Fatah

The Arab summit meetings also take up other matters.

League members agree to created a unified military command, the United Arab Command, with headquarters in Cairo, but this plan, like that of diverting the Jordan River, remains on paper.

The Arab leaders do implement a plan to create the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) to be the primary organization of Palestinians.

The Arab governments, especially Egypt, are becoming increasingly uneasy about the growing activities of Palestinian guerrillas, and they want to create an organization through which they can control such operations

They create the Palestine Liberation Army, whose units will be stationed and controlled by Egypt, Syria, and Iraq.

Egypt will exercise control of the PLO until 1969 when Yasser Arafat, the leader of the guerrilla organization called Al Fatah, will take control of the organization from Ahmad Shukairy, the choice of the Arab League governments.

Tensions between the Arab states and Israel have increased during the mid-1960s.

In November 1966, Egypt and Syria sign a five-year defense pact.

In the same month, Israeli forces cross into the West Bank of Jordan to destroy the village of As Samu in retaliation for increasing Palestinian guerrilla raids.

Fatah, which has merged with smaller groups to form the PLO, carries out its first military operation on December 31, 1964.

Yasser 'Arafat leads a band of guerillas in a night crossing from Lebanon into northern Israel.

Armed with Soviet-made explosives, their uniforms supplied by the Syrians, they advance toward their target: a pump for conveying Galilee water to the Negev desert.

This attempt to sabotage the Israeli National Water Carrier is unsuccessful, however, as the explosives fail to detonate.

The United States has been providing King Hussein with about one hundred million dollars annually, which has stimulated economic development and, despite a number of assassination attempts, has secured the king's future.

The emergence in 1964 of the PLO and the militant group Fatah represent a potential threat to Jordan's sovereignty on the West Bank as well as to Israel.

Fatah, with the support of Egypt and the radical Ba'ath Party government in Syria, begins a series of Jordan-based raids against Israel that inflict serious casualties and damage in early 1965.

Three Israeli civilians are killed in a Fatah attack on a Jewish settlement at Ramat Hakovash, Israel, on May 25, 1965.

The French-designed nuclear reactor in Dimona is widely suspected of being the kernel of an Israeli nuclear weapons program, while French Mirage jets have become the backbone of Israel's air force.

The Israelis also obtain a large indirect supply of arms from the United States, with West Germany as the intermediary.

Under the leadership of IDF Chief of Staff Rabin, Israel is turning its military into a highly professional organization.

Israel retaliates by raiding the West Bank in an effort to deter Fatah's destructive military operations.

The Soviet Union warns Egypt that they have information that the Israelis have mobilized two brigades on the frontier.

Nasser reacts by sending troops to the Israeli border, and Syria follows suit.

The claim will be made that Nasser believed that the presence of Egyptian troops would deter the Israelis from attacking Syria.

Israel responds by deploying its own forces.

It is clear that it will be difficult for Egypt to come to Syria's aid according to the terms of their agreement because of an obstacle—the presence of UNEF troops, stationed on the Egyptian side of the Egyptian-Israeli border since the 1956 War.

A great deal of pressure to remove the troops has been put on Nasser by Arab critics such as King Hussein of Jordan and Crown Prince Faisal (Faisal ibn Abdul Aziz Al Saud) of Saudi Arabia, who accuse him of not living up to his responsibilities as an Arab leader.

He is accused of failing to match words with deeds and of hiding behind the UN shield rather than thinking about liberating the Palestinian homeland.

Israeli leaders in 1967 repeatedly threaten to invade Syria and overthrow the Syrian government if guerrilla raids across the Syrian border do not stop.

In April 1967, there are serious Israeli-Syrian air clashes over Syrian air space.

Israeli prime minister Levi Eshkol warns that Damascus can be occupied if necessary.

Nasser asks the UN on May 16 to remove the UNEF from the Egyptian-Israeli frontier in Sinai, making the move that leads inexorably to war. 

Once the UNEF is withdrawn, Nasser will declare he is closing the Strait of Tiran, which connects the Gulf of Aqaba and the Red Sea, to Israeli shipping—a threat he will never carry out.

Israel, for its part, regards the withdrawal of the UNEF troops as a hostile act and the closing of the strait as a casus belli.

Meanwhile, Jordan and Iraq sign defense agreements with Egypt.