A short history of the Six Day War

By: Iliyas Ismail

"The armies of Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon are poised on the borders of Israel ... to face the challenge, while standing behind us are the armies of Iraq, Algeria, Kuwait, Sudan and the whole Arab nation. This act will astound the world. Today they will know that the Arabs are arranged for battle, the critical hour has arrived. We have reached the stage of serious action and not of more declarations." - Gamal Abdel Nasser, Egyptian president, May 30th 1967 

The Six-Day War was a war between the combined Arab armies of Syria, Jordan, Egypt and Iraq, against the state of Israel, from June 5th, 1967 to June 10th. 

Prior to the war, Israel had already fought two other major wars with Egypt (the main combatant in all the wars) and was victorious in both theaters in 1948 and 1956 respectively. Subsequent to the 1956 war, the United Nations had placed a peacekeeping force consisting of international countries, making up the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF), on the border between Egypt and Israel. This was placed to create a buffer zone and maintain peace between the two countries.

The 1956 war ended with uneasy calm on both sides. The Arab world was still maintaining a bellicose attitude towards Israel and refused to recognize the Jewish state let alone make peace. The stage was set, 11 years later when another turn of event was to change how the Arabs view Israel forever.

On May 19, 1967, the President of Egypt, Gamal Abdel Naser, ordered the peacekeeping force to be removed from the Egyptian Israel border. Then United Nation Secretary General, U- Thant, tried in vain to persuade Nasser to abandon his plan but finally agreed reluctantly, and withdrew the international force from the Sinai peninsular. U- Thant was subjected to much criticism and contempt, especially in the United States and Britain, for having failed to "stand up to Nasser". (1)

Later, on May 22-23, President Nasser ordered a blockade in the straits of Tiran to any ships bound for Israel. The latter viewed this as an open declaration of war and prepared for the worse turn of events.

Gamal Abdel Nasser, Egyptian president from 1953-1970

President Nasser, who was widely regarded as a hero in the Arab world, who sought to embrace Pan-Arabism to unite the Arabs, flew to Jordan to meet with King Hussein. The two countries signed a mutual defence pact, where each country agreed to send armies to the other in the wake of any foreign attack. This led to the conclusion by Israel that it would be only a matter of time before another major war would break out.

On June 5, 1967, Israel initiated a pre-emptive strike to the surrounding countries, to break the advantage of the numerically superior Arab army. Egypt was to suffer the most devastating attack. At around 7:45 am, Israel launched what it called Operation Focus to attack the Arab airfields. Around 190 Israeli jets took off from Israel to attack the Egypt by first flying west to the Mediterranean Sea, before turning south into Egypt, flying well below Egyptian radar cover to avoid detection.

The attack came in three waves, the first wave destroyed around 190-204 aircraft (according to varying accounts). The second wave began at 9:07 Israeli time and destroyed another 107 aircraft. (2)

The attack proved to be disastrous to the Egyptian army and came as a total surprise. On the first day alone, the Israelis managed to destroy 338 Egyptian jet fighter, most while still parked on the runway or in the hangar. Highly efficient bombs, designed to render serious damage to airstrip tarmac, rendered most of the jets that weren’t destroyed, impossible to take off. The attack was a major blow to the Egyptian Army, with the Israelis suffering only minor losses.

On-ground Egyptian jets destroyed by Israel

Earlier, Jordanian radars picked up signals of heavy movements of planes from Israel towards Egypt and warned Egypt, but communication problems within the Egyptian side proved the effort to be futile, as warnings could not be effectively issued to intended airfields.

After the Israeli jets were returning home, Jordanian radar picked up heavy movement of activities over Israeli sky. The Egyptian president assured the King that what Jordanian radars were picking up were actually the Egyptian air force heading towards Tel Aviv(the Israeli capital) to attack it, whereas in reality it was the Israeli air force who were returning from bombing raids in Egypt. From this false information, the King was confident that Egypt was having the upper hand and he decided to attack Israel.

Meanwhile, on the Sinai penisular the former had stationed a large number of troops. There were 100,000 soldiers, and 900 tanks along with APCs and artillery pieces. Israel, now having full air superiority, easily managed to secure land under Egyptian rule.

There were three divisions, headed by General Israel Tal, Avraham Yoffe and Ariel Sharon which consisted of 70,000 men in total with 700 tanks. The first division had 250 tanks, 50 guns, a paratrooper reconaissance unit and advanced toward the Gaza Strip. The area was fortified and Egyptians and Palestinians put up stiff resistance, with the stiffest coming from the 20th Palestinian Division headed by Egyptian military command. Lack of air cover however, meant that constant aerial bombardment could not be sustained and Gaza fell after two days of battle.

Body of an Egyptian soldier in front of a destroyed tank

The seond and third divisions headed by Yoffe and Sharon attacked the heavily defended Abu Ageila-Kusseima region. Abu Ageila is important because it could give access to Israeli troops to the routes in central Sinai. Sharon dispatched two brigades to the north of Um Qatef in trying to break the defences at Abu Ageila. Another brigade was sent to block the road from el-arish and encircle Abu Ageila from the east. A paratrooper brigade was dropped at the same time to disable Egyptian artilleries from attacking Israeli armor.

Abu Ageila fell after three and a half days of heavy fighting. Egypt's Minister of defence, Marshal Abdel Hakim Amer, panicked after he heard the fall of Abu Ageila, a key asset, and ordered all Egyptian divisions to retreat west. This marked the defeat of Egypt, what followed was a major disaster. This single decision had serious repercussions to the Egyptian war effort. 

The withdrawal was done is such a haste and there was really no plan drafted for it. Israeli troops pushed forward and met the withdrawing Egyptians. The latter sustained heavy losses due to lack of aerial cover. The army could and should have stayed put and defended the Sinai peninsular from Israeli advancement. Instead, they withdrew, and now, overwhelmed and were chased by Israeli troops. Confused Egyptian troops had Israeli tanks in front and behind of them and some were even moving side by side with enemy tanks and with constant aerial bombardment, they were doomed to defeat.

Captured Egyptian soldiers

The IDF sought to outrun the Egyptian force and the former started to rush westwards to meet the Egyptians there, instead of simply pursuing them from behind. They managed to reach some parts of westerm Sinai quicker than the Egyptians and ambushed the Egyptians when they had arrived. Sharon's army first went southward then westward to the Mitla Pass. Some of Yoffe's division joined Sharon there, while others blocked the Gidi Pass. The Gidi pass was captured before Egyptian soldiers arrived but other passes, including the Mitla Pass was only partially blocked and many Egyptian soldiers managed to cross over the Suez Canal to safety.

Egyptian prisoners of war being guarded by an Israeli soldier

Soldiers that remained offered resistance. After clearing out pockets and capturing many soldiers, the Sinai campaign was completed and the whole peninsular was captured from Egypt. The only exception being the city of Port Fouad where Egyptian troops managed to defend and retain the area.

More than 4000 Egyptian troops were made prisoners of war.

The Egyptians mainly suffered casualties due to the excessive heat and lack of water after they had began their massive retreat. Thousands died due to dehydration and exhaustion.

Egyptian Tupolev Tu-16 (mainly destroyed during the first hours of the war)

Jordanian front

Egypt was then the strongest Arab nation in terms of military capability among the Arab nations involved in the conflict. The Israeli conquest of Sinai on June 8, 1967 meant that the biggest threat from the southern border of Israel was removed.

While Israeli forces were engaging with Egyptian troops, at the same time they also had to put up with Jordan’s impending attack. Jordan did not immediately join the war. King Hussein only decided to enter after receiving the false message from Egyptian army general, Abdel Hakim Amer that Egypt had already succeeded in destroying 75% of Israel’s jet fighters(3). Israel had repeatedly warned Hussein to stay out of the war, and by doing that Israel would not open up a new front with Jordan. King Hussein replied that it was all too late.

In his recollection of the war, Hussein stated:

"It was now 9 A.M. on Monday, June 5, and we were at war.

Riad [the Egyptian general who commanded Jordanian forces] increased our fire power against the Israeli air bases by directing our heavy artillery – long-range 155's – on the Israeli air force installations within our line of fire. Our field artillery also went into action, and our Hawker Hunters [British-supplied fighter jets] were ready to take part in the combined operation with the Iraqi and Syrians. " (4)

The West Bank was at the time was controlled by Jordan, in the aftermath of the 1948 war in the absence of a viable Palestinian state. Just a few days before the war, Jordan had stationed ten of its 11 army brigades in the West Bank. This included three infantry brigades stationed in the northern part of West Bank. Another four infantry brigade was put in place in central West Bank and the remaining three, which consisted of 1 infantry and two armored brigade was stationed in the south. The total Jordanian army was 45,000. Israel on the hand had amassed 8 brigades consisting of 40,000 men on the other side of the border.

The West Bank

Jordanian artillery started to pound Israeli cities with heavy shelling, and Hawker Hunters attacked Israeli airbases in Netanya without having any losses. Iraqi and Syrian fighter jets attacked airfields at Lydda and Ramad David respectively. Israel however, up to this point did nothing to respond to the Jordanian, or the Syrian and Iraqi attacks. Israel hoped the Jordanian attacks were just moves of solidarity with Egypt, and not a move intended for opening up a new front, since Hussein had always negotiated with Israeli leaderships through many secret meetings before the war.

With aerial bombardment on Israel continuing, Jordanian infantry moved west towards Israel, crossing the 1949 armistice line. The Jordanians quickly seized the Government House in the de-militarized zone used by United Nations peace observers and this finally drew a response from Israel. The Jordanians were supposed to link with the Egyptian army marching from the south towards Jordan, and cut Israel in half.

Israel responded first by targeting Jordan’s air force, again to achieve air supremacy as it already did against Egypt. Israeli fighter jets (consisting mainly of Dassault Mirage III and IV and Dasault Mystere) flew pass Jordanian border and spotted targeted airfields in the cities of Amman and Malfraq where Jordanian fighter jets were refueling. What ensued was the eventual total destruction of all the total 28 Jordanian fighter jets.

Jordanian Dassault Mystere

At 2.30 pm of the same day, the Israeli 16th Jerusalem brigade began their assault to flush out the Jordanian army occupying the Government House. Two Israeli companies and six Sherman tanks headed to the building. They succeeded a couple of hours later and the Jordanians were forced to retreat. The Israeli army then advanced to the village of Sur Baher, which gave them control of the road linking the city of Jerusalem to other important cities like Bethlehem and Hebron.

The Jordanian army faced the same challenges as their Egyptian counterpart while engaging Israeli troops. Both had their air forces decapitated and had to deal with continuous Israeli aerial bombardment. Egypt, at least had a few remaining fighter jets to supplement their defense (although this proved to be insignificant in the face of massive number of enemy fighter planes), but Jordan had none. Jordanian radar facility was also knocked out, making it difficult to spot enemy planes whereabouts.

Israel also attacked an Iraqi air base in western Iraq and managed to destroy a significant number of fighter jets either on ground or in aerial dogfights. They were 12 Mig-21s, 2 Mig-17s, 5 Hunter F-6s and 3 11-28 bombers. 2 Israeli aircraft were downed during this attack. 

One would wonder how Israeli jets manage to reach Iraq and return without being hit by Jordanian air defenses, since they had to go through Jordanian airspace to reach Iraq. This illustrates the weakness of Jordanian defenses.

The Syrian Air Force also weren't spared, and  suffered major losses. All these attacks ensured that Jordan would not get any aerial support from neighboring countries.

Israeli bombardment at the outskirts of Jerusalem

Israel had a 2 phase planned attack on the West Bank(5), the first phase had 3 objectives. The first is to eliminate the Jordanian threat from Jenin which forms a bulk into Israeli territory, thus removing the airfields in Ramat David and the Jezreel Valley from the range of Jordanian artillery stationed there. The second is to eliminate the Latrun bulge which threatened Israeli communications with Jerusalem. The final objective is to open a secure road towards the Mount Scopus enclave, which was surrounded by Jordan since the end of the 1948 war.

The first phase was to achieve the minimum of coverage of their objectives. The second phase was to knock out the Jordanian army out of the war.

Major General Uzi Narkis, Israel's chief of Central Command, sent an armoured brigade through the northern sector of Jerusalem. The division moved from the Latrun area down towards the road near Jerusalem. The division then launched three separate attacks on Jordanian-held territory to secure control of the significant Ramallah ridge. Control of the ridge would give control to the northern and eastern approaches to Jerusalem, and would isolate Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank.

With the advance of the Israeli divisions and the fall of many Jordanian positions, the commander of the Jordanian 27th Brigade pleaded for reinforcement from King Hussein. The 6oth Jordanian Armored brigade made its way through Jericho towards Jerusalem under the cover of darkness. They were spotted by Israeli columns and were ambushed and could not reinforce the remaining troops defending Jerusalem. Other subsequent Jordanian attempt to sent reinforcements were also thwarted by Israeli ambushes.

The battle then focused around the city of Jerusalem, where the Israelis encircled the city and faced the Jordanians face to face in bloody battles, especially in the Battle for Ammunition Hill where 71 Jordanians and 37 Israelis were killed in action. On June 7th, just hours before the United Nations was about to announce a cease fire, Israel launched another major assault on the Old City of Jerusalem to ensure its capture.

Three Israeli infantry brigades thus pushed through the Jordanian defenses and successfully occupied the city and repelled the Jordanian forces.

Israeli troops in front of the Wailing Wall, Jerusalem, after its capture

After the fall of the city, the Israelis advanced further capturing more territories in the West Bank. Jordanian troops had to retreat eastwards, and the entire West Bank was lost to the Israelis. Jordan had lost the war.

Syrian Front

Israel borders Syria on its north and the two countries are divided by the mountaineous terrain known as the Golan Heights which belonged to Syria.

Prior to the war Syria had already constructed a complex series of fortifications and bunkers on the Golan Heights. This served an advantage to the Syrian army, as the well-dugged bunkers plus the high altitude of the terrain, pose a serious challenge to the Israelis if they were to conduct any offensive into Syrian territory.

The Syrian front was opened on the same day when Israel launched its preemptive strike on the airfields of Egypt and Jordan, on the 5th of June. Syrian fighter jets flew across Israel's northern frontier and attacked cities such as Tiberias and also Haifa. Israel responded by attacking Syrian airfields and destroyed 2/3 of Syrian fighter jet planes (53 planes) belonged to Syria. Those remaining retreated to distant bases, and without any clear explanations, didn't play any significant role afterwards. 

Syrian troops then intensified its shelling of Israeli cities and Syrian infantry and armored brigades launched offensives crossing the Israeli border. The air superiority that Israel achieved however, foiled the Syrians attacks. Heavy aerial bombardment and lack of air cover meant that the Syrian troops were siting ducks. The Syrian attempts to capture Israeli territory halted.Any hope of conducting further offensive into Israeli territory were abandoned and the Syrians instead stayed put on their side of the border, on the Golan Heights while continuing to shell Israeli positions.

Israel at the time was more preoccupied with dealing with its central and southern front, against Jordan and Egypt, as these two posed a greater threat. It was not after Israel's successful campaign against defeating the two countries that it turned its full might towards Syria.

The initial Israeli plan was to launch a major offensive on the Golan Heights on the 7th of June, the day when the Sinai and the West Bank campaign was completed.

However, it was postponed to the June the 8th, as debates among Israeli leadership raged on the idea of the offensive. It seemed to some an attack on the heavily fortified Syrian Golan Heights would cause heavy casualty on Israeli troops. It was decided, after intense debates, that the Golan Heights campaign would go on anyway.

On June the 8th, 3am, Syria accepted a United Nations ceasefire. Despite this however, at 7am, four hours after the Syrian announcement, Israel pushed on with the offensive. The campaign against the Syrian Golan Heights was successful due to several reasons:

1) Israel had gathered enough information on Syrian army intelligence. The whereabouts of Syrian artillery, army bunkers, number of troops and many other top secret military information was obtained by Israel when it sent a spy, Eli Cohen, to do the job and went to Syria in the year 1962. Eli posed as a Syrian national after being given a false identity by the Israeli government and managed to climb up the ranks to become the Chief Adviser to the Syrian Minister of Defense. It was a highly successful espionage operation by the Israelis.

Eli Cohen (1924-1965)

2) The Israelis and Syrians were involved in bloody close combats against each other in the Golan Heights. The Israelis were equipped with the Uzi sub-machine gun, which were much more lighter, easier to reload and handle as against the Syrians who mainly used the AK-47, which were not really the best weapon of choice for closed combats in bunkers.

Israeli tanks on the Golan Heights.

One by one, the Syrian army saw their bunkers fell to Israeli control. Aerial bombardment from the Israelis intensified as the Syrian ground-to-air battery defenses were destroyed and several cities near the Heights were also taken from the Syrians. Israeli tanks moved swiftly and knocked out enemy positions with the guidance of the obtained leaked Syrian army intelligence.

Syrian troops surrendering to the Israelis

In a desperate attempt to seek international military assistance, a Syrian national radio decided to make a critical maneuver. They tried to get the U.S.S.R. to intervene militarily by broadcasting a false report that the Syrian city, Quneitra, had fallen into enemy hands, even though the Israelis were still 10 miles away from the city. They hoped to convince the Soviets that Israel (with the backing of the United States) were keen on capturing more Syrian lands and were marching towards the Syrian capital, Damascus!

The plan backfired, and not only did the Soviets did not intervene, the national broadcast of the fall of Quneitra so dampened the morale of the remaining Syrian army defending the Golan Heights, that many of them left their posts and abandoned their objective to defend the area from Israeli attacks.

At the end of the day on June the 10th, the Golan Heights were taken from the Syrians and the war was over.

In six days of bitter fighting, Israel had managed to prove to the Arab world that it is now a force that needs to be reckoned with and must be taken seriously. The Arabs were humiliated by the crushing defeat of their armies and demanded redress.

Hafez al Assad, Syrian Minister of Defense during the 1967 war. He later rose to become the Syrian President during the 1970 Corrective Revolution.

The 1967 Six Day War was a disaster for the Arab countries. In their effort to destroy Israel, the latter now has a territory three times more than as it had before the war broke out.

It was a humiliating blow for the Arabs, indeed, they had underestimated the capabilities and strength of the enemy and overestimated their own. Several reasons for the Arab defeat during the war could be summarized as follows;

1) Israel had launched a preemptive strike on the airfields of the Arab states and had achieved air supremacy. This is a decisive factor for Israel's victory.

2) General Abdel Hakim Amer's command for Egyptian troops to withdraw from the Sinai. This order effectively meant the defeat of Egypt.

3) Intensive Israeli military training as opposed to the Arabs' preparations. The Israelis had trained for the desert terrain in the Sinai peninsular by using their own Negev Desert as a training area. What they found out is that, the seemingly impassable hilly terrains of the desert geographical landscape for tanks and trucks, could be overcome quite easily. 

For instance, armored jeeps that pass through sand dunes could easily get bogged down, and the way out of this is to let some air out from the trapped tire, so that the surface of the tire contacting with the ground is increased and and the force exerted to push the jeep would be more. 

4) The Israelis had done extensive and detailed research and analysis on the Sinai Peninsular. They came up with a map showing different levels of terrain on the peninsular and decided upon which path should be used to get through faster for armored brigades to pass through. Tanks could not go through all types of terrain, especially slopes which are too steep, therefore proper routes should be determined before an attack could be executed. Israel, it seems, knew more about the Sinai desert than the Egyptians themselves.

5) The Israeli spy to Syria, Eli Cohen was a major contributor to the defeat of the Syrian army. His position as the Chief adviser to the Minister of Defense had gave him influence in the Syrian government.

6) In fighting the Arab nations, Israel was actually fighting each of them separately and not as a combined and coordinated force. The Arabs failed to coordinate their troops to a single unified force that would have otherwise given Israel a serious blow.

7) Arab soldiers were less disciplined compared to the Israelis. Arab commanders often treated their own soldiers poorly.

8) Reinforcements from other nations arrived a bit too late. This could be seen with the case of the Saudi troops. They were on route to the Jordanian front, but only arrived after the war was over, and did not see action.

Aftermath:

1) The casualties suffered by the three nations of Egypt, Jordan and Syria were very high. The number of troops killed in battle on the Arabs side were around 15,000-20,000 men while Israel had lost around 700-1000 men.

2) Israel had captured the Sinai peninsular from Egypt, the West Bank from Jordan and the Golan Heights from Syria.

3) Gamal Abdel Nasser, the president of Egypt announced his resignation for failing to protect the nation. The Egyptian populace however, rejected his resignation and demanded that he continue in office. Nasser agreed.

4) Six years later, in 14 October, 1973, Egypt and Syria (This time with Jordan playing a limited role) would launch another war to reclaim their teritories.

Conclusion

The Arab armies' failure in the war should serve as a lesson in any future confrontation against Israel. They had managed to rally popular support in their fight against the Jewish state but failed to translate this into coordinated actions. The lack of training and discipline of the Arab armies should be rectified. Indeed, while the Israelis were making serious preparations for the war, the Arabs, more specifically the Egyptians were busy parading on the streets of Cairo calling for Israel's destruction.

Military action against Israel was proved to be a very bad idea and was doomed from the start, even in the 1948 War of Independence. This war again displayed Israel's military prowess and engenuity in action. The Arabs had a huge amount of war machines, more so if we combine the strength of the three main Arab players in this war but it was negated by their lack of preparation and coordination. Any further military action should only be executed once the Arabs had mustered enough strength and remove the excessive bureaucracy existing in their military system.

References:

1) Crocker, Chester A,2007, Leashing the dogs of war: conflict management in a divided world, United States Institute of Peace

2) http://zionism-israel.com/dic/Operation_Focus.htm

3) Hussein, Hussein of Jordan:My war with Israel, pg 66

4) ibid.

5) http://www.sixdaywar.org/content/easternfront.asp