Fighting Back
Stan Andrews and the Birth of the Israeli Air Force
Progressing at the taut pace of an espionage novel, Fighting Back is the engrossing biography of a defiant, passionate Jewish American soldier.
Jeffrey and Craig Weiss’s gripping biography Fighting Back explores the brief yet intrepid life of Stan Andrews, a Jewish American war pilot who fought for Israel during the country’s crucial War of Independence.
Stan Anekstein was born in 1923 to Jewish immigrants who settled in the Bronx. Though he and his siblings were raised without strict religious adherence, his father “glowed with fervor” at the prospect of a Jewish homeland in the Middle East. But before serving in World War II, Anekstein changed his last name to Andrews, having observed the continuing prevalence of antisemitism.
After returning to the postwar US, Andrews became more committed to the defense of Jews and to challenging derisive stereotypes. By 1948, he decided to utilize his South Pacific fighter pilot experience in the emerging State of Israel. He volunteered to join the then-“ragtag” Israeli Air Force.
Contrasting Andrews’s often brash, keen energies with the more reflective and committed attitudes he later developed, the book includes excerpts from his letters to friends and family, along with his various writings and artwork, to flesh out its context. It develops the historical backdrop in engrossing terms, too, covering the volatile geopolitical situation in Palestine before and after Israel’s 1948 declaration of statehood.
With the taut pace of an espionage novel, the book recounts the clandestine transport of fighter planes from then-Czechoslovakia to Ekron. Amid the imposing forces of five Arab nations, it also details how Israel’s multifront war unfolded and how Andrews experienced it. The battles were marked by the strategic “dogfighting” style of air attack used by Andrews and his colleagues, which is said to have foregrounded the Israeli Air Force’s lasting emphasis on skill, speed, and technology.
As a handsome and unmarried military pilot, Andrews attracted a considerable amount of attention from women. Some romances were more intimate and enduring; others were easy conquests or one-night stands. While the book’s inclusion of the latter involvements enhances Andrews’s charismatic “fly boy” image, their recounting is too peripheral to the central story. Still, through its comprehensive coverage of Andrews’s singular life experiences, the book evokes haunting intrigue about what he might have later achieved and the potential evolution of his personal and political beliefs.
Prior to detailing Andrews’s final desert combat mission, the book broadens its scope to cover the efforts of other volunteer flyers and their friendships and conflicts. This revised edition also addresses the October 7, 2023, attacks and the taking of hostages by Hamas, expressing defensive support for Israel as a country continually “under siege.” The complexities of Jewish American identities are raised with nuance, as are changes to the perceptions of Zionism since 1948.
Set amid the tumult of the establishment of the State of Israel, the biography Fighting Back memorializes the defiant sacrifices of a passionate Jewish American soldier.
Reviewed by
Meg Nola
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