I made my first visit to Israel in November 1950, only two and half years after the state had been established, and just over a year after the bloody struggle for its existence had been suspended with a series of armistices. One of my purposes here is to relive my heady experiences in that first of several visits that I have made to Israel and to record the shape that the state was in at such an early stage of its existence. The contrast between Israel then and Israel now is striking. Like most of my generation of Australian…