The UN Security Council met on 5 June 1967 after receiving opposed accounts from מדינת ישראל MEDINAT YISRAʾEL and the United Arab Republic. The UN's 1967 Yearbook records that the Israeli representative contacted the Council president at 3:10 a.m. New York time, reporting an Egyptian attack; the Egyptian representative contacted him twenty minutes later, charging the Israeli armed forces with attacking Egyptian territory and airfields.1

The Yearbook describes the Egyptian accusation as:

a treacherous, premeditated aggression2

These incompatible reports show the immediate struggle to define responsibility. Recording both does not make their factual claims equally established. The Israeli military's own later account identifies its opening air strikes against Egyptian airfields. That sequence must be distinguished from the separate argument over the blockade, threatened attack, and the necessity of acting first.3

The emergency meeting also reveals the Council's limited control over events: convening delegates did not stop the fighting. The first ceasefire resolution followed the next day.

How is this dated?

The UN Yearbook dates the emergency session to 5 June 1967. Its New York civil date converts to 26 Iyar 5727. The telephone calls and meeting are distinct actions on that date; the account used here is the UN's retrospective summary.4

Guided reflections

  • What evidence is needed to move from a delegate's accusation to an established account of the opening attack?
  • How should a chronology distinguish the first military action from the preceding threats to Jewish sovereignty and safety?

Footnotes

  1. United Nations, Yearbook 1967, section “Outbreak of hostilities on 5 June 1967 and consideration by the Security Council,” https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-204939/. The meeting was S/PV.1347/Rev.1. ↩
  2. UN Yearbook's English account of the Egyptian representative's allegation; same section. ↩
  3. IDF, Six-Day War timeline, opening operation, https://m.www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/six-day-war-timeline-1/six-day-war-timeline/. ↩
  4. https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-204939/ ↩

Works cited

  1. United Nations. Yearbook of the United Nations 1967. Section Outbreak of Hostilities on 5 June 1967 and Consideration by the Security Council. Reproduced by UNISPAL. https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-204939/.