Operation Balak

[3] "Looking back, I have neither failed nor succeeded, the fate of most of us," Levett reflected later, "but I shall leave the world a better place than when I entered it because I helped found the State of Israel."

"[4] "Recruited in March 1948 by emissaries in Europe of the Haganah, the Jewish fighting force in Palestine, Mr. Levett was viewed with a healthy dose of suspicion," noted the Times.

[4] In June Levett was given the task of flying Avia S-199 fighters, supplied by Czechoslovakia from the Czechoslovak Air Force airfield (code-named Etzion or Zebra by Israelis) near Žatec (seventy-five kilometers west of Prague) to Ekron airfield (formerly RAF Aqir) close to Rehovot now Tel Nof Israeli Air Force Base.

The airfield near Žatec had been put at disposal of the Haganah by a new Czechoslovak foreign minister Vladimír Clementis (a prominent Slovak member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia) and was under the command of Yehuda Ben Chorin.

Operation Balak lasted three months, during which time Levett managed to airlift tons of arms, ammunition and personnel.