The Israel-Arab Reader

by Walter Laqueur

  Brothers, you may have questions on your mind which you would probably expect me to answer. Or perhaps you wish me to talk about national and international activities related to the battle, whether these were of a positive or negative nature. But you realize that war has its conditions and requirements which make it incumbent upon us to avoid discussing any matter that would not benefit the war effort.

  Nevertheless, in this regard I am anxious to point out that our steadfastness in the war of liberation has begun to give the slogan, “pan-Arabism of the battle”, a practical and real meaning. In this regard I would like to express, on your behalf, the greatest appreciation for the role of the sisterly Iraqi forces whose men fought heroically against the enemy and whose blood was mixed with that of their brothers in the Syrian forces. Their participation in the battle has been a true expression of the pan-Arabism of the battle. Greetings to the Iraqi Army and to our people in sisterly Iraq.

  The day will come when the Saudi forces and the Jordanian forces will also take part in the battle and play their role in the national battle. Also, the two sisterly states Algeria and Libya, from the first moment [of the battle] took the initiative to give practical backing and actual support with various forms. The United Arab Amirates and the state of Qatar also extended a helping hand.

  The support that was given to the northern front was matched by support to the western front where the valiant Egyptian forces are fighting major battles against the enemy after they humiliated him and defeated him. This defeat made the enemy resort to contradictions and exposed him to the entire world. This happened when the Egyptians crossed the Suez Canal, destroyed the enemy fortified positions and continued their advance into Sinai steadily and with strength.

  If this indicates anything, it indicates Arab unity. It also indicates that our nation is alive. Our unity and vitality appear most gloriously during crises and hardships. We should not forget that our steadfastness is the fundamental and basic factor in every stand. On this rock all the enemy’s attempts will be crushed. Continuous steadfastness increases the rally of the Arab nation around us and their support for us will double.

  Our heroes have transformed Israel’s aggression, since 6th October, to a retreat of the enemy forces. As I told you on that day, our forces rushed to repulse the aggression, forcing the occupation forces to withdraw before them. They continued their advance and expelled the enemy forces from Mount Hermon, Qunaytirah, Jibbin, Khushniyah, Jukhadar, Awl Al, Tall al-Faras and Rafid and other villages and positions in the Golan. They inflicted on the enemy losses which deeply shook the Zionist entity. At that time, while the enemy was hiding his losses and defeats from the people of Israel and from the outside world—a method which he is still following— we in turn kept quiet about the victories of our forces and postponed announcing them.

  While the enemy’s reports and statements exposed themselves day after day and uncovered more contradictions, we preferred to wait before announcing what we had achieved and until the repelling of the enemy forces is final and the liberation of the land is complete.

  We could have announced the liberation of the greater part of the Golan on the fourth day of the battle. The faith of our armed forces in God— praise be to Him—as well as our armed forces’ confidence in our people, their proper use of the good weapons in their possession, and their faith in the cause they are fighting for have all reflected on the course of fighting through the victories that our forces have achieved and are still achieving in every field and on every level. The heroic acts of our army have compelled the enemy to admit that the battle is tough and that the fighting is intense.

  On our part, we have not anticipated an easy victory or that the enemy would accept his expulsion from our land without ferocious resistance. We know the enemy’s expansionist ambitions and know that there are forces encouraging these ambitions and supporting the attempts to achieve these ambitions. In the aftermath of his losses and defeats in the first days of fighting, the enemy hastened to enlist the help of these forces, asking them for assistance and large numbers of foreigners to offset his losses in men in the various corps, particularly the air force as well as new weapons to offset his losses in weapons. With the quick supplies he received and which were added to the calculated reserve forces, the enemy heavily concentrated on one sector of our front and began to exert pressure with the larger part of his forces, tanks and planes and was able to achieve a limited penetration of our lines. Nevertheless, our forces initiated a quick reply and waged, from new positions, fierce fighting in which every member of our forces fought most valiantly and repulsed the enemy counter-offensive and inflicted heavy losses on his tanks and planes and forced him to retreat.

  Our forces continue to pursue the enemy and strike at him and will continue to strike at enemy forces until we regain our positions in our occupied land and continue then until we liberate the whole land.

  We know that our enemy has a source to supply him and offset his losses in men and weapons. However, we are confident of the resources of our people and nation and the sources of our support. I say to those who are supporting the falsehood and aggression of Israel that they should consider and think of the consequences that their hostile aggressive attitudes will have on their many interests in the Arab homeland. By gaining the animosity of the masses of our nation, they are arousing the anger of these masses. And when peoples become angry, no force can stand in their way.

  Brother compatriots, brother soldiers, freedom and dignity have a price and the price is no doubt costly. However, we are ready to pay this price in order to preserve honour, to defend freedom, to liberate the land and to regain the rights so that we can give the coming Arab generations their right to an affluent life and a shining, smiling future in which they can enjoy freedom, security, reassurance and peace.

  We are knocking at the door of freedom with our hands and with all our strength, realizing that the enemies of peoples do not voluntarily recognize the freedom of these peoples. We are determined that the liberation of the land and the achievement of victory in this war be the great goal from which we shall not budge, God willing. For the sake of the great goal, every sacrifice and effort will be cheap. As long as our goal is great and as long as we believe in this goal, our effort and struggle will be commensurate with our goal. As long as we believe in the goal, all enemy efforts and psychological warfare tactics will be defeated and fail and will definitely not affect the morale of our people and their ability to hold out and resist.

  We are a people who, in the hour of decisiveness, are capable of creating miracles. The hour of decisiveness has come. Let us adapt ourselves to continue the war of liberation to its victorious end. Let us continue the war of liberation with a deep breath, believing in God, confident in ourselves and of our ability to make victory with our own hands.

  Finally, on your behalf, I convey a greeting—coming from a heart full of love and appreciation—to all the men of our armed forces. I hail their courage, valour, high efficiency, firm faith in the cause of their homeland and their certain capability to wrest the right. Greetings from the heart to every Arab soldier who is helping to make victory in the battle of liberation certain. Greetings to every one of you. Let us all reiterate at all times: either martyrdom or victory.

  Egyptian President Anwar Sadat: Speech (October 16, 1973)

  . . . The Egyptian armed forces have achieved a miracle by any military standard. They have fully devoted themselves to their duty. They have efficiently absorbed all the weapons and methods of training of the modern age, as well as its sciences.

  When I gave them the order to reply to the enemy’s provocation and to check his deceit, they proved themselves. After the orders were given them, these forces took the initiative, surprised the enemy and threw him off balance with their quick movement. I shall not be exaggerating to say that military history will make a long pause to study and examine the operation carried out on 6th October 1973 when the Egyptian armed forces were able to storm
the difficult barrier of the Suez Canal which was armed with the fortified Bar Lev Line to establish bridgeheads on the east bank of the Canal after they had, as I said, thrown the enemy off balance in six hours.

  The risk was great and sacrifices were big. However, the results achieved in the first six hours of the battle in our war were huge. The arrogant enemy lost its equilibrium at this moment. The wounded nation restored its honour.

  The Middle East political map has changed. While we say so out of pride, as some of the pride is faith, we are duty bound to record here, on behalf of the people and this nation, our absolute confidence in our armed forces; our confidence in their command, which drew up the plan; our confidence in the officers and men who have implemented the plan with fire and blood. We record our confidence in the armed forces’ faith and knowledge, our confidence in the armed forces’ arms and in their capability of absorbing the arms. I say in brief that this homeland can be assured and feel secure, after fear, that it now has a shield and a sword.

  From here I want to draw your attention with me to the northern front, where the great Syrian army is fighting one of the most glorious battles of the Arab nation under the loyal and resolute command of brother President Hafiz al-Asad.

  I want to tell our brothers on the northern front: You made a promise and you were faithful to the promise. You made a friendship and you have turned out to be the most honest friends. You have fought and you have proved to be the most courageous fighters. You have fought like men and stood fast like heroes. We could not have found more reassuring and praiseworthy men in this comradeship in which we had to fight together against a common enemy, the enemy of the whole Arab nation.

  We have been the vanguards of the battle. Together we have borne its brunt and paid most dearly with our blood and resources. We shall continue the fighting and defy danger. We shall continue, backed by our brothers who have sincerely and faithfully joined the battle, to pay the price in sweat and blood until we reach an objective acceptable to us and to our nation in this serious stage of its continuous struggle.

  That was about war—and now that about peace. When we speak about peace we must remember and not forget—just as others also must not pretend to forget—the real reasons for our war. You will allow me specifically and categorically to put some of these reasons to you.

  (1) We have fought for the sake of peace, the only peace that really deserves to be called peace—peace based on justice. Our enemy sometimes speaks about peace. But there is a vast difference between the peace of aggression and the peace of justice. David Ben Gurion was the one who formulated for Israel the theory of imposing peace. Peace cannot be imposed. The talk about imposing peace means a threat to wage war or actually waging it.

  The great mistake our enemy has made is that he thought the force of terror could guarantee security. But the futility of this theory has been proved in practice on the battlefield. It has been proved that if this theory did work at one time, due to the weakness of the opposite side, it does not work if these people rally their forces every day. I do not know what David Ben Gurion would think if he were in command in Israel today. Would he have been able to understand the nature of history or would he be like the Israeli command today—in opposition to history?

  Peace cannot be imposed. The peace of a fait accompli cannot exist and cannot last. There can only be peace through justice alone. Peace cannot be established through terror however oppressive and whatever illusions the arrogance of power or the stupidity of power might give. Our enemy has persisted in this arrogance and stupidity not only over the past six years, but throughout the past twenty-five years—that is, since the Zionist state usurped Palestine.

  We might ask the Israeli leaders today: Where has the theory of Israeli security gone? They have tried to establish this theory once by violence and once by force in twenty-five years. It has been broken and destroyed. Our military power today challenges their military power. They are now in a long protracted war. They are facing a war of attrition which we can tolerate more and better than they can. Their hinterland is exposed if they think they can frighten us by threatening the Arab hinterland. I add, so they may hear in Israel: We are not advocators of annihilation, as they claim.

  Our Zafir-type trans-Sinai Egyptian Arab rockets are now in their bases ready to be launched at the first signal to the deepest depth in Israel.

  We could have given the signal and the order from the very first moment of the battle, particularly as the Israelis’ haughtiness and vicious pride gave them the illusion that they could bear greater consequences that they really could sustain. But we are aware of the responsibility of using certain types of arms, and we ourselves restrain ourselves from using them. The Israelis should remember what I once said and still say: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth and death for death.

  (2) We do not fight to attack the territory of others, but we fought and will continue to fight for two objectives: (a) to restore our territory which was occupied in 1967; and (b) to find ways and means to restore and obtain respect for the legitimate rights of the people of Palestine.

  These are our objectives in accepting the risks of the fighting. We have accepted them in reply to unbearable provocations. We were not the first to begin these, but we acted in self-defence to defend our land and our right to freedom and life.

  Our war was not for aggression, but against aggression. In our war we did not depart from the values and laws of international society as stipulated in the UN Charter, which the free nations have written with their blood after their victory over Fascism and Nazism.

  We may say that our war is a continuation of humanity’s war against Fascism and Nazism; for, by its racist claims and its reasoning of expansion through brute force, Zionism is nothing but a feeble replica of Fascism and Nazism which is contemptible rather than frightening and calls for disdain more than for hatred. . . .

  Brothers and sisters, the entire world has supported our rights and praised our courage in defending these rights. The world has realized that we were not the first to attack, but that we immediately responded to the duty of self-defence. We are not against but are for the values and laws of the international community. We are not warmongers but seekers of peace. The world has realized all this, and in the light of it sympathizes with our cause.

  Today, the world sympathizes with us more out of its respect for our determination to defend this cause. We were sure of world sympathy, and now we are proud of its respect for us. I tell you in all sincerity and honesty that I prefer world respect, even without sympathy, to world sympathy that is without respect. I thank God.

  Brothers and sisters, a single state has differed from the whole world— not just from us, but from the whole world, as I said. This state is the United States. The United States claims it was shocked because we tried to repulse the aggression. We do not understand how or why the United States was shocked. This state, it said, was not only shocked but has recovered from the shock without coming to its senses.

  It is regrettable and sad that this should be the attitude of one of the two superpowers in this age. We were expecting; or perhaps wishing, despite all the indications and experiences, that the United States would recover from the surprise and come to its senses. But this did not happen. We have seen the United States recovering from the surprise and turning towards manoeuvres. Its first objective is to stop the fighting and bring a return to the lines that existed before 6th October. We could have been angered by this inverse logic, but we were not. This is because, on the one hand, we are confident of ourselves, and, on the other, we really do want to contribute to world peace.

  The world is entering an era of detente between the two superpowers. Now we oppose the policy of detente. We had one reservation about this policy and this reservation still exists. If we want the world, after a world war has become impossible, to enter an era of peace, then peace is not an abstract or absolute meaning. Peace has one single meaning: that all the peoples of the world shoul
d feel that it is peace for them and not peace imposed on them.

  I would like to say before you and to all the world that we want the policy of detente to succeed and to be consolidated. We are prepared to contribute to the success of this consolidation. But we rightly believe that this cannot happen while aggression is being committed against an entire Arab nation, which lies strategically in the heart of the world and possesses its most important economic resources. Any disregard of this logical fact is not only disregard but also an insult, which we do not accept, either for ourselves or for the world, which is aware of the importance and value of this area in which we live. Therefore, the world must realize now that this area can give and can withhold.

  Brothers and sisters, the United States, after a manoeuvre we refused even to discuss—especially after we had forged the path of right with the force of arms—has resorted to a policy that neither we nor our Arab nation can keep silent about. It has established a quick bridge to transport military aid to Israel. The United States was not content with the fact that it was its arms that enabled Israel to obstruct all attempts for a peaceful solution of the Middle East question. It has now involved itself in something with more serious and more dangerous consequences. . . . If you want to know our terms for peace, then here is our peace plan: 1. We have fought and will fight to liberate our territories which the Israeli occupation seized in 1967 and to find a means to retrieve and secure respect for the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people. In this respect, we uphold our commitment to the UN resolutions, [those of] the General Assembly and the Security Council.