Suez Crisis

The Suez Crisis of 1956, called the Sinai War in Israel and the Tripartite Aggression in the Arab world, was a joint invasion of Egypt by Israel, the United Kingdom and France. Israel attacked across the Sinai on 29 October with the aim of reopening the Straits of Tiran to its shipping, and Britain and France then intervened on 31 October after an ultimatum, hoping to topple President Gamal Abdel Nasser and retake control of the Suez Canal, which he had nationalised earlier that year. Heavy diplomatic pressure from the United States, the Soviet Union and the United Nations forced the three powers to withdraw, and a United Nations emergency force was placed on the Egypt-Israel border. Israel held the Gaza Strip and Sinai for about four months, the canal stayed closed until March 1957, and the episode showed that Britain and France could no longer act abroad without American consent.