55 years ago/June 12, 1967

Troops of the Golani Brigade captured the Mt. Hermon region. Prime Minister Levi Eshkol held a speech in the Knesset about the events of the previous weeks and the war. He said besides others: “We saw clearly that this is no mere ingathering of the exiles, but a new – yet ancient – nation, a united nation, which has been tempered in the furnace into one Israel, forged out of all our tribes and the remnants of scattered communities – they, their sons and their daughters. A nation has come into being which is ready for any effort or sacrifice in order to achieve its goals.” Israel reached many of its military goals, like the natural borders they could defend easier; the strategic depth; and the wasp waist in the middle of the country, which threatened that an enemy could cut the country in half, disappeared. Besides the military goals, there were a big moral value to have the Old City of Jerusalem on their hands, with the most sacred places of the Judaism. Hungary and Poland broke off diplomatic relations with Israel.