This week we will be discussing a spy story in Israel's early years that left a nasty mark on the young state, with reverberations for the following 20 years. It was called the "Lavon Affair," after Defense Minister Pinhas Lavon, "Esek HaBish" or "The Mishap". It revolved around nearly a dozen highly dedicated young Egyptian Jews who were asked, and agreed to spy for Israel against the country in which they were born. Why they were caught and more or less abandoned by Israel to incarceration and for a while, torture in Egypt's prisons to be finally released only 14 years later is a question that has never been answered. This story, known as "Operation Susannah," is thus one of idealism and self-sacrifice, as well as abandonment and an unwillingness to take responsibility. Due to strict censorship in Israel, few knew more than in the year 1954, Israeli underground cells had been operating in Egypt which were subsequently uncovered by the Egyptian police. The young Jews were arrested and forced to undergo a show trial. Two people, Yosef Carmon and Max (Meir) Binnet, committed suicide in prison due to the brutal interrogation methods of the Egyptian police. Two more, Dr. Moshe Marzouk of Cairo and Shmuel Azar of Alexandria, were sentenced to death and hanged in a Cairo prison. Israel glorified them as martyrs.