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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Israel
Index
Palestinian women in traditional dress selling produce at
an outdoor market in the occupied West Bank
Courtesy Palestine Perspectives
The Meir government's rejection of Sadat's peace overtures
convinced the Egyptian president that to alter the status quo and
gain needed legitimacy at home he must initiate a war with limited
objectives. On Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, October 6,
1973, Syria and Egypt launched a surprise attack against Israel. In
the south, waves of Egyptian infantrymen crossed the Suez Canal and
overran the defense of the much touted Bar-Lev Line. In the north,
Syrian forces outnumbering the Israeli defenders (1,100 Syrian
tanks against 157 Israeli tanks) reached the outer perimeter of the
Golan Heights overlooking the Hula Basin. In the first few days of
the war, Israeli counterattacks failed, Israel suffered hundreds of
casualties, and lost nearly 150 planes. Finally, on October 10 the
tide of the war turned; the Syrians were driven out of all
territories conquered by them at the beginning of the war and on
the following day Israeli forces advanced into Syria proper, about
twenty kilometers from the outskirts of Damascus. The Soviet Union
responded by making massive airlifts to Damascus and Cairo, which
were matched by equally large United States airlifts to Israel. In
the south, an Egyptian offensive into Sinai was repelled, and
Israeli forces led by General Ariel Sharon crossed the canal to
surround the Egyptian Third Army. At the urgent request of the
Soviet Union, United States Secretary of State Henry Kissinger went
to Moscow to negotiate a cease-fire arrangement. This arrangement
found expression in UN Security Council Resolution 338, which
called for a cease-fire to be in place within twelve hours, for the
implementation of Resolution 242, and for "negotiations between the
parties concerned under appropriate auspices aimed at establishing
a just and durable peace in the Middle East." Following Kissinger's
return to Washington, the Soviets announced that Israel had broken
the terms of the cease-fire and was threatening to destroy the
besieged Egyptian Third Army. Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev
informed Nixon that if the siege were not lifted the Soviet Union
would take unilateral steps. The United States pressured Israel,
and the final cease-fire took effect on October 25.
The October 1973 War had a devastating effect on Israel. More
than 6,000 troops had been killed or wounded in eighteen days of
fighting. The loss of equipment and the decline of production and
exports as a consequence of mobilization came to nearly US$7
billion, the equivalent of Israel's gross national product
(GNP--see Glossary)
for an entire year. Most important, the image of an
invincible Israel that had prevailed since the June 1967 War was
destroyed forever. Whereas the June 1967 War had given Israel in
general and the declining Labor Party in particular a badly needed
morale booster, the events of October 1973 shook the country's
self-confidence and cast a shadow over the competence of the Labor
elite. A war-weary public was especially critical of Minister of
Defense Dayan, who nonetheless escaped criticism in the report of
the Agranat Commission, a body established after the war to
determine responsibility for Israel's military unpreparedness.
Israel's vulnerability during the war led to another important
development: its increasing dependence on United States military,
economic, and diplomatic aid. The war set off a spiraling regional
arms race in which Israel was hard pressed to match the Arab
states, which were enriched by skyrocketing world oil prices. The
vastly improved Arab arsenals forced Israel to spend increasingly
on defense, straining its already strapped economy. The emergence
of Arab oil as a political weapon further isolated Israel in the
world community. The Arab oil boycott that accompanied the war and
the subsequent quadrupling of world oil prices dramatized the
West's dependence on Arab oil production. Evidence of this
dependence was reflected, for example, in the denial of permission
during the fighting for United States transport planes carrying
weapons to Israel to land anywhere in Europe except Portugal.
The dominant personality in the postwar settlement period was
Kissinger. Kissinger believed that the combination of Israel's
increased dependence on the United States and Sadat's desire to
portray the war as an Egyptian victory and regain Sinai allowed for
an American-brokered settlement. The key to this diplomatic
strategy was that only Washington could induce a vulnerable Israel
to exchange territories for peace in the south.
The first direct Israeli-Egyptian talks following the war were
held at Kilometer 101 on the Cairo-Suez road. They dealt with
stabilizing the cease-fire and supplying Egypt's surrounded Third
Army. Following these talks, Kissinger began his highly publicized
"shuttle diplomacy," moving between Jerusalem and the Arab capitals
trying to work out an agreement. In January 1974, Kissinger, along
with Sadat and Dayan, devised the First Sinai Disengagement
Agreement, which called for thinning out forces in the Suez Canal
zone and restoring the UN buffer zone. The published plan was
accompanied by private (but leaked) assurances from the United
States to Israel that Egypt would not interfere with Israeli
freedom of navigation in the Red Sea and that UN forces would not
be withdrawn without the consent of both sides. Following the
signing of this agreement, Kissinger shuttled between Damascus and
Jerusalem, finally attaining an agreement that called for Israel to
withdraw from its forward positions in the Golan Heights, including
the return of the Syrian town of Al Qunaytirah. The evacuated zone
was to be demilitarized and monitored by a UN Disengagement
Observer Force (UNDOF).
After the signing of the Israeli-Syrian Disengagement Agreement
in June 1974, the public mood in Israel shifted against
concessions. In part, Israel's hardened stance was a reaction to
the 1974 Arab summit in Rabat, Morocco. At that summit, both Syria
and Egypt supported a resolution recognizing the PLO as the sole
representative of the Palestinian people. The Israeli public viewed
the PLO as a terrorist organization bent on destroying the Jewish
state. Throughout 1974 Palestinian terrorism increased; in the
summer alone there were attacks in Qiryat Shemona, Maalot, and
Jerusalem.
Another important factor underlying Israel's firmer stance was
an internal political struggle in the newly elected government of
Yitzhak Rabin. Rabin had narrowly defeated his chief rival Shimon
Peres in bitterly fought internal Labor Party elections in late
December 1973. Peres, who was appointed minister of defense, forced
Israel into a less flexible posture by blocking any concessions
proposed by Rabin. In addition, the issuing of the Agranat
Commission report and the return from the front of reservists
mobilized for the war further fueled public clamor for a stronger
defense posture.
In Washington, President Gerald R. Ford, facing a recalcitrant
Israel and under pressure from the pro-Israel lobby, decided to
sweeten the offer to Israel. The United States pledged to provide
Israel US$2 billion in financial aid, to drop the idea of an
interim withdrawal in the West Bank, and to accept that only
cosmetic changes could be expected in the Second Syrian-Israeli
Disengagement Agreement. In addition, in a special secret
memorandum Israel received a pledge that the United States would
not deal with the PLO as long as the PLO failed to recognize
Israel's right to exist and failed to accept Security Council
Resolution 242. In September 1975, Israel signed the Second Sinai
Disengagement Agreement, which called for Israel to withdraw from
the Sinai passes, leaving them as a demilitarized zone monitored by
American technicians and the UNEF.
Data as of December 1988
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