40th Anniversay of the Six Day War, 1967, the war that changed the Middle East and us ever since.

We haven't learned all we should about Israel
(http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/413817,CST-EDT-edits05a.article)

June 5, 2007

Forty years ago today, in one of the most stunning developments of the last half-century, Israel pulled off the ultimate in go-for-broke gambles. On the morning of June 5, 1967, it sent all but 12 of its 200 air force planes on a surprise attack on Egypt's air force, knowing if those planes were detected and destroyed, the Israeli homeland would be vulnerable in the extreme to the combined Arab air forces. They weren't and it wasn't, and the Six Day War was written into history.

In marking the occasion, the world remembers the speed and overwhelming force of Israel's campaign, and what a supreme statement it was of Israel's right to exist. The world remembers how Israeli forces captured the Sinai, the Golan Heights, the West Bank and Gaza -- and how Jerusalem, divided after the 1948 War of Independence, was reunited.

What the world may not remember, or choose to remember, is how Egypt brought about the air strike by imposing a naval blockade of the Strait of Tiran and forcing the United Nations to remove its forces from the Sinai, after 10 years of keeping the peace, in preparation for a war to wipe Israel off the map -- and how alone in the world Israel was in defending itself. The world may not remember that even after their humiliating defeat, the Arabs' response to Israel's offer to negotiate a peaceful solution to their conflict came in the words: "no recognition, no peace and no negotiations."

Still, in the 40 years since the Six Day War, Israel and the Arab world have negotiated, most promisingly when Egyptian President Anwar Sadat courageously promoted moderation and participated in the 1978 agreement with Jimmy Carter and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin -- this five years after the 1973 October War. But as dramatized by PLO head Yasser Arafat's unconscionable trashing of a 2000 peace proposal orchestrated by Bill Clinton, too many Arabs in general and Palestinians in particular have no interest in doing anything but what PLO chieftain Ahmad Shuqayri promised in the '60s: to "destroy Israel and its inhabitants."

Celebrations of the 40th are said to be muted in Israel. There's widespread despair that peace seems more remote than ever. Pride in the military suffered with its failures in last year's war in Lebanon, which led to harsh condemnations of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert for overreaching and under-preparing. His political survival is in doubt. But even as the United Nations and much of Europe regularly find reason to condemn Israel for defending itself against Hamas and Hezbollah, while not criticizing those groups for their terrorist actions, Israel's resolve -- to do what is right -- is unshaken. Yes, it will answer aggression with force. But it also will make more concessions in the name of peace than the world will acknowledge or its enemies deserve.