Loud and clear : the memoir of an Israeli fighter pilot

A recently retired Israeli Air Force general and its second-highest-scoring fighter ace, Iftach Spector is one of Israel’s living legends. He was the leader of the flight that attacked the USS Liberty in 1967. After the 1967 and 1973 wars, in which he commanded a squadron of fighter-bombers, he rose to head the IAF’s Training and War Lessons Section and later became its the Chief of Operations. He was one of the eight Israeli pilots who attacked Saddam Hussein’s nuclear reactor at Osirik in 1981. In 2003, his career took an even more dramatic turn: he was the senior signatory of the famous “Pilots’ Letter,” in which Spector and 27 other Israeli pilots stated their refusal to bomb targets in Palestine where collateral damage would likely be severe. His maverick conscience is well on display in this artfully written memoir, which is currently a 10-week-and-counting bestseller in Israel and has been licensed in Brazil as well. The son of a family that immigrated to Palestine at the turn of the 20th century, whose father and mother served in the Palmach, Israel’s early clandestine commando force, Spector has written a rich and reflective meditation on loyalty, on what is right and wrong in war, and on his dedication to the idea and reality of the state of Israel. The Pilots’ Letter ended Spector’s military career, but also made him one of the most compelling and celebrated defenders of the conscience of the Jewish state. In that battle, as in his previous battles against Nasser’s MiGs, his mother’s constant lesson to him sustained him: “All from within.” General Spector’s first book, A DREAM IN BLACK AND AZURE (1992; never translated into English), won the Sade Literary Award, given to him personally by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. He has a B.A. in history and Middle East Studies from Tel Aviv University and a masters in political science from UCLA, both with honors.

Iftach Spector-retired Israeli Air Force general and its second-highest-scoring fighter ace-is one of Israel’s living legends. During the Six Day War in June 1967, he led the flight that attacked the U.S. surveillance ship USS Liberty off the Sinai Peninsula, an apparent case of mistaken identity that remains controversial to this day. He was one of the eight Israeli pilots who attacked and destroyed Saddam Hussein’s nuclear reactor at Osirik in 1981. In 2003 he was the senior signatory of the famous 'Pilots’ Letter,' in which General Spector and twenty-seven other Israeli pilots stated their refusal to bomb targets in Palestine where collateral damage would likely be severe. It was the end of his military career. In this vivid memoir, at turns moving and exciting, Spector illuminates what it was like coming of age in the fledging Jewish state of Israel and how he defended both its territory and its conscience as he rose through the ranks as a fighter pilot.

The letter December 1960 Palmach By myself Doubletalk Bastille Day Savage Operation Focus The black flag and the USS Liberty Toledano From inside Nissim Authority Challenge Comradeship Clarity Baboons Model Room for decision Hassan again Wholeheartedly Halo Tammuz A refusenik speaks. A memoir of the author who is one of Israel's living legends - the second-highest scoring fighter ace in the Israeli Air Force, a courageous and much-admired fighter, with a string of successful combat missions to his credit