Why did the Israelis Win the First Arab-Israeli War of 1948/9

International involvement
1. Ineffective UN ceasefires
  1. The war was in 3 phases
2. The US recognized Israel 14th May
Israeli Superiority
1. Israeli Planning
  1. Since the UN Partition Plan was announced, Zionist Militants has already begun to seize ares marked out for the future Palestnine
  2. Unified command structure
  3. were good at collecting detailed information
  4. Work of Ben Gurion
    1. 1946: Ben Gurion began a massive covert arms acquisition campaign - eg. Operation Balak from Czechs.
  5. Trained from WW2
2. Holocaust Syndrome
  1. Sense of divine purpose
3. Did have: Irgun (2,000-4,000 active, 200 rifles & 500 machine-guns.) Stern Gang (500-800 activists).
Arab Disunity
1. Egypt
  1. Egyptian soldiers were poorly equipped
    1. Possibly due to Egyptian corruption in procurement
  2. lacked motivation
    1. Most forces didn't know why they were fighting
  3. lacked incentive
  4. Only sent token forces to turn the attention of nationalists towards external happenings
2. Troops mobilized by the Arab League arrived too late to make any effective difference
  1. Arab League set up 1945
3. Self interest
  1. Mostly tribal
    1. Some countries made insignificant contributions (Lebanon,Saudi, Yemen) around 800 men each
  2. Golda Meir deal with King of Transjordon
4. British suppression of Arab Revolt (1936-9) had seriously weakened Arab leadership.
5. Had some strengths
  1. 7,500 British / WW2 combat-trained Palestinian Arabs. 10,500 Palestinian Arabs served in British Palestine Police Force & armed!

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Why did the Israelis Win the First Arab-Israeli War of 1948/9

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	Created by elenamaymartin over 10 years ago