lot about feeling the group,” he says. “The jokes and references can be different, and the dilemmas I present will be different. I have special missions in the escape room that are meant only for soldiers.”

Selavan was born and raised in Jerusalem to parents who moved to Israel from the US. He entered the IDF in 2007, joining the 188th Armored Brigade, the same unit that was shattered during the first hours of the fighting at Tel Saki in 1973, a fact that begins to explain his connection with the site and the battle.

In a story he calls “Captain Underpants,” a reference to the popular series of children’s novels of the same name, he relates his experiences as a combatant in the 2014 war in Gaza called Operation Protective Edge. The seven-week conflict claimed the lives of 74 Israeli soldiers and civilians and more than 2,000 Palestinians.

At the end of the fighting, while still stationed in Gaza, he opened a package in one of the many shipments of donations sent to the troops. “After nearly two weeks of active combat, without a shower or a change of underwear, I found myself desperately searching for something that would give me a good sense of hygiene…I will never forget the moment of opening a box and finding the bag with a pair of underwear.”

A sticker on the package read: “To the fighters of the 188th, A loving hug from the Brigade fighters in the Yom Kippur War 1973.”

“Suddenly it made it real. We were part of the same story, and felt I needed to tell others about the story,” he declares, saying that it became part of his life mission to tell this story in a way that would be meaningful and memorable without being teachy or condescending.

In his briefing to visitors at Tel Saki today, Selavan relates his own experience in the 2014 war. “The 19-year-old soldier whose commander is hit and makes the decision to take over the tank to enter Gaza to save his friend is like the 19-year-old soldier in the Golan Heights in 1973 who understood that if he didn’t take over, it’s the end. The guys who went through the experience in 1973 (who sent us the underpants) is not what I experienced; and if there’s another conflict, it’s also going to be nothing like what I experienced. Still, it’s worth telling these stories because of their value; in every situation, we always must deal with ethical dilemmas.”

The most recent addition to the Tel Saki site is the newly constructed Friendship Trail, which replaces the original dirt path. It is scheduled to be officially dedicated this year on September 27, the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War.

Various memorabilia have been placed along the path, including historic armored vehicles that have been brought up to Tel Saki from around the country. A specially commissioned 13-meter high metal statue of two friends hugging each other signifies the three rescue attempts.

The Friendship Trail is the most recent project Dan Almagor has undertaken to commemorate Tel Saki. Since the Friendship and Heritage Foundation was established, as many as 100,000 people have visited the site. The experience “presents some of the decisions we made as 19-20-year-old boys,” says Almagor. “How the values of friendship can persevere, how responsibility can change the fate of a nation. So many young people and IDF soldiers have visited the site. This is our biggest success.”

When Selavan visited Tel Saki for the first time following his army service, accompanying a veteran from the 1973 battle, he says he understood the long-term psychological effect the experience had on the soldiers. “When the soldiers finally were able to leave the bunker, they didn’t live happily ever after. They still live the battle,” he comments.

As a review in Haaretz of the Valley of Tears series states: “The deeply traumatic moment in Israel’s brief history shattered the perception of invincibility that had mushroomed since the crushing victory over the Syrians, Egyptians, and Jordanians during the Six Day War in June 1967.”

How deeply post-traumatic stress disorder permeates so many lives was evident when the series was televised in Israel. Each episode was followed by a studio discussion with veterans, former soldiers sometimes opening up for the first time about their war experiences. The country’s mental health support organizations reported a spike in calls to their hotlines in the months the show aired from former soldiers of all ages, including a significant number of veterans of the Yom Kippur War. ■

Yaakov Selavan’s company’s website is https://slingshot.co.il/