After
1949, although there was an armistice between Israel and the Arab
states, the conflict continued and the region remained imperiled
by the prospect of another war. This was fueled by an escalating
arms race as countries built up their military caches and prepared
their forces (and their populations) for a future showdown. In 1956,
Israel joined with Britain and France to attack Egypt, ostensibly
to reverse the Egyptian government's nationalization of the Suez
Canal (then under French and British control). Israeli forces captured
Gaza and the Sinai Peninsula, but were forced to evacuate back to
the armistice lines as a result of UN pressure led by the US and
the Soviet Union (in an uncharacteristic show of cooperation to
avert further conflict in the Middle East). By the early 1960s,
however, the region was becoming a hot spot of Cold War rivalry
as the US and the Soviet Union were competing with one another for
global power and influence.
In
the spring of 1967, the Soviet Union misinformed the Syrian government
that Israeli forces were massing in northern Israel to attack Syria.
There was no such Israeli mobilization. But clashes between Israel
and Syria had been escalating for about a year, and Israeli leaders
had publicly declared that it might be necessary to bring down the
Syrian regime if it failed to end Palestinian commando attacks against
Israel from Syrian territory.
Responding
to a Syrian request for assistance, in May 1967 Egyptian troops
entered the Sinai Peninsula bordering Israel. A few days later,
Egyptian president Gamal Abdel-Nasser asked the UN observer forces
stationed between Israel and Egypt to evacuate their positions.
The Egyptians then occupied Sharm al-Shaykh at the southern tip
of the Sinai Peninsula and proclaimed a blockade of the Israeli
port of Eilat on the Gulf of Aqaba, arguing that access to Eilat
was through Egyptian territorial waters. These measures shocked
and frightened the Israeli public, which believed it was in danger
of annihilation.
As
the military and diplomatic crisis continued, on June 5, 1967 Israel
preemptively attacked Egypt and Syria, destroying their air forces
on the ground within a few hours. Jordan joined in the fighting
belatedly, and consequently was attacked by Israel as well. The
Egyptian, Syrian and Jordanian armies were decisively defeated,
and Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan, the Gaza Strip and
the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt, and the Golan Heights from Syria.
The
1967 war, which lasted only six days, established Israel as the
dominant regional military power. The speed and thoroughness of
Israel's victory discredited the Arab regimes. In contrast, the
Palestinian national movement emerged as a major actor after 1967
in the form of the political and military groups that made up the
Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO -- click
here for more information).
The
debate over the war in Iraq follows a yellowing script: The minute
someone suggests that the US move to withdraw its troops, war supporters
cry “Havoc!”
True to form, when no less a figure than Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri
al-Maliki stated he wants a timeline for a US pullout, John McCain
summoned the specter of dire consequences. “I’ve always
said we’ll come home with honor and with victory and not through
a set timetable,” McCain said. In his major foreign policy speech
on July 15, Barack Obama affirmed his support for a withdrawal timetable,
adding that the US must “get out as carefully as we were careless
getting in.” Obama’s position is the correct one, but he,
like many other war critics, has done too little to counter the refrain
that withdrawal is simply
“cutting and running,” a recipe for disaster. Full
Story>>
At
the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs
Committee (AIPAC) earlier this month, presidential candidates
John McCain and Barack Obama competed over who would become the “candidate
for Israel.” The match came to a draw when both candidates
pledged undying and unconditional support for Israel. While their
support for “Israel right or wrong” was unquestionable,
at the end of all the commotion, the most pertinent question for
Americans and the world remained unasked and unanswered: Who is
the candidate for peace? Full
Story>>
Quick: Who is the strategic victor, to date, of the war in Iraq?
Nearly everyone outside the Bush administration (and perhaps some
within it) would answer: the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The
catastrophe of the U.S. occupation of Iraq has bolstered the
clerical regime in Tehran, while souring ordinary Iranians on
the prospect of U.S.-delivered “democracy.” The occupation
has done so by emplacing Iranian-backed Shiite Islamists in power
in Baghdad and cooling the jets of those in Washington hoping to “shock
and awe” Iran's mullahs. Full
Story>>
Libya's Fat Cat The Topeka Capital-Journal Januwary 11, 2008
Chris Toensing
Few
dictators in the world are sitting prettier in 2008 than Col.
Muammar Qaddafi of Libya. In a region full of potentates and presidents-for-life,
his reign is supreme. Having seized power in a 1969 coup, he has
ruled his country for longer than any other Arab head of state.
And now, as wintry January begins, the colonel has quietly completed
his journey back in from the cold. Full
Story>>
