WATANI International
9 October 2011
Last Thursday, Egypt marked the Armed forces Day, celebrating the day in 1973 when the Egyptian Armed Forces crossed the Suez Canal and advanced into Sinai. Following 18 days of battle, an armistice was declared, but the event allowed Egypt to negotiate a peace treaty with Israel and end the state of war between the two countries since 1948. The treaty, famously known as the Camp David Accord, was signed in 1979 by the Egyptian president Anwar al-Sadat, the Israeli Prime Minister Menahem Begin, and the US president Jimmy Carter, and returned the Sinai Peninsula to the Egyptian motherland.
The 6 October 1973 canal-crossing worked to give back to Egyptians the dignity and self esteem they had so painfully lost in the wake of the 1967 Six-Day War in which they had been defeated by Israel.