Balancing Moral Commitments and National Interests.

AuthorKurtzer, Daniel
PositionThe Role of US Diplomacy in the Lead-Up to the Six Day War: Balancing Moral Commitments and National Interests - Book review

The Role of US Diplomacy in the Lead-Up to the Six Day War: Balancing Moral Commitments and National Interests by Zaki Shalom, Sussex Academic Press, ISBN-13-978-1845194680, 2012, 190 pp., $65.00.

For all the disputes about Middle East historiography, there is no disputing the monumental changes brought about by the June 1967 war. Virtually everything that preceded the war changed as a result of the resounding Israeli military victory, the massive Arab defeat and the occupation by Israel of the West Bank, Gaza, Sinai and the Golan Heights. The war was the beginning of the end of Nasserism, the idea of secular pan-Arab nationalism propagated by the charismatic leader of Egypt. The war restored Palestinians to center-stage in the Arab-Israeli conflict, from which they had been displaced in 1949. Israel went from a small, beleaguered state to a regional military powerhouse. And the benefits of strategic depth enjoyed by Israelis soon became the burdens of prolonged occupation.

For all these reasons, books on this war and the period preceding it are most welcome, for the most critical questions relating to the motivations and strategies of the main players have yet to be answered adequately. Zaki Shalom's contribution to the literature is very useful, as he has drawn on Israeli government archives and on U.S. government records located at the Lyndon Johnson Library to assess the role of the United States in Israeli calculations leading up to the war. Shalom adds content and color to what we know about the diplomacy and policies of the United States and Israel.

Shalom does not address directly but adds analytically to the key issues that have not yet been answered satisfactorily: What motivated Nasser to act in 1967 when he had warned other Arabs for more than a decade that Israel should not be threatened until the Arabs were fully prepared? Egypt was totally unprepared for war in 1967, suffering not only from an imbalance in weapons but also from its protracted deployment in Yemen. Shalom doesn't answer this question - no one has done so yet with any authority - but reports that (p. 84) "Egypt's position reflects the enormous self-confidence felt by the leadership on the outcome of a clash with Israel." Heady words, but did Nasser really believe this?

Shalom devotes considerable attention to the uncertainties and contradictions of Israeli policy in the lead- up to war. In 1966 and early 1967, Israel responded harshly to guerrilla attacks...

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