World: Israel's Fugitive Flotilla

NOT since the Bismarck has there been such a sea hunt. In the teeth of a gale that whipped the azure Mediterranean into an ash-gray cauldron of 20-foot waves, five Israeli-manned gunboats scooted to Haifa last week on a 3,000-mile dash from the northern French port of Cherbourg. At various points, they were tracked by French reconnaissance planes, an R.A.F. Canberra from Malta, Soviet tankers, the radar forests of the U.S. Sixth Fleet, television cameramen and even Italian fishermen. From a distance, the world watched with emotions ranging from amusement to outrage. In a twist on old-fashioned gunboat diplomacy, Israel had retrieved $10 million worth of naval vessels, circumventing France's embargo on arms sales to the Jewish state and producing a political uproar that had several capitals buzzing.

The uproar began when Paris discovered that the gunboats and their Israeli crews had taken French leave of their fitting-out berths in Cherbourg. The 240-ton, 148-ft. boats had been ordered by the Israelis before Charles de Gaulle, seeking to enhance French influence among the Arab states, tightened his arms embargo on Israel in January 1969. Once the gunboats were completed, the French allowed Israeli sailors to take them out of port, but only on familiarization runs and with limited fuel.

A Wide Berth. On Christmas Eve, as they trudged along the quays to midnight Mass, Cherbourgeois observed that the gunboat crews were busily stowing supplies. Some young Israelis were out scouring the city for stocks of everything from cold tablets and vitamin-C supplements to American cigarettes. Some of them, with broad grins, explained that they were leaving to celebrate Christmas in Israel.

Christmas morning, in single file and with no lights, the fleet of five slipped past the Fort de l'Est breakwater, turned south and moved across the Bay of Biscay. They maintained radio silence until they reached Gibraltar 64 hours later. There they split up to prevent Soviet Mediterranean fleet units from boxing them in and herding them to an unfriendly port. Off Sicily, tankers were waiting to refuel the boats. Israeli naval units, possibly including two submarines, had also converged to serve as escorts. Unwilling to risk a pasting, Egyptian fighters and warships gave the fugitive flotilla a wide berth.

Prayers and Jokes. Shielded by a storm for most of the final lap, the Navy gray vessels rendezvoused outside Haifa and on New Year's Eve made their way into port as hundreds of Israelis cheered and ships' sirens split the air. Prayers of thanksgiving were recited in synagogues. Diners toasted the crewmen and exchanged gunboat jokes, some of them wordplays on the name of General Mordechai ("Moka") Limon, Israel's chief of arms purchasing in Europe and the man in charge of the Cherbourg escape. One joke had France's President Georges Pompidou walking into a French cafe and gloomily telling a waiter: "I'll have coffee without moka and my wife will have tea without limon."