Maurice Wiseberg was one of many Manchester Jews who served in the Israel Air Force. As a youngster, Maurice had been an ardent Zionist. After his brother Baron volunteered early in 1948 as a pilot, Maurice arrived in Israel in June of the same year, during a truce with the Arabs. He traveled via Marseilles, paying his own way. He fully expected that the war would be lost, and went only because, as he put it, “I would never have been able to live with myself if I had not gone.” His immediate family only found out that he had volunteered when he reached France. From there he sailed to Israel in the “Negbah,” and was delighted to see the name of the ship in Hebrew characters.
In Israel, Maurice (known as Naphtali ben Zvi) met his brother Baron (known as Dov), commander of the Ramat David airfield. After attending a wedding to which he had been invited, Naphtali drove a group of boisterous airmen down the Carmel Road in Haifa; one of them was the future president of Israel, Ezer Weizman. Over the next two years, Naphtali’s position as “Inspector General of Transport (Israel Air Force)” meant that he was responsible for transport at several airfields in the north. Improvisation was the order of the day: vehicles and materials were in short supply; and the steering wheels of jeeps would be chained to fences, only to be later found discarded, the “borrowed” jeeps then being steered with large spanners. The first language of both the navy and air force was English, everyone was on a first-name basis, and Naphtali got to know many of the other volunteers from America, South Africa, Canada, England, and elsewhere. Looking back, he marvels at Israel’s victory:
“If the Arabs had fought with their full might, we could have lost the war. They were trained and helped by the British, and the Arab Legion was well-armed. The Arabs arrived at a blockhouse staffed with newly arrived Jewish immigrants, who promptly hoisted a white flag. The tanks continued on to Netanya and fired ranging shots. Then, for no apparent reason, they turned around and left. Israel could have been cut in two… we could have lost at any time.”
Maurice Wiseberg was awarded ribbons recognizing his contributions to the War of Independence by the Israeli Government, as well as from the Haganah.
Source: www.art.man.ac.uk