Allan Massie: Only talking heals wounds of war

The outcome of the Six Days War strengthened Israelis strategic position, but weakened its political and moral one. Picture: Getty

Arabs must soften their hard line stance if there is to be any realistic solution to the Middle East crisis, writes Allan Massie

It’s hard to believe now – hard, I daresay, for young people to credit and hard for us who are older to remember – but at the time of the Six Days War in 1967 public opinion in Britain was overwhelmingly in favour of Israel. The Israelis were defending their freedom and the right of their state to exist, and we were mostly delighted to see “gallant little Israel” win such a swift and comprehensive victory.

Now the wheel has turned. There are still of course foreign policy hawks here who are pro-Israel, and many more of them in the USA, in Congress, the Pentagon and think-tanks, but public opinion has swung round, and even though we are now distrustful of trends in the Muslim world, the Palestinians are seen as victims, oppressed by the Israeli army and security forces. Meanwhile Israel, still confident of American support, defies UN Resolutions, assassinates those whom it perceives as enemies, and in the last few days has once gain launched bombing raids on Syria, ostensibly – and perhaps genuinely – to prevent missiles from being passed on to Hezbollah.

Before 1967 Israel was strategically in a very weak position. It was a tiny state. You could cross it at its narrowest point in less than an hour.

Victory in war has consequences, not all of which are favourable, some storing up trouble for the future.

The outcome of the Six Days War strengthened Israeli’s strategic position, but weakened its political and moral one. The endangered nation, admired as the only democracy in the Middle East, was now an Occupying Power, holding the Palestinians in subjection. What was Israel to do? Withdrawing from the West Bank and the Golan Heights would have returned it to a position of strategic weakness, surrounded by States which still refused to recognize its right to exist. So it held on to them.

Gradually it did more than hold on. In the face of Palestinian hostility, manifest in the two infitadas (1987-2003 and 2000-5) and acts of terrorism, it tightened its grip. It pursued a policy of colonisation. Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem were built and then expanded. The process continues, in defiance of UN resolutions and widespread international condemnation. Only this week prime minister Netanyahu has given his approval to still more settlement-building. And to protect Israel from terrorism, a wall was built between Israel proper and the West Bank. Security checks were established throughout the Occupied Territory.

Meanwhile, there was international pressure for the creation of a Palestinian state. The issue was complicated, and for Israel made more alarming, by what followed its withdrawal from Gaza ten years ago, an initiative undertaken by its hard-line prime minister Ariel Sharon. This did nothing to ease Israel’s security. On the contrary, elections in Gaza in a victory for Hamas, regarded by Israel, with reason, as a political party which denies Israel’s right to exist and also as a terrorist organisation.