The Six Day War Restores the Western Wall of the Temple to Jews

IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) capture the temple area:

"Israeli officials flooded the city. It was a pilgrimage. Even the most worldly spoke of it in religious terms--how they stood before the Wall, which was covered in flowers, which was breathing, soft like skin, which was bleeding, wet with tears. A mad moment at the end of a mad age. Yitzhak Rabin wrote a prayer on a piece of paper and shoved it between the stones. Whoever does this is talking to history, worshipping the past. 'It was the peak of my life,' he said. 'For years I secretly harbored the dream that I might play a role in restoring the Western Wall to the Jewish people. Now that dream had come true, and I wondered why I, of all men, should be so privileged.' He gave a speech:

The sacrifices of our comrades have not been in vain. The countless generations of Jews murdered, martyred and massacred for the sake of Jerusalem say to you, Comfort yet, our people, console the mothers and fathers whose sacrifices have brought about redemption. - Rich Cohen, Israel is Real, 268.

I rejoiced with those who said to me,

'Let us go up to the house of the Lord.'

Our feet are standing in your gates, O Jerusalem.

Jerusalem is built like a city

that is closely compacted together.

That is where the tribes go up,

the tribes of the Lord,

to praise the name of the Lord

according to the statutes given to Israel.

There the thrones for judgment stand,

the thrones of the house of David.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem:

'May those who love you be secure.

May there be peace within your walls

and security within your citadels.'

For the sake of my brothers and my friends,

I will say, 'Peace be within you.'

For the sake of the house of the Lord our God,

I will seek your prosperity.

- Psalm 122 - A Song of Ascents

The Six-Day War (which was actually a little longer)

In 1967, less than 20 years after the birth of the nation, President Nasser of Egypt said: "Our goal is clear--to wipe Israel off the map." Surrounded by the armies of three nations (Egypt, Jordan and Syria), and hung out to dry by her allies, Israel began to fight for her life in what was to be known as "The Six Day War."

"The phrase 'Six Day War' first appeared in The New York Times about two months later. The name, which is not properly descriptive--by most measures, the war laster more than a week--stuck because it echoed the holiest numbers in the Jewish lexicon: six days of creation, six million dead. The war was named like a TV show, with a demographic in mind: the Holocaust-haunted Jews of the world. It's a slogan: Six-Day War. It tells you that the story of modern Israel is the story of creation: something from nothing, desert in bloom--it's a miracle beyond normal history, so beyond question, so beyond doubt."
- Rich Cohen, Israel is Real, 269.