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Why History Matters: The 1967 Six-Day War

(Huffington Post) David Harris - 43 years ago this week, the Six-Day War broke out. In June 1967, there was no state of Palestine. It didn't exist and never had. Its creation, proposed by the UN in 1947, was rejected by the Arab world because it also meant the establishment of a Jewish state alongside. The West Bank and eastern Jerusalem were in Jordanian hands. Violating solemn agreements, Jordan denied Jews access to their holiest places in eastern Jerusalem and destroyed many of those sites. The Arab world could have created a Palestinian state in the West Bank, eastern Jerusalem, and Gaza, but they didn't. There wasn't even discussion about it. In the weeks leading up to the Six-Day War, Egyptian and Syrian leaders repeatedly declared that war was coming and their objective was to wipe Israel off the map. Just 22 years after the Holocaust, another enemy spoke about the extermination of Jews. Egypt's President Nasser demanded that UN peacekeeping forces in the area, in place for the previous decade to prevent conflict, be removed. Shamefully, the UN complied. Egypt blocked Israeli shipping lanes in the Red Sea. The U.S. spoke about joining with other countries to break the blockade, but did not act. After winning the war of self-defense, Israel hoped that its newly-acquired territories would be the basis of a land-for-peace accord. Feelers were sent out. The formal response came on September 1, 1967, when the Arab Summit Conference declared in Khartoum: "No peace, no recognition, no negotiations" with Israel. The 1967 war was an act of self-defense in the face of blood-curdling threats to vanquish the Jewish state. All wars have consequences, but the Arab aggressors have failed to take responsibility for the actions they instigated. The writer is executive director of the American Jewish Committee.
2011-06-10 00:00:00
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