Amos Yarkoni

Yarkoni died on February 7, 1991, after a prolonged battle with cancer, aged 70.

The incident over Yarkoni’s burial, and the increasing numbers of non-Jewish soldiers (especially after the influx from the former Soviet Union in the early 1990s) has seen the system of burial for non-Jews in Jewish military cemeteries streamlined.

During the Six-Day War (1967), Yarkoni served on the Sinai front. After years of distinguished service, Yarkoni retired from the IDF in 1969.

In 1961, after his recovery, Yarkoni was re-appointed as Commanding Officer of the Shaked Battalion. At the time, the Military Commander commented that "if Moshe Dayan could be the Ramatkal (Chief of General Staff) without an eye, we can have a Battalion Commander with a prosthetic hand".

The unit fielded both Jews and non-Jews, yet when it came to Bedouin recruits, Amos was careful to accept only Bedouins from northern Israel (rather than the south of the country), so that they would not have to fight against their tribal brethren. Yarkoni was based in the Negev for many years, and was involved in countless operations. He was wounded many times, and his body was peppered with bullet and shrapnel wounds. He lost his right hand in combat in November 1959, and was badly wounded in the leg in an explosion.

In 1955, the frequency and effectiveness of Fedayeen attacks being launched from the Egyptian-controlled Gaza Strip and the Jordanian-controlled Hebron Hills area against isolated Israeli civilian communities increased, and the IDF searched for new ways to eliminate the threat. Rehavam Zeevi, then a senior officer in the Southern Command and in charge of securing the isolated towns of the Jordan Valley, recommended Amos Yarkoni for the task. Yarkoni and Zeevi had met some years earlier, when serving in a joint minorities/Jewish unit, and remained close friends for the rest of their lives.

Yarkoni served in a number of units during the War of Independence, eventually settling in the Minorities Unit, and proved himself to be an excellent tracker and patrolman, continually astounding his fellow soldiers with his abilities. In 1953, Yarkoni passed the Officer's Course (his main concern being that the exam was in Hebrew), and went on to become the Commanding Officer of the Minorities Unit.

Abd el-Majid kept in touch with Dayan up until the War of Independence. In December 1947, as the war raged, he placed his destiny with the Jews, joining the nascent IDF and changing his name to Amos Yarkoni.

In 1936, at the age of 16, he joined a band which sabotaged the Trans-Arabian Pipeline (Tapline), an oil pipeline running from the Iraqi oilfields to Haifa while Palestine was under British Administration (after Israeli independence, the Tapline was redirected to Sidon, Lebanon). Due to an internal disagreement within the band, Abd el-Majid fled to a Jewish area of Palestine, where he was sheltered by Jews. There, he made contacts in the Haganah through Moshe Dayan.

Sgan aluf Amos Yarkoni (Hebrew: עמוס ירקוני) (born 1 June 1920 — died 7 February 1991), was an officer in the Israel Defense Forces and one of six Israeli Arabs to have received the IDF's third highest decoration, the Medal of Distinguished Service. He was the first commander of the Shaked Reconnaissance Battalion of Israel's Southern command.