Fighting Back

Stan Andrews and the Birth of the Israeli Air Force

Jeffrey Weiss, Craig Weiss

• Publisher: Wicked Son
• Year: 2022
• eBook ISBN:
  9781637583128
• Topic: Theologie & Religion
• Subtopic: Religiöse Biographien

Fighting Back is the story of Stan Andrews, an assimilated American Jew and World War II veteran who became one of the first fighter pilots in the history of the Israeli Air Force. "Jeffrey andCraigWeiss have uncovered the story of a Jewish hero in the mold of a Leon Uris character. Readers will enjoy trying to keep up with Stan Andrews—a typical Jewish New Yorker turned daring combat pilot—as he chases history from the air force planes of the United States and the nascent state of Israel."
–Dan Senor, New York Times bestselling co-author of Start-Up Nation: The Story of Israel's Economic Miracle. "Absorbing and beautifully written, Fighting Back tells the thrilling story of an unlikely American Jewish hero. At a time when some American Jews are distancing themselves from the Jewish state, this book is a powerful reminder of the deep roots connecting American Jewry and Israel."
–Yossi Klein Halevi, senior fellow, Shalom Hartman Institute, author, Letters to My Palestinian Neighbor In 1948, Stan Andrews left a comfortable postwar life in Los Angeles to travel to the war-torn Middle East, where a four-front Arab invasion threatened to destroy the newly-declared State of Israel. There he joined the Israeli Air Force and became one of its first fighter pilots. Andrews was an unexpected volunteer for the fight for a Jewish state. He was many things—an artist, writer, assimilated Jew, ladies' man, pilot, and combat veteran of the Pacific War. He had previously been aloof from the struggle for Jewish independence but found himself so roused by the anti-Semitism of 1940s America that he decided to go to Israel and risk everything. Stan made the most of his time in Israel, serving in fighter and bomber squadrons and leaving his mark on an Israeli Air Force that has since become the stuff of legend.

Table of contents

• Fighting Back
• Copyright
• Contents
• Prologue
• Authors’ Note—Why Stan
• Authors’ Note on the Use of “Palestine” and “Palestinian”
• Chapter One: Pretty Boy
• Chapter Two: The Poor Man’s Harvard
• Chapter Three: An Air Force Man
• Chapter Four: To the Philippines
• Chapter Five: Air Apache
• Chapter Six: Prayer Meetings and New Targets
• Chapter Seven: California
• Chapter Eight: To All Concerned
• Chapter Nine: New Relationships
• Chapter Ten: Palestine
• Chapter Eleven: Fighting Back
• Chapter Twelve: Seeing the Sites
• Chapter Thirteen: Fighter Pilots
• Chapter Fourteen: The 101 Squadron
• Chapter Fifteen: The Truce
• Chapter Sixteen: El-Arish
• Chapter Seventeen: Major Andre Stanek
• Chapter Eighteen: Beaufighters
• Chapter Nineteen: Lost Glory
• Chapter Twenty: Hope
• Chapter Twenty-One: Operation Yoav
• Chapter Twenty-Two: Day of Battle
• Chapter Twenty-Three: Change of Status
• Chapter Twenty-Four: Aftermath
• Chapter Twenty-Five: Birth of an Air Force
• Chapter Twenty-Six: The Search for Stan
• Chapter Twenty-Seven: Reflections
• Note About the Chapter Quotations: Acknowledgments
• Endnotes