PALMACHIM BEACH, Israel ? By 6.50 a.m. on the morning of May 31 the sun was rising over the Jerusalem ridges. As the C-130s approached the drop zone in the Holy Land the doors whooshed open, sending dust and dazzling sunlight flying through the darkened cabin crowded with dozens of paratrooper veterans from around the world last week. Some were muttering to themselves.

There were undoubtedly a few who had visions of nightmarish malfunctions as they waited for the signal to jump. Others bore idiotic grins that only airborne veterans could manage before hurling oneself out of an aeroplane.

One of them was Col. Chip Waters, a member of the Bermuda Defence Board, who was finally fulfilling a dream. "Jump!", " "they shouted as nationalities dissolved with a simple leap into the naked sky.

Former and active airborne veterans from the United States military joined French, British, Italian, South African, German and Israeli paratroopers in a multinational jump to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the defeat of the Nazis.

"I tried to jump with the Israelis when I was stationed here 23 years ago, but a war broke out and the Israelis had other things on their minds," said Col. Waters, 55, who retired recently from the US Army and moved back to his native Bermuda.

"It's amazing to finally be here and earn my Israeli wings," said Col. Waters.

Shuffling towards the open door, Col. Waters stared through his large glasses toward the orange orchards, sand dunes and wife just 1,200 feet below and prepared for what would be his 75th jump.

He grinned, appeared relaxed as he waited for the green light and order to jump. In 1981, Waters had been sent here to aid in the construction of two air force bases for the Israelis as compensation for giving up the bases in the Sinai which they were handing back to Egypt in a peace treaty.

"I had tried to jump a number of times then, but could never arrange it," he said.

When the occasion came up to mark the victory over the Nazis by jumping with the Israelis, Waters took it. Green light. Go!

He leaped out the door and entered the exclusive realm of the paratrooper. The jolt of the parachute opening (always a second later than expected) followed by the calm of wind whistling softly as the roar of the turbo-props fade and parachutes snap open all around you filling the sky with olive green canopies for a minute of private human flight.

A total of 240 paratroopers participated in "Freedom Jump," including 49 from 10 countries, foreign military attaches, Israeli reservists and men and women in the Israeli standing army. And this journalist. Throughout the morning, as airborne veterans and modern-day Israeli paratroopers floated down onto the warm Palmachim dunes, the crowd at the jump zone grew more enthusiastic. People clapped. Children gawked. Champagne corks flew. IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Moshe Ya'alon jumped last. On the ground he gathered around him the foreign veterans. As they swapped jump stories, Ya'alon signed their parachuting logbooks.

"My one regret is that I never got to fight the Nazis," said retired US Marine Colonel Butch Brydon, 83, a feisty veteran of vicious battles against the Japanese in the Pacific. "I would never have taken any prisoners. I would have killed every damn one of them," said the octogenarian from Philadelphia.

"Well," Ya'alon said. "I hope we won't have to parachute in Europe ever again."

Paratroopers in US-Army issue jungle camouflage contrasted noticeably with the khaki fatigues and desert uniforms of other countries. The Italians were impeccably decked out in chic, dark camouflage uniforms. The most conspicuous group, however, was the Germans in their dull grey jumpsuits. In an informal ceremony, the contingents shouted out their airborne slogans.

"!" shouted the Italians. "Airborne. All the Way!" shouted the Americans. The six German paratroopers then hushed the crowd with their clipped shout: "

"It's a little strange to hear this. I won't deny that," said Brig.-Gen. Yossi Hyman, the IDF's Chief Infantry and Paratrooper officer.

"We are marking 60 years of the defeat of the Nazis and that's important, especially for me since my father survived Bergen Belsen (the Nazi death camp). Every day I live with the Holocaust. It is not simple. We appreciate the German participation, but we can't forget," Hyman said. Yet, for these paratroopers, fraternity comes before politics.

"To hear them tell it, the world's airborne veterans are a veritable family of man and not necessarily people who have a mental problem of wanting to jump out of aeroplanes. The veteran paratroopers included battle-hardened military career men who belonged to such elite combat units as the US Green Berets, but there were also a number of middle-aged, slightly overweight airborne veterans.

One lost his leg in combat in Vietnam and jumped wearing prosthesis. "I didn't want the Israelis to know before hand so they wouldn't let me jump," the US veteran said, asking that his name not be used.

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz was to have been in the first plane, but pulled out at the last minute. One of his predecessors Yitzhak Mordechai did join, as well as some members of the IDF general staff and politicians.

"My wife was more afraid of me coming to Israel than jumping out of a plane," said Capt. Bruno Hattry, 36, of Versailles, France. "My family doesn't even know what I'm doing. They think I'm just on some tour of the Holy Land," said Rick Vattuone, from San Diego.

"I came because I love parachuting and wanted to jump in the Holy Land," said Maj. (res.) Alton Nini, 62, a Vietnam veteran with a white handlebar moustache from Fort Worth, Texas.

Sky-watching spectators began pointing at a blue chute and a paratrooper dangling a Puerto Rican flag. US Army veteran Andre Vergara, 82, was the only veteran paratrooper jumping to have fought Nazis. "I don't forget," the spry veteran recalled on the ground later. "We lost a lot of good boys in Monte Cassino (Italy)."

But he was more interested in talking about parachuting than his record in Europe, Korea and Vietnam where he won a Silver Star and two Bronze Stars for bravery. Over the gate of the military jump school are the words "" ? the way of the suffering ? which is quite appropriate considering that the base is composed of mainly sand pits to practice rolls, mock aircraft to practice boarding, and a 35-meter high jump tower that reputedly gives the sensation of your parachute opening, but actually feels more like being hanged.

The Israeli paratroopers call this tower "Eichman," after the Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichman, who was captured and hanged in 1962. The German paratroopers laughed it off, but it did raise the touchy question of what their fathers and grandfathers did in the war.

"We are very proud to bring our group here," said Lt. (res.) Jugen Zieringer, 39, an engineer whose father was in the Hitler Youth and grandfather died in France as a soldier in the Wehrmacht. "The freedom of Germany was a good thing for me and for Germany."

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, the commander of the IDF's first paratrooper brigade, was represented in the jump by his media adviser Col. (res.) Ra'anan Gissin. He said the choice of marking the victory over the Nazis by an international parachute jump was aimed at shifting the focus from the Holocaust to valour.

"This jump is compensation for the overbearing feeling of being the victim. When we commemorate the Second World War it has always been: the Holocaust, the Victim. We wanted to explain that over 1.5 million Jews fought as soldiers in the war," said Gissin, who also parachuted. Gissin recalled the 33 parachutists from pre-state Palestine who jumped behind enemy lines to fight the Nazis. Most were caught and killed by the Nazis.

"This was the time to put the proper perspective and highlight the acts of valour and not just the acts of extermination," Gissin said. "And this is not just a parachute jump. This is an expression of solidarity with Israel." It was only appropriate that the commemoration be marked by paratroopers and not other branches of the militaries.

"It isn't as if you could gather infantry. What would they do? March around together on a parade ground? In all earnestness, more than commemorating the defeat of the Nazis, more than forging ties with foreign veterans, what this was really all about was men parachuting for the sake of parachuting."