What was going on when I was born?

While reports surfaced last week about secret exchanges between Israel and the Soviet Union, a far more intense and lucrative relationship has been quietly developing between Israel and China, according to Israeli officials. The Chinese in the last seven months have shown an increasing appetite for Israeli skills in agriculture, solar energy, manufacturing, advanced technology, robotics, construction, road building and arms manufacturing, say Israeli officials familiar with the trade. Some deals have already been struck and many others are pending at one stage or another, according to recent Israeli press accounts.

If I was a male leader, I'd be considered part of the youth crowd, like Gary Hart.'' - Eleanor Smeal, 45 years old, elected president of the National Organization for Women. [A8:4.]

It took a while - longer than usual because one of the candidates waited longer than usual to confirm that he really was a candidate. But the mayoral campaign is finally under way, and this weekend, with seven weeks to go before the Sept. 10 primary, the three major Democratic candidates for mayor went out and did what candidates always do on hot New York City weekends in election years. They went to where the people are. They went to beach clubs that were miles from beaches, and pool clubs where swimming is an afterthought. They went to parks and to churches, to television studios and outdoor concerts. They traveled from the Bronx to Staten Island, from sand dunes by the sea to block parties in central Harlem.

Governor Cuomo and his former law firm, through suit and countersuit, are locked in a court dispute over the distribution of legal fees that could reach several million dollars. Lawyers for Mr. Cuomo and the law firm said it was unclear when the case would be resolved. Pretrial motions are now being heard by Justice Leonard E. Yoswein, the administrative judge of the State Supreme Court in Brooklyn.

In the first introduction of a major home computer system since I.B.M. brought out its ill-fated PCjr two years ago, Commodore International Ltd. is expected to show its long-awaited Amiga machine tomorrow night, hoping the machine's dazzling color graphics and stereo sound capability will stem Commodore's multimillion-dollar losses. For Commodore, the new Amiga marks a sharp change in strategy. It will carry a base price of about $1,400, seven times more expensive than the Commodore 64 home computer that put the company's logotype in millions of living rooms. Company officials say it is aimed not only at home users but small businesses and students, making it a competitor of Apple Computer Inc.'s 18-month-old Macintosh.

Oil ministers are assembling here for Monday's critical OPEC meeting apparently still as divided over how to respond to weakening oil prices and a declining market share as they were at their inconclusive meeting in Vienna three weeks ago. Saudi Arabia's oil minister, Sheik Ahmed Zaki Yamani, during a brief talk today with reporters, repeated his call for lower prices for Saudi heavy crude, saying there ''definitely'' must be cuts.

The Yankees know the season could come to an abrupt halt on Aug. 6, the date the players are threatening to go on strike. So they are making it their own deadline of sorts. ''We might as well be in first place by then,'' Dave Winfield said late today. ''There might not even be a World Series. Who knows?''

Maybe the students of mass behavior can explain it, or maybe the students of Met behavior can explain it. To Dave Johnson, it is best explained by the cyclical fluctuations of the sine curve in mathematics. To Howard Johnson, it is probably that ''hitters are dependent on each other.'' To Dale Murphy of the Atlanta Braves, it is simply ''strange.'' Whatever it is, the Mets have done it. For three months, they were a team slumbering at bat, a team hitting only .229 at its best and ranking 11th in a 12-team league, a team that had no .300 hitters but a bunch of .200 hitters and that lived by the strong young arms of its pitchers.

The Senate majority leader, Bob Dole, said today that he hoped President Reagan, now that he was home from the hospital, would ''step into the breach'' and help the Senate and House reach a compromise on the budget and on a plan to cut the Federal deficit. ''The President's got to be a player,'' said Mr. Dole, a Kansas Republican. He added that the Republicans would make a ''serious, credible counteroffer'' on the budget to House Democrats this week.

An article July 13 about a disputed scientific report by Columbia University researchers misidentified a co-author of the report. He is Dr. Robert B. Mellins.

The second quarter was a period of strong earnings for most of the nation's major bank holding companies, despite a continuing high level of loan losses. Twelve of the 15 largest bank holding companies showed increases in per-share net income over the second quarter of 1984. The increases ranged from 75 percent for Pittsburgh's Mellon Bank Corporation, to 7.1 for the Crocker National Corporation of San Francisco, which is still trying to overcome serious problems of recent years.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff have recommended against United States ratification of internationally agreed revisions of the 1949 Geneva Conventions on treatment of combatants and war victims, according to Administration officials. The intent of the revisions is to enhance humane treatment of combatants and civilians during war. But the main concern of the Joint Chiefs is that the revisions, or protocols, as they are known, would have the effect of legitimizing national liberation movements and terrorists, granting them combatant and prisoner-of-war status.