Ahead of the 50th anniversary of the Six Day War, the Israel State Archives, a unit within the Prime Minister’s Office, on Thursday 22 Iyar, made available material from the Six Day War. These include minutes of 36 meetings of the Ministerial Committee on National Security from January-July 1967, Cabinet protocols and documents pertaining to the war from various ministries (Prime Minister’s Office, Foreign Ministry, Interior Ministry, Religious Affairs Ministry, Tourism Ministry, Justice Ministry, Housing Ministry and others), as well as sound and video files, still photographs and materials from the personal archives of Levy Eshkol, Yaakov Herzog, Aviad Yafe, Moshe Sasson and Rabbi Shlomo Goren.

All of the materials may be found on a special “Six Day War Collection” page on the Israel State Archives website. The collection includes hundreds of items and numbers over 150,000 pages.

Israel State Archivist Dr. Yaakov Lazovik explains “For the first time in 50 years it will be possible to closely follow the dynamic within the government regarding the Six Day War: Why was the waiting period so long and why was it decided to attack? To what extent did the government succeed in managing the war or did events transpire too quickly? How was the diplomatic struggle at the UN waged and how did events in New York affect what happened here and vice-versa? What were the ministers’ initial positions regarding the future of the territories? One may learn about the foregoing and much more from the material we made available this morning.”

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)