1. 1967 Six Day War Analysis
Introduction
The war I am examining is the 1967 Six Day War. The theory that I will test is derived
from a paper published in the Journal of Peace Research entitled “Sociopsychological analysis of
conflict supporting narratives: A general framework” (Bar-Tal, 2014). This paper demonstrates
how specific “narratives” must permeate a state for it to initiate and maintain prolonged
aggression. For clarification, “narrative” is a set of strongly held beliefs by a person or group. In
order to avoid cognitive dissonance, they must act in accordance with their narrative (Helperin et
al, 2010). From these assumptions, I derived the “Conflict Narrative Hypothesis”. The
hypothesis posits that there must be a visible conflict narrative among both the leaders of the
society and its populace for war to occur. Should there be a narrative in place in both countries,
then any, then any stochastic event may lead one side to declare war.
A society with a Conflict Narrative must have three critical beliefs at both the individual
and state level. First, the most of the society’s population must believe in their own superiority.
This may appear in many different ways including nationalistic rallies and patriotic popular
music. Second, the narrative must demean the opposing nation. This means that each level of
society must believe in the inherent inferiority of the other society. Evidence for this appears in
popular culture, political speeches, and public demonstrations. Finally, individuals in the society
must be willing to fight and die for their nation and its narrative. Thus, the narrative must
perpetuate intense nationalism and patriotism. This again shows in the popular culture of the
time. Examples may include pro/anti-war popular songs, pro/ anti-war demonstrations, or public
rallies for or against war. If these three beliefs are visible in both the policy makers and the
public, then the society will be at a high risk for going to war. The remaining clause is a “trigger
event”, which would cause one side to strike. This is an event on in the international system with

2. no clear cause or intent. Because of its ambiguity, the event may be misinterpreted by one
Conflict Narrative state as a declaration of war. This misinterpretation leads directly to a pre-
emptive strike.
In sum, the Conflict Narrative equation for war is as follows-
(Belief of Superiority + belief of opponent’s inferiority+ patriotism) + Ambiguous and
random trigger event = War
Setting the stage
As the name indicates, the 6 Days War took place over six days in June 1967. Many
different nations played roles in this conflict, but the major actors were Israel and Egypt.
Rumblings of tensions surfaced in November of 1966 when Syria and Egypt signed a mutual
defense agreement. In a seemingly unrelated event about a week later, Israel attacked the
Palestinian village of Samu’ in the Jordanian held West Bank. The attack was in response to
heavy PLO guerilla activity, including a mine attack that killed three IDF soldiers (Tessler,
1994). Following the incident at Samu’, King Hussein of Jordan criticized Egypt and its
president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, for not helping Jordan and “hiding behind UNEF (United
Nations Emergency Force) Skirts” (Ibid).
The following spring, Nasser received information from the Soviet Union that Israel was
amassing on the Syrian border. In response, Nasser mobilized. He moved nearly his entire army
to protect the Sinai Peninsula. However, the Jordanian King quickly criticized Nasser, claiming
that the mobilization was just posturing and that Nasser did not intend to remove the UN
peacekeeping troops within the region. The Egyptian president quickly countered this assertion
and removed all UN troops from the Sinai Peninsula on May 16th. About a week later, Nasser
closed the Straits of Tiran to Israel. This had huge domestic implications for Israel as about 90

3. percent of Israeli oil passed through the straits. Therefore, the act was effectively a provocation
of war (Shlaim, 2012).
Nasser understood that his aggressive actions could lead to war. He placed about 465,000
ground troops, 2,800 tanks, and 800 aircraft within striking distance of Israel (Herzog, 1972; pg.
149). Sensing that Nasser’s actions now supported his war-provoking rhetoric, Israel took action.
On June 5, 1967, Prime Minister Moshe Dayan launched a pre-emptive strike on Egyptian
forces. The Israeli airforce destroyed about 300 joint-Arab aircraft as well as countless airfields,
all within a matter of hours. These strikes effectively crippled both the Egyptian and Jordanian
air forces and effectively signaled the start of the six-day war (Oren, 2003; p.172).
Testing the Explanation
Essential Properties of Argument
As stated above, three conditions are necessary for the conflict narrative to be in place.
First, a society’s decision makers and public must believe in their inherent superiority. Second,
they must also believe in the opponent’s inferiority. Finally, there must be pervasive patriotism
that signals a call to action. Given these three conditions, any ambiguous event within the
international system may lead to war, as the society in question must act in accordance with its
beliefs to avoid cognitive dissonance.
To apply this to the 6-days War, I will examine whether these three assumptions
permeated the leaders and popular culture in both Israel and Egypt shortly before the conflict
broke out. I expect to see three things in each society if this theory is correct. First, there must be
claims of superiority from both sides. This means that both Israel and Egypt should have pro-war
songs and public events (i.e. demonstrations, marches, etc…) as well as speeches by political and
military leaders within the society proclaiming the societies superiority. Second, there will be
similar rhetoric from both Israel and Egypt proclaiming the other’s inferiority. I will look for

4. songs, speeches, and rallies that convey the idea that the other is subhuman. Third, I will seek
evidence of a patriotic call to action for each society. A strong example of is propaganda that
urging the public to pick up arms to fight for their nation. If this propaganda is effective, we
should see massive public support for soldiers and a rise in enlistment and volunteer numbers
shortly before the war.
Given these three necessities, there must be some sort of stochastic event. This could be
any ambiguous event in the international system that may be interpreted as an aggressive act.
Evidence for this includes an occurrence in which there are dissenting views within both Egypt
and Israel about the intentions of that event. In other words, is there a lack of consensus about the
event that may lead to a misperception among the states leaders about the intent of the event?
Empirical Evidence for
Egypt
The Egyptian Conflict Narrative appears in all levels of society during a political rally on
May 29th, 1967. The Arab Socialist Union and the Egyptian National Guard organized the rally
and brought in Ahmend Shukairy, the chairman of the PLO, to give a pro-Arab speech.
According to Thomas F. Brady, a NY Times reporter who attended the rally,
"About 5,000 people gathered late this afternoon to listen to speeches that roared from the
loudspeakers slung from scaffolding every 150 feet."(Brady; May 30, 1967)
These loudspeakers blared pro-war and anti-Israeli sentiments for hours, which incited
chants of “We will fight, we will fight, liberation will come." and “Long Live Nasser, Long Live
Nasser…”(Ibid). In addition to the chants and speeches, Brady noted,
“Two posters stood on either side of a colored photograph of President Gamal Abdel Nasser…
One showed a muscular arm holding a tine soldier marked with the Star of David out over the
Sea. The other showed a giant soldier in bright pink uniform standing astride the Strait of Tiran,
which the United Arab Republic has declared closed to Israeli shipping…

5. He later states, “Banners hung across the streets from one building to another. One said
Women’s organizations of Boulak say: Long Live Nasser… On a garish geometric tapestry of
orange, green and yellow that draped the covered podium, a sign in black Arabic script read
'Victory from God'."”
Toward the end of the rally, Ahmed Shukairy finally gave his speech. He proclaimed,
"The battle with Israel looms. Let Johnson and Wilson hear our cry- we are not afraid of you!"
At the end of the podium “enthusiastic young men” repeatedly attempted to climb onto stage,
only to be held back by the National Guard. However, one older man with a cane meandered past
all of the Guards and made his way to the podium. As he reached the speakers, he yelled into the
mic, “Long live Nasser!”
In addition to the speech, there was visual propaganda promoting a pro-war narrative.
There was a giant poster of a soldier in a bright pink uniform guarding the Strait of Tiran and the
banner proclaiming “Victory from God.” The giant soldier demonstrates the physical superiority
of Egypt, while banner proclaims their moral supremacy, as ‘god is on their side’. Furthermore,
it seems apparent that the Egyptian population at large took this propaganda to heart. This is
evident in the massive public support for Nasser and the Egyptian cause, seen in public
demonstrations similar to the one documented by Thomas F. Brady. Furthermore, this sense of
nationalistic superiority permeates Egyptian popular culture of the time. One of the most popular
songs of 1967 was “Don’t Worry President”, which held the refrain, 'Don't worry president
(Nasser)… You are supported by the most courageous men.” (Hamamsy and Soliman, 2013; pg.
214).
There is also an obvious demeaning of the enemy. This appears in a massive banner that
shows Nasser holding an Israeli soldier out over the ocean as if he were a piece of trash. This
public animosity not only manifested for Israel, but for those that supported Israel as well.
Notably, Americans were often portrayed in a negative manner. "On a public level, the image of

6. the American was either the old rich American who came to Egypt as a tourist, or the loud,
vulgar image reflected by the Egyptian media.” (Ibid)
Finally, from these previous two conditions, there arises a strong sense patriotism and a
call to fight. This is most obviously seen in a NY Times article written on May 23, 1967, entitled
Cairo Acts to Bar Israeli Shipping in Gulf of Aqaba. The Times reports that many Muslim
leaders called for a unification of all Arabs for the Arab cause. They document a speech given by
Sheik Hassan Maamoun, a powerful Arab-Islamic leader of the day, who states that-
“The world’s Muslims [must] support President Nasser in face of the ‘Zionist menace’… he
called the situation a ‘decisive battle in the history of religion and Arabism.’ He urged all
Muslims to “strike hard at the aggressor,’ meaning Israel.” (Feron; May 23, 1967)
This unification had a strong effect. Egyptian radio played songs with repeating refrains
like, "Nasser, Nasser, we will follow you. We will kill them, we will torch them, we will grind
them to dust.” Radio Cairo played these songs not only for the Egyptian populace, but also
blasted them to Israeli radio stations as well (Bernstein & Ilan Ziv, 2007). Frighteningly, these
songs and their accompanying ideology affected nearly everyone in Egyptian society, even those
as young as elementary school-
"One Egyptian mother said her three children were excited by songs on radio and television. Her
eight-year-old son… came home with new recitations: 'Palestine, you are our hope. We are your
fighters. We have the sword to drive the hated enemy from your soil.'" (Brady; June 1, 1967)
Israel
During my investigation, I found very little hard evidence for the three necessary
components of the Conflict Narrative in Israeli society. The only trace of a conflict narrative was
a strong nationalistic sense of duty. This was likely born out of the Zionist movement and the
prolonged Jewish persecution in Europe. To ensure that these nationalistic continued, the Israeli
government sponsored patriotic youth trips. These paid-for trips, called ye di'at ha-'aretz
(knowledge of the land), allowed the country’s youth to visit many of the Jewish historic sites in

7. the hopes of furthering the Zionist cause (Regev, & Seroussi, 2004; pg. 35). It seems that this
patriotic sense carried over into non-Israeli Jews as well. As documented in the NY Times on
May 31, 1967, many Jewish-Americans decided to help defend the state of Israel by filling in at
vacancies in hospitals, nurseries, and kibbutzim. The article states about one small group,
“The four, a solemn group during the interview, come from an Orthodox Jewish background and
are committed to the Zionist ideal. They have visited Israel one or more times.” (N.A.; May 31,
1967)
In addition to this patriotism, Israel segregated its popular culture. As stated in Popular
Music and National Culture in Israel,
"For a short period in the 1960s, the hit parades included both Israeli and foreign songs, but
later stations separated them into hit parades; one of foreign songs and one of Israeli songs."
(Regev, & Seroussi,2004; pg. 35).
This demonstrates an acknowledgement of ‘us’ being distinct from ‘them’. Given this
segregation and a shared sense of patriotism, we can conclude that there was a communal sense
of responsibility to fight for the Jewish homeland. This sense of patriotic duty likely helped
mobilize Jewish supporters in the name of Zionism. However, there was little evidence for a
sense of inherent superiority among the Jewish nation and there was no evidence that they felt
the Arabs to be naturally inferior.
Empirical Evidence against
Egypt
There is little evidence that a Conflict Narrative was not in place in Egyptian society. The
only plausible counterargument is that Nasser caused an inadvertent war with his aggressive
rhetoric. This hypothesis comes from doubt over Nasser’s conviction for war. Many believe that
Nasser was posturing and that he wanted only to appear strong but had no desire to fight Israel.
King Faisal of Saudi Arabia had repeatedly insulted Nasser and accused him of allowing Israel to
attack the Jordanian village of Samu’ (Bernstein & Ziv, 2007). Many feel that these ongoing
Intra-Arab disputes led Nasser to take an aggressive foreign policy stance to mitigate much of his

8. criticism. This aggressive stance led him to remove the UN peacekeeping troops from the Sinai
Peninsula and to close the Straits of Tiran. These actions spurred domestic fervor for war.
Immediately following Nassers closure of the Straits of Tiran, much of the Egyptian public
marched the streets shouting “Nasser, Nasser, long live Nasser.” (Bernstein and Ziv, 2007).
Because his actions won him international and domestic support, he may have feared the
political repercussions of backing down. If this is the case, then the six-day war could be an
inadvertent war.
However, for inadvertent war theory to apply, Nasser cannot have known that his actions
would cause war. On the contrary, Nasser repeatedly stated that he knew that closing the Straits
of Tiran was effectively a provocation of war (Louis & Shlaim, 2012; pg. 63). Furthermore, he
appeared eager for the opportunity, "We are ready for war… War might be an opportunity for the
Jews and for Israel to test their strength against ours." (Brady; May 30, 1967). Clearly, Nasser
knew the consequences of his actions. This demonstrates Nasser did not commit an inadvertent
war, which in turn supports the Conflict Narrative hypothesis.
Israel
The empirical evidence against a conflict narrative in Israel comes largely from the
Israeli respect for their Arab opponents. The NY Times quoted Prime Minister Eshkol,
"We haveno interestin violating their security,their territory or their legitimate rights.Norshall we
interfere in anyway in their internal affairs,theirregimesor their regionalor internationalrelations…we
expectof them,according to the principles of reciprocity, theapplication of the sameprinciples toward
us."(Feron;May 23, 1967)
This quote eliminates one of the main clauses of the Conflict Narrative- the belief in the
opponent’s inferiority. Eshkol states that Israel does not intend to interfere with the Egyptians
“legitimate” rights. Had Eshkol viewed Egypt as inferior, then there would have been no
acknowledgment of their earned rights. Furthermore, Eshkol expects Egypt to return the favor.

9. This again demonstrates that, while Eshkol may not have agreed with Egyptian actions, he saw
them as equal and competent and believed them to be moral in their actions.
Further evidence comes from the much more hawkish Moshe Dayan. Dayan was Israel’s
secretary of Defense and firmly believed in an aggressive foreign policy. While he ultimately
replaced Prime Minister Eshkol thanks to public support earned from his strong Zionist leaning,
he acted as a military adviser beforehand. He constantly advised Eshkol to attack early and often.
He says,
"We cannot lose the initiative. The situation gets militarily more complex. It does not matter who
will shoot the first shot. We have to act, and act as quickly as possible"(Bernstein & Ilan Ziv,
2007).
It was not just Moshe Dayan either. A joint statement from Israel’s top generals to Prime
Minister Eshkol reads,
"The risk you are taking in not going to war is that it will take place on our soil. It gives the
Egyptians more time to organize better, to plan better; it gives all the advantage to them." (Ibid)
This again does not follow from a conflict narrative. These statements demonstrate an
Israeli understanding of the power and capabilities of their enemy. For a conflict narrative to be
in place, a society and its leaders must believe that the enemy is weak and cannot match the in-
group’s moral or physical strength (Bar-Tal et al, 2014). Instead, these proclamations show a
profound respect for the Egyptian and Arab fighting forces. There is both a sense of urgency and
a sense of fear. This sentiment appears in a quote from an Israeli paratrooper during the war. He
described the beginning of the war as “a war for survival” and “a defensive war against jihad”
(Bernstein & Ilan Ziv, 2007). From this, it seems that the Israeli motives were not about inherent
superiority and a God-given right to wipe out their inferior neighbors. Instead, it was an act of
preservation. Israel was frightened for its safety and it ultimately decided to respond as
aggressively as possible.

10. Assessment of Evidence
There is too little evidence to support the Conflict Narrative Hypothesis as a causal model
for the six-day war. There are three main problems. First, Israel had no clear conflict narrative.
Aside from a shared sense of duty and patriotism, there was no evidence that a feeling of
superiority and Arab inferiority permeated all levels of society. In fact, they appeared to have
great military respect for their hostile Arabs neighbors. Instead of seeing them as subhuman,
there was a well-documented sense of fear that emanated from both the Israeli generals and the
Israeli.
Second, there is a large sense of ambiguity in what constitutes a stochastic event. The
conflict narrative hypothesis supposes that if the narrative is in place in both countries, a single,
random event could spark a war. A perfect example of this comes from World War 1, with the
assassination of the archduke Ferdinand. This event was unpredicted and caused massive
confusion among all parties involved in the beginning of the war. However, there was no such
event for the six days war. Instead, a steady progression in Israeli-Arab tensions manifested in a
linear route to war. The only potentially “random” trigger event was the closing of the Straits of
Tiran. However, Nasser knew what he was doing and understood the ramifications of his actions.
Therefore, this was not a stochastic event.
Finally, there remains the tautology problem. Egypt had a strong conflict narrative, and if
we consider for the sake of argument that Israel had one as well, we are still left with the
question of which came first, the conflict or the conflict narrative?
Conclusion
In this paper, I examined the six-day war using the Conflict Narrative Hypothesis. The
hypothesis states that if two opposing countries have a sense of superiority, see their opponent as

11. inferior, and have a nationalist call to action, then any random trigger event may cause war. For
my case, I examined whether or not this conflict narrative was in place in both Egypt and Israel
in May and Early June of 1967. I expected to find a strong conflict narrative among all levels of
societies in both actors. However, this was not the case. Instead, I found Egypt to have an
extensive narrative that affected its leaders and public. However, Israel had no such narrative.
The only evidence I found was that they had a strong nationalistic sense of duty, likely born out
of the Zionist movement. There was no evidence that they felt themselves inherently superior to
their adversaries. Instead, they seemed to have a profound respect that was likely born out of
fear. It seemed that Israel worried about its survival, and this fear, not any sense of superiority,
led to their aggressive actions.
The implications of my paper are simply that the Conflict Narrative Hypothesis needs to
be refined. Most importantly, it needs a more accurate definition of what constitutes a belief in
superiority and inferiority. For my paper, I looked at propaganda, popular culture, and the words
and actions of the country’s respective leaders. While I felt that this provided a comprehensive
picture of the general thoughts and attitudes of the society and the time, there is no way to get
into the thoughts of the people involved. I can only infer what the people believed based on the
available evidence. This leads to some ambiguity in interpretation. For example, does the belief
in Zionism equate to a belief in superiority? One central tenant of Zionism is that Israel is the
Jewish homeland. This belief often coincides with the thought that Jerusalem was a gift from
God to the Jewish people. Receiving a gift from God could very well lead to a sense of
superiority. However, I was unable to find any direct evidence to this effect.

12. Ultimately, I feel that there is merit to the Conflict Narrative Hypothesis. However, until
we are better able to interpret public belief, it may remain just a theory and not a testable
hypothesis.
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