What is significant about the 'Good Fence' is not really the fence at all, but the gate in it. The fence simply marks the international border between Israel and Lebanon. But the gate marks the opening of relations between the citizens of the two countries.
In June 1976, the Israeli government announced that it was opening a section of the border to allow medical and other aid to residents of southern Lebanon who stood in need. The border was opened near Metulla; the gate in the fence marks the crossing point where the medical center was located. Every week for a number of years, the villagers of Southern Lebanon came to this gate and received help from Israeli personnel.
Slowly the programme expanded. Lebanese workers deprived of work in war-torn southern Lebanon began receiving permits to work in northern Israel. Lebanese citizens who had relatives in Israel were allowed to visit them. School children began to visit sites in Israel, and vacation camps were arranged for them. Agricultural aid was given, veterinary help was offered, and commercial ties between Israel and Lebanon were established.
The following report appeared in Davar, an Israeli newspaper, in 1981:
It has been five years since the official opening of the Good Fence. On January 26, 1976, Shimon Peres, then Minister of Defense, announced the existence of the Good Fence and by doing so revealed for the first time a story of human caring. Reporters and residents of Metulla and the surrounding area had suspected for some time that something unusual was going on near the border, but had not succeeded in guessing what it was. When the news was revealed, newspaper and television reporters hurried to the area to send reports to Europe and America.
The human stories behind the pictures kept the media very busy for months: the first Lebanese resident who reached the Good Fence with her son and found an Israel Defense forces soldier who helped her get treatment for her child; the first Lebanese soldier, severely wounded, who was also treated, but who died before he could return; the first armored car that traveled the South Lebanon road near the border, followed by the first tank, filled with militia soldiers waving and making 'V' signs; the first South Lebanese laborers who crossed through to find work in Israeli territory; Sister Enid, who served an important role in the clinic at the Good Fence. The intention was to present Israel to the world as an enlightened nation helping her northern neighbors, who had previously been her enemies and who were now engaged in a civil war whose end could not be predicted.
During the first weeks, the crossing was simply a crooked fence - all you had to do was to crawl beneath it to get to the other side. Alter a while, a more official crossing was established near an I.D.F. post, close to an apple orchard belonging to a resident of Metulla. A hut was set up, which after a while turned into a clinic, followed by other buildings used as waiting rooms and reception areas. The national flag was also not forgotten, of course, and a dirt road was laid down later for the convenience of those coming to the area. Order reigned over the area, and nobody, not even veteran Metulla residents, minded that this point on the uneasy border had turned into an attraction for tourists who came in their thousands from all over the world.
Davar 26/2/81
With the opening of the Good Fence, the northern border of Israel began to take on some of the characteristics of a 'normal' border. From a complete lack of contact - the sealed border of early 1976 - relations warmed considerably. In 1981 alone, some 50,000 Lebanese visited Israel, and in the first four years after the opening of the fence, Israeli doctors treated some 200,000 patients.
But it did not last. The P.L.O. continued to build up their strength in southern Lebanon, and eventually Israel decided to take action to remove the threat. This was 'Operation Peace in the Galilee' or 'The Lebanon War.'
Online publication 1997, as is from: Getting Israel Together: The Galilee, 1986.
(C) former Youth & Hechalutz Department, WZO [Department for Jewish Zionist Education, The Jewish Agency for Israel].