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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Israel
Index
Fearing these actions to be signs of an imminent Egyptian
invasion, Israel rapidly mobilized its reserves. On October 29,
under Major General Moshe Dayan, the IDF launched a preemptive
attack into Sinai. Israeli advances on the ground were rapid, and,
supported by air cover, by November 2 they had routed the Egyptian
forces and effectively controlled the entire peninsula. With
Israeli troops on the east bank of the Suez Canal, British and
French troops landed at Port Said and demanded withdrawal of both
sides from the Canal. The UN met in an emergency session and
demanded that the British and French leave Suez, which they did in
December 1956 in response to both United States and UN pressure,
and that Israel withdraw to the Armistice line of 1949, which it
did somewhat reluctantly in March 1957 after the United Nations
Emergency Force (UNEF) had been stationed in the Gaza Strip and at
Sharm ash Shaykh on the Strait of Tiran.
Israel's victory in the 1956 War (known in Israel as the Sinai
Campaign) thus afforded it a modicum of increased security by
virtue of the UN presence. Far more important, however, was that it
enhanced Israel's standing as a military power and as a viable
nation. Although many Israelis felt that the military victory was
nullified by the UN demand to withdraw from Sinai, Israel had
achieved significant psychological gains at a cost of fewer than
170 lives.
The decade after the 1956 War was the most tranquil period in
the nation's history. The Egyptian armistice line remained quiet,
and there were few incidents along the Jordanian line until 1965,
when Egyptian-sponsored guerrilla raids by Al Fatah first occurred.
Beginning in 1960, there were repeated guerrilla activities and
shellings of Israeli settlements from the Golan Heights of Syria,
but these incidents remained localized until 1964.
Underlying tensions, however, did not abate. By the early
1960s, both sides considered a third round of war inevitable. An
ominous arms race developed. Egypt and Syria were supplied with
Soviet aid and military hardware, and Israel suddenly found
European powers--the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany),
Britain, and especially France--to be willing suppliers of modern
armaments. Jordan continued to receive arms from Britain and the
United States.
Tensions mounted in 1964, when, after Israel had nearly
completed a massive irrigation project that involved diverting
water from the Jordan River into the Negev Desert, Syria began a
similar project near the river's headwaters that would have
virtually dried the river bed at the Israeli location. Israel
launched air and artillery attacks at the Syrian site, and Syria
abandoned the project. Guerrilla incursions from Syria and Jordan
steadily mounted, as did the intensity of Israeli reprisal raids.
In April 1967, increased Syrian aircraft-shelling of Israeli
border villages encountered an Israeli fighter attack during which
six Syrian MiGs were shot down. Syria feared that an all-out attack
from Israel was imminent, and Egypt, with whom Syria had recently
signed a mutual defense treaty, began an extensive military buildup
in early May. On May 18, Egypt's president, Gamal Abdul Nasser,
demanded the withdrawal of UN forces from Gaza and Sinai; Secretary
General U Thant promptly acceded and removed the UNEF. Four days
later, Nasser announced a blockade of Israeli shipping at the
Strait of Tiran, an action that Israel since the 1956 War had
stressed would be tantamount to a declaration of war. Jordan and
Iraq rapidly joined Syria in its military alliance with Egypt.
Data as of December 1988
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