[Elder of Ziyon] Egyptians thought Nasser was a spy for Israel

From Israel's Documented Story, the blog of Israel's Archives (by Yaacov Lozowick):

At the first secret high-level Egyptian-Israeli meeting prior to Sadat's visit to Jerusalem in 1977, Egypt's Deputy Prime Minister Dr. Hassan Touhami asked Moshe Dayan for the truth about the previous Egyptian president, Gamal Abdel Nasser. According to the English-language summary of the meeting:

Touhami's opinion of Nasser was of extreme and hateful despise. He asked Moshe dayan if Nasser had been in connivance with him when Nasser sent Abdel Hakim Amer with an airplane on an inspection tour just when our planes attacked at 08:00 on the morning of the 5th of June 1967.

The Mossad report of the meeting added a bit of detail:

The fact that the [Egyptian] Airforce was unprepared and its commanders were sanguine was explained by Touhami by the fact that Nasser was actually in conspiration with the Israelis. "Tell us the truth," Touhami requested seriously, "wasn't Nasser conniving with you at the time? Otherwise, how to explain what happened?" Touhami gave the appearance of rage and despise at Nasser, whom he described as having brought Egypt to the edge of calamity.

When the alternative is believing that your leaders were preening idiots that you worshipped, I guess the "spy" hypothesis is fairly compelling.

By the way, that blog is getting better and better - history tells us a lot.

(h/t Silke)

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Posted By Elder of Ziyon to Elder of Ziyon at 12/07/2012 11:30:00 AM