The Suez Crisis
and the Six-Day War
IAFS/JWST 3650
Announcements
• Jewish Studies Mix-and-Mingle: April 10 at
6PM at Illegal Pete's (CU students and
graduate students only) RSVP to
Meghan.Zibby@colorado.edu
Announcements
• See revised syllabus (in email) for reading
assignments
• Thursday: come prepared to discuss Dayan
reading
• Chester office hours this week: Fri 2-3
• Thu, April 11: In-class paper workshop
Paper Workshop
• Email draft to group by Tues 5pm
Outline
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Post-independence Israeli security concerns
Palestinian refugees
1956 Suez Crisis
1950s-1960s Palestinian politics
1967 War/Six-Day War
Israeli Security Concerns
• Fear of
“encirclement”
• Egyptian
restrictions on
shipping in Suez
Canal, Straits of
Tiran
Israeli Security Concerns
Ben-Gurion
• Activist stance (PM
David Ben-Gurion):
establish that Israel
could not be
defeated
• Moderate stance
(FM Moshe
Sharett): force one
of several options
Sharett
Palestinian Refugees
• Arab insistence on “right of return”
• Israeli passage of “law of return,” increasing
Jewish population
• Arabs in Israel (~170,000 in 1950) subject to
land confiscation and banishment
Palestinian Refugees
• Many Arab refugees outside Israel remained in
refugee camps long-term
• Lebanese, Syria, Egyptian refusal to grant
citizenship (vs Jordan)
• Concerns about resettlement
Suez Crisis
• 1955: Egyptian leader Col. Gamal Abdul
Nasser accepts Soviet military aid
• British fears of shift in Middle East power
dynamics
• July 1956: Nasser’s nationalization of Suez
canal
Suez Crisis
• British threats re canal
• Late Oct/early Nov 1956: Disastrous military
operation to regain canal carried out by
Britain, France, and Israel
Suez Crisis
• Israeli goals: Sinai
and Sharm alSheikh
• US reaction:
economic measures
to force British
withdrawal
Suez Crisis Repercussions
• Egypt: Nasser
remained in power,
retained canal
• Britain: no longer a
world power
• Israel: military
victory, UN warning
re interference with
Straits of Tiran
Palestinian Politics
• 1964: Arab League est.
Palestinian Liberation
Organization (led by
Ahmad Shukeiri)
• Haj Amin: PLO
“colonialist, Zionist
conspiracy”
• Syrian desire for more
militant action
Haj Amin in 1948
Shukeiri
Fatah
• Established 1958
• Gaza-based
• Military action, before Israel gained upper
hand via nukes, as necessary precursor for
political action
The 1967 War/Six-Day War
• Early 1967: increase in Fatah attacks on Israel
• 7 Apr: Syria-Israel clash in Golan Heights
• 21 May: Egyptian closure of Straits of Tiran
The 1967 War/Six-Day War
• Defense Minister Moshe
Dayan push for military
response
• 5 Jun: Israeli airstrikes destroy
Egyptian air force
Dayan
The 1967 War/Six-Day War
• Israeli occupation of
Jerusalem’s Old City,
West Bank, Sinai
Peninsula up to
canal, Golan Heights
• Additional 100,000
Palestinian refugees
to Jordan
Significance
• Continuing negotiations and conflict over
1967 lines
• Arab governments primarily interested in
Palestinians as means to demonstrate antiIsraeli militancy
• Palestinian militants increasingly independent
of Arab states
Significance
• Clear Israeli military superiority
• Israeli feeling of having broken “encirclement”