PLANNING a long-overdue visit to Israel? Well, good for you. But why restrict yourself to the usual centres like Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Netanya or Herzlia? Instead, be a bit more adventurous... and head north. For the Golan Heights has much to offer. And soon it will have even more.
For a trail of places on the Heights is set to commemorate the country’s most famous spy, Eli Cohen.
The Eli Cohen Trail will stretch several kilometres and have eight landmarks situated at spots Cohen visited with the Syrian military.
The legendary spy, known as “our man in Damascus”, spied on the Syrian military establishment for four years, befriending top-level Syrian officials and celebrities under the alias Kamel Amin Thaabet.
After being discovered, he was tortured by the Syrians before being executed in Damascus on May 18, 1965. His body was never returned to Israel.
His name has become synonymous with heroism. The information he provided was fundamental to Israel’s decisive victory in the 1967 Six-Day War.
The great achievements of the war — control of the strategic plateau, control of water resources and control of a large area for settlement — are attributed in part to the information Cohen obtained.
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