Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Note on Official Documents
- Abbreviations
- The Six-Day War and Israeli Self-Defense
- Part One A War is Generated
- 1 Who Was to Blame and Why It Matters
- 2 The Syrian Connection
- 3 Egypt Flexes Its Muscle
- 4 Historical Opportunity for Israel
- Part Two Cold War Togetherness
- Part Three The First Victim of War
- Part Four Rallying Round Self-Defense
- Part Five War Without Limit?
- Part Six Peace Sidelined
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
2 - The Syrian Connection
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2013
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Note on Official Documents
- Abbreviations
- The Six-Day War and Israeli Self-Defense
- Part One A War is Generated
- 1 Who Was to Blame and Why It Matters
- 2 The Syrian Connection
- 3 Egypt Flexes Its Muscle
- 4 Historical Opportunity for Israel
- Part Two Cold War Togetherness
- Part Three The First Victim of War
- Part Four Rallying Round Self-Defense
- Part Five War Without Limit?
- Part Six Peace Sidelined
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Examination of the June 1967 war requires inquiry into the underlying circumstances. On the Arab side, the war would involve principally Egypt. But confrontation between Israel and Syria early in 1967 set the context. This 1967 Arab-Israeli tension was nothing new. Relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors had been tense from the time of Israel's emergence in 1948. Israel had sprung from a movement calling itself Zionism that developed within European Jewry at the turn of the twentieth century as a reaction to anti-Semitism in Europe. Zionists called for a Jewish state in territory that historically went by the name Palestine, then part of the Turkish Empire.
During World War I, Britain battled Germany and Turkey, and in the case of Turkey sought to wrest away its extensive territories in the Arab world. Britain enlisted the Arabs of the Turkish Empire to fight on its side, promising independence after Turkey's expected defeat. Arab military support was forthcoming. In hopes of turning opinion in Europe and the United States in its favor against Germany, Britain responded favorably to entreaties from the Zionist movement. In November 1917, Britain declared that it favored a “national home” for the Jews in Palestine.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Six-Day War and Israeli Self-DefenseQuestioning the Legal Basis for Preventive War, pp. 6 - 14Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2012