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Article
Introduction
On November 19, 1977, the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat landed in Israel. The peace negotiations between Israel and Egypt, which ended with the signing of a full peace treaty between the two countries about a year and a half later, offi-cially began. However, Sadat’s visit was revolutionary only because it was the first time an Egyptian official announced publicly his readiness to maintain political contacts with Israel; secret talks between Israel and Egypt began decades before Sadat’s visit.
In fact, the secret contacts with Egypt began before Israel’s establishment. In 1945, Eliyahu Sasson, head of the Arab Department at the Jewish Agency, turned to Egyptian diplomat Abdul Rahman Azzam, secretary-general of the Arab League—founded on March 22 of that year—to obtain his support for the distribution of Palestine and the establish-ment of a Jewish state. A year later, two members of the Jewish Agency, Abba Eban and David Horowitz, met with Azzam in London, but the results of the meeting were disap-pointing. Azzam refused all peace solutions with the Jews in Palestine and said that the Arabs would try to destroy the Jewish community by force. After that meeting, the chair-man of the executive committee of the Jewish Agency, David Ben-Gurion, sent Sasson to Cairo for another meeting with Azzam and with Egyptian prime minister Mohamed Nokrasi. In this meeting, the Egyptians again demonstrated an uncom-promising position, when Azzam suggested to establish in Israel “a Jewish symbolic state,” similar to Vatican City in Rome (Segev, 1978, p. 59).
The establishment of Israel during a war with its neigh-bors was supposed to eliminate any contact between the new state and Egypt. But the reality was different. Ever since the birth of the State of Israel, the country’s leaders corresponded frequently with those of Egypt. Yet due to the sensitivity of the situation in the Middle East, these communications often remained secret. Sometimes the contacts were initiated by Israel and sometimes by Egypt, and often they occurred through the initiative of a third party wishing to act as a mediator. Most of the times, this third party was a govern-ment agent of a third country, such as the United States, Britain, or even Yugoslavia and India; occasionally, how-ever, an individual aiming to foster an agreement between the two countries catalyzed the communication.
As a result of the need to preserve the secret nature of the talks, the intelligence organizations of the two countries, in collaboration with the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), often played an important role in them. Moreover, sometimes even the negotiation itself began as an initiative of an Intelligence agent.
This article examines the secret contacts between Israel and Egypt during the 18 years Abdel Nasser ruled the Pharaonic country. Because in those years overt contact with Israel was taboo, secret diplomacy was almost the only diplomacy that
1
Tel Aviv University, Israel
Corresponding Author:
Ido Yahel, Tel Aviv University, Israel. Ramat Aviv 6997801. Email: ido.yahel05@gmail.com
Covert Diplomacy Between Israel and
Egypt During Nasser Rule: 1952-1970
Ido Yahel
1Abstract
The history of Egypt and Israel consists of four wars and hundreds of border incidents that have taken the lives of tens of thousands of people. It seems that only the rise to power of a leader in the stature of Anwar Sadat could put an end to this bloody circle, because the previous president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, was not willing to hold any kind of political contact with Israel. But Nasser’s reign involved constant political contact between Egypt and Israel, most of whom remain confidential. This article attempts to examine whether any of these contacts were likely to succeed and yield a peace treaty between the two countries, an agreement that could have prevented three wars and saved the lives of so many people on both sides. It will do so by examining these contacts, their characteristics, and the reasons for their failure, while dividing them into three periods: the 1948 war to the 1956 war, the 1956 war to the 1967 war, and the 1967 war to the death of Nasser in 1970.
Keywords
took place between the two countries at that time. By examin-ing these secret talks, we can try to understand why these negotiations failed to result in a political agreement, and whether there was a real chance to achieve peace between the two states during that period—peace that could have pre-vented the 1956, 1967, and 1973 wars and saved the lives of thousands of people.
From 1948 to Suez Crisis
The secret contact between Egyptian and Israeli officials resumed immediately after Israel’s establishment. In one of these channels, a primary official involved was an Egyptian intelligence officer named Gamal Abdel Nasser.
During the talks for armistice between the two countries, a friendly relation developed between Yeruham Cohen, an Israeli intelligence officer, and Mahmoud Riyad, a brigadier in the Egyptian army who later became foreign minister and secretary-general of the Arab League. In September 1949, Riyad accepted Cohen’s invitation to visit him at Kibbutz Givat Brenner, a visit that followed additional ones in Beersheba and Ashkelon. Cohen also visited Egypt several times, and on February 7, 1950, he met with Nasser in Fallujah (Segev, 1978, pp. 60-61). Another meeting between Cohen and Nasser occurred in April in Uja. Yigal Allon, who was the commander of the secret Jewish underground orga-nization, the Palmach, encouraged Cohen to continue culti-vating ties with the Egyptian officer. However, the meeting in Uja was the last time the two saw each other (Carmel, 1998, pp. 70-71).
At the same time these meetings among military person-nel were taking place, Sasson secretly met with several Egyptian representatives at the Lausanne conciliation con-vention in April 1949. These meetings were mainly focused on solving problems related to the implementation of the armistice agreement, but Israeli representatives sought to achieve another goal: transforming the existing contacts into public political talks, by making the armistice agreement the first step toward a peace treaty between the two countries. But the two channels, the military personnel and the Lausanne meetings, failed (Segev, 1978, p. 61).
The turning point in the secret relations between Israel and Egypt happened as a result of the Egyptian Free Officers coup in July 1952, the event that started Nasser rule over Egypt (Shamir, 1989, p. 73). Immediately after the coup, Israeli officials began sending Nasser messages through var-ious mediators, in order to begin negotiations toward a peace treaty with Egypt. In addition, a number of individuals from different places began to take on the mission of fostering peace between the two neighbors (Heikal, 1996, p. 91).
The first series attempt was that of Richard Grossman, a British MP. At Ben-Gurion’s request, Grossman met with Nasser at the home of William Lakeland, an American diplo-mat who later turned out to be from the CIA. Nasser contin-ued to refuse any talks with Israel, saying that his first priority
was to complete his country’s independence from the British. Crossman informed Nasser that he intended to update Ben-Gurion about Nasser’s position, and when he returned to Egypt from Israel, Nasser refused to meet with him again and instead sent Egyptian foreign minister Mohammed Fawzi. Crossman delivered Fawzi’s position to Ben-Gurion, who accept the position of Egypt not to open negotiations with Israel. But at the same time, Ben-Gurion tried to reach an understanding that Egypt would refrain from actions that could hamper the existence of such negotiations in the future (Heikal, 1996, pp. 91-93).
Israel also tried to turn to Egypt in 1952 through individu-als who did not hold official positions. After the revolution, British and American journalists, who worked in Israel, arrived to Egypt to hold interviews with Nasser. During those interviews, they delivered him different messages from the Israeli government, messages that were completely ignored by Nasser (Heikal, 1996, p. 94).
Another attempt was made by the Jewish scientist Albert Einstein. In fact, Einstein’s involvement in the matter was made possible through contacts with Mahmoud Azmi, a senior adviser of the Egyptian delegation to the United Nations (UN). Azmi invited Mohamed Heikal, an Egyptian journalist and a confidant of Nasser, to a meeting with Albert Einstein in December 1952. The scientist asked Heikal to notify Nasser about his wish to serve as an intermediary toward expediting the peace process. According to Heikal, Einstein said that he did not intend to act as a mediator, but that he hoped to sow new ideas in the minds of the leaders of the region. Heikal delivered the message to Nasser and the issue was discussed by members of the Egyptian leader’s inner circle. Nonetheless, his refusal for any dialogue with Israel remained intact, and Einstein’s initiative was not accepted. Yet Einstein did not give up, and after Nasser failed to respond to his letter, he tried to pass him the same message through the prime minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru. But even this attempt failed, and Nasser continued to ignore the suggestions of the scientist (Heikal, 1996, pp. 94-97).
Heikal’s writings, which describe Nasser as an opposi-tionist to peace, are not consistent with the descriptions of Palestinian author Said Aburish in the biography he wrote about the Egyptian leader. According to Aburish, Nasser cre-ated a secret team in 1953 whose goal was to reach an Egyptian–Israeli peace agreement. The team, led by Abdul Rahman Sadek—an Egyptian diplomat who served in France—and Colonel Sroat Oqsa—a military attaché at the embassy—secretly made contact with Israeli representatives in the French capital. The Israelis responded positively to the offer, and the two parties began to engage in covert commu-nications, which lasted through the years 1952-1955 (Aburish, 2004, p. 50).
Defense forces (IDF) and later served as chief of Israel’s national intelligence agency—the Mossad—wrote in his book Head to Head (1999) that the Israeli representatives who took part in the discussions were members of the Mossad in cooperation with Samuel Devon, a senior Israeli delegate to the embassy in Paris (Amit, 1999, pp. 204-205). The relationship between Devon and Oqsa in Paris was men-tioned also in the work of the Israeli journalist Hezi Carmel (1998). In his book, however, Carmel claims that the talks revolved mainly around Israel’s efforts to prevent the execu-tion of captured in “Operaexecu-tion Susannah,” during which the Israeli intelligence carried out terrorist acts in Egypt in order to prevent the British withdrawal from the Suez Canal and thereby harmed Egypt’s relations with the West. The perpe-trators of these act were captured by the Egyptians and some were sentenced to death. The event was known in Israel as the “Unfortunate Affair.”
In October 1954, Britain’s signed an agreement to with-draw from the canal and Nasser’s alleged reason to refuse to negotiate with Israel vanished. Indeed, the literature that describes Nasser as an obstacle to talks before signing the agreement demonstrates a certain change in his behavior. Carmel, for example, described new negotiations between the Egyptian colonel Oqsa and Eliyahu Sasson and Reuven Shiloah, who served as chief of the Mossad until 1952 and then was appointed as a diplomatic delegate at the Israeli Embassy in the United States. Carmel claims that these con-tacts were far more comprehensive than those that preceded them (Carmel, 1998, pp. 74-75).
Sasson and Shiloah held a series of secret meetings in October 1954 with Oqsa, and with a personal representative of Nasser who came to Paris especially for this purpose. The talks produced an Israeli–Egyptian document of understand-ing with four points: the commitment of both parties to act to the best of their ability to prevent incidents at the border, the maintenance of telephone contact (red line) between the par-ties to resolve issues in real time, the establishment of com-munication channels directly through their representatives in Paris, and the passage through the Suez Canal for Israeli-bound cargo, on condition that the ship transferring such cargo would bear a foreign flag (Carmel, 1998, p. 75).
Following the signing of the secret agreement, Nasser agreed to accept an Israeli representative in Cairo to promote negotiations in preparation for a summit meeting between him and the Israeli prime minister Moshe Sharett. Sharett himself confirmed in his diaries (1968) that indeed there were preparations for a secret meeting between him and Nasser (Sharett, 1968, pp. 904-905). Israel and Egypt agreed that the technical aspects of the visit would be handled through intelligence pipelines. Sharett decided that the Israeli representative to Cairo would be the former chief of staff Yigael Yadin and two members of the CIA, Kermit Roosevelt and Jim Angleton, would coordinate the mission. On January 26, 1955, Sharett conveyed to Yadin instructions regarding his Cairo trip through a Mossad courier.
However, a day after the delivery of the secret message, the court in Cairo sentenced to death the two leaders of the Israeli network in Operation Susanna, and three days after the verdict they were hung. Sharett, furious that Nasser had not pardoned the two, ordered the delay of Yadin’s trip to Cairo. Three weeks later, infiltrators murdered Israeli citi-zens in the city of Rehovot, and observation reports made by Egyptian intelligence in Gaza were discovered in the pockets of one of the infiltrators. Three days after the terrorist attack, a force of Israeli paratroopers raided an Egyptian military camp on the outskirts of Gaza, killing 37 soldiers. These actions effectively eliminated the secret pipeline established in Paris and led Israel and Egypt to a series of violent clashes along the border, which contributed to the breakout of the 1956 Sinai Campaign (Carmel, 1998, pp. 76-79).
Aburish also describes the covert contacts in Paris, but he argues that Nasser’s decision not to pardon the captives of the “affair” resulted from his disappointment from Moshe Sharett. Aburish writes that Nasser believed that Sharett was a weak prime minister who could not be trusted and that was the reason for his decision to sever contacts with him and his representatives. Therefore, Aburish argues that the decision to hang the captives of Operation Susannah did not blow up the secret talks between Israel and Egypt, but the “affair” itself was responsible for this. In addition, shortly after the execution, Ben-Gurion, who was perceived by many as the leader who prompted the operation, became the Israeli defense minister. This led Nasser to lose faith in Israeli gov-ernment, and he stopped viewing it as a partner for the peace process (Aburish, 2004, pp. 71-73).
On the other hand, the description found in Heikal’s book is different. He acknowledges that there were secret contacts with political implications, but he claims that they were made without Nasser’s approval. He adds that an intelligence officer, whose name is not stated in the book, was sent to take part in the talks at a later stage to collect information on the activities carried out by Israel in the French capital. However, this mission did not meet the expectations of the Egyptian government. Heikal describes the events as “a flood of use-less information” (Heikal, 1996, p. 104).
Jordan in order to allow Egypt a land crossing to other Arab states, as well as internationalizing Jerusalem and increasing the number of refugees allowed to return to their homes (Bar-On, 1992, pp. 109-110).
Following the distribution of the memorandum, the American and British governments decided to appoint a team that would work on a “new approach” to the Middle East. The Americans nominated Francis Russell, who served until then as a political delegate at the U.S. Embassy in Israel, and the British sent Shuckburgh. The team members worked in top secrecy, and in February 1955, they submitted the “Plan Alpha,” which included the points raised previously by Shuckburgh, with certain changes, such as the land connec-tion of Israel to Eilat by creating two triangles in the southern Negev, meeting at the Arava road in a common apex. Michael Oren, in his book Six Days of War (2002), writes that in addi-tion to territorial compensaaddi-tion, the Egyptians were slated to receive shiploads of American arms if they had chosen to accept the program (Bar-On, 1992, pp. 110-111; Oren, 2002, p. 28).
In the spring of 1955, the Americans and the British decided to present the program to Egypt and Israel. Henry Byroade, the U.S. ambassador to Cairo, introduced it in early April to Mahmoud Fawzi, and a few days later also to Nasser. Fawzi responded positively, but Nasser was less enthusiastic, and in any case strongly opposed to the triangles plan. He demanded that the entire Negev be transferred to Arab sovereignty.
At the same time, the American state department pres-sured Abba Eban, Israeli ambassador to the UN and the United States, and Moshe Sharett, who returned to serve as foreign minister after Ben-Gurion was elected prime minis-ter in November 1955, to accept the basics of the program. But Israel refused any withdrawal from the Negev, and by doing so it also rejected Plan Alpha. In light of these devel-opments, at the beginning of 1956, the two powers decided to shelve the plan (Bar-On, 1992, pp. 112, 122-123, 138).
Plan Alpha was not the only secret mediation efforts between Israel and Egypt that occurred in the days after the hanging of the two Israelis in Cairo and the escalation along the Israeli–Egyptian border. Another attempt was made by Almora Jackson, a member of the U.S. delegation to the UN. Jackson was asked by Fawzi and Ahmed Hussein, Egypt’s ambassador to Washington, to broker an agreement between Israel and Egypt on the basis of two principles, similar to those of Plan Alpha: granting the right of return to Palestinian refugees and Israeli withdrawal from the Negev in order to create a land crossing between Egypt and the Arab countries in Asia.
Following the request, Jackson began to conduct shuttle diplomacy between Cairo and Jerusalem between July and September 1955, during which Ben-Gurion placed the fol-lowing conditions for negotiations with Egypt: arranging a high-level meeting between the two countries, a complete ceasefire along the border, prisoner exchanges, and cessation
of the Egyptian prohibition against Israeli ships crossing the Strait of Tiran. In exchange for fulfilling those demands, Ben-Gurion said that he would be willing to discuss limited changes of boundaries, in order to allow a land crossing between Egypt and Jordan through Israeli territory, and also a compensation for Palestinian refugees. In response, Nasser told Jackson that the situation at the border must “cool down” before he could respond to Ben-Gurion. This failure to come to an agreement effectively put an end to Jackson’s mission (Shamir, 1989, pp. 77-78, 81-83).
But at the end of 1955, the Americans conducted another covert mediation attempt, which was code-named “Project Gamma.” In November 1955, the CIA representative in Israel, James Angleton, met with the director-general of the Israeli prime minister’s office, Teddy Kollek, and offered the mediation services of Robert Anderson, a close associate of U.S. president Dwight Eisenhower and a former deputy defense minister. At the same time, the Americans also pro-posed Anderson’s service to Egypt. Both sides were skeptical about the chances of success in this mission, but nevertheless agreed to meet with the U.S. envoy. Anderson arrived in January 1956 for his first mission to the region, which, according to Nasser’s demand, was held under a heavy veil of secrecy (Bar-On, 1992, pp. 130-132; Shamir, 1989, p. 80).
The Americans insisted on continuing to try to reach a breakthrough in the talks between Israel and Egypt due to the fact that in their view, this was the best way to gain a signifi-cant foothold in Egypt and push out the Soviet Union. This was due to the fact that the Soviets supplied large quantities of weapons to Egypt in September 1955, after Nasser signed an arms deal with Czechoslovakia. Shimon Shamir, in his article “The Collapse of Project Alpha,” (1989) argues that both Israel and Egypt had an interest in cooperating with the U.S. peace initiative: Israel hoped to receive military aid from the United States similar to or even exceeding the Soviet assistance, while Nasser aspired to receive financial aid from the United States to build the Aswan Dam.
Shamir also adds that through response to the American initiative, Nasser wanted to weaken the Baghdad Pact, a mil-itary alliance that was signed in February 1955 among the United Kingdom, Iraq, Turkey, Pakistan, and Iran in order to encircle the Soviet Union with pro-Western states, a pact Nasser was opposed to (Shamir, 1989, p. 80). The Americans also agreed to help Egypt export its cotton, to help Nasser covertly in his struggle for hegemony in the Arab world and to renew the initiative to resolve the Palestinian problem, if the Egyptians would accept Anderson initiative (Bar-On, 1992, p. 130).
Mordechai Bar-On describes in his book The Gates of
Gaza: Israel’s Road to Suez and Back, 1955-1957 (1992) the
sovereignty over the Negev. In addition, Nasser demanded that Israel allow all Palestinian refugees the right to choose between returning to their homes or receiving financial com-pensation. However, Nasser refused to hold a high-level meeting with Israel. In exchange for the concessions made, Nasser would relieve the prohibition on Israeli cargo transfer in the Suez Canal as well as the Arab economic boycott on Israel. But according to Bar-On, Nasser was not ready to call a future arrangement “peace” and instead preferred a slightly less far-reaching approach, such as “easing” or “arrange-ments.” Ben-Gurion, on the other hand, completely rejected any territorial concessions in the Negev and demanded a complete ceasefire along the border. He also was unwilling to compromise about his demand for a direct meeting between the parties: “Without direct contact—nothing will happen," the Israeli prime minister said (Bar-On, 1992, pp. 132-133).
Toward the end of the first round of talks, the Israeli guidelines became clear: willingness for a full peace agree-ment, but also for a partial agreement to prevent war. Moreover, Israel was willing to discuss changes in boundar-ies and the return of refugees, but only through direct contact between senior officials, preferably with the participation of Nasser himself (Bar-On, 1992, p. 134).
Anderson returned in late January for another round of talks in Cairo and Jerusalem. During this round, it became clear that the existence of a direct high-level meeting had become a significant obstacle for further talks. Nasser con-tinued to oppose the idea, insisting that the negotiations must be conducted through American mediation. Ben-Gurion, on the other hand, argued that refusal of the demand for direct negotiations raised doubts about the goodwill of Egypt. In his book, Bar-On claims that Nasser’s refusal to meet directly with Israeli representatives also made the Americans suspect that he did not really aspire for the success of Anderson’s mission. Anderson returned in March for a final round of talks, but Nasser’s refusal for a direct encounter, even a secret one, brought an end to Project Gamma (Bar-On, 1992, pp. 135-136).
Shamir and Bar-On argue that the two sides were not really interested in the success of “Gamma,” but did not want to be perceived as an opponents to the U.S. plan. This is especially true for the Israeli side. Therefore, immediately after it became clear that Anderson mission had failed, Ben-Gurion and Sharett made great efforts to point out that the party primarily responsible for this failure was Egypt. Shamir and Bar-On noted that although the U.S. president Dwight D. Eisenhower accused Israel of contributing to the breakdown of talks due to its noncompromising position on the territo-rial issue, he still blamed the Egyptian president as the main reason for the failure. Bar-On presents a section of Eisenhower’s diary, which states that “Nasser proved to be a stumbling block” (Bar-On, 1992, pp. 137-138; Shamir, 1989, pp. 80-81). Michel Oren adds in his book that the U.S. presi-dent’s disappointment in Nasser was so great that he
authorized a secret project code-named “Omega,” which aimed to overthrow Nasser from power through any means except assassination (Oren, 2002, p. 30).
Anderson’s mission also appears in the work of the Egyptian journalist Heikal. He notes that the Americans strove to achieve influence in Egypt following the Czech arms deal, but also claims that Nasser’s participation in the Bandung Conference—held in April 1955 and considered the foundation of the Non-Aligned Movement—caused the American to try and get a foothold in Egypt. Even the Egyptian president’s meeting with prime minister of Communist China on his way to the conference had an impact on the Americans. According to Heikal, Egypt’s main reason for agreeing to the meetings with Anderson was the construction of the Aswan Dam. He notes that Anderson pledged in one of the talks to help Egypt to get a loan of $200 million from the World Bank to build the dam, in addition to a $70 million loan from the United Kingdom and the United States. The rest of the matters discussed in the books of Shamir and Bar-On, such as the Negev disagreements, the refugees, and the direct encounter between Egyptian and Israeli representatives, also similarly appear in Heikal’s book (Heikal, 1996, pp. 108-110).
The essential difference between the Egyptian journalist’s book and the works of the Israeli researchers concerns the determination of responsibility for the failure of the talks. While Bar-On and Shamir suggest that Egypt is to blame, Heikal imposes the lion’s share on Anderson. He argues that Anderson tried to dictate to Nasser what to say to Eisenhower and completely changed the Egyptian president’s letter to the U.S. president. This approach, according to Heikal, caused Nasser to lose his confidence in the American envoy and led to the failure of the mission (Heikal, 1996, p. 109).
It seems that despite claims made in the works of Nasser biographer, Aburish, until the evacuation of the British forces from Egypt, Nasser fairly consistently refused any attempt of dialogue between himself and Israel. Such assertions are also corroborated by Heikal, who was part of Nasser inner circle, as well as by the Israeli researchers. Even if indeed Nasser did establish a “secret team” in order to conduct negotiations with Israel in 1953, there is no indication that these initia-tives aimed to promote a political settlement between the two countries.
After 1954 and the signing of the Anglo-Egyptian agree-ment, however, the picture changed, and it appeared that Nasser did in fact intend to reach some sort of agreement with Israel. So if both sides were interested in negotiations, the question remains why their secret contacts did not mature into a peace treaty and instead, took a violent turn that reached its peak in the Sinai War.
literature, it can be inferred that Nasser was indeed interested in the success of the secret contacts that took place after 1954, despite Heikal’s claim that the Paris talks were made without his knowledge or approval. Such a claim may be more an attempt to remove the responsibility of the failure from the Egyptian leadership, because it is unlikely that all the mentioned contacts were made without the knowledge or permission of Nasser.
Another factor that contributed to the failure of the talks was the distrust of Nasser for Israel and the intermediaries. This is apparent in several examples: his rejections of pro-posals for a land passage from Egypt to the Arab countries in Asia unless the area was under Arab sovereignty; his refusal to believe that Israel would compensate Palestinian refugees equitably; the crisis that broke out between him and Anderson, as described by Heikal; and the Operation Susanna that dissolved any confidence Nasser had in Israel’s inten-tions. In addition, each time Nasser received an answer that failed to satisfy him, he immediately hardened his stance, a pattern that would be repeated during the secret negotiations in the 1960s.
Although Nasser may have wanted to reach some agree-ment with Israel, his suspicion and distrust prevented doing so. In response to the question raised earlier, whether the execution of the Operation Susanna leaders led to the cancel-lation of Yadin’s Cairo trip, the answer likely lies in Nasser’s decision not to proceed with covert channels, following the “affair.”
A final reason for the failure of the talks before 1956 was the changing political environment in Israel. As previously mentioned, in 1955, Ben-Gurion returned to Israeli politics, first as defense minister and then as prime minister. Oren writes that Ben-Gurion did not believe that Nasser was going to make peace with Israel, and the secret contacts he con-ducted were just a distraction, “intended to lull Israel before massacre will be implemented upon it” (Oren, 2002, p. 27). The fact that Ben-Gurion, who was so pessimistic about the chances of peace with Arab countries in general and with Egypt in particular, returned to serve in such key roles, surely contributed to the failure of the secret diplomacy between Israel and Egypt before 1956.
From 1956 to 1967
The war between Israel, Britain, and France against Egypt in October and November of 1956 curbed the American efforts to achieve peace between Israel and Egypt. The other secret contacts had also nearly ceased by the end of the fifties. Aburish notes in his book that in 1957 there were secret mes-sages exchanged between Nasser and Ben-Gurion through Dag Hammarskjold, who served as UN secretary-general at the time. Aburish argued that Ben-Gurion continued to insist on a meeting with Nasser, but the Egyptian president in his final message to Hammarskjold said that he was not con-vinced that he could return to his home after attending such a
meeting. As evidence, Nasser pointed to the assassination of King Abdullah of Jordan in 1951, who had secret communi-cations with Israel at the time (Aburish, 2004, p. 126).
In addition, in February 1958 another event occurred which significantly reduced the chances for secret diplomacy between Israel and Egypt—the unification of Egypt and Syria into the United Arab Republic (UAR) under Nasser leadership, a union that lasted until 1961. Nasser’s stance as the head of two Arab countries greatly reduced his motiva-tion to conduct negotiamotiva-tions with Israel.
Nahum Goldman, who was at the time president of the World Jewish Congress and chairman of the World Zionist Organization, and president of Yugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito, lead the most interesting attempt to open such a channel for dialogue in those years. According to Heikal, Ben-Gurion turned to Goldman to help him raise four hundred million dollars in order to finance the “Dimona Project,” the Israeli nuclear program. Ben-Gurion told Goldman that since the 1956 war the United States had reduced its support for Israel, and the Dimona Nuclear Program had become a vital ele-ment of the State’s security. However, Goldman was reluc-tant about the existence of this project and did not rush to grant this request. In November 1958, Goldman met with Tito and relayed to him the details of Ben-Gurion’s request. Goldman noted that it would be difficult for world Jewry to refuse such a request, especially when it was presented as an essential contribution for the security of Israel. However, Goldman added that if the Arab states will agree to commu-nicate with Israel, he and his colleagues would feel more comfortable saying no to Ben-Gurion (Heikal, 1996, pp. 140-141).
Immediately after his meeting with Goldman, Tito sent a letter to Nasser. In addition, the Yugoslav president recom-mended that Egypt hold some kind of talks with Israel, and added that “you should not leave Goldman’s hand in the air.” However, Nasser persisted in his refusal to have any direct contact with Israel. Tito did not despair and held a meeting with Nasser, which was also attended by Jawaharlal Nehru, prime minister of India. Together, they attempted to reduce the Nasser’s hostility toward Israel and persuade him to maintain direct contact with Israel, but this attempt failed. In 1961, the three met again, and, as a first step to break the wall of hostility between the two countries, delivered Nasser Goldman’s proposal to hold talks with the World Jewish leadership in place of the Israeli government, but he again refused this proposal (Heikal, 1996, pp. 140-142).
Even after the dissolution of the UAR, there were nearly no secret negotiations between Egypt and Israel, except in isolated cases, which included another failed attempt by Ben-Gurion in 1962 to arrange a meeting with Nasser through Tito (Kimche, 1998, pp. 178-179).
breakthrough. Meir Amit, who served as the Mossad chief between 1968 and 1963, describes in his book Head to Head
the course of this case, which beyond the Mossad also involved Azam A-Din Al Khalil, an Egyptian Air Force colo-nel, an Egyptian businessman nicknamed “Steve,” and an insurance agent named “Max” (Amit, 1999, pp. 205-208).
The connecting link between the three men was Steve, who was on friendly relations with Max and with Khalil. According to Amit, Steve was concerned that Israeli intelligence was fol-lowing him because of his activities in Europe. However, in July 1964, Steve got into trouble with the authorities in Egypt and began to fear them as well. When he revealed his prob-lems to Max, Max suggested to “turn the tide” and join forces with the Israelis by offering his services as an intermediary between them and the Egyptians increasing his value to both sides. The two men agreed that at first the talks would focus on solving the refugee problem, but then the focus would shift to providing economic aid to Egypt. As a result, Max drove to Israel, where he met with a Mossad agent and convinced him to cooperate with the process. At the same time, Steve traveled to Egypt to raise the issue with Nasser. On his return to Europe from Cairo, Steve claimed that although he did not have a positive response, he was not dismissed out of hand, so he agreed to meet with an Israeli representative to jump-start the process (Amit, 1999, pp. 209-210).
In January 1965, Steve met with a representative of the Mossad who was code-named “R,” at Max’s home. The three men met six more times during the first half of 1965, and in the course of one of those meetings, Steve noted that the talks were held with the knowledge and approval of Nasser. In addition, Steve reported to Khalil the issues that were raised in his talks with R. Because the focus of the meetings were on the economic aspect, they discussed two concrete proposals: the supply of wheat from Canada to Egypt under the influence of Israel and the acquisition of one hundred thousand cotton bales by Israel (Amit, 1999, pp. 211-213).
Amit writes that in September 1965, Israel decided to try and maintain a direct relationship with the Khalil during his stay in Paris. Khalil refused to meet without an Israeli com-mitment to help Egypt get a loan from one of the European countries. However, a representative of The Mossad learned where Khalil was staying and thus was able to contact him by telephone. During the conversation, Khalil asked The Mossad to get “something in writing” regarding the points that were to be raised in the negotiations. After consultation, The Mossad drafted a letter which received the approval of Prime Minister Levi Eshkol, and delivered it to Khalil. The letter elaborated the following points: establishment of a per-manent and confidential pipeline of communication between Eshkol and Nasser, willingness of Israel to help Egypt achieve international credit, an Egyptian commitment to accept Johnston’s program from 1955 regarding the distribu-tion of water resources between Israel and its neighbors, and an examination of measures to prevent violence and reduce tension in the Middle East (Amit, 1999, pp. 214-218).
After the delivery of the letter, there was a pause in talks until the end of January 1966, when R again met with Khalil and Steve. Khalil stated at this meeting that he had discussed the issue with Nasser, and in response R proposed that Khalil will meet with Amit himself. The meeting took place the next day. At this meeting, Amit returned to the points raised in the letter, and he set out the terms of the loan from European countries. Amit also raised two additional requirements that were not previously specified in the letter: providing the pas-sage of ships carrying cargo to Israel who wave a foreign flag and lowering anti-Israeli propaganda in Egypt. In return, Amit said that Israel will stop the “sabotage” it makes to Egypt in the United States and other countries. Amit noted that although Khalil had some reservations, the Egyptian answers were acceptable and they opened a dialogue. When Khalil said after the meeting that he would return to Egypt for consultations with Nasser, Amit told him that finding a solution regarding the distribution of water and the ship crossing in the canal will also help to reach an agreement on the loan (Amit, 1999, pp. 218-219).
Four days after this meeting, Khalil met with Mohamed Abdel Hakim Amer, the second in command in the Egyptian regime, to discuss the points that had been raised. After rais-ing objections to Amit’s points, Amer demanded that the next meeting between Khalil and the Israeli be held in Cairo because he was concerned that further talks in Europe would lead to their exposure. Therefore, Khalil transferred an invi-tation to Amit to meet in a private villa at the Egyptian capi-tal (Amit, 1999, pp. 219-224).
At the same time, the Israeli leadership also discussed the secret channel. Seven days after the Amit-Khalil meeting, Amit came to the prime minister’s office to meet with Eshkol, deputy defense minister Zvi Dinstein, and Isser Harel, the former Mossad and the Shin Bet chief. Harel firmly opposed any talks with Khalil and the trip to Cairo in particular. But not only Harel objected to the agreement. According to Amit, he encountered a hostile, reserved, and hesitant atmosphere from the very beginning of the discussions. Some critics argued that the trip to Cairo was very dangerous to the people who would participate, while others claimed that the price required of Israel was not worth the return on investment. Finally, Eshkol decided to allow The Mossad to continue the talks, but required them to occur in Europe and not in the Egyptian capital (Amit, 1999, pp. 225-226).
After the meeting, R met with Steve and asked him to convey a message from Amit to Khalil about the location of their next meeting. Steve expressed his disappointment, but agreed to transmit the information. However, before Steve could do so he received a message from Cairo asking him to tell the Israelis that their visit to Cairo was postponed due to the illness of their host. In late February, R met with Steve and understood from him that the channel now faced perma-nent closure.
expressed Israel’s willingness to provide Egypt a tenth of the amount of the loan immediately for the release of the four convicted of “operation Susanna” that were still in an Egyptian prison, but a week later Steve returned from Egypt with a negative response. Amit wrote that Steve claims the message infuriated Khalil and Nasser, who then told Steve to cancel Amit’s invitation to Egypt and ordered Khalil to cut all ties with the Mossad. In April and May, the Mossad con-tinued the relationship with Steve, but it was worthless. In July and September 1966, Amit created a direct contact with the Khalil, but nothing came of it and the secret channel was cut off permanently (Amit, 1999, pp. 225-226).
We see in this case the same pattern that had characterized Nasser’s behavior during the fifties. Even in this case, Nasser apparently had agreed to cooperate with the talks, largely because he had a financial interest. But his basic distrust and fear eventually led to their collapse. This is evidenced by his demand to transfer the second Khalil-Amit meetings to Cairo due to his suspicion of a potential leak. In addition, as had already been seen, when things take a turn unfavorable to Nasser, he immediately hardens his attitudes and even instruct to break the ties with Israel. Therefore, it is possible that Nasser wished the talks will be successful, but the cir-cumstances, including the fact that some of the decision makers in Israel objected to them, failed them.
From the Six-Day War to the Death of
Nasser
The Six-Day War completely changed the strategic balance between Israel and Egypt. The Israeli occupation of the Sinai Peninsula, the loss of control of the Straits of Tiran, and the inability of Egypt to hurt Israel by the Fedayeen operations changed Egypt’s goals and what it sought to achieve through political contact with Israel. On the other hand, the humilia-tion of defeat reduced the willingness of the Arab world in general and Egypt in particular to negotiate with Israel. Two months after the war ended, eight Arab leaders, including Nasser, gathered in Khartoum and decided on “the three no’s—no to peace with Israel, no recognition of it, and no negotiations with it. It seemed that as long as Nasser was to be the leader of Egypt, there would be no diplomatic contact between Egypt and Israel. However, Noa Schonmann, in her MA thesis “Tactics of Peace” (2005) describes three secret attempts of Nasser to reach a political settlement with Israel between the years 1967 to 1970. These attempts were uncov-ered via documents released by the U.S. State Department in May 2001 and January 2004 (Schonmann, 2005, p. 6).
Before reviewing the three attempts depicted in the work of Schonmann, it should be noted that this was primarily an attempt of Nasser to renew Egypt relations with the United States. Until November 1964, the United States had provided considerable financial assistance to Egypt, but in the same month, it was stopped due to a series of incidents between the two countries, including an attack by rioters on the U.S.
Embassy in Cairo and the accidental downing of an American plane by Egyptian forces. In addition, Nasser cut off diplo-matic ties between the two countries on June 6, 1967, when he accused the United States of playing a part in the surprise attack by Israel on Egypt airports, which started the 1967 War. In other words, Nasser’s willingness to reach an agree-ment with Israel was only a means toward achieving his objective to rehabilitate his relations with the Americans (Oren, 2002, pp. 42-43; Schonmann, 2005, p. 26).
According to Dan Schueftan (1978), Nasser’s desire to renew ties with the United States stemmed from his under-standing that only the Americans could force Israel to with-draw from territories occupied through the Six-Day War. Schueftan claims that the model that Nasser had in mind was the arrangement the U.S. imposed on Israel after the Sinai Campaign, which forced it to withdraw from the Sinai Peninsula (Schueftan, 1978, pp. 328-329).
A few days after the war, Saleh Nasr, head of Egypt’s General Intelligence, delivered a message to the Italian for-eign minister, Amintore Fanfani, from President Nasser, which stated that Nasr would fly to Rome to meet with the U.S. president’s envoy. The goal of meeting with the U.S. president’s envoy was to negotiate with Israel on the basis of the following principles: de facto recognition of Israel, with-drawal of Israel to the 1967 borders, secure borders, free pas-sage in the Strait of Tiran, compensation for damages caused to civilians during the war, and the West’s commitment to cooperate with Egypt’s 30-year program aimed at the coun-try’s economic development. On June 24, Fanfani relayed the message to U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk. In addition, documents issued by the U.S. State Department stated that Nasr demanded that the talks be conducted at the level of for-eign ministers of the two countries (National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59; Schonmann, 2005, p. 33).
The U.S. response to the initiative was somewhat com-plex. On the one hand, the same day the message was received they sent an answer that the American ambassador in Rome would be willing to meet with an official Egyptian representative. On the other hand, quite a few voices in the U.S. administration questioned Nasr, although he claimed that he was acting with the knowledge and support of the Egyptian president (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 34-36).
the Egyptian officer by the American people (National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59).
Due to this uncertainty, Rusk decided to meet with Mohammed Fawzi, who served at the time as a senior adviser to Nasser, on June 27 at the margins of the emergency UN General Assembly following the Six-Day War. During the meeting, it became clear that there was in fact a gap between the message Fanfani delivered and the position of the Egyptian regime. While in the message it was written that an Israeli withdrawal would lead to a de facto recognition of Israel by Egypt, Fawzi insisted on a withdrawal without any conditions. In addition, while Rusk demanded that the nego-tiations should be completed with a declaration of transition from “war” to “peace,” Fawzi clarified that the Egyptians were willing to declare a state of “calmness.” Also when it came to free movement within the Strait of Tiran, Fawzi did not give a clear agreement, but remained vague by saying that Egypt is ready to “acquiesce” to such a transition, but was not ready to announce it officially (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 38-39).
Due to the double messages that came from Cairo and Fawzi’s insistence not to accept the formula of “land for peace,” which the Americans tried to promote, the State Department decided not to continue the dialogue through the Italian channel. Nasr’s attempt, whether it was his own ini-tiative or whether he did so on the Egyptian government’s opinion, failed (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 39-40).
The second dialogue attempt Schonmann describes began in late October 1967 with the arrival in Cairo of Robert Anderson. During his visit, he met with the Egyptian presi-dent and his advisers several times, where he was told that Egypt is “eager” to make peace with Israel, but direct contact with it would be suicide because of the atmosphere in the Arab world. Therefore, Egypt suggested that the superpow-ers should impose such an agreement on the region and appoint an international body to oversee the enforcement. This agreement, according to Nasser, would be based on the principles of President Lyndon Johnson for a regional agree-ment: the right of Israel to exist as well as all countries in the region; free pass to any civilian ships in the Gulf of Aqaba and the Suez Canal; Israel’s full withdrawal from the territo-ries occupied during the war; ending the state of hostility between Israel and the Arab countries; and resolving the refugee problem (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 42-44).
The United States decided to accept Nasser’s initiative and began to promote it. They turned to the United Kingdom and Jordan, and jointly drafted a proposal to the Security Council on the basis of the five points raised in the Nasser-Anderson meeting. However, on November 4 the U.S. ambassador met with Mahmoud Riad, Egyptian foreign min-ister, who informed him that Egypt decided to support the Indian draft to the Security Council, which had been a part-nership of six nonpermanent members (India, Brazil, Argentina, Nigeria, Mali, and Ethiopia). The Indian proposal was not acceptable by Israel, because it called for its full
withdrawal from the territories occupied in 1967, with no explicit mention of its right to exist and cease-state of hostil-ity, and therefore the United States did not support it (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 53-55).
The Americans saw Nasser’s decision to withdraw from their original proposal as a result of Soviet pressure and decided again not to continue the dialogue with him. On November 6, the Egyptian ambassador in Baghdad approached Anderson, and handed him an invitation from Nasser to return to Cairo to meet with him. But President Johnson ordered Anderson not to respond to the invitation. As a result, Nasser sent another message to Anderson, where he renounce from several of the principles he agreed to dur-ing their meetdur-ing, such as the right of every country in the region to exist, due to the fact that it countered the principle of “three no’s” of the Khartoum Conference. These moves effectively blocked the second secret talk’s channel of Nasser after the Six-Day War (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 55-57).
The third channel was open on December 9, when Nasser met in Cairo with James Birdsall, an American businessman. According to Schonmann, Birdsall was asked to deliver a message to President Johnson from Nasser, who announced that he would abolish the state of war with Israel, “with all that entails, including the replacement of ambassadors when Israel compensate the Palestinian refugees.” Nasser added that he hoped the U.S. president would use his influence on Israel to make it withdraw from the territories it occupied in 1967. Nasser insisted that no one would see the message apart from President Johnson himself (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 60-63).
Nine days later, Birdsall met with Johnson and passed him the words of the president of Egypt. State Department documents state that in addition to the renewal of U.S. rela-tions with Egypt, Nasser expressed his hope that a peace agreement would lead to a friendly gesture of the U.S. toward all the Arab countries, and mentioned his desire to visit the White House (Johnson Library, National Security File).
After several days of consultations, Johnson sent his reac-tion to Nasser through Donald Bergus, in charge of U.S. interests at the Spanish Embassy in Cairo. Bergus said that while President Johnson praised the readiness of Nasser to cancel the state of war with Israel, he did not intend to pres-sure Israel to withdraw from the territories, but only to work for “a satisfactory arrangement,” based on Resolution 242. Johnson added that a stable peace must include Israeli with-drawal, but also an end to all the claims of the Arab states from Israel (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 66-67).
it was opened, another covert communication channel that could have led to an Israeli–Egyptian agreement was blocked (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 67-70).
Schonmann claims that the fact that Nasser had always backed away from his proposals indicates that his intentions of reaching an agreement with Israel was not sincere and that it was a way to achieve his strategic goal—restoring diplo-matic relations with the U.S (Schonmann, 2005, pp. 72-73). However, I am not convinced that that is accurate. I think that a broader view of all of the secret communications of Israel and Egypt during Nasser’s rule shows that this case follows the same pattern that repeats itself throughout all the negotiations.
Even in the late sixties, we can see that upon receiving an answer he did not expect or that disappointed him, Nasser did the opposite thing expected from those who negotiated with him—Instead of softening his positions, he hardened them. This pattern shows once again his unwillingness to break the glass ceiling that Sadat broke 10 years later, because of both his suspicions and the atmosphere in the Arab world.
The first attempt to communicate with Israel does not connect to this pattern, but it is difficult to determine whether it was the directive of the government’s initiative in Cairo or the Egyptian intelligence officer. The decision to support the Indian draft to the Security Council was, as stated, related to a broader picture of the Cold War considerations. However, beyond that, the pattern which was noted by Schonmann connects to the ideas held in the fifties and sixties and the secret diplomacy between Israel and Egypt.
There is also a reference in Schueftan’s work about the Nasser’s disappointment from the Americans in the late six-ties. He did not write about the initiatives that appear in Schonmann’s work, but instead he stated that the insistence of the U.S. to a significant political reparation for an Israeli withdrawal, in contrast to events on 1956, led Nasser to abandon the political strategy and open in a different one— Threatening U.S. interests to stay out of the area, which could lead to the brink of conflict with the Soviet Union. This change of strategy by Nasser eventually brought the outbreak of the War of Attrition between Israel and Egypt (Schueftan, 1978, p. 329).
From the beginning of 1968 until the death of Nasser in September 1970, there were apparently no significant com-munications between Egypt and Israel. In March 1969, the War of Attrition broke out and the prospect of a political settlement between the two became almost impossible.
However, during the war three notable attempts were made, two by Israel and one by Egypt. Moshe Halfon, in his book “War to Peace” (2002), cited Israel Galili, one of the closest people to Israeli prime minister Golda Meir, as saying that in July 1969, Meir sent a secret message to Nasser and did not receive an answer. Then, in April 1970, Israel sent two British officials to Egypt to try to jump-start a peace pro-cess between the two countries, but Nasser refused on the
grounds that the situation in the Arab world does not allow him to hold contacts with Israel. Meron Medzini, in the polit-ical biography “Golda” (2008), writes about these trials in a similar manner (Halfon, 2002, p. 53; Medzini, 2008, p. 452).
Mordechai Gazit, who served as the director general of the Israeli prime minister’s office, described the last mediation attempt of Nahum Goldman, which was probably the last such attempt during Nasser regime. In March 1970, Goldman reported that Meir was invited through an Egyptian weekly editor, probably Heikal, to Cairo to meet with the Egyptian president, and requested the approval of the prime minister. The goal of the invitation was to promote a dialogue between Israel and Egypt. Meir, who did not believe Nasser’s inten-tions, refused the request. Ten days later, the story was leaked to the press and a big protest broke out in Israel (Gazit, 1984, p. 42). Medzini also surveyed the Goldman affair, and added that Nasser did not really mean to hold a dialogue, but this was the Egyptian president’s attempt to cause embarrassment to Israel (Medzini, 2008, pp. 460-461).
Conclusion
As was discussed, the open negotiations between Israel and Egypt that began in 1977 was not the first time that there was contact between the two countries. This study reviewed the existing literature on secret diplomacy between Israel and Egypt which took place in the fifties and sixties, when Gamal Abdel Nasser served as the leader of the southern neighbor of Israel. These negotiations were conducted in several dif-ferent ways, and involved intelligence officials in Israel, Egypt or the United States, which even acted as the driving force behind them.
Reviewing the pattern of secret diplomacy between Israel and Egypt reveals that it was unlikely to reach a peace agree-ment between the two countries during the reign of Gamal Abdel Nasser. This is because the nature and attitudes of the Egyptian leader did not allow him to make the necessary concessions to enable the success of the negotiations.
The written materials indicate that Nasser did wish for some of these attempts to be successful and that he did not merely use them as a tactic for achieving larger purposes. However, in the absence of enough written evidence, particu-larly from the perspective of the Egyptians, it is difficult to come to a more decisive conclusion. Also, in order to fully understand Nasser’s motives, it is necessary to examine litera-ture from other disciplines, such as political psychology. In doing so, we can overcome the lack of written material. Thus, it would be possible to build a broader picture and reach more comprehensive conclusions about the chances for peace between Israel and Egypt during the period of Nasser regime.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article.
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Author Biography
Ido Yahel is a graduate student in political science at Tel Aviv
