Al Aridi, Amin

Son of-Gamila and Salah, was born in 1923 to a Druze family in the town of Baysour, Lebanon. When he immigrated, he joined the Syrian army. From there he moved to the Druze battalion of Shakib and the father who was a captain in the Syrian colonial army and deserted him. The captain collected around 400-500 fighters from the Druze. The soldiers of the Druze Mountain were known as fierce fighters and their battalion was called Jabal al-Druze (Jabal Druze). The battalion was actually a regiment of mercenaries and arrived in Palestine during the War of Independence at the request of Kaukji, commander of the “Rescue Army.” The soldiers took part in the attack on Ramat Yohanan in the Zevulun Valley. After the failure of the attack, sixty of the battalion’s soldiers deserted and Amin was one of them. Following an agreement between the leaders of the Druze community in Israel and the heads of the Haganah and Moshe Dayan at the head, 60 of them joined the Israel Defense Forces and formed the foundation for the Minorities Unit. During Operation Hiram to liberate the Western Galilee, the Druze unit fought under the Oded Brigade, which operated in the western sector of the operation. On the night of 28-29 October our forces attacked Tarshiha and the Druze unit was assigned to conquer the village of Yanuh. The attack on Tarshiha did not succeed, and the forces were ordered to retreat. The Druze unit took control of Yanu, but due to faults in the connection, it did not accept the withdrawal order. In the morning Kaukji’s forces recovered and with the help of some villagers attacked the unit and was forced to retreat. Amin fell in battle on October 29, 1948, and the next day he was buried on the battlefield. Four years later, a Druze military cemetery was established in the village of Usfiya on Mount Carmel, and Amin’s body was brought with the rest of the fallen to an eternal rest in an impressive ceremony