Very few Jews, living in Israel or elsewhere foresaw the disastrous consequences of these two acts when they were done. But this looks at events only from the point of view of political analysis. The real issue is that the last forty years spent in the shadow of the Six Day War has only made clear what happens when a people, particularly its leaders, spit at a miracle. In 1967, and indeed even into 1973, this nation had land, a sense of security, and a joie de vivre that one could feel in the festive air. The history of the last 33 years at least is the history of how this nation has lost all it gained in the Six Day War, along with the joie de vivre it had possessed when going into battle in June, 1967.
"A sinister cabal of superior writers."
Article comments
1 - MBD
“I jumped out of bed when I heard my mother's voice. Listening to the 7:00 a.m. news, I heard CBS Radio's Israel correspondent Jay Bushinski say that Israel Defense Forces had advanced 10 miles into Egyptian territory and had destroyed the entire Egyptian Air Force.”
Strange.
The rest of this country heard that Israeli Mirage jets had flown over the Mediterranean at low level to escape radar detection and strafed and bombed the Egyptian air force on the ground.
Sort of like what the Japanese did at Pearl Harbor.
2 - Dr Dreadful
There was a very interesting clickable guide to the Six-Day War on the BBC News website today, with maps showing the day-by-day tactical movements of the armies and the major engagements, with some notes explaining the background to the war and the political machinations that were going on.
I have a music tape somewhere given to me by a friend (she's visited Israel numerous times and keeps urging me to go - I will someday) called "Shma Yisroel". I can't remember the name of the band but they sound a bit like an Israeli version of Clannad. One of the tracks has a recording of a radio broadcast from the commander of the first tank to enter the Old City. Even though it's in Hebrew (which is, excuse the cliche, Greek to me!), it's quite powerful stuff when combined with the music and the momentousness of that event in history.
I wasn't around at the time (well, technically I was, but was too busy filling my nappies to pay much attention to the newspapers) so it's hard for me to fully appreciate the significance of those events as they impacted the world back then. But it's fascinating to review those times from today's perspective and understand how the Jewish state came to assume the form it has today.
3 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
MBD,
By 15:00 Israel Time (which is when I heard the 07:00 news in Brooklyn), the Mirages strafing and bombing Egyptian airbases was old news. The NEW news was the advance of the IDF into Gaza.
And what we did was nothing like the Japs, who did one attack on Hawaii and then invaded American territory close to (their) home - and then lost.
We beat the shit out of the Arabs. We pummeled their asses and made them run like scared rabbits.
But have a little patience. This is a four part series of articles - and it is not filled with bragging at all...
4 - STM
If only all wars would last six days. Less would be better, though ...
None would be a definite bonus.
5 - STM
I have a story on this too, Ruve. I was in Baghdad in 1967 (the summer of love!), and my father was privy to information regarding the Arab-Israeli build-up so we left, and I had to leave my first love - an American blonde named Regan Lenz - behind forever as we fled temporarily to the UK via Amsterdam.
However, my old man returned soon after and as was his usual form, managed to leave Iraq on day SEVEN of the Six-Day War by dressing as an Arab and catching a bus to the Iranian border. I believe he shared his seat with a chicken and a goat. Some other travellers took their chances on the roof.
He returned again soon after at the request of the Iraqi govt to finish a project, and lacking a regular visa but in possession of a piece of paper authorising his return, was arrested in Beirut on suspicion of being a spy (Israeli, one would suspect, although I thought they were on Israel's side then) and held at gunpoint, jailed for a time and interrogated at great length.
Finally, he did make it back to Baghdad, only to have to leave again as the Baathists began plotting their takeover.
When I asked him about all this a few years back, his reply was laconic at best. He discussed it simply as he'd been taking the 243 bus to North Sydney or catching a flight to Melbourne.
When I asked if he was a spy, he said, with a wicked glint in his eye: "No ... but you'll never really know, will you?"
He's dead now, and I don't, but given he was sent to Nigeria during the Biafran war, and to Northern Ireland, China, Poland, Indonesia, Malaya, Pakistan and all points of the compass north, south, east and west, often in times of crisis, I can only guess at what he was really up to.
6 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Dr. D.
I think you may have your tapes mixed up a tad. The Old City was taken from the south, from the Lion's Gate. Soldiers advanced on foot because almost all of the Old City is narrow alleys that a tank wouldn't fit into.
But, there is a dramatic Voice of Israel tape (in Hebrew) of the first soldiers ascending the Temple Mount shouting "har habáyit b'yadénu" - the Temple Mount is in our hands! The tape includes Rav Goren, z"l, pronouncing a blessing over the Temple Mount, among other things...
From what I understand, the first part of Jerusalem to be liberated from the Arabs was Armon haNetziv (just north of where I used to live) a site that overlooks the Valley of G-d's Judgment. After securing the overlook of Armon haNetziv (where there is a monument to the soldiers who fell in this effort), soldiers raced north to get to the southern edge of the Old (walled) City.
7 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Stan,
There are many very interesting personal stories about this war.
One fellow I know was a soldier stationed in an intelligence unit in the US armed forces in West Berlin in June, 1967. His commander told him to pack his gear because he was going into a war zone. He knew of no war zones that the Americans were involved in in Europe, and figured that he was to be sent to Vietnam.
Anxious, he went to his commander to try to get further details. He was told he was going to Cyprus. This mystified him completely. The Turks and the Greeks were not fighting at all.
When he arrived at a base in Cyprus the next day, he and his unit were told to Hebraicize their names, and put them up on the office doors. Apparently, they were to coordinate American intervention in the fighting if it lasted for ten days, because the American military estimated that the Israelis could last no longer than that in a combat situation.
The original plan had been to intervene to maintain the military status quo, but the Israeli attack and invasion of the Sinai and liberation of Jerusalem had changed all that. Nevertheless, the Americans were going to intervene somehow once they figured the Israelis would need the help.
Since my friend was the only Jew in the unit, he taught the others in the unit how to Hebraicize their names. They waited for the appointed day to arrive, as they forwarded orders for trucks, equipage and the like. But the IDF finished the job in six days and my friend went back to his base in West Berlin.
8 - moonraven
Well, this bird was nowhere near the fray.
I was in San Francisco, it was the summer of love and my husband was ready to wring my neck because I had a crush on a skinny guitar player whose name was, if I remember correctly, Carlos Santana.
9 - troll
(STM - here's a somewhat off topic question fer ya as a student of your country's history:
why did Australia abstain from the recommendation process of UNSCOP when it came to the question of partition vrs federalism in '47 - ?)
10 - Dr Dreadful
Thanks for clarifying, Ruvy.
I'm not sure where the tape is (probably buried in my car somewhere) but I'm sure I remember the sleeve notes saying something about a tank. The recording was definitely from the Six-Day War and not from any of the other ones. The ascent of the Temple Mount sounds as if it might be about right though.
11 - STM
I'm not 100 per cent sure on that one troll but I believe there was division within the government here over the issue, and our connection to Britain at that time was still strong.
Perhaps they felt it safest not to put any money on it either way.
Moonraven, welcome back. Haight/Ashbury?
12 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
This was received in my e-mail and confirms (again) my view that the State is disintegrating. Only recently the head of the German Jewish community called for the end of Jewish immigration to Israel. These people, truly fools as well as traitors, have signed their own death warrants. If I say that I do not believe they will live to see the Redemption, this is not out of hate for a fellow Jew, or out of desire to see their deaths - far from me to wish for such a thing! It is rather out of an objective understanding of what they have done. They have rejected the Land Covenant inherent in the Israelite faith. And for this, they will pay. The full article can be viewed in original form at the IMRA website.
[Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA: Burg - who was a leading Israeli leftist, makes his living now by exploiting the connections he made overseas when he headed the Jewish Agency. Burg insists on drawing all the perks available to him
as a former head of the Jewish Agency - including car and staff.]
Burg: Defining Israel as a Jewish state is the key to its end
By Ari Shavit, Haaretz Correspondent Last update - 06:41 07/06/2007
Avraham Burg, former Knesset speaker and former head of the Jewish Agency says "to define the State of Israel as a Jewish state is the key to
its end.
"A Jewish state is explosive. It's dynamite." In an interview in Haaretz Weekend Magazine, he said that he is in favor of abrogating the Law of
Return and calls on everyone who can to obtain a foreign passport.
Burg, who was interviewed on the occasion of the publication of his book "Defeating Hitler" said "the strategic mistake of Zionism was to annul the alternatives. Israeliness has only body; it doesn't have soul."
"Judaism always prepared alternatives," says Burg, who three years after leaving Israeli politics is now a citizen of France and a successful
businessman.
"Just as there was something astonishing about German Jewry, in America, too, they created the potential for something astonishing. They created a situation in which the goy can be my father and my mother and my son and my partner," Burg says.
His book ruminates about Israel and Zionism, compares Israel and Germany, harshly criticizes Eichmann's hanging, reflects on Judaism in the age
of globalization and remembers his father's house.
Burg said he started his book in mourning for the loss of Israel.
"During most of the writing the book's title was 'Hitler Won.' But slowly I discovered the layer of not everything being lost. And I discovered my
father as a representative of German Jewry that was ahead of its time. These two themes nourished the book from beginning to end."
13 - Graham McKnight
MBD, Ruvy is correct in his claim that the Egyptian air force was wiped out with a matter of hours.
14 - moonraven
No, STM: Richmond district.
15 - troll
(Stan - I found an 'official' answer to my question in Australia's historical documents...I'd post the URL but it appears to contain a banned word so I quote the document in full:
*Hood to Department of External Affairs
Cablegram UNSCOP 12 GENEVA, 28 August 1947, 6.37 p.m.
IMMEDIATE SECRET
1. Our UNSCOP.9. Views in Committee have now finally emerged as follows-for partition plus economic union seven, for federation three (India, Iran, Yugoslavia), without commitment to either
proposal Australia. The Australian attitude was outlined as follows-that in accordance with the terms of reference and with undoubted intention of the special assembly the primary obligation of the committee was that of a recording, reporting and fact-finding body, that even had there been something like unanimity on
the particular solution the Assembly would have been entitled to receive in the report a discussion of other possible solutions, that in the present situation such considerations applied even more strongly and that it was essential that the report should present to the Assembly the whole range of arguments covered in
the committee's discussions in such form as to enable the Assembly to review the question as a whole and to make its own determination. We stated that in these circumstances we saw no necessity to indicate now a preference for one proposed arrangement over another; the final determination could only be in the hands of the Assembly which alone was the competent body to
decide what was workable and what was not workable in the light of all factors including political factors many of which were beyond the committee's scope.
2. There was a strong move on the part of some members including the chairman to let the matter go forward in the form of a majority and [a] minority report but with the help of the Netherlands and Czechoslovakia we succeeded in getting adopted the
view that the report would go forward as a whole with a full discussion of the two main alternatives on which the delegates, if they so desired, could record their preference in the body of the report.
3. The report will also contain a chapter setting out certain matters on which common ground agreement has been found in the committee, for example, the termination of mandate and granting of independence at the earliest practicable date, rejection of extreme solutions, United Nations responsibility during a
transitional period, holy places and religious interests,
increased but controlled Jewish immigration in transitional period, special action by the Assembly with regard to Jewish displaced persons as a whole as a means of alleviating the Palestine problem.
4. I recommend that we be enabled to sign the report in the above form adding if necessary a statement reserving our position with regard to the two main alternative proposals on the lines referred to in paragraph two. The report will probably come up for
signature on 1st September so should be glad to receive any comments immediately.*
looks like Hood wanted to reserve power to the Assembly where Australia voted in favor of partition)
16 - moonraven
If Israel IS de-countrified, as it should be as a result of its routinely perpetrating crimes against humanity, maybe Australia would be a good place to put the Jewish contingent--lots of space, apparently--and they can go back to a sipler time of making melons grow in the desert.
17 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Parts III and IV of my series are finally published. I invite you all to read both and feel free to comment. As I said, many of your questions about Zionism, and why it is a dying institution will be answered there.
However, I suggest you read part III AND the comment which I added at the end. The editor saw fit to gut the article, and I had to restore the parts he gutted to make clear what the article was talking about...
18 - STM
"maybe Australia would be a good place to put the Jewish contingent--lots of space, apparently--and they can go back to a simpler time of making melons grow in the desert."
Yep, everyone's welcome here if they can cut it, and there IS plenty of room, no doubt about that. I'm sure Israelis would feel right at home, except the dust is red, not brown. The drought looks to be breaking, though. It has been pissing down here, with rainfall all over.
Kids in the bush who've never seen rain have marvelled at the wonders of the windscreen-wiper.
19 - moonraven
Great!
I look forward to eating those melons from the Kibbutzim Outback.
20 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
"Yep, everyone's welcome here if they can cut it, and there IS plenty of room, no doubt about that. I'm sure Israelis would feel right at home, except the dust is red, not brown."
Thanks, Stan - but no thanks. Australia is probably a wonderful place to live - you're rightfully proud of the land you live in; but this is HOME. And it is great to finally be home.