A Year Later

The Arabs would seem to have every reason to want to forget June 5th. Yet throughout the Arab world last week, alternate cries of vengeance and mourning echoed from a million transistor radios and a dozen leather-lunged Arab prime ministers and presidents on the first anniversary of the Six-Day War with Israel. Heedless of the lessons of that swift, disastrous encounter, Arab speakers called in thundering phrases for a renewal of the war, foreshadowing further strife in the Middle East. As a fighting slogan the Arab nations have adopted "Victory or Martyrdom," and in a nationwide speech, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser declared that "we have no alternative but to attain unequivocal, decisive and dignified victory."

Confined to their bases to mourn their fallen comrades, Egyptian army units, re-equipped with Soviet armor and vehicles, swore a solemn oath "by great Allah" to liberate Arab lands occupied by Israel. MIG 21s wheeled over Cairo in tight combat formation.

Clashes & Prayers. Obeying instructions from underground resistance organizations and Cairo broadcasts, the Arab population in Israeli-occupied territory staged protest strikes and demonstrations, closed their schools and shops for a day, and prayed for their dead. But for the most part, they avoided head-on encounters with Israeli police and occupation forces.

The biggest clash was at the edge of the walled city of Jerusalem between helmeted police and a procession of mourners on their way to a Moslem cemetery. The police were stoned when they tried to limit the number of Arabs entering the Damascus Gate and responded with a charge. The Israelis also fired their weapons in the air to frighten away Arab demonstrators heading in the direction of the Wailing Wall, where they might have collided with praying Jews.

Along the bristling Jordan River line, Israelis thwarted a planned fedayeen commando strike by landing the "first punch. A burst of Jordanian shells fired at riverbank settlements on the eve of the anniversary drew a ferocious artillery and air bombardment riposte from the Israelis.

When that failed to silence the Arab cannon, Israeli fighter-bombers streaked over the Jordan and pounded "Long Tom" gun emplacements near Irbid, a town twelve miles inside the cease-fire line. The Jordanians reported 35 dead, mostly civilians, and the Israelis gave their toll as three dead farmers and several injured.

With the atmosphere in the Middle East more tense and hostile than at any time since the war last year, the Arabs were proving far easier for the Israelis to defeat than to discourage--and peace in the troubled area seemed as far away as ever.

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