Here’s My Story: Standing Together for Israel

Mr. Ze’ev Ron

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I served in the Israeli Air Force for about twenty-three years, working in various key roles related to electronic aviation systems. In the late ‘70s, about four years after I had been drafted, the commander of Ramat David Airbase, where I was stationed, asked me to join the team tasked with integrating the new F-16 fighter jets, which were replacing our aging Skyhawk and Phantom aircraft.

At that time, a large delegation was preparing to travel to the United States — about one hundred families, along with forty individuals, myself among them — for a period of about eight months. The culmination of a complex logistical process that had taken more than five years, our mission was to study and train on the new aircraft. We would also be overseeing production and customization of their advanced systems for Israeli Air Force needs, conducting test flights and integration procedures, and then ferrying the planes to Israel.

I gladly accepted the offer, and after a period of specialized training, we set out in the early winter of 1979.

Initially, we were stationed at Hill Air Force Base in Utah. Many in the delegation, like myself, came from religious or traditional backgrounds, but this was a wasteland, as far as Judaism was concerned. Although we had no formal synagogue, we organized ourselves as best we could to maintain Jewish life, with communal prayers, holidays, and kosher food.

As Chanukah approached, a fellow serviceman and I reached out to some friends who had previously served with us in the Air Force, who later became observant and were studying at the central Chabad yeshivah at 770. We asked for help obtaining a Torah scroll, tefillin, and mezuzot. It wasn’t easy for them to get permission from the yeshivah, but with the help of Rabbi Yehuda Leib Groner, the Rebbe’s secretary, they managed to secure the necessary approval to come visit us.

They arrived loaded with supplies — not only a Torah scroll, but hundreds of mezuzah scrolls and dozens of pairs of tefillin. We celebrated a beautiful, joyous Chanukah together, and since it went so well, we asked them to come back for Purim. One highlight took place on the night after Purim, when they connected a stereo system to a telephone line and arranged a live broadcast of the Rebbe’s farbrengen back in New York.

After Purim, we left Utah and relocated to Fort Worth, Texas, home to the massive Lockheed Martin production facilities where the F-16s were built. We lived near the plant and learned how the aircraft and its systems were assembled, with the goal of planning the design of the Israeli iteration of the aircraft and to determine the modifications we would need to make in order to integrate them with our own Israeli-developed technologies.

Inspired by the warmth we experienced during the Chabad students’ visits, two other observant colleagues and I decided to travel to New York for Passover. Although I come from a religious home, I had little prior connection to Chabad. But after this initial encounter with the chasidim, I wanted to experience their world more closely.

Once again, we contacted Rabbi Groner, who arranged accommodations for us. When we met him, he asked us if we would like to have a private audience with the Rebbe. My two friends hesitated, but I immediately said yes.

However, when I arrived at 770 at the appointed time, I was very nervous about meeting this figure I had heard so many people talking about. “Who am I to enter the Rebbe’s room?” I thought to myself. I would have been satisfied with just shaking his hand.

When I entered, the Rebbe stood up. He shook my hand and asked for my name, my parents’ names, and a few more personal details, before inquiring about my work in the United States.

I responded by telling him about the Air Force team assigned to receive the new F-16 aircraft. He asked some general questions about the delegation and my role, and then began posing a series of highly specific questions that left me astonished.

As I’ve explained, my field of expertise was in the advanced electronic systems of combat aircraft. The planes manufactured in the United States were designed for the American military, and when the Israeli Air Force acquired them, we would use them as a platform for integrating technologies developed by Israel’s military industries — enhancing their capabilities to meet Israel’s unique defense needs.

All of this involved innovative systems for combat, communication, and defense — the cutting-edge technologies of the time. This allowed the Israeli Air Force to perform tasks that the public was not aware of and was not supposed to know about. The aircraft we worked on had abilities beyond what most people could even imagine. Due to security restrictions, I cannot elaborate further, as much of this remains classified to this day.

Aside from the specialized teams working in this field, it’s doubtful whether there was another person in the world who had any familiarity with these systems forty years ago.

Now, I did know that, in addition to being a great rabbi, the Rebbe had a technical background, having studied engineering and worked in that field, but I never imagined he would have knowledge relevant to aviation systems. And yet, during that audience, he asked precise, targeted questions directly related to my work, demonstrating a remarkable understanding of this highly specialized domain.

More than that, embedded within his questions were suggestions — ideas for improving and expanding the systems’ capabilities — that were truly ahead of their time. He would say things like, “If you do so-and-so, you could achieve such-and-such capability.”

Though I was amazed by his knowledge, at the time, I assumed his comments were made out of theoretical interest or curiosity. I did not grasp their practical significance.

About fifteen years later, when a number of operational demands emerged that required us to upgrade these systems, I suddenly recalled that meeting and the Rebbe’s remarks. It became clear that many of the ideas he had suggested had real tactical implications; in fact, they formed the basis for developments that were eventually implemented.

It is often said that anyone involved in designing such complex systems must think “outside the box.” It is clear to me that the Rebbe excelled in that regard, along with possessing extraordinary long-term vision.

The conversation — conducted mostly in Hebrew, along with English technical terminology — lasted about twenty minutes, but to me it felt like three years. The Rebbe looked directly at me as we spoke, and I felt as though his gaze penetrated deeply. There were chairs in the room, but we both remained standing across the table throughout the entire conversation.

At the end, the Rebbe gave me a dollar, which I have to this day, he shook my hand again, and he blessed me.

I left the room in a state of shock. And in retrospect, after the ideas suggested by the Rebbe have been implemented in practice, I realize just how significant his contribution to Israel’s security was.

A long-time veteran of the Israeli Air Force, Mr. Ze’ev Ron continued to work with computers, as well as in the field of kosher supervision, after concluding his service. He was interviewed in October 2013.