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JERUSALEM!

Jerusalem (Yerushalayim, in Hebrew) King David proclaimed Jerusalem to be the capital of the State of Israel, its seat of government, and the holiest city in Judaism. It is also Israel's largest and most populated city.

How does a person start in talking of Jerusalem, I tell you the truth, I am humbled just to say I was there, what a life altering experience it was for both Jennie and I,

Our Jerusalem trip started out this way, Ron said he needed to go into work this day, but he had arranged for a friend of his who drives a taxi in Tel Aviv to come down and take us anywhere we wanted to go, Jacob, the taxi owner did not feel all that comfortable with his English so he had his 34 year old daughter Uli, take a day off of work and be our translator, Uli works as a Event coordinator for Jewish Comedians.

We started out real early this day and headed southeast towards Jerusalem, 95 miles away. Jacob was what they called a "Religious Man" we enjoyed several religious conversations and discussions.

Jerusalem is on top of a very large hill on our way up to the city we passed by some iconic memorials along the way in the center divider of the highway. Before us were (26) old army trucks that participated in the 1967 Six-Day-War & the Israeli invasion and reestablishment of The City of Jerusalem

Countdown to War

On May 15, Israel's Independence Day, Egyptian troops began moving into the Sinai and massing near the Israeli border. By May 18, Syrian troops were prepared for battle along the Golan Heights.
Nasser ordered the UN Emergency Force (UNEF), stationed in the Sinai since 1956 as a buffer between Israeli and Egyptian forces after Israel's withdrawal following the Sinai Campaign, to withdraw on May 16. Without bringing the matter to the attention of the General Assembly (as his predecessor had promised), Secretary-General U Thant complied with the demand. After the withdrawal of the UNEF, the 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

The Blockade

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.

Escalation

Nasser was aware of the pressure he was exerting to force Israel's hand, and challenged Israel to fight almost daily. The day after the blockade was set up, he said defiantly: "The Jews threaten to make war. I reply: Welcome! We are ready for war. Nasser challenged Israel to fight almost daily. "Our basic objective will be the destruction of Israel. The Arab people want to fight,"
he said on May 27.

The following day, he added: "We will not accept any...coexistence with Israel...Today the issue is not the establishment of peace between the Arab states and Israel....The war with Israel is in effect since 1948. King Hussein of Jordan 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, Irag Irag joined the military alliance with Egypt, Jordan, Syria

The 1967 Six-Day War

Israel consistently expressed a desire to negotiate with its neighbors. In an address to the UN General Assembly on October 10, 1960, foreign Minsister Golda Meir challenged Arab leaders to meet with Prime Minister David Ben Gurion to negotiate a peace settlement. Nasser answered on October 15, saying that Israel was trying to deceive world opinion, and reiterating that his country would never recognize the Jewish State.

In 1963, The Arab League decided to introduce a new weapon in its war against Israel - the Palestine Liberation Organization The PLO formally came into being during a 1964 meeting of the first Palestinian Congress. Shortly thereafter, the group began to splinter into various factions. Ultimately, the largest faction,

Fatah would come to dominate the organization, and its leader, Yasser Arafat would become the PLO chairman and most visible symbol. All the groups adhered to a set of principles laid out in the Palestine National Charter which called for Israel's destruction.

The PLO's belligerent rhetoric was matched by deeds.Terrorist Jordan, The Gaza Strip and Lebanon The orders and logistical support for the attacks were coming, however, from Cairo and Damascus. Egyptian President Nasser's main objective was to harass the Israelis, but a secondary one was to undermine King Hussein's regime in Jordan.

Terror from the Heights
The breakup of the U.A.R. and the resulting political instability only made Syria more hostile toward Israel. Another major cause of conflict was Syria's resistance to Israel's creation of a National Water Carrier to take water from the Jordan River to supply the country. The Syrian army used the Golan Heights
more hostile toward Israel. Another major cause of conflict was Syria's resistance to Israel's creation of a National Water Carrier to take water from the Jordan River to supply the country. The Syrian army used the

which tower 3,000 feet above the Galilee, to shell Israeli farms and villages. Syria's attacks grew more frequent in 1965 and 1966, forcing children living on Kibbutzim in the Huleh Valleyto sleep in bomb shelters. Israel repeatedly protested the Syrian bombardments to the UN Mixed Armistice Commission, which was charged with policing the cease-fire, but the UN did nothing to stop Syria's aggression - even a mild Security Council resolution expressing "regret" for such incidents was vetoed by the Soviet Union. Meanwhile, Israel was condemned by the United Nations when it retaliated.

While the Syrian military bombardment and terrorist attacks intensified, Nasser's rhetoric became increasingly bellicose. In 1965, he announced, "We shall not enter Palestine with its soil covered in sand; we shall enter it with its soil saturated in blood."
Again, a few months later, Nasser expressed the Arabs' aspiration: "[el] the full restoration of the rights of the Palestinian people. In other words, we aim at the destruction of the state of Israel. The immediate aim: perfection of Arab military might. The national aim: the eradication of Israel."

Syria's attacks on Israeli kibbutzim from the Golan Heights finally provoked a retaliatory strike on April 7, 1967. During the attack, Israeli planes shot down six Syrian fighter planes - MiGs supplied by the Soviet Union. Shortly thereafter, the Soviets - who had been providing military and economic assistance to both Syria and Egypt - gave Damascus false information alleging a massive Israeli military buildup in preparation for an attack. Despite Israeli denials, Syria decided to invoke its defense treaty with Egypt and asked Nasser to come to its aid.

The U.S. Position

The United States tried to prevent the war through negotiations, but it was not able to persuade Nasser or the other Arab states to cease their belligerent statements and actions. Still, right before the war, Johnson warned: "Israel will not be alone unless it decides to go alone." Then, when the war began, the State Department announced: "Our position is neutral in thought, word and deed."

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.

The battle then moved to the ground, and some of history's greatest tank battles were fought between Egyptian and Israeli armor in the blast-furnace conditions of the Sinai desert.

Jerusalem Is Attacked

Prime Minister Levi Eshkol sent a message to King Hussein on June 5 saying Israel would not attack Jordan unless he initiated hostilities. When Jordanian radar picked up a cluster of planes flying from Egypt to Israel, and the Egyptians convinced Hussein the planes were theirs, he ordered the shelling of West Jerusalem. It turned out that the planes were Israel's and were returning from destroying the Egyptian air force on the ground.

It took only three days for Israeli forces to defeat the Jordanian legion. On the morning of June 7, the order was given to recapture the Old City . Israeli paratroopers stormed the city and secured it. Defense Minister Moshe Dayan arrived with Chief of Staff Yitzhak Rabin to formally mark the Jews' return to their historic capital and their holiest site. At the Western Wall , the IDF's chaplain, Rabbi Shlomo Goren, blew a shofar to celebrate the event.

The Stunning Victory

While most IDF units were fighting the Egyptians and Jordanians, a small, heroic group of soldiers were left to defend the northern border against the Syrians. It was not until the Jordanians and Egyptians were subdued that reinforcements could be sent to the Golan Heights, where Syrian gunners commanding the strategic high ground made it exceedingly difficult and costly for Israeli forces to penetrate. Finally, on June 9, after two days of heavy air bombardment, Israeli forces succeeded in breaking through the Syrian lines.

After just six days of fighting, Israeli forces were in a position to march on Cairo, Damascus, and Amman. By this time, the principal objectives of capturing the Sinai and the Golan Heights had been accomplished, and Israeli political leaders had no desire to fight in the Arab capitals. Furthermore, the Soviet Union had become increasingly alarmed by the Israeli advances and was threatening to intervene. At this point, U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk advised the Israelis "in the strongest possible terms" to accept a cease-fire. On June 10, Israel did just that.

The victory came at a very high cost. In storming the Golan Heights, Israel suffered 115 dead-roughly the number of Americans killed during Operation Desert Storm. Altogether, Israel lost twice as many men - 777 dead and 2,586 wounded-in proportion to her total population as the U.S. lost in eight years of fighting in Vietnam. Also, despite the incredible success of the air campaign, the Israeli Air Force lost 46 of its 200 fighters.The death toll on the Arab side was 15,000 Egyptians, 2,500 Syrians, and 800 Jordanians.