Talk:Six-Day War

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Good article Six-Day War was a nominee for good article, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
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[edit] GA Review

Unfortunately, I am going to have to fail this article, as it does not meet the GA Criteria at this time. More specifically, some of my concerns are as follows:

  • Inline citations are missing from quite a few paragraphs and, in some cases, entire sections. This includes, but is not limited to:
    • The first two paragraphs of "Suez Crisis Aftermath"
    • Much of the first paragraph of "The Straits of Tiran"
    • The final paragraph of "The Straits of Tiran"
    • The final sentence of "Egypt and Jordan"
    • The end of "The drift to war" (which currently reads as original research)
    • The final paragraph of "Preliminary air attack"
    • Almost everything in "Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula"
    • Four paragraphs in "West Bank"
    • Almost everything in "Golan Heights"
    • The entire "War in the air" and "War at sea" sections
    • The first, fourth, seventh and eighth paragraphs in "Conclusion of conflict and post-war situation"
    • Much of "Allegations of U.S. and British combat support", including quotations
    • The second paragraph of "U.S. and British non-combat support"
  • The article contains four "citation needed" tags and a "specify" tag *--Datapolitical (talk) 00:33, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
  • The article is not stable, as there are multiple edits every day.
  • The copyright of some images is questionable:
    • Image:FCO17473 10Apr67.gif uses a deprecated tag *removed--Datapolitical (talk) 09:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
    • The tag on Image:Arab israeli memo.jpg says that an additional copyright tag is needed *--Datapolitical (talk) 09:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
    • I don't know that a case for Fair Use can be made for Image:Life67.jpg, as magazines should not be used to illustrate text unless the text relates to the magazine itself. *--Datapolitical (talk) 09:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
  • The article lacks consistency in some areas:
    • Not all abbreviations are spelled out the first time they are used (eg. UNTSO) *--Datapolitical (talk) 09:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
    • It needs to be either "U.S." or "US" throughout the article; likewise, "U.N." or "UN" *(partly) --Datapolitical (talk) 09:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
    • Most people's names are given in full the first time, but President Johnson's first name is not mentioned in the text of the article at all.
  • The article contains several "It should be noted" statements, which are discouraged as per Wikipedia:Words to avoid#Words that editorialize *--Datapolitical (talk) 09:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Several external links do not work:
    • The Corfu Channel Case (Merits), International Court of Justice, ICJ Reports, 1949, pp. 28-29 [icj-cij.org]
    • A Campaign for the Books [time.com]
    • Bamford Bashes Israel: Conspiracy Theorist Claims Attack on USS Liberty Intentional [std.com]
    • UN Resolutions on Palestine [palestine-un.org]
    • Israel Defense Forces' History [www1.idf.il]
  • The article would benefit greatly from copyediting. There are writing errors that distract from the text. For the most part, it is okay. I found that punctuation errors made quite a few sentences confusing. After a prepositional phrase (eg. "In 1967", "At this time", "After receiving this message", etc.), a comma is needed. Having large amounts of the text in parentheses also makes the article choppy and hard to follow.
  • More consistency is needed in the Footnotes section. All online references should have a publisher and access date.

I hope these comments are helfpul. I don't want to be discouraging, as the article is very interesting and I have no doubt that it can become a Good Article. I don't feel it is ready yet, though. I wanted to give detailed feedback with specific items to address, as I saw that people were upset by the comments left during the previous GA review. Best wishes, GaryColemanFan (talk) 14:57, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Moving to Good Article Status

So thanks to GaryColemanFan we've got a task list to work off of. I'm going to start going through and starring everything I've finished doing, and anyone else who's working on improving the article can feel free to do the same. My goal is to have this done by the end of the semester. --Datapolitical (talk) 09:06, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Recent additions

An unregistered user has made several contributions to the article yesterday. They are unreferenced, and are placed next to existing references, which might be misleading. Can anyone verify them? -- Nudve (talk) 05:36, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Yea, there are more than a couple. They seem to have been reverted by another unregistered user (or someone who just didn't log in). If the person who made them thinks they're correct, they should list the proposed changes on the talk page or give specific references.

I know it'll be a hideous pain to list all content changes on the talk page, but considering that this is a politically charged event, an edit war would not surprise me if changes were made without discussion.

Also, references to the US and the Soviet Union seem to have been changed to Nato and the Warsaw pact respectively. I'm not sure who made those changes, but are we sure those are correct? (If it's a registered user, can they explain them on here?) --Datapolitical (talk) 23:09, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Right. We could give it a few more days, but otherwise, if nobody here can verify them and the contributor cannot be contacted, there might be no choice but to revert. -- Nudve (talk) 05:27, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
The book I've been reading about the Six Day War references the US and the Soviet Union directly, and doesn't talk about pressure coming from the Warsaw Pact at all. I personally think the changes are incorrect, but lets wait until Wednesday before we revert.
Also, someone changed these numbers:
On the eve of the war, Egypt massed around 160,000 of its 300,000 troops in the Sinai. Many Egyptans were witheld from action in the Sinai because Egypt feared another attack by foreign powers like in 1956. No less than a third of them were veterans of Egypt's intervention into the Yemen Civil War and another third were reservists. These forces had 1,792 tanks, 2,109 APCs and more than 4,500 artillery pieces.[1]
Since the citation didn't change but the numbers did, i'm tempted to revert, but I'll hold off till Wednesday when we can fix everything from the last week as well if it can't be verified.--Datapolitical (talk) 23:45, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't recall any references to the Warsaw Pact either -- Nudve (talk) 06:18, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
I just pulled out a book from my school's library on the war, Six Days, by Jeremy Bowen, so I'll be checking the stuff we need sourced against that.--Datapolitical (talk) 06:46, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Semi-protection

So I've gotten the article semi-protected for a month so we can fix this thing up without vandalism. I'm confident the edits over the past few days are bogus, so i'm gonna do a revert now. If someone feels that this is in error, please feel free to undo that, but also provide your reasoning here. Specifically in relation to the changes from US to Nato and Soviet Union to Warsaw Pact, those need clarification as there is a material difference between the two.--Datapolitical (talk) 05:13, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can see, the changes were wrong or meaningless. "Nato" in the 56 war is ridiculous - it would amount to Britain and France pressuring themselves; India and Yugoslavia is correct, India and South Africa isn't, Egypt wasn't worried about anyone but Israel attacking, etc.John Z (talk) 07:37, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Info on a copy-protected image

Since we can't use the Life Magazine image (of the soldier in the Suez Canal) found in this article: http://www.azure.org.il/magazine/magazine.asp?id=387, which was removed for copyright issues, I put a link to that site in our external links section. I'd like to reference the photograph in the article itself and talk about its relevance, so any thoughts on how to do that properly (i'm thinking something on "Images of the Six-Day War" to talk about the significance of the image that headlines the article (of the three soldiers entering the Old City) and of the Life magazine cover.--Datapolitical (talk) 08:13, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Sources for apocryphal quote on British tanks

This paragraph was in the article and had no source, and clearly needs one. I've been unable in about 20 minutes of searching the web and in searching the four reference books on the war I checked out from the library to find any reference to the story. I've moved the section here, so if anyone can find a source on this, put it back, but I figure it should stay on the talk page until we've got some reference to it.

A possibly apocryphal story was going the rounds that the UK had supplied some Chieftain tanks to the IDF for evaluation. When hostilities broke out, the UK Ministry of Defense, in a panic, called Israel for assurances that the tanks would not approach the border combat zones. Back came the Israeli response, "Don't worry, we've moved the borders!"[citation needed]

(there were a few spelling errors as well which I've cleaned up, and which make me just a bit more unsure about this section)--Datapolitical (talk) 00:24, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] editorializing removed

The political importance of the 1967 War was immense; Israel demonstrated that it was not only able, but also willing to initiate strategic strikes that could change the regional balance. Egypt and Syria learned tactical lessons, but perhaps not the strategic ones,[specify] and would launch an attack in 1973 in an attempt to reclaim their lost territory. [110]

The phrase "but perhaps not the strategic ones" can be considered editorializing, and since the source cited makes no reference to the claim, I removed that clause from the sentence. If anyone can find a reference directly supporting it, please add it back in. --Datapolitical (talk) 00:31, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gulf of Aqaba as an act War

Concerning the closing of the Gulf of Aqaba by the UAR as an act of war, the viewpoint of the UAR has to be considered[1]

The Gulf of Aqaba, the representative of the United Arab Republic stated, had always been a national inland waterway subject to Arab sovereignty. Since the Gulf's only three legitimate littoral States - Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Republic - were all in a state of war with Israel, their right to bar enemy vessels was recognized under international law. The claim that Israel had a port on the Gulf had no validity, as Israel had illegally occupied several miles of coastline on the Gulf, including Om Rashrash, in violation of Security Council resolutions of 1948 and the Egyptian-Israel General Armistice Agreement. The Armistice Agreements did not vitiate his Government's rights to impose restrictions on navigation in the Strait; nor had the 1956 aggression changed the legal status of the Gulf of Aqaba or the United Arab Republic's rights over its territorial waters.

It was further pointed out that the claim that the blockade of the Gulf of Aqaba itself constituted an act of war and justified the Israel aggression as an act of self-defence provided no excuse for the massive assault. The Strait of Tiran had never been opened to Israel until the aggression of 1956. No vital interests had suffered; not an Israel ship had passed through the Strait in the last two and a half years. The action of Israel was not legitimate self-defence within the meaning of Article 51 of the Charter because no armed attack on its territory had in fact occurred. On 5 June 1967, the United Arab Republic had not yet even completed its defensive precautions in Sinai, and a similar condition had prevailed in Syria and Jordan.

[edit] Arab Belligerents

I notice that the list of combatants in the info box keeps changing and I think there must be some confusion about countries and flags, etc. The United Arab Republic split in 1961, however Egypt continued to be known by that name until 1971. Its flag was the flag now associated with Syria. Following the rise of the Ba'ath party in Syria, in 1963, they adopted the flag used by Iraq at the time. So, the Arab belligerents in the 6 Six Days war are: the United Arab Republic, Syria (with the flag of Iraq), and Jordan (with the flag of Jordan). I don't know why other involved countries were removed (e.g. Iraq and Libya), but I just wanted to raise the issue of naming. JEB90 (talk) 07:57, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

What does Libya have to do with the war? They weren't belligerents. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.173.165.226 (talk) 07:15, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Waiting period (Six-Day War)

I stumbled across that article. It has many problems, and it doesn't appear in the main article. What do you suggest be done about it? Should it be merged? -- Nudve (talk) 15:08, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] How many Syrians fled the Golan heights

Recently, an anon has been an edit warring, claiming that "100 000 Syrians fled the Golan, not 1000" (as it is currently written). He was thrice reverted, once with the "rv uncited change", which I assume means "change to sourced statements" (otherwise this is not a legitimate reason to revert).

My question is, whether the number is really sourced. The ref is "International Committee of the Red Cross, 1998, p. 454.". (possibly dumb question ahead, please correct if so) What is this referring to? The ICRC's 1998 international review? Or possibly the annual report? If the international review, then page 454 does not appear to have contained any meaningful information (pages 445-453, pages 455-462), and adjacent pages don't appear to contain directly relevant information either. The 1998 annual report didn't appear to contain the needed information either. Also, it is important to note that the article's text originally read "about 100,000", but was changed mid-February by an anon, without anyone taking notice.[2]

Wikipedia's article about the Golan heights states "Between 80,000 and 109,000 of the Golan's inhabitants [...] fled or were driven out during the Six-Day War", citing Benny Morris(2001) and Report of the UN Secretary-General.

So, given all this, I believe a slight rewrite is in order. If no one opposes, I will modify the sentence to incorporate the above sources. Rami R 19:33, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I support -- Nudve (talk) 04:30, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
The vast majority of the Syrians who fled the Golan Heights were residents of Quneitra, a city which was handed back to Syria in 1974. DrorK (talk) 07:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
The article on Quneitra suggests that there were about 20,000 before 1967. This Syrian site[3] says 60,000; while this one[4] says 153,000. Does anyone here have an RS on exactly how many of the refugees were from Quneitra? -- Nudve (talk) 08:35, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
The 20,000 is apparently from britannica. Anyway, I have updated the article based with the current available reliable sources. The article can be further updated, if any new reliable sources are found. Rami R 17:02, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Before / After Map?

I think this article would benefit from a before/after map showing the territorial changes as outlined in the info box. Currently:

Israel captured the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt,
the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) from Jordan,
and the Golan Heights from Syria.

Paulshannon (talk) 15:21, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] United Arab Emirates

I dont see how the UAE was part of the war as the country was formed in 1971. Before that it was a number of Emirates all being British protectorates with no military force other than the trucial scouts that were under British command.--81.156.165.31 (talk) 22:17, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

That's true. Plus, since the articles itself has no mention of it, it should be removed. Any objections? -- Nudve (talk) 05:18, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Pre-Emptive Strike

The sources cited to support the idea that Israel engaged in a pre-emptive strike are dubious. The likes of "The Economist", CNN, are not the proper sources to cite because they do not specialize in the analysis of history. A draft resolution which would "vigorously condemn Israel's aggression"[5] was rejected by 57 votes against to 36 in favor with 23 abstentions. Considering that a large part of the world in 1967 condemned Israel for committing aggression, the "pre-emptive" position in no way represents a consensus; Nierva (talk) 20:30, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Not only are they reliable sources, but they also reflect the modern consensus of opinion on the subject. The proposal by the U.S.S.R. you refer to was rejected. And Egypt didn't "request" that the U.N. force leave, it ordered them out. Please don't remove properly sourced information again, thanks. Jayjg (talk) 01:27, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
The BBC is not an outlet that engages in the scholarly analysis of history but is merely a news outlet that reports current events. "The Economist" does not analyze history but only promotes a particular set of foreign and economic policies. None of these sources are reliable for the subject at hand. The resolution you refer to, despite being rejected, still had substantial support. The results contradict the misleading suggestion in this article that Israel engaged in a pre-emptive attack is supported by a consensus.
Concerning the presence of the United Nations Emergency Force, it was terminated by a decision of the Government of the UAR. The UNEF had entered Egyptian territory with the consent of the UAR Government and in fact could remain there only as long as that consent continued.
Your indiscriminate deletion of sourced material is provocative and at the least shows an absence of good faith.
Nierva (talk) 02:12, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
My "indiscriminate deletion of sourced material"? It was you who deleted seven reliable sources, in some bizarre attempt to suppress the majority view on this. I've restored them, of course, and added six more sources. I'll quote from one of them:

"...Israel launched a pre-emptive strike against Egyptian planes as they stood on the airfields. These events triggered the so-called June war of 1967, but the pre-emptive action of Israel was not condemned by the S.C. - or indeed by the G.A. There appeared to be a general feeling, certainly shared by the Western states, that taken in the context this was a lawful use of anticipatory self-defence, and that for Israel to have waited any longer could well have been fatal to her survival." Antonio Cassese. The Current Legal Regulation of the Use of Force: Current Legal Regulation Vol10, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1986, p. 443. ISBN 9024732476

This is the view of international law on the matter by Antonio Cassese, the first President of the International Criminal Tribunal For the Former Yugoslavia. You, by contrast, have provided this as a source [6], a Table of Contents, and this: [7] a speech by Egypt's ambassador to the U.N. And this from someone who is claiming that the BBC and The Economist are not reliable sources. If you imagine that The Economist "does not analyze history but only promotes a particular set of foreign and economic policies", what on earth do you imagine the Egyptian ambassador to the U.N. does? Please review WP:V and WP:NPOV, and do not remove the reliable sources again, nor insert the unreliable ones. Thank you. Jayjg (talk) 03:14, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Even if one discounts CNN, The Economist, and the BBC (and no reasonable person will discount those three as reliable sources), the fact that the 6 Day War began with a preemptive strike is sourced to no less than 19 other sources, many of which satisfy Nierva's criteria of being "scholarly." For good measure, I'm about to add one more. --GHcool (talk) 03:48, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

There’s no doubt that the term “pre-emptive” is precise, appropriate and well sourced. -- Olve Utne (talk) 14:48, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

No one has disputed the reliability of the BBC and CNN. What is in dispute is the competence of these popular media organs in the analysis of history and international law. You will not find a citation of CNN in the work of a scholar in order to prove his argument that Israel launched a "pre-emptive" strike. These organs do not specialize in the analysis of history but merely report on current events in a manner that is often biased. While it's reasonable to cite these sources on current events, it is fallacious to consult them on matters of history.
Nor is anyone actually disputing belief that Israel engaged in a pre-emptive strike. This article makes a misleading attempt to show that this opinion represents a consensus when I have demonstrated the contrary. That there were 36 votes cast in the United Nations General Assembly condemning Israel for having committed aggression means that this viewpoint has to be considered. Whereas I am trying to show the perspective from the other side, many of you stubbornly insist that only one biased view has to be entertained.
A demonstration of an oppposing point of view is found in the work of the international jurist Henry Cattan who wrote:

...After the discovery of the true facts about Israel's aggression, Israel invoked two arguments to justify its launching the war. Its first argument was that it acted by way of a preventative strike which, in its view, is equivalent to self-defense under Article 51 of the UN Charter. Such argument has no basis in fact or in law. In fact, Israel, as we have seen, created the crisis and attacked its neighbors. In law, the Charter recognizes the right of self-defence against an armed attack, but not a pre-emptive strike in advance of any attack. None of the Arab States had attacked or threatened to attack Israel and as D.P. O'Connell observes, the invasion of a neibhoring country's territory is not an exercise of the right of self-defence.

Nierva (talk) 20:50, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Aside from the fact that Cattan must have a very selective reading of history (Egypt didn't threaten Israel? Really?) I think criticism and condemnation of Israel's actions have been fairly covered in the article. We can never know what Egypt, Syria, etc., would have done if Israel had not attacked first. But the term "pre-emptive" must by necessity deal with the motivation of the attack, and you don't seem to be disputing this. --Leifern (talk) 20:59, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
That is your opinion. There are other opinions that conflict with that view and they should be fairly represented. Nierva (talk) 21:06, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
But it is you who are deleting information, not me. I have not tried to omit objections of any kind to Israel's actions. Besides, it is not a matter of opinion whether Nasser threatened Israel. Here's one well-documented quote from the article itself: 'President Nasser, who had called King Hussein an "imperialist lackey" just days earlier, declared: "Our basic objective will be the destruction of Israel. The Arab people want to fight."' You are also mixing up your arguments. In the introductory paragraph, the attack is merely characterized as pre-emptive and does not state whether it was "legal" or not. --Leifern (talk) 00:56, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Other observations found in the work of the United States scholar John Quigley:

"Even if Israel had expected Egypt to attack, it is not clear a preemptive strike is lawful. The UN Charter, Article 51, characterizes armed force as defensive only if it is used in response to an "armed attack." Most states consider this language to mean that a preemptive strike is unlawful. India, for one, asserted in General Assembly discussion of the June 1967 hostilities that preemptive self-defense is not permitted under international law. Most authorities agree with that view, though some say force may be used in anticipation of an attack that has not yet occurred but is reasonably expected to occur imminently Israel did not face such a situation.

Nierva (talk) 21:32, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Nierva commits the red herring fallacy with his/her argument above. Preemptive strikes are a complex issue in terms of legality, and perhaps an argument could be made that Israel's preemptive attack was illegal. I am not educated well enough in international law to know whether Israel's attack of Egypt was legal or not, but my guess is that it was legal since Egypt violated international law by closing the Straits of Tiran, and which any nation would interpret as a casus belli. The point is that Israel attacked preemptively regardless of whether or not it was legal to, and describing the attack as something other than a preemptive one is uncalled for. --GHcool (talk) 22:29, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Not that we should determine matters of international law here, but there is no question that a naval blockade is an act of war.--Leifern (talk) 00:58, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Egypt's forces?

So what was the makeup of Egypt's forces in the Sinai? From the article, there were seven divisions. One of them was mechanized. But the article contradicts itself on the other six. Either it was four armored and two infantry, or vice versa... I don't have any references, or I'd fix it myself. 70.168.46.226 (talk) 12:20, 5 June 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Lebanon?

In my opinion, as the article and others refer to Lebanon as being neutral, showing it in the list of oponents of Israel makes no sense. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lususromulus (talk • contribs) 16:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)