The PLO had set up Fatah as its armed wing and began to attack Israel in terrorist raids. However, Israel was being funded by the USA and their weaponry was much larger and greater than anything the Arabs had. Ultimately, this greatly angered the Arabs as they blamed the USA for the strength of Israel.
Most of the attacks involved Palestinian rebels infiltrating Israel from , the , and . The orders and logistical support for the attacks were coming, however, from Cairo and Damascus. Egyptian President main objective was to harass the Israelis, but a secondary one was to undermine regime in Jordan.
King Hussein viewed the PLO as both a direct and indirect threat to his power. Hussein feared that the PLO might try to depose him with Nasser’s help or that the PLO’s attacks on Israel would provoke retaliatory strikes by Israeli forces that could weaken his authority. By the beginning of 1967, Hussein had closed the PLO’s offices in , arrested many of the group’s members, and withdrew recognition of the organization. Nasser and his friends in the region unleashed a torrent of criticism on Hussein for betraying the Arab cause. King Hussein wanted to avoid war, and in the event fighting did break out, wished to remain neutral. However, half the population of Jordan was Palestinian and they therefore wanted revenge for what had happened in 1948-49 (The War of Independence).
The Six Day War of June 1967 was preceded with two years of constant terrorism that served as an indicator of impending war. Al Fatah, a militant Palestinian organization headed by Yasser Arafat, led the terrorist movement during 1965-67. They maintained headquarters in Syria and attacked from Jordan and Lebanon. Strategically located amidst Arab support, they received funding and arms from Syria, Egypt, Jordan, and Kuwait.
The Arab-Israeli War of 1967 would be known as the Six-Day War because of how long the war lasted for. The fighting began on June 5, 1967, but the tensions behind this particular episode had a long history and would continue long after this one major conflict.
In 1965, Al Fatah initiated around 30 raids on Israel which caused Israel to retaliate against the terrorist attacks. They did so twice, one May 28 and September 5 and sent troops into Jordan to destroy alleged bases. These Israeli actions failed to dissuade terrorism in 1966 and instigated Al Fatah aggression further, intensifying hostilities between Israel and her Arab neighbour
The Lebanese and Jordanians tried to stop the Fatah raids on Israel, but the Syrians actively helped and encouraged the PLO group’s attacks. There were no attacks on Israel from Egypt due to UN troops sitting on the Egyptian/Israeli border after the Suez War of 1956. The Syrians accused the Egyptians of weakness and being friendly with Israel. There was a bomb attack on the border of Jordan and Israel which led to small scale fighting between the soldiers from the two countries.
Egypt demanded the withdrawal of the UN troops who then had to leave and so the Egyptian/Israeli border was unprotected. Egypt closed the Gulf of Aqaba to Israeli shipping. Egypt then demanded that all Palestinian refugees from the 1948 war be allowed to return, and that Israel give up the land it had taken in 1948-49 Israel refused to give way.
Israel was forced to act in fearing a repeat of the 1948 incident. The Israeli Cabinet had by then determined that nothing would come of peaceful efforts to end aggressions being committed against the small nation. Israelis were certain that the Arabs were preparing to commit mass murder, and they acted first. Faced with few choices, on June 4, 1967 the Cabinet authorized the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defence to decide on appropriate steps to defend the State of Israel.
After a long period of provocation, hostile actions, and threats from its Arab neighbouring countries war broke out. On June 5, Israel launched a pre-emptive strike against Egypt and captured the Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip. . The Six Day War broke out on June 5, 1967, following three weeks of tension which began on May 15, 1967. The Six Day war began with an air attack which destroyed the air forces of Egypt, Syria and Jordan within four hours. The success of Israel in this war was beyond all normal expectations. Israel went to war on June 5 for sheer survival. On that date, Israelis crossed into the Sinai and won the war in less than a week.
Israel managed to defeat the Arab nation virtually within a day yet the war was to last for six days. The Arabs lost men in their thousands, the figure reaching to around 15,000 men in total whilst the Israelis lost less than a thousand of their men. The Arabs began with the larger army yet the Israelis had the power and financial support of the USA and believed they were fighting for their nation’s survival.
The causes of the war were several, some of long standing, and some of more recent origin. The Six-Day War was started by Israel with an air attack against Egypt, Syria, and Jordan. Israel emerged from the war with new territory, notably that of Palestine and portions of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula and Syria's Golan Heights and the West Bank of Jordan. The territorial issue from this war remains unsettled today, though arguably the war produced a changed situation in the Middle East that has made compromise and settlement that much more difficult
The Israelis had won the war and land and now had to decide what to do with the land. The Israeli chose to confiscate Arab land and build Jewish settlements in order to make the areas more secure.
The defeat of in 1967 severely weakened the idea of total Arab unity that had been emerging prior to the war under the guidance of Egypt's President Nasser. The Arab nation blamed the US, Britain and other European powers who they believed had helped Israel to win the war. This dissolution of a united Arab world came soon after the cease-fire and even resulted in Nasser's loss of position as the appointed leader of the Arab World. With this sense of unity gone, the various individual states became more dependent on and vulnerable to more direct Soviet influence and control. It was in the best interest of the Soviet Union to maintain a strong presence in the region, due to both its own need and more importantly the west's, need for the main natural resource of the Middle East, oil. With the exception of Egypt who expelled the Soviets in 1972, this situation would remain in the other Arab states and in some cases like Syria, increase, until the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the cold war in 1989.
