A Plan for Peace in Three Parts - Part II

[shazzan]

Voice of the Arabs radio station proclaimed on May 18, 1967:
"As of today, there no longer exists an international emergency force to protect Israel. We shall exercise patience no more. We shall not complain any more to the UN about Israel. The sole method we shall apply against Israel is total war, which will result in the extermination of Zionist existence."

An enthusiastic echo was heard May 20 from Syrian Defense Minister Hafez Assad:
"Our forces are now entirely ready not only to repulse the aggression, but to initiate the act of liberation itself, and to explode the Zionist presence in the Arab homeland. The Syrian army, with its finger on the trigger, is united....I, as a military man, believe that the time has come to enter into a battle of annihilation."

On May 22, Egypt closed the Straits of Tiran to all Israeli shipping and all ships bound for Eilat. This blockade cut off Israel's only supply route with Asia and stopped the flow of oil from its main supplier, Iran.

In 1956, the United States gave Israel assurances that it recognized the Jewish State's right of access to the Straits of Tiran. In 1957, at the UN, 17 maritime powers declared that Israel had a right to transit the Strait. Moreover, the blockade violated the Convention on the Territorial Sea and Contiguous Zone, which was adopted by the UN Conference on the Law of the Sea on April 27, 1958.

President Johnson expressed the belief that the blockade was illegal and unsuccessfully tried to organize an international flotilla to test it. At the same time, he advised the Israelis not to take any military action. After the war, he acknowledged the closure of the Strait of Tiran was the casus belli (June 19, 1967):
"If a single act of folly was more responsible for this explosion than any other it was the arbitrary and dangerous announced decision that the Strait of Tiran would be closed. The right of innocent maritime passage must be preserved for all nations."

King Hussein of Jordan signed a defense pact with Egypt on May 30. Nasser then announced:

"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 declarations."

President Abdur Rahman Aref of Iraq joined in the war of words: "The existence of Israel is an error which must be rectified. This is our opportunity to wipe out the ignominy which has been with us since 1948. Our goal is clear -- to wipe Israel off the map." On June 4, Iraq joined the military alliance with Egypt, Jordan and Syria.

The Arab rhetoric was matched by the mobilization of Arab forces. Approximately 465,000 troops, more than 2,800 tanks, and 800 aircraft ringed Israel.

Moreover, while the Arabs were falsely accusing the United States of airlifting supplies to Israel, Johnson imposed an arms embargo on the region (France, Israel's other main arms supplier also embargoed arms to Israel).

By contrast, the Soviets were supplying massive amounts of arms to the Arabs. Simultaneously, the armies of Kuwait, Algeria, Saudi Arabia and Iraq were contributing troops and arms to the Egyptian, Syrian and Jordanian fronts.

On June 5, 1967, Israel was indeed alone, but its military commanders had conceived a brilliant war strategy. The entire Israeli Air Force, with the exception of just 12 fighters assigned to defend Israeli air space, took off at 7:14 a.m. with the intent of bombing Egyptian airfields while the Egyptian pilots were eating breakfast. In less than 2 hours, roughly 300 Egyptian aircraft were destroyed. A few hours later, Israeli fighters attacked the Jordanian and Syrian air forces, as well as one airfield in Iraq. By the end of the first day, nearly the entire Egyptian and Jordanian air forces, and half the Syrians’, had been destroyed on the ground.

But then again all this is just lies put out by the neo-con Israel boosters in the US I suppose. You as a former super spy have access to the real history.

[theaustinescorts]

Quoting from radio broadcasts and media statements by Presidents during a crisis doesn't comprise history, and I suspect you know that. The real causes of war are rarely found in the propagandistic media blitz at the time of a crisis.

The circumstances you cite were preparations and media rhetoric by the Arabs in anticipation of what they thought would be an attack by Israel. It is well established and incontrovertable however that Arab fears were based on misleading intl given to them by the USSR, which was seeking to provoke a war.

These DEFENSIVE mobilizations were MISINTERPRETED BY ISRAEL as aggressive measures. That is also incontrovertable. The Mossad did several studies later which established that they pre-empted unnecessarily. This is the uncontested history, and there is no controversy about it because all the actors are on record about it.

Just one example. Yes President Johnson made a public statement about the blocking of the Straits, but he also called Abba Eban into his office to ask him NOT TO ATTACK.
Abba Eban has recorded this meeting, and has Walt Rostow, who was Johnson's NSC advisor. Johnson pleaded with Eban and warned him not to attack, but Eban told them that they were convinced the Arabs would attack, and based this on the same circumstances you're citing. However, Eban and all of Israel since learned that their pre-emption was unnecessary.

As far as myself being a former "super spy," I certainly have never claimed such, and that you would make such a remark is consistent with the disingenuousness of your posts. For whatever reason you are making this a personal matter full of insults and acrimony, consistent with your apparent lack of maturity.

Back to the content of the thread however....Under Likud Prime Minister Netanyahu Israel has just launched an unprecedented expansion of settlements on the west bank. This has torpedoed the latest Washington-arranged peace talks [which is what Netanyahu desired]. There are now over 100 such communities, and over 500,000 Jews living in them [one out of 10 Jews in Palestine]. This of course makes it impossible to even impliment the "two state solution" favored by American politicians, in which the Arabs would have a tiny state of their own there and in the Gaza. This is what the Likud intended since these settlements in "Judea" and "Samaria" were begun in the 1970s by PM Menachim Begin [formerly the head of Irgun]. How anyone can continue in the claim that it hasn't been Likud's intentions to rule over all of Palestine, since their terrorist beginnings, is at this point quite ridiculous given these policies.

The Israeli left, and Peace Now in particular, is opposed to these settlements. It is the Israeli far-right, the Likud, which has always sought Jewish dominion over all of Palestine.

Unfortunately for us, it is the Likud which conducts psychological warfare and media operations in the US to influence opinion here. Mossad was purged of all but far-right officers in the Likud governments of the 1970s and 1980s. This is known by everyone in the intelligence field, and one doesn't have to be a "super spy" to be aware of it.

btw...if you remember the Iran-Contra affair from 1986 it came to light that Mossad and the Mullahs in Iran were working together. Mossad and Iran are in fact partners in many things, and the current public antagonism reflects only how utterly misleading and baseless the public reporting is regarding the reality of government operations, which are usually about 95% hidden from public view! What politicians say for public consumption is laughable.