Strip was officially merged into the short lived United Arab Republic, a political union between Egypt and Syria. In 1962 the UAR government established a Palestinian Legislative Council to govern Gaza. During the January 1964 Arab League summit in Cairo, the Palestine Liberation Organization or PLO was established. It included various Palestinian factions and its first leader was Ahmad Shukeiri, who was supported by Nasser. When the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was founded in 1964, Nasser proclaimed that it would hold authority over Gaza, but that power was never granted in practice. A year later, conscription was instituted for the Palestinian Liberation Army. But after Egypt was defeated in the Six-Day War in June 1967, Nasser began to call for peace with Israel. But his traditional allies (Syria, Iraq, Algeria, and the PLO) opposed his recent moves and formed a "Rejectionist Front." In January 1968, Nasser commenced the War of Attrition against Israel, ordering his forces to begin attacking Israeli positions east of the now-blockaded Suez Canal. In the same month, he allowed the Soviets to construct naval facilities in Port Said, Mersa Matruh, and Alexandria. Then in March, the Palestinian political party Fatah under the leadership of Yasser Arafat, faced off with Israel in Jordan in what became known as the Battle of Karameh. The Jordanian Army eventually backed Fatah fighters forcing Israel to withdraw its troops without achieving its strategic goal—destruction of the Palestinian fedayeen base. The battle was thus seen as an Arab victory over Israel and Nasser immediately dispatched Mohammed Hassanein Heikal to invite Arafat to Cairo. There, Nasser offered the Fatah movement arms and financial support, but advised Arafat to think of peace with Israel and establishing a Palestinian state comprising the West Bank and the Gaza Strip; Nasser was effectively ceding his leadership of the "Palestine issue" to Arafat. Eventually Yasser Arafat was later elected President of the PLO. Nasser helped negotiate the Cairo agreement between the PLO and Lebanese government in 1969. Hours before dying, Nasser brokered a peace deal between the PLO and Jordan after Black September at the 1970 Arab League summit, which was held in Cairo. But after the death of Nasser his successor Anwar Sadat signed the Camp David Accords. This angered the Arab World and it led to the expulsion of Egypt from the Arab League until 1989. Arafat criticized the peace treaty, saying "Let them sign what