MISSIONS IMPOSSIBLE

Perhaps the most daring rescue ever attempted was the Entebbe mission carried out in 1976 in Uganda, 4,000 kms. from Israel. 98 Jewish and Israeli hostages were rescued by an Israeli commando squad, and brought back to Israel. Tragically, apart from the three hostages who never made it back, was the leader and hero of the mission IDF officer Yonatan Netanyahu, brother of the present Prime Minister.

Another daring mission took place very recently when the said Prime Minister exposed documents containing over 1,000 kilograms of nuclear information - captured by Israeli commandos - from the most secret and well fortified archives in Iran. 

Speaking of Iran – the world’s most dangerous terrorist power - another very different rescue was carried out from there by Israelis in 1979.

In the Bible, a man named Noah built an ark to save two animals of every species during a major flood that engulfed the planet. A more recent tale centres on a mission to reintroduce to Israel the fauna and flora mentioned in the Bible.

One of the primary mandates of the Nature Reserves Authority, established in 1964, is to preserve and develop nature reserves. The large number of such reserves in existence today represent the entire spectrum of Israel's natural heritage, including Mediterranean forests, seaside landscapes, sand dunes, water landscapes, desert and crater landscapes, and oases.

Special rescue operations, including establishment of feeding stations and nesting sites, have been initiated to protect endangered species. The aim is to reintroduce animal species which once roamed the hills and deserts of the Land of Israel, into their former natural habitats. Amongst these reserves, are two special wildlife reserves - the Hai Bar biblical reserves in the Aravah and on Mount Carmel – which aim to populate Israel with biblical animals.

One extremely rare species, the Persian fallow deer was thought to be hunted to extinction by the 1900s. The deer was rediscovered in Iran in the late 1950’s, and that’s when general Yoffe who was appointed head of the new Israeli Nature and Parks Authority began courting Iranian officials. In 1978, the shah’s brother, Prince Abdol Reza Pahlavi, an avid hunter, agreed to give general Yoffe four fallow deer. Later that year, the general had a heart attack and asked general Yitzhak Segev, Iran’s last military attache to Iran, to take over for him on the ground.

The Wall Street Journal published the story of the dramatic rescue of the deer in an event known as a “deer lift”, on the eve of the Islamic revolution. On November 28, 1978, a zoologist travelled to Teheran from Israel carrying a hidden blow-dart gun and secret orders from general Yoffe. “His mission,” reported the Journal, was “to capture four Persian fallow deer and deliver them to Israel before the Shah’s government collapsed.”

As the general was being rolled onto the airplane on his stretcher, he turned to Segev, clutched his hand, and said, “Segev, you will get me those deer”. At the time, 1,700 Israelis lived in Iran and the clock was ticking — for them and for general Yoffe’s deal for the deer, which would expire with the collapse of the Shah’s government. 

Dispatched to Iran, the Israeli’s, headed by the zoologist, captured the four deer at a game preserve on the Caspian sea, 10 hours from Iran. “There was shooting all over the streets, and here I am, an Israeli general, going to the zoo!” Segev recalled.

After a mad chase, they made it to the airport by the skin of their teeth, nailed the deers’ crates shut and loaded them onto the last flight out of Teheran operated by the Israeli airline El-Al. “We arrived to the airport in Tel Aviv,” Van Grevenbroek, the zoologist said, “unloaded the deer and there's the big general waiting with tears in his eyes.”

In December 2009, the story gained another chapter: Israeli wildlife officials released four descendents of the Iranian deer into the Jerusalem hills. There, nearly 500 fallow deer now roam freely in the wild.