Israel at War: 1956 | 5 Minute Videos

Stinging from their loss to Israel in its War of Independence in 1948, Arab countries plotted revenge. Still, a new war seemed unlikely until Egypt allied with the Soviet Union to acquire a fresh arsenal of modern weapons. Renowned historian Michael Oren explains what happened next.

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Script:
Just before dawn on October 29, 1956, paratroopers of the Israel Defense Forces, led by the legendary commander, Ariel Sharon, descended into Egypt’s Sinai Desert.

The paratroopers’ goal was to conquer the strategically important Mitla Pass.

But the broader objective was to eliminate the threat posed by the Soviet-armed Egyptian military and Egypt’s strongman Gamal Abdel-Nasser.

Israel was not alone in seeking Nasser’s defeat. Great Britain and France also wanted to intervene against Nasser, who had just nationalized the economically-vital Suez Canal.

They only needed a pretext.

And Israel provided them with one by attacking Egyptian forces in the Mitla Pass, 20 miles away from the Canal.

Thus began what is known as the Suez Crisis, the second Arab-Israeli war.

Where did it all begin?

The war’s origins can be traced to the end of Israel’s War of Independence in 1949, when Israel signed armistice agreements with Jordan, Egypt, and Syria.

Israel viewed these agreements as precursors to peace but the Arabs saw them as temporary truces leading up to what they called the “second round,” to attack and destroy Israel.

Throughout the early 1950s, the Arabs acquired modern weapons—above all, fighter jets—which Israel, still laboring under a US arms embargo, could not obtain.

The Arab states also backed bands of Palestinian terrorists known as Fidayeen — self-sacrificers — who launched raids against Israeli communities from the West Bank, which was then ruled by Jordan, as well as from the Gaza Strip, ruled by Egypt.

In response, Israel formed paratrooper units under Ariel Sharon to retaliate against the Fidayeen raids.

Border tensions reached a fever pitch. Still, war seemed unlikely unless a leader emerged who could rally the Arab world and unite it against Israel.

That leader was the charismatic Gamal Abdel-Nasser, who electrified Arabic-speaking audiences with his fiery rhetoric against the West.

After seizing power in July 1952, he portrayed himself as the hero of Pan-Arabism, the notion that all Arab states should unite and form one powerful nation.

Nasser also railed against “the Zionist Entity”—he refused to call Israel by its name — and pledged to fight it.

He rejected repeated American and British attempts to broker a treaty with Israel, even though they offered him large pieces of Israel’s Negev desert in return.

Instead, he intensified Fidayeen attacks, and sought advanced weaponry from the West’s paramount enemy, the Soviet Union.

In September 1955, he succeeded, signing a massive arms deal with the Soviets that included not only hundreds of tanks and armored vehicles but also modern fighter jets and bombers.

Suddenly outgunned by Egypt, surrounded by threats on all sides, Israel’s very existence hung in the balance—so believed Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and IDF Chief-of-Staff Moshe Dayan.

Israel sorely needed an ally, but no country was willing to aid the isolated Jewish state.

That is until 1955, when Nasser started backing Algeria’s struggle for independence from France, giving France and Israel a common enemy.

Secretly, at first, France started providing Israel with arms.

A great many arrived but for Ben-Gurion and Dayan, not fast enough. In another year, at most, they estimated, Egypt would be ready to strike.

The opportunity to preempt that attack came in July 1956, when Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal.

Britain and France, which largely owned the Canal, were willing to take it back by force, but they needed a pretext.

In a secret agreement, Israel committed to land its paratroopers in the Mitla Pass near the Canal.

This would set off a pre-planned chain of events.