Revisiting the Six Day War

RHONDA SPIVAK

Public figures, politicians and military experts from around the world gathered together at the Interdisciplinary Centre in Herzliya, Israel, at the end of March for an international conference marking the 40th anniversary of the Six Day War.

"I was 17 years old during the Six Day War and I remember the hareda [fear] of an existential threat on Israel. I heard the war on a transistor radio and I remember that my father returned home only on Shabbat at the end of the war," said Dalia Rabin, daughter of the late prime minister Itzhak Rabin, who, in 1967, was the Israel Defence Forces chief of staff.

In describing the mood in the country leading up to the war, Rabin said, "The sense was that the last person out would turn out the lights."

According to Shlomo Gazit, former head of the IDF's Military Intelligence Unit, "There was a great panic and a horrible atmosphere among the Israeli public before the war."

However, he noted, this panic did not exist in the army. "We [in the army] felt confident," said Gazit. "There was panic and fear that there would be 10,000 dead on our side - but I promised that there would be fewer than 500 dead. In the end, there were about 350 Israeli soldiers that were killed."

In the days leading up to the war, Gazit recalled meeting with a Soviet Jew who had been jailed in Siberia and had a detailed knowledge of Russia, to discuss potential Russian involvement in the conflict. "He told me that Russia will be willing to wipe Israel off the map," said Gazit. "They even would use nuclear weapons. I didn't change my mind, based on the intelligence we had. But still, I didn't sleep well that night."

In Gazit's view, one of the factors that ultimately led to the Six Day War was Israel's "building of the national water carrier," which sent water to the north and south and "made the Arabs realize that Israel had an economic basis to exist, such that they began thinking about preparing for war."

In describing the "euphoria" after the victory in 1967, Rabin said that there was a sense that "we did the unbelievable" and that "the nation felt there had been a real miracle – the economy flourished and the world looked at us differently." In her view, Israel experienced a similar feeling when her father signed the Oslo Accords and the peace process gained momentum. "Before the peace process, there had been a crisis of confidence [in the country], but with the peace process, the economy flourished and our image was better," said Rabin. "The notion of seeing a democratic Israel at peace [with its neighbors] was my father's dream."

Labor party secretary-general Eitan Cabel spoke at the conference about what he believes was Itzhak Rabin's true legacy as the IDF chief of staff during the Six Day War. According to Cabel, in all of the security decisions that Rabin made, he tried "to spill the least amount of Israeli blood as possible.

"There are others who think less about the spilling of blood than Rabin did.... Rabin saved the lives of hundreds, if not thousands," Cabel declared. "Moshe Dayan was a bit too hasty to go to battle ... he was willing to go to battle bechol mechir [at all costs]."

Cabel contrasted Rabin's performance as chief of staff in 1967 to that of Dan Halutz, who resigned as chief of staff after last summer's Second Lebanon War. "It is better to have a chief of staff [such as Rabin] who hesitates about going to war than one who pretends to know more than he does, and is too quick to go to war [such as Halutz]," said Cabel.

"I have read over the deliberations made in the weeks leading up to the war, and practically in every diyun [deliberation], they speak of the expected number of casualties," Cabel said.

In Cabel's view, the day that Itzhak Rabin went to his home immediately prior to the war, which has since been referred to as Rabin's "nervous or physical breakdown," should be seen as part of the intense "in-depth" deliberations he took before going to war. The notion of expected casualties weighed heavily on him.

At the time Cabel addressed the conference, he was still a minister in Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's government. However, following the release of the Winograd Committee's Interim Report, Cabel resigned as a cabinet minister and has publicly called on Olmert to follow him.

Cabel actively supported Ehud Barak in his previous bid to become leader of the Labor party, and is often credited with having been responsible behind the scenes for ensuring that Barak became prime minister. However, Cabel said that in the upcoming Labor party primaries on May 28, "I am not officially supporting anyone.... I am not involved. I am not saying anything."

Rhonda Spivak is a freelance writer who divides her time between Winnipeg and Israel.

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