1973 Arab-Israeli War

Galen Jackson, the editor of the volume, is an assistant professor of political science at Williams College, where he teaches courses in international relations, international security, American foreign policy, nuclear weapons, cybersecurity, the international relations of the Middle East, and the Arab-Israeli conflict. He has published articles on the Arab-Israeli dispute in a number of scholarly journals, including International Security, Security Studies, the Journal of Cold War Studies, Middle East Journal, and Diplomacy & Statecraft. His book manuscript, A Lost Peace: Great Power Politics and the Arab-Israeli Dispute, 1967-1979, will be published in April 2023.

This exceptionally well-integrated collection of essays about the October 1973 War (also referred to as the Yom Kippur or Ramadan War) and its consequences offers an excellent overview of Arab-Israeli politics prior to October 7, 2023, 50 years later. William B. Quandt, who served on Henry Kissinger’s National Security Council staff in 1973, argues in the introduction that the war could have been avoided had Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir been less intransigent and if Kissinger had taken Egyptian President Anwar Sadat more seriously in earlier discussions of a major diplomatic initiative. As it was, the conduct of the war led to the breakdown of détente with the Soviet Union and a nuclear alert because Kissinger had given the Israelis too much slack in obeying the ceasefire negotiated by the superpowers. Several contributing authors question Kissinger’s credibility, and Quandt still wonders what really lay behind Sadat’s refusal of an earlier ceasefire proposal, given his distrust of the Syrian ally and his control of Egypt’s professionalized military. An earlier ending might have preempted any use of the Arab oil weapon. The ensuing peace process unfortunately excluded the Palestinians, also extensively analyzed in the present volume. A must-read! Essential. General readers through faculty; professionals.

• Table of ContentsIntroduction: The October 1973 Arab-Israeli War—Looking Back 50 Years Later - William B. QuandtChapter 1: The October 1973 War: Culmination of the Failure of Political Analysis - Yigal KipnisChapter 2: Egypt’s Military Effectiveness in the October War - Risa BrooksChapter 3: Self-Inflicted Wound? Henry Kissinger and the Ending of the October 1973 Arab-Israeli War - Galen Jackson and Marc TrachtenbergChapter 4: Syria and the 1973 Arab-Israeli War - Raymond HinnebuschChapter 5: The Impact of the October 1973 War on the Palestinians - Khaled ElgindyChapter 6: The Cold War and Oil: Paving the Way to a US-Led Peace Process - Jeremy PressmanConclusion - Jerome SlaterIndexAbout the Contributors