Operation Volcano (1955 Israeli Raid)

The Al-Auja (Nitzana) Demilitarized Zone was an area whose sovereignty had not been resolved under the 1949 armistice arrangements between Israel and Egypt.[4] Both sides failed to comply fully with the agreement: Israel had established a Nahal outpost in the zone that functioned as a military post, while Egypt had established military positions along the border and inside the zone.[4] This mutual non-compliance kept the area a persistent flashpoint during the early 1950s.

The period leading up to the operation was one of worsening border incidents and broader disputes over the armistice framework.[4] Israel's reprisal policy was shaped in part by the formation of a special elite unit under Ariel Sharon to counter cross-border infiltration, pillage, and murder; retaliation was conceived as a deterrent but carried the risk of escalation.[5] A historical account describes the doctrine as striking the countries from which attackers came in an effort to pressure neighboring governments to prevent further incursions.[6] Benny Morris's study characterizes the broader pattern of raiding and counter-raiding as one that helped define Israeli-Arab relations over the following decades.[7]

On October 28, 1955, an Israeli reprisal raid struck Kuntilla, a police station south of the demilitarized zone on Egyptian soil, in what the Israel State Archives describes as a broad reprisal operation.[4] Several days later, Israel mounted another action in the Nitzana demilitarized zone.[4]

The raid described in later accounts targeted Egyptian positions in the Nitzana area in autumn 1955.[3] In a retrospective recollection, veteran Yishai Zimmerman said Egypt had moved a battalion into the demilitarized zone and entrenched there. He recalled that, after Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion gave the Egyptians a week to withdraw and they did not comply, an augmented paratrooper brigade attacked and captured the position in approximately half an hour.[8]

The assault force included paratrooper Battalion 890, commanded by Ariel Sharon.[3] Company commanders included Meir Har-Zion and Rafael Eitan, known as “Raful.”[3] Ynet reports that the Israeli force captured an Egyptian position and took 40 prisoners, while six IDF soldiers were killed.[3] The Israel State Archives includes a photograph captioned “Retaliatory operation – conquest of Nitzana” and dated November 2, while its narrative says the action in Nitzana occurred overnight into November 3; it provides no detailed operational narrative or casualty figures for that engagement.[4]

During the withdrawal, reserve officer Katcha was wounded in the abdomen by Egyptian gunfire and shrapnel.[3] His evacuation presented a choice between a long, winding route and a shorter route through a minefield.[3] Brigade demolitions officer Yermi Bardanov arranged the 40 Egyptian prisoners in groups of three as though they would be marched into the minefield. A captive Egyptian officer, faced with this prospect, then revealed a safe path across it.[3]

Katcha was subsequently taken to an Israeli field clinic, where he was mistakenly assessed as dead and placed on a stretcher among the fallen.[3] A passing officer noticed movement in his leg. Sharon, described as the last to leave the battlefield, found him and ordered his transfer to a hospital in Beersheba.[3] A formal complaint was later filed against Sharon for removing Katcha from the clinic without waiting for medical authorization. Sharon was investigated but received praise for saving his friend's life, and Katcha spent approximately ten months in hospital and rehabilitation.[3]

Following the Kuntilla and Nitzana operations, forceful United Nations intervention helped restore “some degree of quiet” to the area.[4] An official Israeli memorial page lists Operation Volcano among the reprisal operations of the period.[2] The later Operation Olive Leaves, also known as Operation Kinneret, was conducted on December 10–11, 1955, against fortified Syrian positions near the northeastern shore of the Sea of Galilee.[9]

Veteran Yishai Zimmerman, who recalled fighting with an Uzi during the battle, received the Medal of Courage for his role.[8] Ynet's retrospective profile also recounts Sharon's rescue of Katcha as part of the enduring personal bond between the two men.[3]

The name “Operation Volcano” appears in the Jewish Virtual Library glossary and on an official Israeli memorial page.[1][2] The Israel State Archives volume does not use that name in its narrative of the Kuntilla and Nitzana actions; its photograph instead labels the Nitzana episode “Retaliatory operation – conquest of Nitzana.”[4] Benny Morris's study lists a raid against Sabha among the IDF reprisal operations of the period but does not identify it as Operation Volcano or provide its date, forces, commander, or casualties.[7]

Historian Ahron Bregman judged that Israel's broader retaliatory doctrine neither curbed infiltration nor eased public insecurity.[6] Morris's study describes Arab infiltration and Israeli retaliation as core phenomena of the period and among the principal causes leading to Israel's participation in the 1956 Sinai campaign.[7]

The central uncertainty is whether all later uses of the name “Operation Volcano” refer to the same action recorded in the archival narrative. The Jewish Virtual Library uses the name for a November 2 attack on As-Sabha.[1] Ynet uses it for an autumn 1955 reprisal operation against Egyptian forces in the Nitzana area.[3] The Israel State Archives describes the Kuntilla and Nitzana actions without applying the name to either one.[4]

The Archives narrative places the Nitzana action overnight into November 3, while its photograph caption dates the “conquest of Nitzana” to November 2.[4] The difference may reflect the overnight timing, but the source does not explain it. The Archives also states that both Israel and Egypt failed to comply fully with the armistice arrangements in the demilitarized zone.[4]

Zimmerman's account of an Egyptian battalion entering the zone and refusing a one-week ultimatum is a retrospective recollection rather than an independently corroborated contemporary account, and the reviewed sources provide no Egyptian account of that episode.[8] Casualty figures are also incomplete: Ynet reports six IDF soldiers killed and 40 Egyptian prisoners taken but provides no Egyptian casualty total.[3]