The October (Yom Kippur) War • 349THE OCTOBER (YOM KIPPUR) WARThe war's outbreak was signaled by a massive Egyptian air and artillery
(and water cannon) assault on Israel's Bar Lev line east of the Suez Canal,
together with a large-scale Syrian tank invasion of the Golan Heights.
With only 600 officers and soldiers on the Bar Lev line and seventy tanks
guarding the Golan, Israel could not blunt this first Arab assault. Within a
few hours, thousands of Egyptians had crossed the canal. Using their sur¬
face-to-air missiles to down IDF planes, they effectively denied the enemy
its accustomed control of the air; they also overran most of the Bar Lev
line. The Syrians retook Mount Hermon and made inroads into the south¬
ern half of the Golan Heights; they might have invaded Israel itself.
Israel's Unpreparedness
Mobilizing Israel's reserves was quick and easy; on Yom Kippur most re¬
servists were either at home or praying in the synagogues. Soon hundreds
of units were grouping and heading to the two fronts. Had the surprise
attack occurred on any other day, it would have been harder for the IDF
to call up its reserves. Nonetheless, Israel was taken by surprise. Both Is¬
rael and US intelligence had noted the massing of Egyptian and Syrian
troops in the preceding week but had assumed they were on routine ma¬
neuvers. Besides, they doubted that Muslim armies would attack during
Ramadan, Islam's month of fasting. Israel did not want to call up its re¬
serves, having done so at great expense a few months earlier. By the time
it realized that war was inevitable, it had missed the chance to bring its
front line up to the level of strength needed to stop the Arab armies. In an
emergency meeting on the morning of 6 October, the cabinet discussed a
preemptive air strike, but Golda Meir ruled it out, lest Washington cut off
all aid to Israel.
The Course of the Fighting
The Arab assault worked at first but then stopped. The Egyptians could
have pushed deep into Sinai, and the Syrians could have moved down the
Golan Heights into northern Israel. Why did they hold back? Sadat planned
to push the Israelis back deep into the Sinai and then halt his advance. He
did not intend to invade Israel, for he assumed that Washington would in¬
tervene and negotiations would begin while Egypt held an advantage on
the ground.