In 1951 Yaalon changed his European-sounding surname "Berger" in favor of "Yaalon", a combination of two of his favorite words: "Yael" (meaning "little antelope", the Hebrew translation of his mother's Czech maiden name "Jellinek"), and "Aliyah" ('ascension' in Hebrew, referring to the immigration of Jews to Israel). Yaalon moved "Hardy" to a middle name position, and thus became known as "Dan H. Yaalon". Shortly after, at a meeting about geological surveying and mapping, Yaalon's colleagues proposed naming some mountains and wadis after themselves. The official naming committee of that time approved the idea, hence the names of "Mt. Ya’alon" and "Wadi Ya'alon" in the southern Arava region. Around fifteen years later a young Nahal group (a paramilitary Israel Defense Forces program that combines military service and the establishment of agricultural settlements) that settled in the eastern foothills of Mt. Ya'alon, adopted "Ya'alon" as their group name. One of the group members, Moshe Smilansky, himself looking for a Hebrew version of his surname, adopted the group name as his own and changed his name to Moshe Ya'alon. He went on to become the Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces (2002–2005) and subsequently the Israeli Minister of Defense (2013–2016).
