This book deals with the diplomatic triangle of Israel, the United States, and Egypt during the War of Attrition along the Suez Canal in 1969–1970. Considering the Egyptian president’s political positions and outlooks on the Arab-Israeli conflict and the pan-Arab sphere, relations with the United States, the study reviews the internal disagreements between the State Department and Henry Kissinger, the national security adviser in the White House.

The study demonstrates that the United States and Egypt worked together to thaw their relations after the severance of ties in June 1967, motivated by a desire to protect and advance their interests in the Middle East. The book is based chiefly on textual analysis of political and historical events in the domain of international relations, but with the same attention to internal policy as well. In addition, the research draws chiefly on primary sources that have only recently been released to the general public and that have not yet been the subject of serious analysis. The lion’s share of the work is based on qualitative content analysis of documents from the National Archives in Washington and especially of the US State Department.

Providing a reading that is new, comprehensive, and complete, both with regard to the scope of the sources as well as the analysis of developments in the relations between Egypt and the United States, this book is a key resource for students and scholars interested in the Arab-Israeli conflict, political science and diplomacy, Israeli studies and the Middle East.

Yehuda U. Blanga is a senior lecturer in the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at Bar-Ilan University. His research focuses on the military and political involvement of the superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, in the Middle East and on Egyptian and Syrian policies (regime, military, and society).