Col. Alex Ziloni, one of the founders of the Air Force, passed away yesterday (Friday) at the age of 107. Ziloni was the first Chief of Staff of the Air Service, established the Tel Nof base and was its first commander, and even devised the design of the Air Force flag.
Ziloni was born in 1916 in Poland, immigrated to Israel as a child, and served in the "Haganah".
In World War II, he studied engineering in England, enlisted in the British Air Force and became the commander of a technical squadron in its ranks.
After the war, he returned to Israel and was the chief of staff of the Israeli Air Service, which preceded the Air Force, and was even the first Israeli commander of the Tel Nof base.
In addition, he was one of the pioneers of the technical formation of the Air Force and served in a variety of other positions.
After holding 12 different positions in the Air Force, the late Alex Ziloni was discharged with the rank of lieutenant colonel and lived in Tel Aviv.
In 2020, at the age of 105, he was promoted to the rank of Colonel by the Chief of Staff at the time, Lt. Col. (resp.) Aviv Kochavi.
Air Force Commander Major General Norkin and Chief of Staff Lt. Col. Kochavi awarding Ziloni the rank of colonel, 2021, photo: courtesy of the IDF spokesperson
The commander of the Air Force, Major General Tomer Bar, said goodbye to Ziloni: "The Air Force bows its head and shares in the grief of the Ziloni family. Alex was one of the founding fathers of the air force. A wise, brave and professional man, who with his special talent worked to establish the air service, and as its chief of staff, worked in his own pioneering way The road to the establishment of the first force building, which helped the success of the corps in the War of Independence. After the establishment of the state, Alex served as the first commander of the Tel Nof base and led the base to many victories in the first years of the corps. We will continue to perpetuate his glorious legacy and embrace his family. May his memory be blessed." .
This is how Ziloni established the Air Force
About a month ago, we brought the story of the founding of the Air Force, through the eyes of Alex Ziloni, in the supplement "Sheshav".
On a fateful day in January 1948, Ziloni, then 32 years old, found in a pile of papers placed on his desk, one document that made him jump: "It was news about the mandate authorities' intention to sell 20 Auster planes that were defined as 'scrap', and were stored at Akir Airport (later - Tel Nof) ", he told.
Immediately upon reading the document, Ziloni did not hesitate for a moment and began to plan a dangerous operation that required extraordinary composure and whose chances of success were doubtful.
In the first step, he flew south in a light plane to Akir Airport, where he examined the "scrap" in question, and immediately flew back to Tel Aviv.
The second stage of the plan was implemented the very next morning: Ziloni arrived at the British Army's logistics headquarters located on King George Street in Jerusalem, and introduced himself as a representative of the Jewish Agency, so to speak, "interested in scrap metal for civilian needs."
Commander of the Air Force Major General Tomer Bar, photo: Yossi Zeliger
The British officer was suspicious and asked questions, but Ziloni kept his cool.
The British demanded 10,000 pounds and Ziloni offered 7,500.
The Brit hesitated and finally said: "I agree on two conditions: one that the money will be on my desk within an hour, and the other that I can purchase one of the planes from the agency in a few months."
Ziloni replied "it will be fine", went out into the street and started running quickly towards the institutions building to keep his word and bring the required money on time.
In January 2023, it was exactly 75 years since the start of the implementation of the third phase of Alex Ziloni's pioneering, daring and ground-breaking project, in which the Auster aircraft were secretly improved and assembled in the cellars of the Templar Winery in Sharon.
On January 21-22, 1948, two convoys of ten trucks arrived one after the other at the abandoned Templar winery complex of Sharona, carrying in their open cargo compartments the same 20 old "Oster" planes, which were called "Primus".
"The whole operation was conducted in great secrecy," Avi Moshe Segal, the curator of the Air Force Museum in Hasteri, told our reporter, adding that the tiny planes were quickly unloaded from the trucks, put on carts into the production halls of the expansive winery, and from there taken down to the depths of the wine cellars.
There they were awaited by "Max Payne" high school students and some technical experts, who taught the youth woodwork, fabric and paint on airplanes.
Another technical team handled the wings of the planes that were placed in the yard of the abandoned colony.
At the end of two months of intensive work carried out according to Ziloni's exact orders, which was carried out non-stop and under great tension lest they be caught by the British, the technical teams managed to complete the job of training 14 Auster planes from among the 20 scraps.
Every fuselage that the work on was completed was brought up from the depths of the basement, loaded onto a truck next to the wings and sent to "Sde Tel Aviv" (later Sde Dov).
From the moment the "Austrians" entered service, they attacked Arab gangs, evacuated casualties from remote settlements, gathered intelligence, and allowed the pilots to develop skills for the invasion of Arab armies, on May 15, 1948.
Thanks to those "Austrians", two new squadrons were established, the "Negev Squadron" and the "Galile Squadron", and the shrunken "Tel Aviv" squadron was expanded.
Identical numbers were written on the tails of the planes, so as not to arouse the suspicion of the British.
"Looking back," concluded Avi Moshe Segal, who was part of the site restoration council team to save the Sharona colony from destruction, and also significantly assisted this investigation, "the operation of assembling the Auster aircraft in the Sharona winery is considered a defining event, marking the beginning of the path of the Air Force and the magnificent technical array His".
At the end of two days of fascinating interviews, our reporter asked Col. Ziloni what he had to say to the country in preparation for the 75th year of its founding, and this is how he answered: "The words of the exile anthem, which express expectation and hope for the future in which we will be a 'free people in our country', must be changed, when We are actually already a free and proud people living safely in their country."
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