The Egyptian front in outline
Egypt was the largest Arab army facing Israel in 1967, and the fighting on its front decided the course of the whole war. It began with a surprise air strike on the morning of 5 June, continued with a rapid advance across the Sinai Peninsula, and ended with Israeli forces on the east bank of the Suez Canal. Egypt’s consequences lasted much longer than the fighting did: the canal stayed shut for eight years, and a border war of attrition began within two years.
Operation Focus
Israel’s air attack, known by its Hebrew code name Operation Focus, began on the morning of 5 June 1967. Israeli aircraft flew low, many of them out over the Mediterranean, and approached Egypt’s airfields from the west, a direction from which Egyptian radar and defences were not oriented. They struck in waves, first cratering runways and then destroying aircraft parked on the ground.
By the end of the first day, the Egyptian air force had lost most of its combat aircraft, often given in the hundreds in standard accounts, and Israel had gained control of the air. Israeli aircraft also struck Syrian, Jordanian and Iraqi air bases once those states joined the war. From then on Egyptian ground troops in the open desert had little air cover, which mattered greatly in a campaign fought across open terrain.
Egyptian command was not well prepared for a first strike. Much of its army was in Sinai, but its leadership was divided between President Nasser and Field Marshal Abdel Hakim Amer, the army commander and a close ally. The Egyptian army had also been committed for years in Yemen, where it was fighting on the republican side in a civil war.
The Sinai campaign
On the ground, Israeli forces attacked on 5 June in three main thrusts across the northern, central and southern Sinai. They broke through at Rafah and Khan Yunis in the Gaza Strip and around the fortified positions at Abu Agheila, and they used armour and infantry against Egyptian defences that had been designed to fight a conventional battle in prepared positions.
The decisive moment came on 6 June, when Egyptian forces were ordered to withdraw across the peninsula. The retreat was disorderly, with columns of vehicles exposed on the roads and mountain passes to attack from the air. Israeli armoured units reached key passes first and cut off many retreating units. By 8 June, Israeli forces had reached the Suez Canal, and the southern tip of Sinai at Sharm el-Sheikh, overlooking the Straits of Tiran, had been taken on 7 June.
Egypt accepted a ceasefire on 8 June, a day after Jordan. Israel had by then reached its military aims on this front: control of the peninsula and of the Gaza Strip. On the same day, the American intelligence ship USS Liberty was attacked by Israeli forces off the Sinai coast, an incident that is covered separately.
Nasser offers to resign
On the evening of 9 June, President Nasser appeared on television and took responsibility for the defeat. He announced that he was resigning and handing power to his vice president. Within hours, large crowds gathered in Cairo and other cities calling on him to stay, and the next day the National Assembly asked him to withdraw the decision. He did so on 10 June.
Whether the demonstrations were spontaneous or encouraged is still discussed. What is not in doubt is that Nasser stayed in office, that his army chief was removed, and that Amer died in September 1967 while under arrest, an event officially attributed to suicide and still questioned by some Egyptians. The army was reorganised, and many senior officers were replaced.
Rebuilding, the canal and the War of Attrition
The Soviet Union began replacing Egyptian aircraft, tanks and artillery within weeks. The Khartoum summit in late summer brought promises of financial support from oil-producing Arab states, and Egypt took a harder public line against talks with Israel.
The Suez Canal had been blocked by sunken ships and by the front line running along its length. It stayed closed to international traffic until June 1975, after the 1973 war and years of negotiation. Several merchant ships were trapped in the Great Bitter Lake when it closed, and they stayed there for years.
Along the canal, shooting broke out repeatedly during 1968, and in 1969 Egypt began a sustained campaign of artillery bombardment and raids. This became the War of Attrition, which went on until a ceasefire in August 1970. Israel responded with air attacks, including deep into Egypt, and the Soviet Union increased its military role on the Egyptian side. Nasser died in September 1970, shortly after the ceasefire.
What it meant for Egypt
The loss of Sinai deprived Egypt of oil fields, tourism income and canal revenue, and the loss of face was enormous. At the same time, the failure of the 1967 campaign reshaped Egyptian thinking about military reform. The Six-Day War had left the Egyptian army committed to recovering territory, and it set the course of the later war in October 1973 and, eventually, of the peace treaty with Israel in 1979. Egypt regained Sinai in stages under that treaty.