Barak RealitySecrecyIsraels 2007

Between Reality and Secrecy: Israel's Freedom of Navigation through the Straits of
Tiran, 1956-1967
Author(s): Eitan Barak
Source: Middle East Journal , Autumn, 2007, Vol. 61, No. 4 (Autumn, 2007), pp. 657-679
Published by: Middle East Institute
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4330453
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Between Reality and Secrecy:
Israel's Freedom of Navigation through
the Straits of Tiran, 1956-1967
Eitan Barak
Following the Suez War, Israel defined any interference with its freedom of naviga-
tion through the Straits of Tiran as a casus belli. Despite acceptance by the inter-
national community, Egypt's opposed position remained intact. Hence, to prevent
the reoccurrence of war, a complex set of tacit understandings and arrangements
was reached between the opponents during 1957. Under these circumstances and
a veil of secrecy, Egypt acquiesced to the passage of Israeli ships in the Straits
while Israel - uncertain about its legal rights and preferring economic consider-
ations to quibbling over sovereignty - accepted various limitations.
After concluding negotiations for Israel's withdrawal from the Sinai Peninsula in the
aftermath of the 1956 Suez War, Israel's Foreign Minister Golda Meir publicly declared
at the UN General Assembly on March 1, 1957 that "interference, by armed force, with
ships of the Israeli flag exercising free and innocent passage in the Gulf of Aqaba and
through the Straits of Tiran" would be treated as a casus belli. ' Hence, on May 22, 1967,
when Egypt's President, Gamal 'Abdul Nasser [Nasir], declared that "under no circum-
stances will we allow the Israeli flag to pass through the Aqaba Gulf," the international
Eitan Barak is Assistant Professor of International Relations at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The
author would like to thank Mr. Tony Newton and Ms. Bridget Sisk of the UN Archives and Records Centre
for their assistance in the conduct of this research as well as to my research assistants Naomi Krieger and
Gal Sever. The author would like to thank as well the Leonard Davis Institute for International Relations,
The Hebrew University, for its financial support. He is currently completing a book on Israel's relationship
with Egypt and Syria during 1957-67 from an international security regimes perspective.
1. For the common perception of a clear definition of a casus belli see, for example, Yair Ev-
ron, The Demilitarization of Sinai 1957-1967 (Jerusalem: The Leonard Davies Institute, 1975), p. 8.
For Meir's declaration, see UN Depository Libraries, Doc. A/PV.666, pp. 1275-79 (unless otherwise
stated, all the UN documents mentioned here are available in the Depository Libraries). Under the
regime of innocent passage codified in the 1958 United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea,
"Passage is innocent so long as it is not prejudicial to the peace, good order or security of the coastal
State." See Art. 14, No. 4 of The 1958 Geneva Convention on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous
Zone, United Nations Treaty Series, Vol. 516, p. 205, 214. Furthermore, in the famous 1949 Corfu
Channel decision - which established the rules regarding innocent passage as codified in the above-
mentioned article - the International Court of Justice (ICJ) decided that the passage of British war-
ships through the Corfu Straits was innocent. The fact that Great Britain was an ally of Greece at that
time, which had declared itself to be in a technical state of war with Albania, the coastal state, did
not affect the court's decision. Albania was found responsible for the loss of life and damages to the
British ships by naval mines The ICJ, however, looked at the passage's character and not the vessel's
character as the determinative factor in deciding whether the passage was innocent and made clear
that determination of innocence was not a subjective decision to be made unilaterally by the coastal
state. See the Corfu Channel case (Merits) (United Kingdom/Albania), ICJ Reports 1949, p. 1, 28.
MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL * VOLUME 61. NO. 4, AUTUMN 2007

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658 * MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
community - not simply

the rival parties - realized
that war was in the offing.2
However, documenta-
tion declassified over the last
few years by Israel and by
the UN enables us to expose
the untold story of Israel's 0 MX
maritime activity and status

regarding navigation in the
Straits of Tiran (hereafter:
"the Straits") during the dec- ... ... ... . .~ ~~~~~
ade that spanned the above-
cited declarations. Research-
ers' focus on the dramatic ~~~~~ Red Sea ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~2;
events (the 1956 Suez War
and the 1967 Six Day War)
demarcating the period, the
scant documentation on the
F 1~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~d M Nv .~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~........
Egyptian side and the se-
The Straits of Tiran (Map~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.. CIA). ..
crecy surrounding the exer-
cise of this freedom on the
Israeli side have managed
to keep this intriguing story,
in which economic interests
suppressed considerations of national sovereignty and international acceptability, in
the dark until now. After all, as compared to the publicity given to Meir's declaration,
Nasser's statement, made ten days later (March 11, 1957), has remained in the shad-
ows. In that statement, Nasser announced - despite the clear Israeli statement - that
he would not permit passage of Israeli ships either through the Gulf of Aqaba or the
Suez Canal.3 As no war had broken out, it is clear that one side had retreated from its
formal stance. Documentation found in Israeli and UN archives, together with docu-
ments from the US State Department and, to a lesser extent, the British Foreign Office,
enable us to draw a more encompassing picture of those events. Our conclusion: both
countries retreated from their respective stances.
Through a set of tacit understandings and arrangements concluded between the
2. For Nasser's speech see The New York Times, May 26, 1967, p. 16. For support for the argument
that the closure was the watershed precipitating the 1967 crisis see, for example, Michael Brecher,
Decisions in Crisis: Israel, 1967 and 1973 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), p. 104.
For the Egyptian side see, for example, Anwar El Sadat, In Search of Identity: An Autobiography
(New York: Harper Collins, 1978), p. 173.
3. For Nasser's declaration see Abba Eban, Hamaaraha Hamedinit Baumot Hameuhadot ve-beart-
sot Habrit Beicvot Mivtsa Sinai [The Diplomatic Battle in the United Nations and the United States
in the Aftermath of the Suez Operation], October 1956-March 1957, Vol. II, Annex I (Washington:
June 1957), p. 7. Unpublished manuscript, Israel State Archives (hereafter: ISA), Foreign Office Files
(hereafter: FO) 2458/18-19.

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FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION THROUGH THE STRAITS OF TIRAN * 659
two adversaries, Nasser agreed to the passage of Israeli shipping. Israel's unenthusias-
tic acceptance of these arrangements was, however, the product of third-party demands
(the US and then-UN Secretary-General (UNSG) Dag Hammarskjold) combined with
Israel's uncertainty about the legal status of its position. In addition, contrary to pre-
vailing images, Israel was deeply concerned over the durability of its achievement: the
acceptance of Israel's position according to which it has a 'right' to free navigation
through the Straits supported by the US and the major naval powers.
In order to provide a frame of reference for the analysis of the period under study,
we first review the terms of Israel's freedom of navigation through the Straits prior to
the 1956 Suez War and during the negotiations in its aftermath.
ISRAEL AND FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION IN THE STRAITS OF TIRAN,

1948-1957
On January 28, 1950, after occupying the islands of Sanafir and Tiran, originally
held by Saudi Arabia, Egypt was quick to state that:
This occupation is not conceived in a spirit to hinder in whatever way it may be

the innocent passage across the maritime space separating these two Islands from
the Egyptian Coast of Sinai. It goes without saying that this passage, the only prac-
ticable, will remain free as in the past, being in conformity with the intemational
practice and the recognized principles of international law.4
In parallel, however, Egypt placed a number of large shore guns at Ras Nasrani, over-
looking the Straits; one year later, in 1951, it unilaterally expanded the width of its
territorial waters from three to six miles.
As a result of the expansion, the entire expanse of the Straits was included within
the territorial waters of either Egypt or Saudi Arabia. The presence of rocks, reefs, and
a number of islets (the largest of which are Sanafir and Tiran) limited transit through
the Straits to two narrow passages (Enterprise and Grafton) situated between the Sinai
Peninsula's coast and the island of Tiran, both within Egyptian territorial waters.5 An
4. For the statement, which was transmitted as an aide-memoire to the American Embassy in Cairo
on January 28, see Louis M. Bloomfield, Egypt, Israel and the Gulf of Aqaba in International Law
(Toronto: Carswell, 1957), p. 9. For the Ambassador's report to the Secretary of State on January
30, 1950, see Foreign Relations of the United States (hereafter: FRUS) 1950, Vol. V, The Near East,
South Asia, and Africa (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1978), No. 102.
5. As Saudi Arabia gave its consent to Egypt's 1950 occupation of the two main islands in the
Straits, there was no dispute over the sovereignty question (i.e., whether Tiran, Sanafir, and the
Sinai Peninsula are parts of Egypt's territory). However, the customary rules on passage through
straits used for international navigation between one and another part of the high seas - as defined
and applied by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Corfu Channel case (1949) - al-
low innocent passage of foreign ships (The Corfu Channel case, p. 4). Due to the 1951 Egyptian
expansion of its territorial waters, however, the question became the applicability of this custom-
ary rule to straits that connect the high sea with the territorial sea of a foreign state. Many schol-
ars held the view that freedom of navigation in this scenario was in fact "well-rooted in interna-
tional customary law" - a view that was accepted and codified by the 1958 UN Conference on
the Law of the Sea. The Arab states took the position that the Gulf of Aqaba constituted an "in-
ternal sea" subject to the absolute sovereignty of the coastal states (except Israel which was not
[Continued on next page]

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additional channel of some 16.5 meters depth, located between Tiran and the Saudi
Arabian coast, could be used only by small ships due to its course and navigational
difficulty.6
Notwithstanding its public statements, Egypt promulgated regulations in early
1951 requiring vessels intent on passing through the Straits to provide advance notifica-
tion and to submit to inspection. "As to enemy boats," Egypt specifically declared that:
"entering and traversing the territorial waters" were forbidden, while "enemy commer-
cial boats" enter "at their own risk," meaning the threat of seizure and detention. This
last stipulation was most effective in preventing Israeli shipping from going through
the Straits.7
Nonetheless, the enforcement of the regulations in general and their application
to the very few ships destined for Eilat (two ships annually on average, obviously wav-
ing a foreign flag) was extremely lax until 1955.8 In effect, the Eilat port's construction
was completed only in June 1952 (albeit ocean-going vessels were able to dock only
after March 1956). Up to late 1953, Egypt permitted shipment of non-strategic goods to
Israel, despite the occasional hindrance of a ship's passage for a day or two.9
ISRAEL's REACTION
News of Egypt's intention to "control Israeli traffic on the Red Sea," which
reached Israel in late 1950, prodded the military to recommend dispatching ships and to
prepare a military response (codenamed Operation Ophir No. 2) should the Egyptians
obstruct a vessel's passage. However, in April 1951, the Operation was cancelled as
the Israeli Cabinet had decided on "a diplomatic response exclusively in case an Israeli
vessel would be detained in the Tiran's Straits."'0
In the diplomatic arena, Israel had begun the practice of linking questions of
freedom of navigation in the Gulf of Aqaba to that in the Suez Canal, which was then
[Continuedfrom previous page]

considered a legitimate riparian state) or, since 1957, an "historic bay" of the riparians (Israel,
of course, excluded). Furthermore, even if there was such a customary rule - the Arabs argued
the right of innocent passage did not apply to Israeli shipping given Arab claims of a state of
belligerency with Israel. For the exact quotation see Ruth Lapidoth, Freedom of Navigation with
Special Reference to International Waterways in the Middle East (Jerusalem: The Leonard Davies
Institute, 1975), pp. 40, 55. For the Arab position see, for instance, Carl F. Salans, "Gulf of Aqaba and
Straits of Tiran: Troubled Water," in J.N. Moore, ed., The Arab-Israeli Conflict, Readings and Docu-
ments, abridged and revised edition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977), pp. 186-197; See
also Lapidoth, pp. 56-66.
6. See Oscar Schachter, "The Gulf of Aqaba," position paper prepared for the UNSG, January 17,
1957, p. 2. UN Archives S-316-12-14.
7. For the declaration transmitted as an aide-memoire to the American Embassy in Cairo see FRUS
1951, Vol. V, The Near East and Africa (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1982),
pp. 628-29.
8. See a brief presented by Meir before members of the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Security
Committee (KFASC), March 12, 1957, 26 ISA, A/7565, File No. 7.
9. Bloomfield, The Gulf ofAqaba, p. 4.
10. Moshe Dayan, Avnei Derekh [Milestones: An Autobiography] (Tel Aviv: Davir, 1976), p. 100.
This episode is missing from the book's English version, Story of My Life: An Autobiography (New
York: William Morrow, 1976).

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the focus of Israel's efforts due to its maritime traffic from Haifa's port to the F
Indeed, Israel's first complaint to the UN Security Council (UNSC) on these issues,
lodged in July 1951, referred exclusively to freedom of navigation through the Suez
Canal as the absence of a proper port until mid-1952 turned the freedom of navigation
in the Straits into a theoretical issue. Israel expected, however, that the September 1951
UNSC resolution accepting its position, coupled with diplomatic efforts by the great
powers and the UN, would suffice to induce a change in the Egyptian position regard-
ing Israeli shipping in both these lanes."
Nevertheless, in November 1953, the Egyptians suddenly adopted a harsher stance
on both the Suez Canal and the Straits. They accordingly issued a decree announcing
that all commodities enumerated therein would be considered war contraband even if
in transit; they prohibited the passage of food as well.'2 "Israel felt isolated, friendless,
cut off," recalled its fresh Chief of Staff Moshe Dayan, who ordered the Israeli Navy
to prepare to dispatch a naval reconnaissance mission within ten days notice along the
Saudi coast in the area of the Straits (codenamed Operation Almog-Shnunit).'3
Nevertheless, even when the Egyptians opened fire on an Italian ship (the SS Ma-
ria Antonia) headed for Eilat in January 1954, Israel's Prime Minster, Moshe Sharett,
still continued to search for a diplomatic solution for both lanes, that is, mobilizing the
UNSC "to force Egypt to lift the blockade."'4 So, on January 28, Israel lodged a dual
complaint to the UNSC: In addition to the Egyptian restrictions on the passage of ships
trading with Israel through the Suez Canal, it objected to "interference by Egypt with
shipping proceeding to the Israeli port of Elath [Eilat] on the Gulf of Aqaba."'5
A few days later, on February 2, 1954, the order to execute the naval recon-
naissance mission was given. However, attempts to conduct the mission failed due to
deficiencies in the vessel selected for the task. The final attempt, made on March 31,
1954, floundered after the vessel encountered a storm and drifted off course. After
abandoning the vessel on the Saudi coast, the Israel Air Force (IAF) was ordered to sink
it - after rescuing the crew - in order to "blur its tracks."'6
In parallel, the Straits issue appeared on the UNSC agenda for the first time.
However, most of the attention during the February-March 1954 debates was devoted
to the issue of the Suez Canal, while the Egyptian interference in the Straits was re-
ferred to the Israel-Egypt Mixed Armistice Commission (IEMAC). In any case, New
Zealand's favorable draft resolution reaffirming Israel's freedom of passage through
the Suez Canal, submitted on March 29, 1954, was vetoed by the Soviet Union.'"
Three months later, in light of the draft's failure at the UNSC, Israel's Minister of
Defense Pinhas Lavon instructed a test ship (Bat Galim) to be sent through the Straits
I 1. For Israel's complaint see S/224 1, July 12, 195 1. For the favorable resolution to Israel's stance
see UNSC Res. 95, S/2322, September 1, 1951.
12. See ISA, Naomi Barzilay, ed., Documents on The Foreign Policy of Israel, 1954, Vol. IX, Com-
panion Volume (Jerusalem: Government Printer, 2004), XVI.
13. Dayan, Story of My Life, p. 176.
14. Dayan, Avnei Derekh, pp. 112-3.
15. Doc S/3168/Add I (January 29, 1954), p. 3.
16. Meir Amit, Rosh Be-Rosh [Head On] (Or Yehuda: Hed Arzi, 1999), p. 57. Amit was the head
of the Southern Command from October 1955 to August 1956.
17. For New Zealand's draft resolution see UN Doc. S/3 188 corr. 1.

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flying the Israeli flag, accompanied by aerial protection. Nevertheless, Sharett, upheld
by his supporters in the government, was able to change the destination to the Suez Ca-
nal. Indeed, on September 28, 1954, the Bat Galim was ordered to the Canal. Two days
later, upon entering the Canal, Egypt confiscated the vessel together with her cargo and
jailed the ten crew members.'8
Significant for the progress of events was Ben-Gurion's return to the office of
Minister of Defense on February 20, 1955. As the development of the Negev in general
and Eilat in particular was a sort of ickefixe for him, he was appalled by the great pow-
ers' support of the Alpha Plan (February 1955) requiring Israel to cede the southern
part of the Negev to Jordan.'9 Naturally, his return - after more than a year of living in
the Negev itself at Kibbutz Sede-Boqer - meant a harsher formal stance on the Straits
.20
In May 1955, Ben-Gurion declared that Israel would not tolerate any limitations
on navigation to Eilat and spoke of forcibly opening the Straits. Three months later, he
issued directives to construct a separate civilian port in Eilat (it would be ready only
after the Suez War) whilst ordering the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) to begin initial
preparations to open the Straits by force (codenamed Operation Omer).21
However, following an extensive Israeli raid on Egyptian installations in Khan
Yunis on September 1, 1955 (codenamed Operation Elkayam), which resulted in heavy
Egyptian losses, Cairo tightened its naval blockade over Israeli navigation through the
Straits and closed the entire air space above the Straits to Israeli aircraft.22 According
to the new regulations, issued on September 5 by the Egyptian Minister of War and
made public a week later, "all ships must have prior permission (requested 72 hours in
advance) to pass through Egyptian territorial waters in the Gulf of Aqaba."23 In parallel,
Egypt fortified its position at Ras Nasrani with heavy artillery; hence, at the outbreak of
the Suez War, it had an array of two six-inch guns and four three-inch guns.24
Following those new restrictions, which in fact meant a complete Egyptian naval
and aerial blockade of the Straits, Israel published a harsh statement, sent in parallel
(September 27, 1955) to the President of the UNSC.
18. Eyal Kafkafi, Lavon: anti-mashiah [Pinchas Lavon, Anti-Messiah: A Biography] (Tel-Aviv:
Am Oved, 1998), p. 229; Dayan, Avnei Derekh, pp. 128, 132, 140.
19. The Alpha Plan was a joint Anglo-American effort initiated by a senior British diplomat, Sir
Evelyn Shuckburgh, to establish a non-belligerency agreement or "an over-all settlement" between
Egypt and Israel. In addition to Israeli territorial concessions it demanded Israel repatriate a consider-
able number of refugees while compensating the rest. In return, Israel was promised to have the Pow-
ers' guarantee to the settlement and an end of the Arab blockade of Israel. Nasser was offered, as an
additional incentive, substantial military and economic aid. For a detailed explanation on the plan and
an analysis of its failure see Mordechai Bar-On, The Gates of Gaza: Israel's Road to Suez and Back,
1955-1957 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994), pp. 83-97; Shimon Shamir, "The Collapse of Project
Alpha," in William Roger Louis and Roger Owen, eds., Suez 1956: The Crisis and its Consequences
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), pp. 73-101.
20. For Ben-Gurion's perception see for example Dayan, Avnei Derekh, p. 230.
21. Dayan, Avnei Derekh, pp. 230, 150, 345.
22. On the aerial blockade and the Egyptian legal arguments for it see Shabtai Rosenne, "Legal
review," April 4, 1957, ISA, FO 4095/3.
23. Schachter, "The Gulf of Aqaba," p. 22.
24. Bloomfield, Gulf ofAqaba, p. 5.

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It concurrently undertook an extensive diplomatic campaign to gain internation

support for its position.25 Ben-Gurion then explicitly declared that should the blocka
remain in force, Israel would not hesitate to use force "within a year" and preparat
for the military seizure of the Straits (the aforementioned Operation Omer) began
move ahead at full steam.26
The collision seemed - a year before the Suez War - unavoidable. Yet, real-
izing he lacked the needed government support for his plans (especially after the US
warned Israel on November 21 that: "There must not be any effort to compel a settle-
ment of specific issues by force, in the Gulf of Aqaba for instance") Ben-Gurion, now
as Israel's Prime Minister (as of November 3, 1955), ordered the IDF in December
1955 to cancel Operation Omer (he had postponed it previously to late January) despite
heavy pressure from the IDF to carry it out. In parallel, he cancelled the purchase of the
"test ship," the detainment of which would have triggered the operation. 27
It seems that Ben-Gurion himself accepted the moderate line proposed earlier
by Sharett after the Czech sale was exposed in September 1955: exhausting Israel's
efforts to procure arms in order to reinstitute the military balance with Egypt. After
all, disguised as an Egyptian-Czech transaction, it was the first Egyptian-Soviet arms
deal to provide Egypt with huge amount of weapons, such as two hundreds tanks, and
destabilize the regional arms race. In fact, it brought about the collapse of the 1950
US-British-French Tripartite Declaration that formally placed an embargo on weapons
deliveries to the countries involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict.28
After all, beyond the symbolism attached to keeping the Straits open for Israel,
as Sharett wrote to Ben-Gurion on July 25, 1956 after he resigned from the post of
foreign minister, "naval transport to Eilat is currently not a crucial and essential part of
our trading routes system."29 A day later, July 26, 1956, Nasser nationalized the Suez
Canal. By doing so, he shifted Israel's - as well as the world's - attention to the
pending international crisis, forcing the Straits issue to resume its marginal position on
the international agenda.
25. For the letter see UN Doc. S/3442. For the diplomatic campaign see, e.g., "Israel will Act to
Abolish the Blockade on Eilat," Ma'ariv, September 12, 1955, p. 2.
26. For Ben-Gurion's statement see "Israel Protests in U.N.," The New York Times, September
29, 1955, p. 3.
27. For the warning transmitted to Sharett and Eban by Dulles himself see FRUS, Vol. XIV, Arab-
Israeli Dispute, 1955 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1989), No. 421. For Israel's
willingness to comply with the US requests to mitigate the conflict with Egypt - after internal dis-
cussion - see FRUS, vol. XIV, Arab-Israeli Dispute, 1955, No. 437. For Ben-Gurion's activities see,
e.g., Benny Morris, Israel's Border Wars, 1949-1956: Arab Infiltration, Israeli Retaliation, and the
Countdown to the Suez War (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), pp. 280-82.
28. For a detailed account of the far-reaching effects the deal had on Israel's leadership and public
see Bar-On, The Gates of Gaza, pp. 1-13. For an article that disputes Bar-On's view on the arms deal's
implications, see Motti Golani, "The Historical Place of the Czech-Egyptian Arms Deal, Fall 1955,"
Middle Eastern Studies, Vol. 31, No. 4 (October 1995), pp. 803-827. For details on the Tripartite
Declaration see, for instance, Michael B. Oren, "The Tripartite System and Arms Control on the Mid-
dle East, 1950-1956," in Dore Gold, ed., Arms Control in the Middle East (Jerusalem and Boulder:
Westview Press, 1990), JCSS Study No. 15, pp. 77-86.
29. Moshe Sharett, Yoman Ishi [Personal Diary] (Tel-Aviv, 1978), Vol. 6, pp. 1594-1602 (entry
for July 27, 1956).

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THE POLITICAL STRUGGLE TO OBTAIN FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION:

NOVEMBER 1956-MARCH 1957
During preparations for the Suez War, Ben-Gurion continued to perceive the
Straits' capture as a main goal of the battle, together with defeating the Egyptian forc-
es.30 And indeed, on November 11, 1956, the Israeli cabinet decided that one of the
conditions for Israel's withdrawal from the Sinai was continued control of the Straits
and the coastline connecting them to Eilat.3'
On the same day (November 11, 1956), Ben-Gurion accepted Dayan's proposal
to transfer Israeli frigates from Haifa to Eilat by way of the Cape of Good Hope in order
to establish a fait accompli.32 While two frigates were making their way to Eilat, the
first merchant ship flying the Israeli flag arrived at Eilat via the Straits on November
18.33 The ship had been purchased especially for the operation and was manned by
soldiers flown to Djibouti, its port of departure.
In parallel, Israel initiated various activities to create facts on the ground, hoping
to strengthen its position in the political negotiations. These ranged from laying down
an oil pipeline from Eilat to northern Israel to establishing settlements (populated by
soldiers in civilian dress) in the recently occupied territory around Sharm el-Sheikh
and on the islet of Tiran.34 Three days later, the first Israeli warship (the frigate Miznak)
traversed the Straits for the first time since Israel's independence in 1948 and arrived
at Eilat. On January 2, her sister ship (Mivtach) arrived at Sharm and then departed for
Eilat, after being sent off with much media coverage.35
However, these and other actions did not alleviate the growing international pres-
sure for immediate and complete withdrawal. Israel therefore stopped linking the ques-
tion of free navigation through the Straits with that through the Suez Canal and focused
on the effort to obtain US assurances for the freedom of navigation through the Straits.
On January 5, 1957, the presiding UN Secretary-General (UNSG) Dag Hammarskjold
clarified that - despite his personal recognition of Israel's freedom of navigation -
negotiations would begin only after the sides returned to the ante bellum status quo.
Israel subsequently decided, on January 13, that it would not evacuate the Straits until
this freedom was guaranteed.
Together with its outward political struggle, Israel attempted to find an alterna-
tive route between Tiran Island and Saudi Arabia that would, in the future, replace
Egypt with the militarily weaker Saudi Arabia as Israel's adversary over free navigation
in the Straits. Therefore, on January 11, 1957, an Israeli naval patrol set out to explore
this possibility. However, a battle ensued with a Saudi regiment deployed on the shore
across from Sanafir and Tiran Islands.3f Following the battle, the respective sides came
30. See for example Dayan, Story of My Life, p. 231.

31. David Ben-Gurion, Diary (Tel Hashomer: Israel Defense Ministry and IDF Archives [hereaf-
ter: IDFA]), entry for November 11, 1956.
32. Dayan, Aveni Derech, p. 318.
33. Eban, The Diplomatic Battle, p. 7.
34. For laying down the oil pipeline see Eban, The Diplomatic Battle, p. 7. For the settlements see
Dayan, Aveni Derech, p. 326.
35. See IDFA, IDF General Staff (GS) meetings 1/57, File 33, January 3, 1957.
36. IDFA IDF GS Mtg 2/57, File 33, January 13, 1957.

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to opposing conclusions: Israel decided to strengthen its military position vis-a-vis the
Saudis and so invaded the island of Sanafir and stationed forces there, while Saudi Ara-
bia instructed its forces not to open fire upon Israeli ships in the Straits, save in cases
of self-defense.37
At the end of January, tensions between Israel and the UN mounted as Ham-
marskjold receded from his position defining the Gulf of Aqaba as an international
passageway and even refused to differentiate between the issue of the Straits and that
of the Gaza Strip. In fact, in a report submitted to the UNGA on January 24, 1957,
Hammarskjold expressly stated that he doubted whether Israel possessed the legal right
to pass through the Straits.38 This abuse of international law for political purposes was
too much for the British. The Ministry of Transport's legal department saw Hammar-
skjold's statement as "misleading" and clarified to the UK delegation in New York that
the only issue in doubt was the right of suspension, an act prohibited once the Straits of
Tiran was defined as an international passageway.39
On February 2, 1957, the UNGA condemned Israel's failure to withdraw be-
hind the armistice demarcation line "despite the repeated requests of the General As-
sembly;" it thereupon called for Israel's immediate compliance.40 Realizing that the
UNGA's next step would be to call for the imposition of sanctions on Israel, the US,
fearing damage to its own interests, altered its former approach. Instead of relying in
this negotiation on Hammarskjold's discretion while providing general support for his
position and efforts, the US Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, decided to become
personally involved.4' After numerous diplomatic contacts, an American formula for
breaking the deadlock was drafted on February 11. The aide-memoire, which included
a guarantee of sorts for Israel's freedom of navigation (it likewise addressed the issue
of Gaza), stated the following:
In the absence of some overriding decision to the contrary, as by the International

Court of Justice, the United States, on behalf of vessels of United States registry, is
prepared to exercise the right of free and innocent passage and to join with others to
secure general recognition of this right.42
Despite the repetition of this view in a special broadcast to the nation delivered by
President Dwight D. Eisenhower on February 20, Israel persisted in its demand to guar-
antee its freedom of navigation by means of official guarantees or by stationing UNEF
in the Straits, with official Egyptian approval.43 At this point, the US lost its patience
37. IDFA IDF GS Mtg 4/57, File 33, January 20, 1957.
38. See UN Doc. A/3512. For Israel's concerns regarding his new approach see Protocol, Mtg.,
KFASC, January 29, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 6.
39. See D. R. Livesey to P. H. Laurence, Levant Department, Foreign Office, February 11, 1957;
Laurence to UK Delegation, February 18, 1957, London, The National Archives, Foreign Office
Record 371/128131.
40. GAOR Res. 1124(XI), February 2, 1957.
41. Bar-On, The Gates of Gaza, p. 294.
42. FRUS, Vol. XVII, Arab-Israeli Dispute 1955-1957, 1957 (Washington, DC: US Government
Printing Office, 1990), No. 78.
43. For excerpts and a personal account of this address see Dwight D. Eisenhower, Waging Peace
1956- 1961 (New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1965), p. 188.

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and began to apply massive pressure on Israel, which eventually led to a compro
proposed on February 25. It was in fact Eisenhower, in a talk with Dulles on February
24, who raised the idea that the US would notify Israel that "our ships proceed into the
Gulf of Aqaba, as soon as the Israelis withdrew" as "this would show that we are not
talking about theory." For Ben-Gurion it was a great achievement indeed.'
The settlement paved the way for the formulation of an agreed upon formula
between Israel and the US according to which Israel would declare at the UN its con-
sent to full withdrawal in return for recognition of its right to navigation in good faith.
The following day, on February 28, crucial negotiations between the US and Israel
culminated in a draft statement designated for the UN. In her memoirs, Israel's Foreign
Minister Golda Meir recalled that "at the end of February we arrived at a compromise
of sorts ... It wasn't much, and it certainly wasn't what we had been fighting for, but it
was the best we could get - and it was better than nothing."45
And indeed, as agreed, Meir announced the completion of the Israeli withdrawal
at the UNGA on March 1, and delivered the respective statement after which, as agreed,
the major naval powers, including the US, endorsed Israel's interpretation regarding the
freedom of navigation in the Straits. The crux of this understanding - as claimed time
and again in the literature - was the clear-cut elevation of any interference with this
freedom to the status of a casus belli.
FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION UP TO THE 1967 CRISIS
After Meir's declaration, Israel went about completing its withdrawal from
Straits area (March 8, 1957) while the UNEF took its position at Ras Nasrani, previ-
ously held by Egypt.46 The function of the small force assigned to the Straits was that
of "a military check-post, [which] observes and records all sea and air traffic;" and,
indeed, the force reported "on all shipping going through Straits of Tiran."47 According
to a 1961 UNSG report, "A detachment of approximately one and one-half platoons of
the Swedish battalion, with Canadian administrative troops, is stationed at Sharm-el-
Sheikh to keep the Straits of Tiran under constant observation."48
However, despite the tendency observed in the literature to conclude that once the
Israeli withdrawal had been completed, things ran smoothly until May 1967, the newly
declassified archival material paints a different picture.
On March 8, only four days after Meir's UN declaration, the US representative to
the UN, Henry Cabot Lodge, assured the Egyptian Foreign Minister, Mahmud Fawzi,
that the US view regarding the Straits - as declared on March 1 - would not reach
the level of "legislation" or even "recommendations," nor "was it part of US policy to
44. For the Eisenhower-Dulles conversation see FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 142. For Ben-Gu-
rion's perception see his conversation with the American Ambassador to Israel, Edward Lawson, on
February 14. FRUS, 1957, XVII, No. 100.
45. Golda Meir, My Life (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1975), pp. 254-5.
46. For the exact position's location see, A/c.5/1049, Survey of UNEF: Report of the Secretary
General, December 13, 1965.
47. See UN Release No. UNEF/159, April 26, 1957.
48. See A/4857, Progress Report of the Secretary General, August 30, 1961.

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use force to put across that policy."49 Whether or not encouraged by that verbal assur
ance, Nasser, as already mentioned, on March 1, declared that he would not permi
Israeli ships to traverse the Gulf of Aqaba or the Suez. At the same time, however, he
secretly promised Dr. Ralph Bunche (Hammarskjold's Special Assistant) that until t
UNSG's arrival in Cairo, "no decisions would be taken on major issues, in particula
not on issues covered by the statement of 20 February" (in reference to Eisenhower's
public statement).50
The UNSG indeed arrived in Cairo on March 19, 1957 but the US, which needed
to fulfil its promise to Israel and send ships through the Straits while soothing the Ara
world, could not wait. Warned by the Saudis - who had previously discussed the is-
sue with Arab leaders in Cairo - that "any country which undertook to assist Israel in
securing right of navigation in [the] Gulf of Aqaba would be regarded as placing itself
in [the] same position as [the] British and French in their attack on Egypt," the US was
in no position to sit idle.5'
FULFILLING THE AMERICAN PROMISE
On March 9, Israel's Ambassador to the US and Permanent Representative at the

UN, Abba Eban, met with the acting Secretary of State, Christian Herter (Dulles was
hospitalized at the time) and his aides. As Eban recalled, in reply to his question as to
"whether and how the U.S. government intends to realize the right of passage through
the Gulf and the Straits in the near future," Herter stipulated that as soon as Israel de-
cided on the ship bearing a US flag and the cargo, "the State Department would use all
its weight to encourage its sailing and would guarantee its support to the ship's own-
ers." He even encouraged Israel to make haste in this regard.52
In tandem, Israel was requested to refrain from sending warships through the
Straits to "avoid complications" given the terms of the Israeli-Egyptian Armistice
Agreement, "which forbade passage of war vessels within three miles of the coastline
of [the] other party" as the State Department's legal adviser, Herman Phleger, point-
ed out. Eban hurried to clarify that "Israeli warships presently stationed at Eilat would
be bottled up in [the] Gulf [of] Aqaba" and promised that "Israel had no intention [of]
bringing any more warships into Aqaba." To Jerusalem, Eban recommended that "until
this legal problem is resolved, it would be better to keep our fleet in the Gulf without
transferring it southward; we should currently focus on establishing the practice of
civilian merchant traffic through the Gulf."53
49. Lodge to Washington, FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 190.

50. For Nasser's promise see UNSG's report to the UNEF Advisory Committee, Minutes, Mtg
24'h, March 16, 1957, p. 2, UN Archive, S-0316-002-4.
51. For the Saudi warning to the US Ambassador to Egypt, Raymond Hare, see Hare to Washing-
ton, February 28, 1957, FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 171.
52. Eban, The Diplomatic Battle, p. 317. For the American account of the meeting see FRUS,
1957, Vol. XVII, No. 208.
53. Washington to the Embassy in Israel, FRUS, 1957, XVII, No. 208; Eban, The Diplomatic B
tle, p. 317 and a brief by Israel's Foreign Minister Golda Meir, Protocol, Mtg., KFASC, March
1957, ISA, A/7565, File 7, Protocol 241B.

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ISRAEL'S FEARS AND THE UNSG 's ACTIONS
Nasser's statement regarding the continuation of the blockade was understood

in pristine terms by Israel. Riots in the Gaza Strip and UNEF's perceived defeatism
greatly troubled Israel, which feared a similar scenario developing at the Straits de-
spite Hammarskjold's prompt reassurance to the contrary. Later, when The New York
Times published an erroneous report of an Egyptian military contingent moving toward
Sharm el-Sheikh, the UNSG was once more quick to calm Israel.54 Concurrently, he
instructed UNEF's commander, Lieutenant-General Bums, that his troops "should not
leave or hand over to Egyptian troops [stationed] there before reporting to him so that
he [Hammarskj6ld] could inform the Advisory Committee, which could then decide
whether to alert the General Assembly."55
Hammarskjold's fears of reprisal and escalation were justified. On March 15,
1957, Ben-Gurion informed Dayan that he was sending a single civilian vessel to Eilat.
"Were Egypt to detain it along its way, or else attack it upon entering the Straits - he
made clear - we would reply with our own attacks on Egyptian vessels in the High
Seas, or even ports and coastal facilities in Egypt."56 A week later, Dayan ordered a
military plan to be formulated for the requested close and rapid reactions.57
THE CAIRO ACCORDS: THE ISRAELI-EGYPTIAN TACIT UNDERSTANDING
On March 19, 1957, Hammarskjold arrived in Cairo (his deputy, Bunche, was
already there) for five days of intense discussions with Nasser and Fawzi. Knowing
Israel's intention to send a Danish ship to Eilat - a move he opposed informally
Hammarskjold realized that obtaining Egypt's consent to Israeli navigation through the
Straits (in addition to the Suez Canal) was a must; an urgent mission was required to
avoid renewed military confrontation.58
Surprisingly, when he raised this issue with Fawzi the next day, the latter hinted
that, in contrast to the issue of Israeli navigation through the Suez Canal, "acceptable
arrangements on the role of UNEF in Gaza and in the Gulf of Aqaba could be made if
the question was not pressed too hard or too formally."59 And indeed, during a meeting
held with all four personalities on March 23, a tacit understanding on the issue of Israeli
navigation through the Straits was reached. According to Hammarskj6ld's biographer,
"Nasser indicated that Egypt did not intend to move troops back into Gaza and that if
UNEF stayed on at the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba, Egypt would, in Fawzi's phrase,
'close its eyes."' In New York, Hammarskjold reported to the US that upon asking
"what Egypt would do if Israeli ships proceeded through the Straits of Tiran," Fawzi
54. See a brief by Meir, Protocol, Mtg., KFASC, March 26, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 8, Protocol
25/B, p. 20.
55. Brian E. Urquhart, Hammarskjold (London: Harper & Row, 1972), p. 217.
56. Dayan, Avni Derech, p. 344.
57. See IDF GS meetings 9/57, File 33, March 21, 1957, p. 3.
58. For Hammarskjold's knowledge and reservations regarding Israel's intention see Protocol.
Mtg., KFASC, March 26, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 8, Protocol 25/B, p. 17.
59. Urquhart, Hammarskjold, p. 218.

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had said: "please forget you asked that question."60

However, while the Cairo negotiations were still in progress, the first ship des-
tined for Eilat - the Danish Birgina Toft - made its way to the Straits. Despite the
anxiety felt by Israel's military, Dayan refused the Navy's request on March 18 to sup-
ply the ship with an armed escort, stressing that "in passing through the Straits we have
no need to make a show of military frigates. For Israel, the value of the ship's passage
was in free commercial navigation."6' On March 25, the Birgina Toft passed through the
Straits and became the first vessel to reach Eilat following Israel's withdrawal from the
Sinai. However, while it is not certain that the tacit understanding demanding confiden-
tiality on the passage of vessels to Israel through the Straits had already been transmit-
ted to Israel, Israel implemented the confidentiality condition with alacrity.62
ISRAEL'S PERCEPTIONS AND SUBSEQUENT IMPLEMENTATION OF THE

TACIT UNDERSTANDING
By the time Hammarskjold left Cairo, information about the understandings re-
garding the Straits and the Suez Canal had begun to flow to Israel, which already had
accepted the fact that its warships would not pass through the Straits. And indeed, for
the next ten years, Israeli warships steered clear of the Straits of Tiran. Furthermore,
two weeks after Hammarskjold's visit, Israel received information indicating that "the
UNSG had received assurances from Nasser that he would turn a blind eye to the Straits
only in cases of ships not bearing the Israeli flag."63
Therefore, despite being dissatisfied with the tacit understandings Hammarskjold
had reached in Cairo, Israel began camouflaging her ships. Two ships that had original-
ly flown the Israeli flag passed masked under different flags. "Considerations [officials
of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) explained later] were mainly political,
that is, the will to implement the free navigation policy in the Gulf of Eilat while not
surrendering to Nasser's conditions for commercial reasons."fi
In the meantime, Israel had finally succeeded in leasing for three years a ship
bearing the American flag. On April 4, 1957, the Jewish-owned American tanker Kern
Hills passed through the Straits while carrying Iranian crude oil, shortly after a well-
publicized meeting with a US Navy patrol in the Red Sea "to make clear our support of
the right of 'innocent passage,"' in Eisenhower's words.65 On April 6, the tanker docked
in Eilat with wide media coverage, to Dulles' discontent.66 "The world at large might
60. Urquhart, Hammarskjold, p. 219. For his report to Lodge see US Mission at the UN to Wash-
ington, FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 252.
61. Dayan, Avnei Derech, p. 345.
62. See Mtg., FASC, March 26, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 8, Protocol 25/B, p. 17.
63. Israel's Consulate-General in New York (S. Arad) to Jerusalem, April 4, 1957, ISA, FO 3086/6,
Vol. II.
64. For the ships' details and the Israeli explanation for this step see Memo, Yuval Elizur to the
Assistant DG of the MFA, Emile Najar, May 23, 1957, ISA, FO 3086/6, Vol. II.
65. For more on the Kern Hills' passage see Jerusalem to Israel's embassy at Washington, April
12, 1957, FO 2452/5. For Eisenhower's words see Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 190.
66. For Dulles' discontent from the publicity surrounding Kern Hills' arrival and his request that
Israel would keep silent over this issue see Meir's briefing at the Cabinet meeting. ISA, Israel's Cabi-
net Minute, April 28, 1957, p. 12.

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generally assume," noted the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral
Radford, in his report to Dulles and the Pentagon, "that the U.S. Navy was prepared
to back up official United States Government statements." Nevertheless, following the
considerable publicity given by Israel to the meeting at sea, Dulles asked Radford that
patrols come no closer than 100 miles of the Straits, even if this entailed halting them
completely.67
Apparently due to Nasser's conditions for the tacit understanding reached by
Hammarskjold as well as US interests in the Arab world, the ruckus created in Israel
over the Kern Hills' arrival in Eilat angered the US, which claimed that Israel was
provoking the entire Arab world - but especially Saudi Arabia - with its actions.68
And indeed, as Hammarskjold had anticipated while briefing the US on his talk with
Nasser in Cairo, a new actor had started to "cause difficulties" on the Straits issue:
Saudi Arabia.69
BAFFLE BY PROXY
At the end of March, reports had piled up in Israel according to which Nasser had
transmitted the question of Israeli navigation in the Gulf to King Saud. Israel learned
that Nasser had made it clear to Saud that because he was still deeply entangled in the
Suez Canal matter, he was unable to deal simultaneously with the issue of passage
through the Straits. However, if Saudi Arabia had the desire and ability to interrupt Is-
raeli passage through the Straits - Nasser made quite clear - he would agree to give
Saud a free hand.
Nasser, who was amenable to returning Sanapir and Tiran to the Saudis as a ploy
to strengthen his position, stated that a Saudi-Israeli crisis was far more favorable to
Egypt than an Egyptian-Israeli crisis because a military clash with the Saudis would
be far more problematic for Israel given the different American stance towards Saudi
Arabia. At just about this time, furthermore, Israel learned that the Saudis were having
doubts about the military feasibility and political practicality of attempting to interrupt
Israeli passage through the Straits.70
A month later (April 1957), Saudi doubts had ended and they began a vigor-
ous political campaign against Israeli passage through the Straits. By May 1957, 'Abd
al-Azzam Pasha, a special representative, was sent to the US; at first, he focused on
"recent incidents involving Israeli warships in the Gulf of Aqaba." Shortly afterwards,
he made an accusation that was to become a main element in Saudi arguments against
Israel: Israel's presence in the Gulf was hindering passage of Muslims wishing to make
pilgrimage to Mecca via Aqaba and the Gulf of Aqaba.7'
67. See Memo for the Record by the Chairman of JCS, April 19, 1957, FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII,
No. 292.
68. See Eliyahu Sasson, Israel's Ambassador to Italy, to Jerusalem, April 10, 1957, ISA, FO
2452/5.
69. See US Mission at the UN to Washington, FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 252.
70. See Gershon Avner, Counselor in the Israeli embassy to the UK, to Jerusalem, March 28, 1957,
ISA, FO 3086/6. On Israel's concerns regarding Saud's new intention see also ISA, Israel's Cabinet
Minute, April 14, 1957, p. 9.
71. For Pasha's conversation with William Rountree, Assistant Secretary of State for Near East-
[Continued on next page]

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'Abd al-Azzam Pasha submitted a personal letter from King Saud to Eisenhower
-as the latter recalled - "protest[ing] our [the American] stand passionately and per-
sistently." In the letter, various aerial and naval manoeuvres conducted by the Israelis
in the Gulf were detailed, including an apparent breach of Saudi territorial waters by
Israeli warships.72 And indeed, despite public denials to the press and Eban's reply to
Herter that "Israeli warships were tied up at Elath and had not violated the territorial
waters of Saudi Arabia," Israeli documents reveal that Saud was justified in his com-
plaint.73 Israel's MFA was astonished when reading the military's response, to whit,
that "patrols of torpedo ships are usually held for reconnaissance purpose along the
coastline. These patrols do not approach within two miles [of] the coast." The Minis-
try's legal advisor, Shabtai Rosenne, was quick to alert the IDF that this was a grave
violation of international law, as the minimal width of territorial waters is three miles.
In addition he emphasized that Israel had no right to pass through territorial waters for
reconnaissance purposes because this was not considered innocent passage.74
Eisenhower later recalled that even though he supplied Saud with guarantees that
the US supported the principle of innocent passage for Arabs and Israelis, the Saudis
continued to exert pressure and even created an Arab coalition over the matter. The
issue would remain "a subject of some sensitivity" in US-Saudi relations for a good
period of time. Evidence for this sensitivity was presented some two years later, in
June 1959, when the designated US Ambassador to Israel, Ogden Reid, was instructed
not to appear in Eilat "on occasions related to Israel's efforts to expand traffic via that
route."75
THE ONGOING TACIT UNDERSTANDINGS
After the American reprimand in April 1957, Israel maintained strict confiden-
tiality regarding its moves. Military censorship prohibited the publication of tanker
movements towards Eilat and newspaper editors were requested to voluntarily cen-
sor themselves on this matter.76 This confidentiality served Israel's interests as well:
In February 1957, Israel successfully concluded an agreement with several petroleum
companies to supply the country with 35,000 tons of Iranian crude oil. A quotation
in the March 11 issue of Time magazine, in which an Israeli official praised Iran for
[Continuedfrom previous page]

em, South Asian and African Affairs and his aides on May 9, 1957 see FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No.
321. For Rountree's memo to Dulles the day after see FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 324. For Israel's
perception of this accusation see Mtg., KFASC, August 27, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 10, Protocol
37/B, p. 22.
72. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 190.
73. For the public denial see FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 324. For Eban's reply to Herter on May
25 see FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, p. 616, fn. 5.
74. See Legal Opinion 26/57, May 22, 1957, ISA, FO 3086/3.
75. Eisenhower, Waging Peace, p. 190. For the instruction to Reid (given by Rountree) see FRUS,
Volume XIII, 1958-1960, Arab-Israeli Dispute; United Arab Republic; North Africa (Washington DC:
US Printing House, 1992), No. 83.
76. For the government's decision to impose censorship on these issues see ISA, Israel's Cabinet
Minute, April 28, 1957, p. 33. See also letter (the writer's identity is blurred) to Meir and M. Gazit,
April 28, 1957, ISA, FO 3086/6.

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its agreement to supply Israel with oil, brought such harsh responses from the Arab
world that Iran's Foreign Minister, Aliquli Ardalan, was forced to deny the report and
declare that Iran would never sell oil to Israel. Realizing that publicity invited failure,
Israel's informal representative in Teheran, Zvi Doriel, heavily criticized the publicity
surrounding the arrival of the Kern Hills, while stressing the agreement's sensitivity for
Iran and requesting strict censorship on this issue.77 "Israel was facing a situation where
it had to choose between publicity and oil" contended Meir in a closed forum in April,
while justifying the gag orders. She continued that the "danger is not only in prevent-
ing a tanker from passing, but ... that the oil producers would refuse to supply at all."78
On June 18, two months after the arrival of the first tanker from Iran (the Kern Hills),
Meir was able to inform members of the KFASC that "an oil tanker arrives [in Eilat]
approximately once in ten days although we still get nervous every time a new tanker
is due."79 In parallel, Israel enforced secrecy over the pending arrival then en route
from Djibouti - of the first Israeli vessel (the Atlit) since its withdrawal from Sinai in
March 1957. The Atlit docked in Eilat on June 10, after raising a flag of convenience
while traversing the Straits.80
The imposition of secrecy and Israel's practice of flying foreign flags over Israeli-
bound vessels upon entering the Straits enabled Egypt to avoid losing face in public
and enabled it to announce, on April 13, 1957, that it would continue to prevent Israeli
navigation in the Straits as well as in the Suez Canal. A month later, on May 20, it
ordered all merchant ships crossing the 27'h northern latitude (approximately that of
Sharm el-Sheikh) to raise their national flags until docking.8'
Despite the silence maintained over this classic informal arrangement, it eventu-
ally was revealed to Arab leaders, albeit not to Arab and Israeli publics. "This verbally
agreed arrangement," described Patrick Seale, Hafez al-Asad's biographer, "was for a
decade a closely guarded secret which both sides had an interest in keeping. Egypt had
no wish to publicize a cosmetic compromise, while Israel's Labour government feared
to furnish ammunition to the right."82
IMPLEMENTING FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION: THE ONGOING BATTLE
After the tacit agreement between Israel and Egypt over the issue of free naviga-
tion in the Straits was in place, Israel began turning its efforts towards "creating facts."
A main factor motivating these measures was that contrary to common belief, Israel
was not at all sure about its legal right to freely pass through the Straits.
Saudi pressure during the summer of 1957 to jeopardize the guarantees of the
77. See Uri Bialer, Delek Mi-Iran: Shlichuto shel Zvi Doriel Be-Tehran, 1956-1963 - Helek II:
Ha-Peola [Oil from Iran: Zvi Doriel 's Mission in Tehran, 1956-1963 - Part II: The Operation];
Iyunim Bitkumat Israel [Studies in the Emergence of Israel: Studies in Zionism, the Yishuv and the
State of Israel], Vol. 9 (1999), pp. 133-5.
78. Mtg., KFASC, April 30, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 8, Protocol 27/B, p. 6.
79. Mtg., KFASC, June 18, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 8, Protocol [29/B], p. 9.
80. See Gazit to Meir, June 10, 1957, ISA, FO 3086/6, Vol. II.
81. See Israel's Mission at the UN to Jerusalem, May 7, 1957, ISA, FO 3112/7, Vol. II.
82. Patrick Seale, Asad of Syria: The Struggle for the Middle East (London: Tauris, 1988), p.
132.

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US and the other naval powers increased Israel's anxiety and its efforts to establish
unequivocal, de facto freedom of navigation. The strategy focused on achieving two
(somewhat antithetical) goals: (a) diverting the matter away from the International
Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague and thereby waging an indirect legal battle; and
(b) creating defacto high traffic rates through the Straits, with an emphasis on vessels
belonging to the naval powers and multiple different flags (i.e., belonging to different
countries).
THE INDIRECT LEGAL BATrLE
From a legal perspective, Israel's fears at that time were close to the truth. As
opposed to Egypt's arguments justifying its blockage of Israeli shipping in the Suez
Canal, refuted by the September 1951 UNSC resolution, its legal arguments regarding
the Straits case (e.g., the status of the Gulf of Aqaba as an "internal sea"), already ap-
plied in part prior to the Suez War, were yet to be refuted by any international body. In
addition, new arguments raised had eroded the support given Israel by several states.83
In fact, Israel's anxieties were so deep that it avoided presenting its case for free
navigation through the Suez Canal before the ICJ in fear that the discussions would
eventually encompass the Straits question. After all, even the US guarantee, proclaimed
in the February 1957 aide-metmoire, was conditional on the absence of "some overrid-
ing decision to the contrary, as by the International Court of Justice." Israel maintained
this position even though many states, including its supporters, viewed an ICJ ruling or,
at least, an advisory opinion, as a proper solution for the dispute.
Therefore, when Israel discovered at the end of March 1957 that the US and the
UK might refer the Straits question to the ICJ for an advisory opinion, it felt seriously
threatened. Documents reveal that Israel's formal objections to this option - such as
"any western initiative for an opinion from the ICJ would be likely to be misinterpret-
ed" -were fabricated.84 Instead, Israel truly feared the very elaboration of the issue in
a legal framework. Israel's major concern - which Eban briefed to a closed forum of
Knesset Members (MKs) in August 1957 - was that the Arabs would raise the argu-
ment that the Gulf of Aqaba was an internal sea.85
In October 1957, however, in preparation for the expected legal battle on the
Straits issue during the imminent (February-March 1958) Geneva Conference, which
was convened to codify the Law of the Sea, the Saudis suddenly raised a new legal
argument: that the Gulf of Aqaba is an "historic bay" of its riparian (excluding Israel).
Hence, the principle of free passage is not applicable.86
However, when the Conference took place, despite the Arab states' efforts to the
contrary, the clause in the Geneva Convention on the Territorial Seas and the Contigu-
83. For the various arguments and Israel's legal responses see Lapidoth, Freedom of Navigation
with Special Reference to International Waterways in the Middle East, pp. 56-63.
84. For Israel's formal stance see memo of conversation, Washington, March 29, 1957, FRUS,
1957, Vol. XVII, No. 256.
85. See Mtg., KFASC, August 27, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 10, Protocol 37/B, p. 23. See also
Meir's briefing Mtg., KFASC, April 30, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 8, Protocol 27/B, p. 6.
86. For the Saudi statement by Ahmad Shukairy see UNGA, 12th session, official records, 697'
Mtg., October 2, 1957, p. 233.

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ous Zone referring to innocent passage included a closing section that became known
as the "Aqaba clause." According to the clause, "there shall be no suspension ... [of
the right of innocent passage] between one part of the high seas and another part of the
high seas or the territorial sea of a foreign State."87
It was an important achievement for Israel, but Egypt's refusal to join the con-
vention aroused a new legal dispute: Was this clause a declarative expression of an
existing legal principle or a new law to which only states that had joined the convention
were obligated? Concurrently - and possibly in response - Egypt and Saudi Arabia
claimed a territorial sea of 12 miles, thus allegedly excluding the Gulf of Aqaba from
consideration as a high sea.88
A year later, in 1959, Israel's anxiety about the ICJ resurfaced when Egypt vio-
lated the tacit understanding regarding the Suez Canal (i.e., Egypt suddenly confiscated
Israeli goods shipped on foreign vessels).89 On the one hand, Israel again vigorously
objected to bringing the issue to The Hague. As Foreign Minister Meir stated in De-
cember 1959: "The world is not so decent or advanced that a Jewish matter can be
decided by international law." On the other hand, waging a diplomatic campaign was
needed in order to keep the issue on the international agenda. As one MK put it in Feb-
ruary 1960, "this [the diplomatic struggle over the Canal] is the front line of the battle
over free navigation in Eilat for two reasons: as long as a struggle exists over Suez,
Eilat remains in the shadows; as long as free passage is ongoing, it becomes afait ac-
compli in the world's view."90
CREATING DE FACTO INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF HIGH TRAFFic THROUGH THE STRAITS
Following Eban's suggestion, Israel began working vigorously to make the traffic
to and from Eilat a reality while "keeping as low a profile as possible so as not to pro-
voke a reaction from the Arab states ... and thus hamper [the attempt to] establish facts
on the ground." An important target for Israel - also rooted in US pressure - was to
employ as many different flags as possible.9' This target was obtained. Whereas a total
of ten ships had reached Eilat by June 15, 1956, 20 ships and four tankers from various
states (including Italy, Costa Rica, Denmark, France, and Panama) had made the same
voyage in the subsequent year, extending from June 1956 to June 1957. The dramatic
growth, however, did little to satisfy Israel's appetite, as Meir stated in June 1957: "We
are working to bring a ship from the Far East; many flags [are needed to make] it afait
87. Emphasis added. See Art. 16(4).

88. See, for example, Rosalyn Higgins, "The June War: The United Nations and Legal Back-
ground," in Moore, ed., The Arab-Israeli Conflict, Readings and Documents, p. 548.
89. For the arrangements reached over the Suez Canal see Eitan Barak, "On the Power of Tacit
Understandings: Israel, Egypt and Freedom of Passage through the Suez Canal, 1957-1960," The
Middle East Journal, Vol. 58 (2004), pp. 447-9.
90. For Meir's briefing see Mtg., KFASC, December 22, 1959, ISA, A/7566, File 8, Protocol 53/D,
p. 3. For the second quotation see Mtg., KFASC, February 9, 1960, ISA, A/7566, File 9, Protocol 20,
p. 28.
91. For the quotation see Moshe Bartur, Director of the Economic Division to head of delegations,
July 2, 1957, FO 3112/7, Vol. II. For the US pressure see Mtg., KFASC, April 30, 1957, ISA, A/7565,
File 8, Protocol [27/B], p. 6.

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accompli."92
In parallel and under the shroud of secrecy, Israel was engaged in a massive
project to establish material facts, for instance, developing the city of Eilat, construct-
ing a deep-sea port, laying an oil pipeline, and improving the highway from Eilat to
Beer-Sheva.93
By August 1957, despite the continuation of the legal battle, Israel's concerns
were alleviated somewhat as even King Saud had apparently learned to cope with Is-
rael's shipping activity in the Gulf. "At this time," Dayan stated, "the Arabs have not
renewed their efforts to obstruct Israeli naval passage [through the Straits]. They have
not positioned military forces on the Tiran and Sanafir Islands, nor have they reinforced
their military presence on the Saudi coast."94 Notwithstanding similar assessments from
the Defense Military Intelligence (DMI), Israel continued to carefully declare its inten-
tion to react forcefully to any hindrance to the passage of its ships through the Straits.
Israel apparently remained concerned that its acceptance of the tacit agreement regard-
ing the Suez Canal (that Israeli goods but not shipping could pass) would encourage
Nasser to impose a similar arrangement in the Straits.95
While attending the UNGA in September 1959, Meir therefore took care to stress
before the UNSG and Herter that Israel had chosen diplomacy to handle this violation
only because it involved the Suez. "If you allow him [Nasser] to go ahead with Suez
and he then tries something in Eilat" she warned, "we won't consult you [beforehand].
The situation is different there [in Eilat]; we would act immediately."96 Two months
later, during Hammarskjold's visit to Israel (November 1957), Ben-Gurion pointedly
told the UNSG that "there is a difference between Eilat and Suez. We would not wage
war against Egypt because of Suez - but we would because of Eilat. The Straits are
the key to Israeli restraint regarding the blockade of the Suez Canal." Furthermore, he
indirectly warned that such a closing would not remain Israel's local problem: "We
know this is a serious matter - an armed conflict in the Middle East could spread [into
a global conflict.]"97 The UNSG, however, was confident that in the coming two or
three years, such a scenario was unlikely.98
THE OPERATION OF THE TACIT AGREEMENT AFTER THE INITIAL PERIOD
Hammarskjold's assessment was more than precise - over a decade would pass
before Israel's worst scenario in fact materialized. The initial period was indeed a tense
one: Egyptian naval patrols along the perimeters of the Tiran and Sanapir Islands (they
avoided entering the Gulf of Aqaba) and construction of an Egyptian airbase in Sinai
and a naval base in Hurghada (across from Sharm el-Sheikh) rekindled Israeli fears of
92. Mtg., KFASC, June 18, 1957, ISA, A17565, File 8, Protocol [29/B], p. 9.
93. Moshe Bartur to head of delegations July 2, 1957, ISA, FO 3112/7, Vol. II.
94. Dayan, Avneu Derech, p. 352.
95. For the DMI's report see IDFA IDF GS Mtg 17/52, File 34, September 30, 1957, p. 13.
96. ISA, Israel's Cabinet Minutes, October 7, 1959, p. 14.
97. See GS IDFA, IDF, GS Mtg 23/57, File 35, December 5, 1957.
98. See Ben-Gurion's briefing to Mtg., FASC, December 11, 1957, ISA, A/7565, File 12, Protocol
[8/C], p. 5.

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a Saudi blockade following the Egyptian-Saudi rapprochement.99

Nonetheless, by the end of 1958, "the Egyptian redeployment," as Israel's naval
intelligence concluded, "is of a purely defensive nature." Egyptian warships were under
orders to open fire only in self-defense, the torpedo flotilla at the Al-Ghardaqa naval
base had been withdrawn, and at Sharm el-Sheikh and Ras Nasrani, Egypt had stationed
only a small police force of 25 men. Israel's naval intelligence even concluded that the
Egyptian navy would not risk entering the Gulf of Aqaba due to its narrowness.'??
In addition to the low-profile military activity in the area, Nasser - realizing the
consequences of blockading the Straits - quashed any attempt to initiate such actions
throughout the ensuing years. As early as October-November 1959 (following the 1958
merger with Syria to form the United Arab Republic), he blocked the Syrian ministers'
proposal, pushed by Akram Haurani, to reinstitute the blockade of Israeli shipping.'0'
But perhaps the most famous exhibition of Nasser's attitude occurred in December
1966. According to the Egyptian Defense Minister, Shams al-Badran, Nasser received
an urgent cable from Egypt's Chief of Staff and Vice-President, 'Abd al-Hakim Amer,
while on his way to Pakistan, requesting the seizure of Sharm el-Sheikh - but without
blockading the Straits - in order to "put an end to the frenzied campaign" by Arab
critics of Nasser's policy of letting Israeli ships pass through the Straits. Although the
Jordanian and Saudi media had regularly taunted Nasser on this point, this criticism
peaked in December 1966, following Israel's heavy reprisal against Jordan on Novem-
ber 13, 1966 (codenamed Operation Samua). Upon Amer's return to Egypt, Nasser
nonetheless informed him that the Egyptians "are not prepared at this time to begin any
[military] campaign."'102
Gradually, as the archival material indicates, the continuing calm pushed the
Straits issue aside in Israel. In 1966, public figures such as Moshe Dayan (a prominent
MK at that time) went so far as to declare that they preferred to see Egyptian instead of
UNEF forces at the Straits. "When such is the case," Dayan articulated in public, "a re-
ality would be established wherein Israeli ships would be navigating calmly alongside
Egyptian territory."'03 This tranquility even led to preparations for renewing flights over
the Straits for first time since October 1955.104
This self-confidence, however, was not shared by the UN headquarters. UN docu-
ments reveal the extreme sensitivity felt by the UNSG and his aides regarding any
99. See report by the DMI's director, Yehosaphat Harkabi, IDFA IDF GS Mtg 7/58, File 75,
March 23, 1958. On the Israeli concerns regarding the Egyptian-Saudi rapprochement see IDFA IDF
GS Mtg 8/58, File 75, March 30, 1958.
100. See IDFA IDF GS Mtg 38/58, File 79, November 27, 1958; for data on the Egyptian police
force see Musicki to Bunche, September 19, 1964, UN Archive S-316-5-27.
101. Robert Stephens, Nasser: A Political Biography (London: Allen Lane, 1971), p. 443.
102. "Statement by Shams al-Badran on Events Preceding the June War of 1967," Al-Ahram,
February 25, 1968.
103. Dayan's address is reprinted in Yoram Nimrod, Me merivah: ha-mahloket al me ha-Yarden
[Angry Waters: Controversy over the Jordan River] (Givat Havivah: ha-Merkaz le-Limudim Arviyim
ve-Afro-Asyaniyim, 1966), Annex B.
104. Letter, Eban to Mordechai Gazit, July 24, 1966, ISA, FO 4095/3. For the entire unknown
and surprising affair of Israel's "freedom" of overflight over the Straits up to the 1967 War see Eitan
Barak, "The Freedom that Never Was: Israel's Freedom of Overflight over the Straits of Tiran Prior to
the Six Day War," Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 43, No. I (forthcoming, January 2008).

129.126.180.2 on Mon, 21 Aug 2023 05:53:58 +00:00
change in the status quo in the Straits throughout the decade. In 1959, for instance,
Israel sold two old frigates to Ceylon (Sri Lanka). As they were about to sail with their
Israeli crews from Eilat to Ceylon in July 1959, Ceylon hurriedly informed the UNSG
of their imminent crossing of the Straits. In a top-secret cable sent the following day,
Bunche forwarded Ceylon's message to the UNEF commander at that time, Major
General Indar Jit Rikhye, instructing him to "take no action [emphasis in original]
of any kind until specifically advised" by the UNSG as this is a "matter of serious
concern here." Whether Ceylon's government had indeed asked Nasser's permission
as the former Israeli ambassador to Ceylon later claimed, the frigates - escorted by
two Israeli jet aircraft and crews on high alert - eventually passed through the Straits
unharmed. 105
Five years later, in September 1964, sensitivity had not waned. It resurfaced when
UNEF headquarters in Gaza requested a reduction in the small force (56 troops and
civilian personnel) stationed at the Straits. "As far as observation and reporting of ship
movements through Straits of Tiran is concerned," Bunche was told, "we here believe
that this can be accomplished more economically with a detachment of 12 men." Not
surprisingly, the request was immediately denied. Being one of the few diplomats who
had full knowledge of the elaborate tacit agreements and understandings, Bunche was
to explain the denial as follows: "[The] significance of that presence extends much
beyond the function of observation and reporting ... for very sound reasons, policy
all along has been to avoid directing any attention to Sharm-el-Sheik and that policy
should be pursued."'"
CONCLUSION
It appears that prior to the Suez War, a disparity had arisen between Israel's de-
clared importance of its freedom of navigation in the Straits and the reality on the
ground. Israel did not maintain significant naval forces in Eilat and its port, completed
in 1952, was rather marginal to Israel's main maritime activities. The critical fact is that
leaving aside the absence of significant Israeli commercial shipping from 1949, when
Israeli forces reached the Red Sea, to November 1956, only ten foreign vessels destined
for Eilat passed through the Straits.'07 However, excluding some rare references in the
literature to the actual navigation regime in force prior to the Suez War, the tacit under-
standings and arrangements that enabled this policy's continuation after that War were
kept shrouded in secrecy.
Fully aware of the fragility of the March 1957 assurances given by the naval
powers - primarily the US - as well as being insecure regarding its legal rights, Israel
was ready to make considerable concessions. This it did by "tiding up" - to use Eban
words - its warships to Eilat, removing its national flag while passing through the
105. For more on the affair see UN Archive S-3 16-3-21. For the ambassador's account see Netanel
Lorch. Ha- Yom yifneh: shivim shenotai ha-rishonot u-mashehu al she-kadam la-hen [Late Aftemoon:
My First Seventy Years and What Preceded Them] (Tel Aviv: Ministry of Defence, 1997), pp. 246-66.
See also ISA, Israel's Cabinet Minutes, October 23, 1959; October 30, 1959.
106. Musicki to Bunche, September 19, 1964, UN Archive S-316-5-27; Bunche to Musicki, Sep-
tember 26, 1964, UN Archive S-316-5-27.
107. Letter, Moshe Bartur to heads of representatives, July 2, 1957, ISA, FO 3112/7, Vol. II.

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Straits and, above all, maintaining secrecy. The secrecy, however, was not limited to
those tacit arrangements but encompassed all signs of Eilat's economic development in
general and its port in particular. Indeed, on August 6, 1957, Dulles, when coming to
the issue of Aqaba during discussions with Eban over US-Israeli relations, expressed
his "appreciation for the Israeli government's cooperation in the exercise of what we
considered to be its rights in a way to minimize Arab opposition."'08
Notwithstanding Dulles' praise, in practice, Israeli ships rarely reached Eilat.
Israel's merchant fleet was extremely small at the time and the port of Eilat was insuffi-
ciently developed. Hence, the ships that worked the regular routes, such as the Djibou-
ti-Eilat line, were leased foreign vessels, which made changing flags a rare necessity. In
fact, throughout those ten years, only 117 vessels bearing the Israeli flag reached Eilat,
that is, a rate of less than one per month. In contrast, during that same decade, 438 for-
eign vessels managed to arrive at Eilat. This information, however, collected by Israel's
MFA upon US request during the May 1967 crisis, was promptly defined as classified
- reflecting Israel's fear that the US might conclude that the denial of Israel's freedom
of passage did not warrant a war.'09 In any case, the Straits' closure on May 22, 1967
provided Israel with a clear casus belli for two reasons, one rooted in reality, the other
in utopian visions.
The reality was the oil: The Kern Hill's arrival with Iranian oil in April 1957 rep-
resented the first of many shipments carried out throughout the period."0 Considered
from this perspective, the Straits were "a lifeline for the Jewish state." Hence, as an
Israeli researcher has written, only when Israel was incontrovertibly assured that the
closure applied to oil tankers did the meaning of the act - war - become self-evi-
dent.II"
The status of this patently economic reason as the exclusive motive justifying
Israel's cause to initiate a war can, however, be questioned in retrospective. Not only
was the price of Iranian oil generally more expensive than the free market price of, for
example, Venezualan oil, the cost of transport through Bandar-e Ma'shoor (currently
Bandar Imam) to Eilat was almost equivalent to the cost of shipping oil to Haifa along
the Atlantic and Mediterranean routes. 112
In addition, the route to Eilat was one of the world's worst in terms of safety and
thus economic efficiency. As UNEF's commander, Lieutenant-General Prem Gyani,
explained to Bunche in April 1963 when suggesting the installation of a simple beacon
in the Straits: "At present, no navigation facilities to mark the Straits of Tiran exist.
Ships do not normally cross at night, except on moonlit nights." As the political sensi-
tivity of the area prevented any action, seven shippers saw no alternative but to address
108. FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 361.

109. Ami Gluska, Eshkol, Ten Pekudah! [Eshkol, Give the Order!] (Tel-Aviv: Ministry of Defense,
2004), p. 325. This episode is missing from the book's English version. Gluska, a former senior
official in the Israeli security apparatus, received unique access to the still classified GS documenta-
tions.
110. For a detailed account of Eilat's role and the Iranian chapter in Israel's oil diplomacy (albeit
up to 1963) see Uri Bialer, Oil and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1948-1963 (London: Palgrave Macmil-
lan, 1999), pp. 216-42.
1 1 1. Ami Gluska, The Israeli Military and the Origins of the 1967 War: Government, Armed
Forces and Defense Policy 1963-67 (London, New York: Routledge, 2006), p. 153
1 12. Bialer, Oilfrom Iran, p. 145.

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the UNSG on the issue some three years later (June 1, 1966): "The Straits of Tiran,"
they complained, "are not properly marked, whereas the absence of lights makes the
passage more or less safe for daylight transit only.""113
The other, visionary, reason was ingrained in the Israeli leadership's perceptions
of Israel's future. As Ben-Gurion, the main proponent of that view, indirectly admitted
in February 1960: "We have two seas - but without Eilat we are landlocked. Without
Eilat we have no route to Asia and Africa; it is a question of our [economic] life. Our
trade is currently conducted primarily with Europe, a little with America, very little
with Asia and Africa. But it is very slowly changing, and in the future it will change
[more]." 4 Adding to the visionary dimensions, as a scholar has rightly noted, was the
"'symbolic value [of the passage] for Israelis, a testament to their 1956 triumph over
Egypt." "5
Whether or not this reason was a sufficiently weighty cause to initiate a war, Nass-
er himself internalized the Israeli images to become a victim of his own vision, that of
an Egypt controlling the "lifeline for the Jewish state." When he declared the closure of
the Straits on May 22, 1967, the die was cast. According to Anwar Sadat, then third in
Egypt's ruling hierarchy, Nasser well understood the significance of his declaration. In
his memoirs, Sadat wrote: "With the Straits of Tiran closed, war became a certainty."' "6
Once the adversaries were trapped by their individual visions, reality (embodied in the
alternate route to Haifa's port) became meaningless for both. Oil, however, eventually
came to play an important role in the 1967 War. As a catalyst bridging the ideological
and existential interests of the parties, oil has always and, it appears, will continue to
play a role in Middle East politics and policy.
113. See Gyani to Bunche, April 13, 1963, UN Archive S-0316-5-31. For the shippers' letter to
the UNSG see the same source.
114. Emphasis added. Mtg., KFASC, February 26, 1960, ISA, A/7565, File 10, p. 18.
115. Michael B. Oren, Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modem Middle East
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), p. 77.
1 16. Sadat, In Search of Identity, p. 173.

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Between Reality and Secrecy: Israel's Freedom of Navigation through the Straits of

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MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL * VOLUME 61. NO. 4, AUTUMN 2007

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community - not simply

maritime activity and status

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ISRAEL AND FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION IN THE STRAITS OF TIRAN,

This occupation is not conceived in a spirit to hinder in whatever way it may be

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[Continuedfrom previous page]

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It concurrently undertook an extensive diplomatic campaign to gain internation

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THE POLITICAL STRUGGLE TO OBTAIN FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION:

30. See for example Dayan, Story of My Life, p. 231.

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In the absence of some overriding decision to the contrary, as by the International

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FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION UP TO THE 1967 CRISIS

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FULFILLING THE AMERICAN PROMISE

On March 9, Israel's Ambassador to the US and Permanent Representative at the

49. Lodge to Washington, FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 190.

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ISRAEL'S FEARS AND THE UNSG 's ACTIONS

Nasser's statement regarding the continuation of the blockade was understood

THE CAIRO ACCORDS: THE ISRAELI-EGYPTIAN TACIT UNDERSTANDING

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had said: "please forget you asked that question."60

ISRAEL'S PERCEPTIONS AND SUBSEQUENT IMPLEMENTATION OF THE

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THE ONGOING TACIT UNDERSTANDINGS

[Continuedfrom previous page]

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IMPLEMENTING FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION: THE ONGOING BATTLE

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THE INDIRECT LEGAL BATrLE

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CREATING DE FACTO INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF HIGH TRAFFic THROUGH THE STRAITS

87. Emphasis added. See Art. 16(4).

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THE OPERATION OF THE TACIT AGREEMENT AFTER THE INITIAL PERIOD

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a Saudi blockade following the Egyptian-Saudi rapprochement.99

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108. FRUS, 1957, Vol. XVII, No. 361.

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