1967: Israel, the War & the Year that Transformed the Middle East

by Tom Segev

"A marvelous achievement . . . Anyone curious about the extraordinary six days of Arab-Israeli war will learn much from it."—The EconomistTom Segev's acclaimed works One Palestine, Complete and The Seventh Million overturned accepted views of the history of Israel. Now, in 1967—a number-one bestseller in Hebrew—he brings his masterful skills to the watershed year when six days of war reshaped the country and the entire region.Going far beyond a military account, Segev re-creates the crisis in Israel before 1967, showing how economic recession, a full grasp of the Holocaust's horrors, and the dire threats made by neighbor states combined to produce a climate of apocalypse. He depicts the country's bravado after its victory, the mood revealed in a popular joke in which one soldier says to his friend, "Let's take over Cairo"; the friend replies, "Then what shall we do in the afternoon?" Drawing on unpublished letters and diaries, as well as government memos and military records, Segev reconstructs an era of new possibilities and tragic missteps. He introduces the legendary figures—Moshe Dayan, Golda Meir, Gamal Abdul Nasser, and Lyndon Johnson—and an epic cast of soldiers, lobbyists, refugees, and settlers. He reveals as never before Israel's intimacy with the White House as well as the political rivalries that sabotaged any chance of peace. Above all, he challenges the view that the war was inevitable, showing that a series of disastrous miscalculations lie behind the bloodshed.A vibrant and original history, 1967 is sure to stand as the definitive account of that pivotal year.

Genres: History, Israel, Middle East, Nonfiction, Politics, War, Military Fiction

1289 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Tom Segev (Hebrew: תום שגב‎) is an Israeli historian, author and journalist. He is associated with Israel's so-called New Historians, a group challenging many of the country's traditional narratives.

Reviews

[Derek · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fascinating book, and a fascinating way to do history. Segev helps make 1967 feel current by giving the reader a tour d'horizon of Israeli politics, economics, literature, and everyday life. To borrow Foucault's phrase, this feels like archeology rather than history, in that Segev is carefully dusting off one level of a story, rather than looking at Israel's story diachronically. 1967 seems to show that Israel, at least at that moment in time, was one of the most complex societies imaginable. Of course, the prime ingredients of this complexity was the legacy of the holocaust, the complexity of the diaspora, and the tortured relationship with internal and external Arab peoples.

[Charles Matthews · Rating 3 out of 5]

This review originally appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle:

War, that bluntest of the instruments of policy, seldom produces the precise results that its proponents expect. Forty years ago, the Israelis fought a war that ended in a swift six days and was hailed by many as a glorious victory. They’re still living with its consequences: terrorist attacks and reprisals, the domestic and international tensions that followed the occupation of the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Israeli journalist Tom Segev’s “1967” is not a military history so much as a social and political history, a portrait of Israel and its government in the days before, during and immediately after the Six-Day War, a name that was officially adopted by the government in July 1967. “There was something businesslike about the name,” Segev writes, “statistical almost, and yet it also evoked the six days of creation, in the spirit of the messianic euphoria that had spread through the country.”

Before the war, Segev observes, Israel was suffering from a kind of malaise. It was crippled by the economic recession of 1966 and divided by ethnic tension between Ashkenazim, Jews whose roots were European, and Mizrahim, Jews from Arab countries. Although the latter now constituted a majority of Israelis, they had, for example, only 25 of the 120 members in the Israeli legislature, the Knesset. The state of Israel had been founded by Ashkenazim, and some of them saw the population explosion among the Mizrahim as a threat to the very identity of the country: “Israel is taking on an Oriental tone,” grumbled one newspaper editorial writer.

“In the gloomy, doubt-ridden atmosphere that pervaded Israel, the IDF” – the Israeli Defense Forces – “was practically the only institution still enjoying public confidence,” Segev writes. And this caused some problems for the prime minister, Levi Eshkol, in the days leading up to the war. Eshkol was forced to bring into his cabinet, as defense minister, the swashbuckling Moshe Dayan, who “revealed himself to be … ruthless and hungry for power.”

Cautious, even vacillating, Eshkol was at a disadvantage in any battle that pitted his ego against Dayan’s. In discussing with two university professors the problem of refugees after the occupation, Eshkol said, “First, I don’t know what I want. Second, I would like to do something.” Segev comments, “It would be difficult to find any statement that better expressed Eshkol’s position on almost everything at any given time.” Dayan, on the other hand, knew exactly where he stood. He finessed Eshkol out of the glory after the war, telling the prime minister that it was too dangerous for him to visit Jerusalem, then flying in by helicopter and carefully staging the photographs of his own entrance into the Old City.

But Segev is careful not to reduce any of the figures in his narrative to caricature. Both Dayan and Eshkol are treated with nuance and, when they deserve it, sympathy. And the strength of his book is that he tells the story not just through the actions of the big power players, but also through the people in the streets and the soldiers in the field. It’s a book enlivened by their voices. A major narrative thread is based on the diaries and letters of a soldier, Yehoshua Bar-Dayan, who provides an anti-heroic account of the victory.

Segev is also a meticulous deconstructor of the postwar myths. He examines how one popular oral history of the war, “Soldiers Talk,” compiled from transcripts of war memories by members of several kibbutzim, was edited “to suit the words to the image of innocent young soldiers, humanists in distress.” The published version omitted, for example, the words of some soldiers who “likened IDF operations against civilians to Nazi acts. ‘I felt like a member of the Gestapo,’ said one. … ‘Soldiers Talk’ met a profound need among many Israelis to be not only strong and victorious, but also just.”

“1967” barely pretends to be a comprehensive history of the Six-Day War. Anyone who wants that should turn to such books as Michael B. Oren’s “Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East.” Segev’s angle of vision on the war is that of a saddened and skeptical Israeli with access to a wide variety of sources in his country and in the United States. But his book lacks the voices and experiences of Palestinians, Egyptians, Jordanians and Syrians, and is thinly documented when it comes to the wider military and diplomatic background, such as the role played by the Soviet Union in the conflict.

Segev believes that the war was unnecessary and calamitous, that “There was … no justification for the panic that preceded the war, nor for the euphoria that took hold after it, which is what makes the story of Israel in 1967 so difficult to comprehend.” His book makes it a little more comprehensible, although the key enigmas remain. When the Israeli security cabinet met on June 15, 1967, Segev observes, “They were partners to a decision on questions that had been with the Zionist movement since the beginning: What kind of state would Israel be? How would it live with the Arabs? The argument has not ended, and it is doubtful whether there are any ideas that were not voiced at that government meeting in June of 1967.”

[David Gicza · Rating 5 out of 5]

A balanced and insightful view into the state of affairs in Israel before and after the 1967 war and refreshingly critical of the manner in which decisions were made at the time which affect the region today. A thorough and engaging writer, Segev created an informative book which left a lasting impression on this reader.

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have now been transformed from a novice on the Middle East situation to someone who would be very uncomfortable attempting to discuss it down the pub.

[Liam89 · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful, scholarly account of the war which lasted just six days, but whose consequences are still being felt today.

[K · Rating 3 out of 5]

When my husband started his doctorate in history, one of the first books he had to read was The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller which introduced me to the concept of microhistory. Trusty wikipedia (among others) defines microhistory as "the study of the past on a very small scale...[e.g.:] the study of a small town or village...looking at individuals of minor importance, or analyzing a single painting." In 1967: Israel, the War and the Year That Transformed the Middle East, Tom Segev gives us a sense of events before, during, and after the Six Day War through the eyes of a variety of individuals, minor and major -- an army private, a kibbutznik, and a variety of civilians as well as the important political figures of the day. We are treated to diaries, correspondence, and "man on the street" quotes whose content often borders on the trivial but succeeds in fleshing out our sense of time and place. Reading "1967" is like reading not one but several integrated microhistories. Even the descriptions of more significant figures like Levi Eshkol and Moshe Dayan have a microhistory feel to them, focusing on petty infighting as well as on historic decisions.

Unfortunately, this can get old long before page 700. The copious detail, while impressive, weighs down the book and becomes forgettable through its sheer volume. I admit that much of this is because I took frequent breaks and read other books in the meantime (which is arguably telling in and of itself), but I feel like I don't remember a lot about "1967" and can't quite articulate a central theme. Tom Segev is clearly bitter and cynical about the Six Day War and its aftermath, but it's hard for me to explain his reasoning. For example, a chapter titled "The Blunder" describes failed efforts to resettle Palestinian refugees from the territories in the aftermath of the war and appears to view this as the root of many of the difficulties facing Israel today. But I couldn't tell you exactly how or why, and I'm not about to go back and reread it even though this is probably one of the more important chapters in the book.

The research that went into this book is impressive, but Tom Segev needs either a more selective editor or a reader with a greater attention span.

[Jan Cölle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Modern style social history, very american, but very well done, especially the aperçu of life in Israel at the time.

[Electriczen · Rating 3 out of 5]

David Margolick's review is so much better than mine:

Peace for Land
By DAVID MARGOLICK
Published: July 15, 2007

During the 40th anniversary of the Six-Day War last month, an Israeli friend invited me to hear Tom Segev, the Israeli commentator and historian, discuss his new book on the subject. Once, the occasion might have been a celebration. But no more. My friend, in fact, described it sardonically as a yahrzeit — that is, in Jewish tradition, the date marking the death of a loved one.

Four decades after their smashing military victory over Egypt, Jordan and Syria, Israelis generally concede that in many ways the war was a disaster. The continued occupation of the West Bank, and control over the Palestinians who live there, has sapped Israel financially, politically, militarily and morally. By now, how it all came to be is only barely understood, or even addressed; with crises in that part of the world occurring almost daily, history seems almost a luxury, and ancient history especially.

Ancient history? 1967? If you don’t think so, picture a time before suicide bombings and settlements; when American support for Israel was not a given; when a majority of the Knesset spoke — and thought — in Yiddish; when Israelis still had no television programs, and Jerusalemites assumed explosions must be earthquakes; when terms like intifada, Hamas and even Palestinian were either unfamiliar or not yet coined; when Israelis argued — with straight faces — that Jews everywhere were safer thanks to them. That’s beyond ancient; it’s prehistoric.

But as Segev writes in “1967,” his illuminating, if exhausting, book on Israel’s most fateful year, even at the time there were Israelis who foresaw what ultimately came to pass. True, conquering East Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza and the Golan Heights helped fulfill the Zionist dream and gave the country more defensible borders. But as various Israeli officials warned, it would also radicalize the Palestinians, intensify Palestinian nationalism and force Israel to act with a brutality and intolerance that, as one put it, “we, as a people and as Jews, abhor.” Besides, King Hussein was doing a fine job neutering the Palestinians, either making them Jordanians or prodding them to emigrate.

It all happened in what Segev depicts as a two-act drama of irrationality between June 5 and 10, 1967. The first act came when, in the throes of a national depression and existential angst, Israel invaded Egypt, destroying its air force and seizing both Gaza and the Sinai Peninsula. The second came a few days later when, in the irrational exuberance of that victory, Israel turned to the north and east, to Jordan and Syria, extending its realm in both directions.

In the spring of 1967, Segev writes, Israel was a profoundly demoralized place. Its economy was tanking. Its European-born elite felt threatened by the influx of poor Jews from Arabic-speaking countries, who had ample troubles of their own. For the first time, more Jews may have been leaving the country than coming in. Among the young, materialism and Americanism were eroding the Zionist ideal. Terrorism — while almost quaint by today’s brutal standards — was increasing. And presiding over all this was Levi Eshkol, the prime minister with the bad fortune to follow David Ben-Gurion.

Tensions throughout the region rose in May 1967, after months of terrorist attacks were launched from Syria and Jordan. The Egyptian president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, who’d already fought one war with Israel, closed the Straits of Tiran, kicked United Nations peacekeepers out of the Sinai and massed his troops along the Israeli border. Cautious by nature and fearing American disapproval, Eshkol vacillated.

But his generals — notably Moshe Dayan, the former chief of staff who’d been forced down Eshkol’s throat as defense minister — urged a pre-emptive strike against Egypt, and the Israeli public, haunted by fears of a second Holocaust, backed them. Eshkol, Segev contends, was too impotent to resist. Next came Jordan. Israel had long had clandestine relations with King Hussein. But compelled to show public solidarity with Egypt, Hussein fired upon Jewish West Jerusalem. The Israelis struck back, marching into the Old City and then the entire West Bank.

One can debate whether Nasser was planning to attack Israel. Beyond debate, though, is the fact that there were a million Palestinians living in the territories, and Israel marched in with shocking casualness. That was apparent from the helter-skelter, improvisatory way in which crucial decisions had to be made — Would the land be annexed? What would be the legal status of residents? — and from some of the cockamamie schemes bruited about. (The army’s chief rabbi, Gen. Shlomo Goren, suggested blowing up the Dome of the Rock.)

Hopes that Palestinians would flee en masse, as they had in 1948 (the Israelis even had buses conveniently available to them in East Jerusalem), never materialized. Menachem Begin proposed dumping the Gazan refugees in Egypt. Other schemes had them going to Iraq (just what the Iraqis needed: another faction) or Latin America. More realistic was a plan to move 250,000 refugees from Gaza to the West Bank. But it never happened; the settlements soon popping up throughout the West Bank housed Jews instead.

However oxymoronic, the Israelis thought they could run an “enlightened occupation,” and there were signs, at least at first, that they did: when they opened a post office in Hebron, the mayor threw them a fruit and cucumber reception. But any occupation on those terms was doomed to fail, especially given the harshness with which Israel dealt with those not catching the spirit. Then, whether for economic or religious or nationalistic or military reasons, or because they had no one trustworthy to whom they could give back the land, the Israelis settled in.

Segev’s look into the origins of the occupation is invaluable. His research is prodigious, his intelligence obvious, his ability to reconstruct complex chains of events impressive. He writes clearly and confidently and has an eye for the telling, and often witty, detail. But he is the victim of his own eminence — his previous books, on the British Mandate and on the impact of the Holocaust on the Jews of Palestine, among others, have been justly praised — and, surprisingly, of his own parochialism.

The book is way too long, a temptation to which respected writers can sometimes succumb. A timid American editor hasn’t helped. Non-Israelis, even those who read Haaretz daily online, will find “1967” slow going. Indeed, if ever a book reflected the widening chasm between Israel and the Diaspora, it is this one. At times — describing day-to-day life in Israel or the political machinations there — it is far too detailed; do we really need to know that Israelis forsook fresh for frozen meat during the recession of 1967? Similarly, repeated quotations from the war diary of a soldier named Yehoshua Bar-Dayan — and how much he misses his wife, Gila, and young son, Yariv — undoubtedly resonate with Israelis, but will surely be exceedingly tiresome to most everyone else.

At other times, there’s not enough context — as if, as one Israeli writing for others, Segev feels he can cut corners. With only a few exceptions — usually old-world types like Eshkol and Mayor Teddy Kollek of Jerusalem, but Dayan, too — Segev seems uninterested in his characters, and never dwells very long or lovingly on them. Good luck keeping political parties like Maarah, Mapai and Mafdal straight, or differentiating among all those generals, who after a while become a blur of Zvi’s and Uzi’s and Uri’s.

By the time he gets to the Israeli occupation, which is what really matters now, even the indefatigable Segev has run out of gas. Crucial questions, like how the Six-Day War emboldened the messianic religious right and Ariel Sharon to build settlements, are all but overlooked. Nor is there anything about the electrifying effect the war had on Jews throughout the world, particularly in the Soviet Union and the United States. And there’s no kind of summation or distillation at the end, describing the Israeli character then and now — something that persevering readers deserve and that Segev, more than just about anyone else, is eminently qualified to give.

So we are left with the dilemma of the occupation, and whether Israel can ever extricate itself from it. It all reminds one of the story of the early Zionist leader who, in the middle of an endless speech, was quietly told he had to wrap things up. “I know,” he replied. “But how?”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/15/boo...

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

A sweeping history that reads like an epic novel; as I turned the last page I felt that sense of loss that comes from leaving behind a world of characters who spring from an author’s rich imagination. But these men (almost all men) were real: Levi Eshkol, indecisive and insecure; Moshe Dayan, self-promoting and imperious; Yitzhak Rabin, Yigal Allon, the Herzog brothers Yitzhak and Chaim, King Hussein, LBJ... and the ordinary people who lived in Israel and fought for it in the Six-Day War. Private Yehoshua Bar-Dayan kept a diary running to 300 pages during his reserve duty; Segev uses it to show readers the reality of the war, from missing a wife and child to running over the dead bodies of fallen Egyptian soldiers.
But the war itself makes up only a third of the book, three days of it dispensed in a single chapter. Before it begins, Segev delves deep and wide into Israeli society, from the relative positions of Ashkenazim and Mizrahim to the goods advertised in the newspapers, the state of the domestic auto industry and the number of slides tourists took on their trips to Europe and subjected their friends to when they returned home. Letters, diaries, newspapers, kibbutz newsletters and government statistics all paint a picture of Israel as it stood on the cusp of war.
Segev is a man of the left and argues the war was not inevitable but sprang from - and was prosecuted due to - causes as venal as Eshkol’s weakness, jealousy of Dayan and rivalry with Ben Gurion. Reckless enthusiasm contributed to the seizure of the Golan and West Bank in his telling.
And serious discussions with Palestinian leaders, King Hussein, and the United States failed to lead to any kind of real solution to the dilemma of what to do with the (occupied? liberated? administered?) territories. Days after the war, the government resolved to withdraw from most of them (though never from Jerusalem), but in the end the reality proved to be what Moshe Dayan summarized, looking at the hills of Jerusalem and the West Bank, as: “Up to here - you. From here - us.”

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

1967 covers a pivotal year for Israel that transformed it into a modern state and established it as a power in the Middle East. Tom Segev writes to cover the build up to the war including military, social, political and cultural factors that led to it and then explores how these changed Israel afterwards. I do agree with all of the reviewers that this book is written like a novel and it is not well done. The story is fascinating and it is told well but the organization is lacking and there are several points where you just want to scream get to the point. The transitions between the cultural side and the political side are not well made although he gets better with those at the end. The details of the war are covered in minimalist fashion (if you want more details on the war check out Michael O'Brien's book Six Day War) but primarily the political maneuverings of the Israeli government. Overall just an average book with good facts but organized poorly.

[Paulo Migliacci · Rating 3 out of 5]

A chatty book, depicting Israel soon before and soon after the Six Days War as a fractious, opinionated, slightly manic young nation - neither the bulwark of freedom its advocates strive to portray, nor the evil oppressor intent on regional domination its enemies insist on denouncing. Segev as usual presents fair and sympathetic portrayals of the dramatis personae - even those he didn't seem to like a lot (Moshe Dayan, for instance). Segev's writing is tighter in 'One Palestine, Complete', but '1967' is almost as good. I would rate it four stars were it not for the lack of focus - Segev introduces a lot of characters along the book and sort of leaves them - and the readers - hanging. That would be sort of OK - History is not storytelling -, but then Segev sets up his book as a collection of stories, as much as History, and those stories lack closure. (However, considering what happened later on, that might be apposite, after all.)

[Benoît Chauvineau · Rating 3 out of 5]

Je suis resté un peu sur ma faim... En effet, dans ce documentaire, l'auteur relate les événements avant, pendant et après la guerre des 6 jours en 1967. Les parties avant et après sont très intéressantes car l'auteur décortique la société israélienne en exposant son mal-être avant la guerre et décrit minutieusement les conséquences de la guerre, en particulier le questionnement sur l'avenir des territoires conquis. Par contre, la partie pendant la guerre est décevante : l'auteur ne parle que du point de vue israélien ; il détaille avec minutie les débats au gouvernement pendant les 6 jours de la guerre, sans éclairer les lecteurs sur les personnes et les forces politiques en présence ; et surtout, il ne prend pas de hauteur sur le déroulement de la guerre. Bref, pour le lecteur qui n'est pas un grand connaisseur de la politique israélienne des années 60, cette partie est plutôt ennuyeuse alors qu'elle aurait dû être passionnante !

[Donna Herrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating exposition of the 6-day war and its aftermath. You may wonder how the world came to the impass that is the middle-east. The answer that I found in this book is that Israel, like most nations, was ruled by a coalition of people who had conflicting goals and visions. Some wanted to purge Israel of all non-jews, some wanted to live with the Arabs, some thought that the Arabs could be reasoned with, some thought that the Arabs would never accept a Jewish nation. The conflict of these viewpoints delayed any action until no action was taken, and the Arab population of the West Bank and Gaza was left isolated from Israel, Jordan, Egypt. Meanwhile, Arab terrorist organizations like Fatah, took root and thrived. Israel tried to protect itself by trying tonuproot the terrorists from the rest of the Arab population.

[David McGrogan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was simply too long - a flaw it has in common with all too many recent popular history books. Does this come from the authors, who feel like they have to show off all their research, or publishers, who feel pressure to demonstrate value for money? Either way, at 700 pages not including notes, this book overwhelmed me. It's not that the story isn't worth telling; it's that the best bits (the description of the rivalries and arguments between the major political players in Israel at the time) get drowned in vast swathes of background detail that are interesting but nothing like as compelling. I wish the author had written a 350 page book on the political narrative, which would have been much tighter, much more focused, and ultimately a better read.

[Ahmad Alzahrani · Rating 3 out of 5]

"سأل فارهافتيج، موشيه ديان كيف يمكنهم تقديم ضربة إسرائيلية أولى كرد، وتساءل عما إذا كان بإمكانهم تنظيم شيء ما. قال الوزير بينتوف: "نحن بحاجة إلى ذريعة".

"ليس لدي أي حيل سوى اتخاذ الإجراءات".

أجاب ديان: "إذا كان لدى شخص ما خدعة أخرى، فكلي آذان صاغيه".
وعن احتمال إرسال ��فينة إسرائيلية إلى خليج العقبة للاستفزاز، قال ديان: “انتحار مطلق”.

اعتقد ألون أن رئيس الوزراء يستطيع أن يعلن لرؤساء دول العالم أن المصريين هاجموا، وبعد دقائق سترد إسرائيل.
قد يخاطر رئيس الوزراء بالكذب، لكن المؤرخين وحدهم هم الذين يعرفون الحقيقة. وقال ألون: "لا أعتقد أن الأميركيين سيبحثون لمعرفة ما حدث بالضبط".

[Christine Sandgren · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I will be 'reading' this one for awhile. I'm over 1/4 through and still no signs of a war.

[Carol Avelar · Rating 4 out of 5]

A valuable reading that just reinforces there is no worthy war. People always suffer and public opion is manipulated according to political interests.

[Gin · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I started reading, I had no idea that it would take be close to a month to finish it. There was Life getting in the way, but that never stopped me before from finishing a book a week.

At 585 pages, it’s as good as three average length books, and it did feel like the book could have been split into three separate ones - Before the war, during, and the aftermath. But I can appreciate why it needs to be a single book.

The second chapter was incredibly long at 100 pages, but it and the subsequent chapters do set up the context for why the Israelis made the decision to attack first. From economic recession to emigration (and thus jeopardising the viability of the Israeli state), from facing the full horrors of the Holocaust (the Eichmann trial was in 1962, and mentioned somewhat briefly - more for what it did for Israeli society), to the threats of its neighbours (particularly Egypt and Syria), these all figured into the Israeli leader’s decision to go to war.

Segev laid out meticulously the context and environment, sometimes almost to a fault as it made for difficult reading at times. I suspect it is also due to my paucity of knowledge about the region and its people. I have only a somewhat passing knowledge prior to tackling this book, and I suspect that I would have enjoyed it more if I was more familiar. It is thus not a book I would recommend to those completely new to the subject.

I also thought Segev was very even-handed when dealing with the issues, in that he laid bare the motives and thinking behind the various Israeli leaders. The calculations, reasons et al given by the leaders today are almost the same as that which was given by the leaders in 1967. I think that it also helps one to better understand why Israeli is doing what it is doing today (in 2023, after the Oct 7 attacks). The occupation of Gaza and the West Bank was after all carried out in the Six-Day War, and we are still living with the tragic consequences today.

[Danny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Segev provides an excellent history of the events leading to the 1967 War, the war itself, and the aftermath in Israel. Relying heavily on Israeli sources and supported with some U.S. diplomatic and presidential sources, Segev provides an excellent view of the war through an Israeli lens. He reveals debates within Israel about its "next war," and discussion about what the next steps that Israel would take in regard to its Arab neighbors including nationalist voices that saw war as an opportunity for expansion both before and after the war. While I would have preferred a greater discussion of the settlement movement and their ideological motivations this book provided a solid overview of the year 1967 from the Israeli perspective. However the Arab voice is almost entirely absent in this book. There are some discussions of Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser and Jordanian King Hussein throughout the book, but there is almost no discussion of Syrian leadership or discussion of the rationale of Arab leaders for their actions leading up to the war. I understand that Segev, an Israeli historian, would have a hard time accessing such records (as would may Arab historians), however this is a major blind spot in covering the war and it can at times feel like a one-sided account. For example, we hear so many personal accounts of Israeli fears of war and their potential annihilation, but we hear nothing of how Egyptians, Jordanians, Syrians, or even Palestinians experienced the war. There is no confirmation, outside of Hussein, on whether or not the Arabs even wanted war. Despite this flaw, this is a tremendous secondary source for anyone seeking to learn more in this episode of history.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once again, Tom Segev has proven himself to be what I would consider the preeminent historians of Israel. '1967' is not just the story of the Six-Day War but an impressive biography of a nation.

I would say it's roughly split into three sections. The first is an in-depth analysis of Israeli history and society— a social history that emphasizes the complexity of Israel and the circumstances it finds itself with relation to Palestinians, the Arab States and the Jewish World.

The second section covers the war itself, from both top-down and bottom-up points of view. I thought it was especially remarkable that he used personal letters and diaries to highlight the experience of one soldier, then juxtaposes it to the perspectives of big-wigs like Levi Eshkol or Moshe Dayan.

The final and probably most poignant portion of the book is the aftermath of the war and how, despite Israel's spectacular victory in the 1967, it has been utterly unable (or unwilling, as Segev seems to argue) to 'win the peace'.

4.5/5— though I'm not sure if I like it more than 'A State At Any Cost'

[Steven · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very well-written, well-balanced, and comprehensive account of the Six-Days' War.

However, there are places where the appropriate context is lacking for some of the anecdotes. There are a few pages where the footnotes are repeated and other references are poorly laid-out (about 2/3 of the way through the book), and I found the introduction section prior to the beginning of the conflict overly-long and overly-anthropological/humanistic. A lot of it was extremely detailed but its relevance was not as poignant as I believe the author thought.

[Itamar · Rating 3 out of 5]

ארוך וקצת יבש, בכל זאת הספר הזה מספק הצצה מעניינת לחיים בישראל בשנים 66-68. מדליק זרקור על התנהלות הממשלה, על מחשבות ורגשות אנשים רגילים וכן כל מיני מהלכים צבאיים ודיפלומטיים.

מה אומר ומה אגיד, החיים פה תמיד היו מסובכים, פחד, אגו יריבויות אישיות משפיעים הרבה, ומערכת השיקולים הבינלאומית אינה פשוטה.

גם בדיעבד לא ברור מה היה קורה אילו. אילו לא היו כובשים את יהודה ושומרון (או לחלופין מחזירים אותה מיד)
אילו היו מגרשים את כלל תושבי רצועת עזה, אילו היו היו נמנעים מפעולות כאלה או עושים אחרות.

אילו

[Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

In-depth history of the Six Day War, including the prelude and the aftermath. While I love reading about Israel’s military & intelligence badassery, Segev does a good job of balancing that with the oppression of the non-Jewish civilians in the newly captured territories. While Jews like Segev and me may rather pontificate about Israel’s military brilliance, Segev restrains himself and writes real history, including both the good, the bad, and the ambiguous.

[Daniel Kukwa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Now this is quite the monumental work. What's fascinating about it is that the war itself, being so short, is almost an after-thought. The best bits are there opening chapters, which lays out life in Israel in the mid 1960s, and the aftermath of the war, where all the mistakes that are still occurring in Israel and the Palestinian Territories first began...in fact, the word used is "blunder". Superb research, and a writing style that keeps things moving at a fast and furious pace.

[SK]

I really enjoyed Segev’s book on Ben gurion so I decided to read this book by him. Whether the war was unavoidable or not I thought it was surprising at how segev portrayed the Israeli societal response to the threats of nasser and co as pure hysterics. I am no historian but I felt convinced by Benny Morris’s harsh review of the book. Nevertheless many interesting anecdotes of a very interesting period of Israeli history. I a fan of segev’s style of writing

[R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a masterful study of a pivotal year in the history of the Middle East whose ripples reach to this very moment.The author puts you in the middle of the forces affecting everyday people as well as those in positions of power. You see the influence of fears, hopes and distrust on the decisions made.

[Mircea Valcea · Rating 2 out of 5]

1. This is not history. Just an endless collection of "little lives" snippets - so the base material of sociology, but lacking the sociology itself (conclusions). I have read similar books (about Stalinist Russia, for example), but there the snippets assembled into a larger image. Here, not.
2. Soooooo boooooring!

[Iryna Davydova]

Important to mention that it's a very leftist view. However, it was very emotional and eye opening. Especially for someone who isn't much of a leftist. It was a challenge for me. And the book had a huge effect on me.

[Andre · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful book, blending history with a pleasant narrative style, enriched with quotes and citations from sources spanning from government minutes to letters and diaries. I loved this book and the understanding it provided me.

[laurentiu]

0