History of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
Encyclopedia
The history of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict covers from the end of the 19th century to the present day. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict
centers on conflicting, often mutually exclusive claims to the area called Palestine
by the Palestinians and the Land of Israel
by Israeli Jews.
, the Middle East
region, including Palestine, was under the control of the Ottoman Empire
for nearly 400 years. Towards the end of the 19th century, Palestine, divided between the Vilayets of Damascus and Beirut and the Mustafiyyet of Jerusalem, was inhabited predominantly by Arab
Muslims, both farmers and Bedouin
(principally in the Negev
and Jordan valley
), with smaller numbers of Christians
(predominantly Arab), Druze
, Circassians and Jews
(predominantly Sephardic
). At that time most of the Jews worldwide lived outside of Palestine, predominantly in eastern
and central Europe
, with significant communities in the Mediterranean, the Middle East and the Americas.
The roots of the conflict can be traced to the late 19th century, with the rise of national movements, including Zionism
and Arab nationalism
. Though the Jewish aspiration to return to Zion had been part of Jewish religious thought for a millennia, the Jewish population of Europe and to some degree Middle East began to more actively discuss immigration back to the Land of Israel
, and the re-establishment of the Jewish Nation in its national homeland, only during the 1870s
and 1880s
, largely as a solution to the widespread persecution of Jews due to anti-Semitism
in Russia
and Europe
. As a result, the Zionist movement, the modern movement for the creation of a homeland for the Jewish people, was established as a political movement in 1897.
The Zionist movement called for the establishment of a nation-state
for the Jewish people in Palestine
, which would serve as a haven
for the Jews of the world
and in which they would have the right for self-determination
. Zionists increasingly came to hold that this state should be in their historic homeland, which they referred to as the Land of Israel
. The World Zionist Organization
and the Jewish National Fund
encouraged immigration
and funded purchase of land, both under Ottoman
rule and under British rule, in the region of Palestine. While Arab nationalism
, at least in an early form, and Syrian nationalism
were the dominant tendencies along with continued loyalty to the Ottoman state.
According to Benny Morris, among the first recorded violent incidents between Arabs and Jews in Palestine was the accidental shooting dead of an Arab man in Safed
, during a wedding in December 1882, by a Jewish guard of the newly formed Rosh Pina. In response, about 200 Arabs descended on the Jewish settlement throwing stones and vandalizing property. Another incident happened in Petach Tikva, where in early 1886 the Jewish settlers demanded that their tenants vacate the disputed land and started encroaching on it. On March 28, a Jewish settler crossing this land was attacked and robbed of his horse by Yahudiya Arabs, while the settlers confiscated nine mules found grazing in their fields, though it is not clear which incident came first and which was the retaliation. The Jewish settlers refused to return the mules, a decision viewed as a provocation. The following day, when most of the settlement's men folk were away, fifty or sixty Arab villagers attacked Petach Tikva, vandalizing houses and fields and carrying off much of the livestock. Four Jews were injured and a fifth, an elderly woman with a heart condition, died four days later.
By 1908, thirteen Jews had been killed by Arabs, with four of them killed in what Benny Morris calls "nationalist circumstances", the others in the course of robberies and other crimes. In the next five years twelve Jewish settlement guards were killed by Arabs. Settlers began to speak more and more of Arab "hatred" and "nationalism" lurking behind the increasing depredations, rather than mere "banditry".
Zionist ambitions were increasingly identified as a threat by the Arab leaders in Palestine region. Certain developments, such as the acquisition of lands from Arab owners for Jewish settlements, leading to the eviction of the fellaheen from the lands which they cultivated as tenant farmer
s, aggravated the tension between the parties and caused the Arab population in the region of Palestine to feel dispossessed of their lands. Ottoman land purchase regulations were brought in after local complaints in opposition to increasing immigration. Ottoman policy makers in the late 19th century were apprehensive of the increased Russian and European influence in the region, partly as a result of a large immigration wave from the Russian Empire
. The Ottoman authorities feared that the loyalty of immigrants was primary to their country of origin, Russia, with whom the Ottoman Empire had a long history of conflicts, and therefore it might undermine Turkish control in the region of Palestine. The main reason for this concern was the dismantling of Ottoman authority in the Balkan region. The main reason for the initial hostility, in the 1880s, towards the Jewish immigration was on the grounds of their being Russian and European, rather than Jewish. European immigration was considered by local residents as a threat to the cultural make-up of the region. The regional significance of the anti-Jewish riots
(pogroms) in Russia
in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and anti-immigration legislation being enacted in Europe was that Jewish immigration waves began arriving in Palestine (see First Aliyah
and Second Aliyah
). As a result of the extent of the various Zionist enterprises which started becoming apparent, the Arab population in the Palestine region began protesting against the acquisition of lands by the Jewish population. As a result, in 1892 the Ottoman authorities banned land sales to foreigners. By 1914 the Jewish population in Palestine had risen to over 60,000, with around 33,000 of these being recent settlers.
As a result of a mutual defense treaty that the Ottoman Empire made with Germany
, during World War I
the Ottoman Empire
joined the Central Powers
and therefore the Ottoman Empire was now embroiled in a conflict with Great Britain
and France
. The possibility of releasing Palestine from the control of the Ottoman Empire led the Jewish population and the Arab population in Palestine to support the alignment of the United Kingdom, France, and Russia
during World War I. In 1915, the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
was formed as an agreement with Arab leaders to grant sovereignty to Arab lands under Ottoman control to form an Arab state in exchange for the Great Arab Revolt
against the Ottomans. However, the Balfour Declaration
in 1917 proposed to "favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, but that nothing should be done to prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine." In 1916, the Anglo-French Sykes-Picot Agreement
allocated to the British Empire the area of present day Jordan
, the area of present day Israel
and the West Bank
, and the area of present day Iraq
. The Balfour Declaration was seen by Jewish nationalists as the cornerstone of a future Jewish homeland on both sides of the Jordan River, but increased the concerns of the Arab population in the Palestine region.
In 1917, the British succeeded in defeating the Ottoman Turkish forces and occupied the Palestine region. The land remained under British military administration
for the remainder of the war.
On January 3, 1919, future president of the World Zionist Organization
Chaim Weizmann
and the future King Faisal I of Iraq
signed the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement
for Arab
-Jewish cooperation in the Middle East
in which Faisal conditionally accepted the Balfour Declaration based on the fulfillment of British wartime promises of development of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Faisal's agreement with Weizmann led the Palestinian Arab population to reject the Syrian-Arab-Nationalist movement led by Faisal (in which many previously placed their hopes) and instead to agitate for Palestine to become a separate state with an Arab majority.
At the 1919 Paris Peace Conference
and Treaty of Versailles
, Turkey's loss of its Middle East Empire was formalized.
and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire
, in April 1920 the Allied Supreme Council meeting at San Remo
granted to Britain the mandates for Palestine
and Transjordan
(the territories that include the area of present day Israel
, Jordan
, West Bank
and the Gaza Strip
), endorsing the terms of the Balfour Declaration. In August 1920, this was officially acknowledged in the Treaty of Sèvres
. Both Zionist and Arab representatives attended the conference, where they met and signed an agreement to cooperate. The agreement was never implemented. The borders and terms under which the mandate was to be held were not finalised until September 1922. Article 25 of the mandate specified that the eastern area (then known as Transjordan
or Transjordania) did not have to be subject to all parts of the Mandate, notably the provisions regarding a Jewish national home. This was used by the British as one rationale to establish an autonomous Arab state under the mandate, which it saw as at least partially fulfilling the undertakings in the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
. On 11 April 1921 the British passed administration of the eastern region of the British Mandate to the Hashemite
Arab dynasty from the Hejaz
region (a region located in present day Saudi Arabia
) and on 15 May 1923 recognized it as a state, thereby eliminating Jewish national aspirations on that part of the British Mandate of Palestine. The mandate over Transjordan ended on 22 May 1946 when the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan (later Jordan
) gained independence.
Palestinian nationalism
was marked by a reaction to the Zionist movement
and to Jewish settlement in Palestine as well as by a desire for self-determination by the Arab population in the region. Jewish immigration to Palestine continued to grow significantly during the period of the British Mandate in Palestine, mainly due to the growth of anti-Semitism in Europe. Between 1919 and 1926, 90,000 immigrants arrived in Palestine because of the anti-Semitic manifestations, such as the pogroms in Ukraine
in which 100,000 Jews were killed. Some of these immigrants were absorbed in Jewish communities established on lands purchased legally by Zionist agencies from absentee landlords. In some cases, a large acquisition of lands, from absentee landlords, led to the replacement of the fellah
in tenant farmer
s with European Jewish settlers, causing Palestinian Arabs to feel dispossessed. Jewish immigration to Palestine was especially significant after the rise of the Nazis to power in Germany
, following which the Jewish population in Palestine doubled.
The Arab population in Palestine opposed the increase of the Jewish population because they perceived the massive influx of Jewish immigrants as a real threat to their national identity and to their attribution to the surrounding Arabic countries. Following this, during the 1920s relations between the Jewish and Arab populations deteriorated and the hostility between the two groups intensified. The Arab population of the Palestine region who opposed the Yishuv
and the British Pro-Zionist policies began to use violence
and terror
against the Jewish population. Arab gangs committed terrorism and murder against Jewish convoys and Jewish residents.
From 1920 to 1948 the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem
Mohammad Amin al-Husayni
became the leader of the Palestinian Arab movement
and played a key role in inciting religious riots against the Jewish population in Palestine. The Mufti stirred religious passions against Jews by alleging that Jews were seeking to rebuild the Jewish Temple
on the site of the Dome of the Rock
and Al-Aqsa Mosque
. He tried to gain control of the Western Wall
(the Kotel), saying that it was sacred to the Muslims.
The first major riots against the Jewish population in Palestine were the Jaffa riots
in 1921. As a result of the Jaffa riots, the Haganah
was founded as a defense force for the Jewish population of the British Mandate for Palestine. Religious tension over the Kotel
and the escalation of the tensions between the Arab and Jewish populations led to the 1929 Palestine riots
. In these religious-nationalist riots, Jews were massacred in Hebron
. Devastation also took place in Safed
and Jerusalem. In 1936, as Europe was preparing for war, the Supreme Muslim Council
in Palestine, led by Amin al-Husayni, instigated the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine in which Palestinian Arabs rioted and murdered Jews in various cities. In 1937 Amin al-Husayni, who was wanted by the British, fled Palestine and took refuge successively in Lebanon, Iraq, Italy and finally Nazi Germany
.
The British responded to the outbreaks of violence with the Haycraft Commission of Inquiry
(1921), the Shaw Report
(1930), the Peel Commission of 1936-1937, the Woodhead Commission
(1938) and the White Paper of 1939
.
The Peel Commission of 1937 was the first to propose a two-state solution
to the conflict, whereby Palestine would be divided into two states: one Arab state and one Jewish state. The Jewish state would include the coastal plain
, Jezreel Valley
, Beit She'an and the Galilee
, while the and Arab state would include Transjordan
, Judea and Samaria
, the Jordan Valley
, and the Negev
. The Jewish leadership in Palestine had differences of opinion regarding the proposal of the Peel Commission. The Arab leadership in Palestine rejected the conclusions and refused to share any land in Palestine with the Jewish population. The rejection of the Peel Commission's proposal by both parties led to the establishment of the Woodhead Commission
, which rejected the non-applicable proposal of the Peel Commission.
In May 1939 the British government released a new policy paper
which sought to implement a one-state solution in Palestine, significantly reduced the number of Jewish immigrants allowed to enter Palestine by establishing a quota for Jewish immigration which was set by the British government in the short-term and which would be set by the Arab leadership in the long-term. The quota also placed restrictions on the rights of Jews to buy land from Arabs, in an attempt to limit the socio-political damage. These restrictions remained until the end of the mandate period, a period which occurred in parallel with World War II
and the Holocaust, during which many Jewish refugees tried to escape from Europe. As a result, during the 1930s and 1940s the leadership of the Yishuv
arranged a couple of illegal immigration
waves of Jews to the British Mandate of Palestine
(see also Aliyah Bet), which caused even more tensions in the region.
Ben-Gurion said he wanted to "concentrate the masses of our people in this country [Palestine] and its environs." When he proposed accepting the Peel proposals in 1937, which included a Jewish state in part of Palestine, Ben-Gurion told the twentieth Zionist Congress, "The Jewish state now being offered to us is not the Zionist objective. [...] But it can serve as a decisive stage along the path to greater Zionist implementation. It will consolidate in Palestine, within the shortest possible time, the real Jewish force, which will lead us to our historic goal. In a discussion in the Jewish Agency he said that he wanted a Jewish-Arab agreement "on the assumption that after we become a strong force, as a result of the creation of the state, we shall abolish partition and expand to the whole of Palestine."
During the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine ties were made between the Arab leadership in Palestine and the Nazi movement
in Germany. These connections led to cooperation between the Palestinian national movement and the Axis powers
later on during World War II
. In May 1941 Amin al-Husayni issued a fatwa
for a holy war
against Britain. In 1941 during a meeting with Adolf Hitler
Amin al-Husayni asked Germany to oppose, as part of the Arab struggle for independence, the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine. He received a promise from Hitler that Germany would eliminate the existing Jewish foundations in Palestine after the Germans had gained victory in the war. During the war Amin al-Husayni joined the Nazis, serving with the Waffen SS in Bosnia
and Yugoslavia. In addition, during the war a joint Palestinian-Nazi military operation
was held in the region of Palestine. These factors caused a deterioration in the relations between the Palestinian leadership and the British, which turned to collaborate with the Yeshuv during the period known as the 200 days of dread.
After World War II, as a result of the British policies, the Jewish resistance organizations united and established the Jewish Resistance Movement
which coordinated armed attacks against the British military which took place between 1945 and 1946. Following the King David Hotel bombing
(in which the Irgun
blew up the King David Hotel
in Jerusalem, the headquarters of the British administration), which shocked the public because of the deaths of many innocent civilians, the Jewish Resistance Movement was disassembled in 1946. The leadership of the Yishuv decided instead to concentrate their efforts on the illegal immigration and began to organize a massive immigration of European Jewish refugees to Palestine using small boats operating in secrecy, many of which were captured at sea by the British and imprisoned in camps on Cyprus. About 70,000 Jews were brought to Palestine in this way in 1946 and 1947. Details of the Holocaust
had a major effect on the situation in Palestine and propelled large support for the Zionist cause.
The newly formed United Nations
recommended that Mandatory Palestine be split into three parts—a Jewish State with a majority Jewish population, an Arab State with a majority Arab population, and an International Zone comprising Jerusalem and the surrounding area where the Jewish and Arab populations would be roughly equal. Resolution 181 decided the size of land allotted to each party. The Jewish State was supposed to be roughly 5700 square miles (14,762.9 km²) in size and was supposed to contain a sizable Arab minority population. The Arab state was supposed to comprise roughly 4300 square miles (11,136.9 km²) and would contain a tiny Jewish population. Neither state would be contiguous. Jerusalem and Bethlehem
were to be put under the control of the United Nations. Neither side was satisfied with the Partition Plan. The Jews disliked losing Jerusalem—which had a majority Jewish population at that time—and worried about the tenability of a noncontiguous state. However, most of the Jews in Palestine accepted the plan, and the Jewish Agency (the de facto government of the Yishuv
) campaigned fervently for its approval. The more extreme Jewish groups, such as the Irgun
, rejected the plan. The Arab leadership argued that it violated the rights of the majority of the people in Palestine, which at the time was 67% non-Jewish (1,237,000) and 33% Jewish (608,000). Arab leaders also argued a large number of Arabs would be trapped in the Jewish State. Every major Arab leader objected in principle to the right of the Jews to an independent state in Palestine, reflecting the policies of the Arab League.
The UN General Assembly voted on the Partition Plan on November 29, 1947. Thirty-three states voted in favor of the Plan, while 13 countries opposed it. Ten countries abstained from the vote. The Yishuv accepted the plan, but the Arabs in Palestine and the surrounding Arab states rejected the plan. The Arab countries (all of which had opposed the plan) proposed to query the International Court of Justice
on the competence of the General Assembly to partition a country against the wishes of the majority of its inhabitants, but were again defeated. The division was to take effect on the date of British withdrawal from the territory (May 15, 1948).
The approval of the plan sparked attacks carried out by Arab irregulars against the Jewish population in Palestine. Fighting began almost as soon as the plan was approved. Shooting, stoning, and rioting continued apace in the following days. The consulates of Poland
and Sweden
, both of whose governments had voted for partition, were attacked. Bombs were thrown into cafes, Molotov cocktail
s were hurled at shops, and a synagogue
was set on fire. As the British evacuation from the region progressed, the violence became more prevalent. Murders, reprisals, and counter-reprisals came fast on each others' heels, resulting in dozens of victims killed on both sides in the process. The sanguinary impasse persisted as no force intervened to put a stop to the escalating cycles of violence. During the first two months of the war, about 1,000 people were killed and 2,000 injured. By the end of March, the figure had risen to 2,000 dead and 4,000 wounded.
On May 14, one day before the British Mandate expired, David Ben-Gurion
declared the establishment of the State of Israel
. The declaration of the state referred to the decision of the UN General Assembly as a legal justification for the establishment of the state. In accordance with the UN Resolution, the Declaration promised that the State of Israel would ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex, and guaranteed freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture.
The termination of the British mandate over Palestine and the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel sparked a full-scale war (1948 Arab–Israeli War) which erupted after May 14, 1948. On 15–16 May, the four armies of Jordan
, Syria
, Egypt
and Iraq
invaded the newly self-declared state followed not long after by units from Lebanon
. While Arab commanders ordered villagers to evacuate for military purposes in isolated areas, there is no evidence that the Arab leadership made a blanket call for evacuation and in fact most urged Palestinians to stay in their homes. Assaults by the Haganah
on major Arab population centers like Jaffa and Haifa as well as expulsions carried out by groups like the Irgun
and Lehi
such as at Deir Yassin
and Lydda led to the exodus of large portions of the Arab masses. Factors such as the earlier flight by the Palestinian elite and the psychological effects of Jewish atrocities (stories which both sides propagated) also played important roles in the Palestinian flight.
The war resulted in an Israeli victory, with Israel annexing territory beyond the partition borders for a proposed Jewish state and into the borders for a proposed Palestinian Arab state. Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Egypt signed the 1949 Armistice Agreements
with Israel. The remaining territories, the Gaza Strip
and the West Bank
, were occupied by Egypt
and Transjordan
, respectively. Jordan also annexed East Jerusalem
while Israel administered west Jerusalem
. In 1950, The West Bank was unilaterally incorporated into Jordan.
Due to the 1948 Arab–Israeli war, about 856,000 Jews fled or were expelled
from their homes in Arab countries and most were forced to abandon their property. Jews from Libya
, Iraq
, Yemen
, Syria
, Lebanon
and North Africa
left due to physical and political insecurity, with the majority being forced to abandon their properties. 260,000 reached Israel in 1948-1951, 600,000 by 1972. Additionally, due to the war, between 700,000 and 750,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled
from the area that became Israel and became what is known today as the Palestinian refugee
s. The Palestinian refugees were not allowed to return to Israel and most of the neighboring Arab states, with the exception of Transjordan
, denied granting them - or their descendants - citizenship. In 1949, Israel offered to allow some members of families that had been separated during the war to return, to release refugee accounts frozen in Israeli banks, and to repatriate 100,000 refugees. The Arab states rejected this compromise, at least in part because they were unwilling to take any action that might be construed as recognition of Israel. As of today, most of them still live in refugee camps and the question of how their situation should be resolved remains one of the main issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
While most of the Palestinian Arab population that remained in Israel after the war was granted an Israeli citizenship
, Arab Israelis were subject to martial law up to 1966. A variety of legal measures facilitated the transfer of land abandoned by Arabs to state ownership. In 1966, security restrictions placed on Arab citizens of Israel were lifted completely, the government set about dismantling most of the discriminatory laws, and Arab citizens of Israel
were granted the same rights as Jewish citizens.
After the 1948 war, some of the Palestinian refugees who lived in camps in the West Bank within Jordan
ian controlled territory, the Gaza Strip Egypt
ian controlled territory and Syria
tried to return by infiltration
into Israeli territory, and some of those Palestinians who had remained in Israel were declared infiltrators by Israel and were deported. Ben-Gurion emphatically rejected the return of refugees in the Israeli Cabinet decision of June 1948 reiterated in a letter to the UN of August 2, 1949 containing the text of a statement made by Moshe Sharett on August 1, 1948 where the basic attitude of the Israeli Government was that a solution must be sought, not through the return of the refugees to Israel, but through the resettlement of the Palestinian Arab refugee population in other states.
The buildup of the conflict along the Jordanian border went through gradual stages. Building up from small Israeli raids with Palestinian counter raids through to the major Israeli incursions, Beit Jalla
, Qibya massacre
, Ma'ale Akrabim massacre
, Nahalin reprisal raid, Rantis and Falameh reprisal raid. The Lavon Affair
led to a deeper distrust of Jews in Egypt, from whose community key agents in the operation had been recruited, and as a result Egypt retaliated against its Jewish community. It was only after Israel's raid on an Egyptian military outpost in Gaza in February 1955 that the Egyptian government began to actively sponsor, train, and arm the Palestinian volunteers from Gaza as Fedayeen
units which committed raids into Israel.
Following years of attacks by the Palestinian Fedayeen, the Palestine Liberation Organization
(PLO) was established in 1964. Its goal was the liberation of Palestine through armed struggle. The original PLO Charter stated the desire for a Palestinian state established within the entirety of the borders of the British mandate
prior to the 1948 war (i.e. the current boundaries of the State of Israel) and said it is a "national duty ... to purge the Zionist presence from Palestine." It also called for a right of return
and self-determination
for Palestinians.
An Israeli raid on an Egyptian military outpost in Gaza in February 1955, resulted in 37 Egyptian soldiers killed. Soon after, the Egyptian government began to actively sponsor, train and arm the Palestinian volunteers from Gaza as Fedayeen
units, which committed raids into Israel. In 1967, after years of Egyptian-aided Palestinian Fedayeen attacks stemming from the Gaza Strip
, the Egyptian expulsion of UNEF, Egypt's amassing of an increased number of troops in the Sinai Peninsula
, and several other threatening gestures from other neighboring Arab nations, Israel launched a preemptive strike
against Egypt. The strike and the operations that followed became known as the Six-Day War
. At the end of the Six-Day War, Israel had captured, among other territories, the Gaza Strip
from Egypt and the West Bank
from Jordan (including East Jerusalem
). Shortly after Israel seized control over Jerusalem, Israel asserted sovereignty over the entire city of Jerusalem and the Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem were given a permanent resident status in Israel. The status of the city as Israel's capital and the disputed status
of the West Bank and Gaza Strip created a new set of contentious issues in the conflict. This meant that Israel controlled the entire former British mandate of Palestine that under the Balfour Declaration was supposed to allow a Jewish state within its borders. The fact that Palestine was never a sovereign state gave the Israelis subsequent support for their argument that they did not occupy these territories, and therefore did not break the Fourth Accord of the Geneva Conventions
and international law. Following the Six-Day War, the United Nations Security Council
issued a resolution
with a clause affirming "the necessity ... for achieving a just settlement of the refugee problem," referring to the Palestinian refugee
problem.
. In July 1968 armed, non-state actors such as Fatah
and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
achieved the majority of the Palestinian National Council votes, and on February 3, 1969, at the Palestinian National Council
in Cairo
, the leader of the Fatah, Yasser Arafat
was elected as the chairman of the PLO. From the start, the organization used armed violence against civilian and military targets in the conflict with Israel. The PLO tried to take over the population of the West Bank, but the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) deported them into Jordan where they began to act against the Jordanian rule (Palestinians in Jordan comprised about 70% of the total population, which mostly consisted of refugees) and from there attacked Israel numerous times, using the infiltration of terrorists and shooting Katyusha rockets. This led to retaliation from Israel.
In the late 1960s, tensions between Palestinians and the Jordanian government increased greatly. In September 1970
a military struggle was held between Jordan and the Palestinian armed organizations. King Hussein of Jordan
was able to quell the Palestinian revolt. During the armed conflict, tens of thousands of people were killed, the vast majority of whom were Palestinians. The fighting continued until July 1971 with the expulsion of the PLO to Lebanon. A large number of Palestinians immigrated to Lebanon after Black September and joined the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees already there. The center of PLO activity then shifted to Lebanon
, where the 1969 Cairo agreement
gave the Palestinians autonomy within the south of the country. The area controlled by the PLO became known by the international press and locals as "Fatahland" and contributed to the 1975-1990 Lebanese Civil War
.
The PLO took advantage of its control southern Lebanon in order to launch Katyusha rocket attacks at Galilee villages and execute terror attacks on the northern border. At the beginning of the 1970s the Palestinian terror organizations, headed by the PLO and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
waged an international campaign against Israelis, primarily in Europe. In an attempt to publicize the Palestinian cause, frustrated Palestinian guerrilla groups in Lebanon
attacked Israeli civilian 'targets' like school
s, bus
es and apartment blocks, with occasional attacks abroad—for example, at embassies or airports—and with the hijacking of airliners. The peak of the Palestinian terrorism wave against Israelis occurred in 1972 and took form in several acts of terrorism, most prominently the Sabena Flight 572 hijacking, the Lod Airport massacre
and the Munich massacre
.
The Munich massacre was perpetrated during the 1972 Summer Olympics
in Munich
. 11 members of the Israeli team were taken hostage by Palestinian terrorists
. A botched German rescue attempt led to the death of all 11 Israeli athletes and coaches. Five of the terrorists were shot and three survived unharmed. The three surviving Palestinians were released without charge by the German authorities a month later. The Israeli government responded with an assassination campaign
against the organizers and a raid on the PLO headquarters in Lebanon. Other notable events include the hijacking of several civilian airliners, the Savoy Hotel attack
, the Zion Square explosive refrigerator
and the Coastal Road massacre
. During the 1970s and the early 1980s, Israel suffered attacks from PLO bases in Lebanon, such as the Avivim school bus massacre
in 1970 and the Ma'alot massacre
in 1974 in which Palestinians attacked a school in Ma'alot killing twenty-two children.
In 1973 The Syrian and Egyptian armies launched the Yom Kippur War
, a well-planned surprise attack against Israel. The Egyptians and Syrians advanced during the first 24–48 hours, after which momentum began to swing in Israel's favor. Eventually a Disengagement of Forces agreement was signed between the parties and a ceasefire took effect that ended the war. The Yom Kippur War paved the way for the Camp David Accords
in 1978, which set a precedent for future peace negotiations.
In 1974 the PLO adopted the Ten Point Program
, which called for the establishment of a national authority "over every part of Palestinian territory that is liberated" with the aim of "completing the liberation of all Palestinian territory". The program implied that the liberation of Palestine may be partial (at least, at some stage), and though it emphasized armed struggle, it did not exclude other means. This allowed the PLO to engage in diplomatic channels, and provided validation for future compromises made by the Palestinian leadership.
In the mid-1970s many attempts were made by Gush Emunim
movement to establish outposts or resettle former Jewish areas in the West Bank
and Gaza
Strip. Initially the Israeli government forcibly disbanded these settlements. However, in the absence of peace talks to determine the future of these and other occupied territories, Israel ceased enforcement of the original ban on settlement, which led to the founding of the first settlements in these regions.
In July 1976, an Air France
plane carrying 260 people was hijacked by Palestinian
and German
terrorists and flown to Uganda. There, the Germans separated the Jewish passengers from the Non-Jewish passengers, releasing the non-Jews. The hijackers threatened to kill the remaining 100-odd Jewish passengers (and the French crew who had refused to leave). Israel responded with a rescue operation
in which the kidnapped Jews were freed.
The rise of the Likud party to the government in 1977
led to the establishment of a large number of Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
On March 11, 1978, a force of nearly a dozen armed Palestinian terrorists landed their boats near a major coastal road in Israel. There they hijacked a bus
and sprayed gunfire inside and at passing vehicles, killing thirty-seven civilians. In response, the IDF launched Operation Litani three days later, with the goal of taking control of Southern Lebanon up to the Litani River. The IDF achieved this goal, and the PLO withdrew to the north into Beirut. After Israel withdrew from Lebanon, Fatah forces resumed firing rockets into the Galilee region of Israel. During the years following operation Litani, many diplomatic efforts were made which tried to end the war on the Israeli-Lebanese border, including the effort of Philip Habib
, the emissary of Ronald Reagan
who in the summer of 1981 managed to arrange a lasting cease-fire between Israel and the PLO which lasted about a year.
Israel ended the ceasefire after an assassination attempt on the Israeli Ambassador in the Britain, Shlomo Argov, in mid-1982 (which was made by Abu Nidal's organization that was ostracized from the PLO). This led Israel to invade Lebanon in the 1982 Lebanon War
on June 6, 1982 with the aim to protect the North of Israel from terrorist attacks. IDF invaded Lebanon and even occupied Beirut. To end the siege, the US and European governments brokered an agreement guaranteeing safe passage for Arafat and Fatah – guarded by a multinational force – to exile in Tunis
. During the war, Israeli allied Phalangist Christian Arab militias carried out the bloody Sabra and Shatila Massacre
in which 700-3,500 unarmed Palestinians were killed by the Phalangist militias while the Israeli troops surrounded the camps with tanks and checkpoints, monitoring entrances and exits. For its involvement in the Lebanese war and its indirect responsibility for the Sabra and Shatila Massacre, Israel was heavily criticized, including from within. An Israeli Commission of Inquiry found that Israeli military personnel, among them defense minister and future prime minister
Ariel Sharon
, had several times become aware that a massacre was in progress without taking serious steps to stop it, leading to his resignation as Israel's Defense Minister. In June 1985, Israel withdrew most of its troops from Lebanon, leaving a residual Israeli force and an Israeli-supported militia
in southern Lebanon as a "security zone
" and buffer against attacks on its northern territory.
Meanwhile, the PLO led an international diplomatic front against Israel in Tunis. Following the wave of terror attacks including the murder on MS Achille Lauro
in October 1985, Israel bombed the PLO commandership in Tunis during Operation Wooden Leg
.
The continuing establishment of the Israeli settlements and continuing Israeli occupation in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip led to the first Palestinian Intifada
(uprising) in December 1987, which lasted until the Madrid Conference of 1991
, despite Israeli attempts to suppress it. It was a partially spontaneous uprising, but by January 1988, it was already under the direction from the PLO headquarters in Tunis, which carried out ongoing terrorist attacks targeting Israeli civilians. The riots escalated daily throughout the territories and were especially severe in the Gaza Strip. The Intifada was renowned by its stone-throwing demonstrations by youth against the heavily-armed Israeli Defense Forces. Over the course of the First Intifada, a total 1,551 Palestinians and 422 Israelis were killed. In 1987, Ahmed Yassin
co-founded Hamas
with Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi
. Since then, Hamas has been involved in what it calls "armed resistance" against Israel, which includes mainly terrorist acts against Israeli civilian population.
On November 15, 1988, a year after the outbreak of the first intifada, the PLO declared the establishment of the Palestinian state in Algiers
. The proclaimed "State of Palestine" is not and has never actually been an independent state, as it has never had sovereignty over any territory in history. The declaration is generally interpreted to have recognized Israel within its pre-1967 boundaries, and its right to exist. Following this declaration, the United States and many other countries recognized the PLO.
Prior to the Gulf War
in 1990-91, Arafat supported Saddam Hussein
's invasion of Kuwait
and opposed the US-led coalition attack on Iraq. Arafat's decision also severed relations with Egypt
and many of the oil
-producing Arab states that supported the US-led coalition. Many in the US also used Arafat's position as a reason to disregard his claims to being a partner for peace. After the end of hostilities, many Arab states that backed the coalition cut off funds to the PLO and bringing the PLO to the brink of crisis.
In the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War, the coalition's victory in the Gulf War opened a new opportunity to advance the peace process. The U.S launched a diplomatic initiative in cooperation with Russia which resulted in the October 1991 Madrid peace conference
. The conference was hosted by the government of Spain and co-sponsored by the USA and the USSR. The Madrid peace conference was an early attempt by the international community to start a peace process
through negotiations involving Israel
and the Palestinians, as well as Arab countries including Syria
, Lebanon
, and Jordan
. The Palestinian team, due to Israeli objections, was initially formally a part of a joint Palestinian-Jordanian delegation and consisted of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza without open PLO associations.
In January 1993, Israeli and Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) negotiators began secret negotiations in Oslo, Norway
. On September 9, 1993, Yasser Arafat sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
, stating that the PLO officially recognized Israel's right to exist and officially renouncing terrorism
. On September 13, Arafat and Rabin signed a Declaration of Principles in Washington, D.C.
, on the basis of the negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian teams in Oslo, Norway. The declaration was a major conceptual breakthrough achieved outside of the Madrid framework, which specifically barred foreign-residing PLO leaders from the negotiation process. After this, a long process of negotiation known as the "Oslo peace process" began.
During the Oslo peace process throughout the 1990s, as both sides obligated to work towards a two-state solution
, Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization negotiated, unsuccessfully, and tried to reach to a mutual agreement.
One of the main features of the Oslo Peace Process was the establishment of the autonomous governmental authority, the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its associated governing institutions to administer Palestinian communities in the Gaza Strip
and the West Bank
. During the Oslo peace process throughout the 1990s, the Palestinian Authority was ceded authority from Israel over various regions of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. This process gave it governmental and economic authority over many Palestinian communities. It also gave the PA many of the components of a modern government and society, including a Palestinian police force, legislature, and other institutions. In return for these concessions, the Palestinian Authority was asked to promote tolerance for Israel within Palestinian society, and acceptance of Israel's right to exist.
One of the most contentious issues surrounding this peace process is whether the PA in fact met its obligations to promote tolerance. There is specific evidence that the PA actively funded and supported many terrorist activities and groups. Palestinians stated that any terrorist acts stemmed from Israel not having conceded enough land and political power to win support among ordinary Palestinians. Israelis stated that these acts of terrorism were because the PA openly encouraged and supported incitement against Israel, and terrorism. There was increasing disagreement and debate among Israelis about the amount of positive results and benefits produced by the Oslo process. Supporters said it was producing advances leading to a viable Palestinian society which would promote genuine acceptance of Israel. Opponents said that concessions were merely emboldening extremist elements to commit more violence in order to win further concessions, without providing any real acceptance, benefits, goodwill, or reconciliation for Israel in return.
In February 1994 during the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre
a follower of the Kach
movement killed 25 Palestinian-Arabs at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron
. As an act of revenge to the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre, in April 1994, Hamas launched suicide bomber attacks targeting Israeli civilian population in many locations throughout Israel, however, once the Hamas started to the use these means it became a regular pattern of action against Israel.
On September 28, 1995, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat
signed the Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in Washington. the agreement marked the conclusion of the first stage of negotiations between Israel and the PLO. The agreement allowed the PLO leadership to relocate to the occupied territories and granted autonomy to the Palestinians with talks to follow regarding final status. In return the Palestinians recognized Israel's right to exist and promised to abstain from use of terror. However the agreement was opposed by the Hamas and other Palestinian factions, whom at this point were already committing suicide bomber attacks throughout Israel.
Tensions in Israel, arising from the continuation of terrorism and anger at loss of territory, led to the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin
by a right-wing Jewish radical on November 4, 1995. Upon Rabin's assassination, the Israeli prime minister's post was filled by Shimon Peres
. Peres continued Rabin's policies in supporting the peace process.
In 1996, increasing Israeli doubts about the peace process, led to Benjamin Netanyahu
of the Likud Party winning the election, mainly due to his promise to use a more rigid line in the negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. Netanyahu raised many questions about many central premises of the Oslo process. One of his main points was disagreement with the Oslo premise that the negotiations should proceed in stages, meaning that concessions should be made to Palestinians before any resolution was reached on major issues, such as the status of Jerusalem, and the amending of the Palestinian National Charter. Oslo supporters had claimed that the multi-stage approach would build goodwill among Palestinians and would propel them to seek reconciliation when these major issues were raised in later stages. Netanyahu said that these concessions only gave encouragement to extremist elements, without receiving any tangible gestures in return. He called for tangible gestures of Palestinian goodwill in return for Israeli concessions.
In January 1996 Israel assassinated the chief bombmaker of Hamas, Yahya Ayyash
. In reaction to this, Hamas carried out a wave of suicide attacks in Israel. Following these attacks the Palestinian Authority began to act against the Hamas and oppress their activity.
In January 1997 Netanyahu signed the Hebron Protocol with the Palestinian Authority, resulting in the redeployment of Israeli forces in Hebron
and the turnover of civilian authority in much of the area to the Palestinian Authority.
In 1997, after two deadly suicide attacks in Jerusalem by the Hamas, Israeli secret agents were sent to Jordan to eliminate the political head of the Department of Hamas, Khaled Mashal
, using a special poison (See the assassination attempt on Khaled Mashal). Nevertheless, the operation entangled and the secret agents were captured. In return of their release Israel sent over the medicine which saved his life and freed a dozen of Palestinian prisoners including Sheikh Ahmad Yassin. This release and the increase of the security forces of the Palestinian Authority, led to a cease-fire in the suicide attacks until the outbreak of the Second Intifada.
Eventually, the lack of progress of the peace process led to new negotiations, which produced the Wye River Memorandum
, which detailed the steps to be taken by the Israeli government and Palestinian Authority to implement the earlier Interim Agreement of 1995. It was signed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, and on November 17, 1998, Israel's 120 member parliament, the Knesset
, approved the Wye River Memorandum by a vote of 75-19.
In 1999, Ehud Barak
was elected prime minister. Barak continued Rabin's policies in supporting the peace process. In 2000, 18 years after Israel occupied Southern Lebanon in the 1982 Lebanon War
, the occupation ended as Israel unilaterally withdrew its remaining forces from the "security zone
" in southern Lebanon.
As the violence increased with little hope for diplomacy, in July 2000 the Camp David 2000 Summit
was held which was aimed at reaching a "final status" agreement. The summit collapsed after Yasser Arafat would not accept a proposal drafted by American and Israeli negotiators. Barak was prepared to offer the entire Gaza Strip, a Palestinian capital in a part of East Jerusalem, 73% of the West Bank (excluding eastern Jerusalem) raising to 90-94% after 10–25 years, and financial reparations for Palestinian refugees for peace. Arafat turned down the offer without making a counter-offer.
After the signing of the Oslo Accords failed to bring about a Palestinian state, in September 2000 the Second Intifada (uprising) broke out, a period of intensified Palestinian-Israeli violence, which has been taking place until the present day. The Second Intifada has caused thousands of victims on both sides, both among combatants and among civilians, and has been more deadly than the first Intifada. Many Palestinians consider the Second Intifada to be a legitimate war of national liberation against foreign occupation, whereas many Israelis consider it to be a terrorist campaign.
The failure of the peace process and the eruption of the Second Intifada, which included increased Palestinian terror attacks being made against Israeli civilians, led much of the Israeli public and political leadership to lose confidence in the Palestinian Authority as a peace partner. Due to an increase in terror attacks during the Second Intifada, mainly carried out by Hamas against Israeli civilians, Israeli troops began conducting regular raids and arrests inside the West Bank. In addition, Israel increased the selective assassinations, initially aimed at active terrorist fighters and later on aimed at the terrorist leadership as well, including Sheikh Ahmad Yassin. This policy spurred controversy within Israel and worldwide.
After the collapse of Barak's government, Ariel Sharon
was elected Prime Minister on February 6, 2001. Sharon invited the Israeli Labor Party into the coalition to shore up support for the disengagement plan. Due to the deterioration of the political situation, he refused to continue negotiations with the Palestinian Authority at the Taba Summit
, or under any aspect of the Oslo Accords.
At the Beirut Summit in 2002, the Arab League
proposed an alternative political plan
aimed at ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but it was rejected by Israel (mostly because it demanded a Palestinian right of return
).
Following a period of relative restraint on the part of Israel, after a lethal suicide attack in the Park Hotel in Netanya
which happened on March 27, 2002, in which 30 Jews were murdered, Sharon ordered Operation Defensive Shield
, a large-scale military operation carried out by the Israel Defense Forces
between March 29 until May 10, 2002 in Palestinian cities in the West Bank. The operation contributed significantly to the reduction of Palestinian terror attacks in Israel.
As part of the efforts to fight Palestinian terrorism, in June 2002, Israel began construction of the West Bank Fence
along the Green Line
border. After the barrier went up, Palestinian suicide bombings and other attacks across Israel dropped by 90%. However, this barrier became a major issue of contention between the two sides.
Following the severe economic and security situation in Israel, the Likud Party headed by Ariel Sharon won the Israeli elections in January 2003 in an overwhelming victory. The elections led to a temporary truce between Israel and the Palestinians and to the Aquba summit in the May 2003 in which Sharon endorsed the Road Map for Peace
put forth by the United States, European Union
, and Russia, which opened a dialogue with Mahmud Abbas, and announced his commitment to the creation of a Palestinian state in the future. Following the endorsing of the Road Map, the Quartet on the Middle East
was established, consisting of representatives from the United States, Russia, EU and UN as an intermediary body of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
On March 19, 2003, Arafat appointed Mahmoud Abbas
as the Prime Minister. The rest of Abbas's term as prime minister continued to be characterized by numerous conflicts between him and Arafat over the distribution of power between the two. The United States and Israel accused Arafat of constantly undermining Abbas and his government. Continuing violence and Israeli "target killings" of known terrorists forced Abbas to pledge a crackdown in order to uphold the Palestinian Authority's side of the Road Map for Peace. This led to a power struggle with Arafat over control of the Palestinian security services; Arafat refused to release control to Abbas, thus preventing him from using them in a crackdown on militants. Abbas resigned from the post of Prime Minister in October 2003, citing lack of support from Israel and the United States as well as "internal incitement" against his government.
In the end of 2003, Sharon embarked on a course of unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip
, while maintaining control of its coastline and airspace. Sharon's plan has been welcomed by both the Palestinian Authority and Israel's left wing as a step towards a final peace settlement. However, it has been greeted with opposition from within his own Likud party and from other right-wing Israelis, on national security, military, and religious grounds. In January 2005, Sharon formed a national unity government
that included representatives of Likud, Labor, and Meimad and Degel HaTorah as "out-of-government" supporters without any seats in the government (United Torah Judaism parties usually reject having ministerial offices as a policy). Between 16 and 30 August 2005, Sharon controversially expelled 9,480 Jewish settlers from 21 settlements in Gaza and four settlements in the northern West Bank. The disengagement plan was implemented in September 2005. Following the withdrawal, the Israeli town of Sderot
and other Israeli communities near the Gaza strip became subject to constant shelling
and mortar
bomb attacks from Gaza with only minimal Israeli response.
Following the November 2004 death of long-time Fatah party PLO leader and PA chairman Yasser Arafat
, Fatah member Mahmoud Abbas was elected President of the Palestinian National Authority
in January 2005.
The strengthening of the Hamas organization amongst the Palestinians, the gradual disintegration of the Palestinian Authority and the Fatah organization, and the Israeli disengagement plan and especially the death of Yasser Arafat led to the policy change of the Hamas movement in early 2005 which started putting greater emphasis to its political characteristics.
In 2006 Palestinian legislative elections
Hamas won a majority in the Palestinian Legislative Council
, prompting the United States and many European countries to cut off all funds to the Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, insisting that the Hamas must recognize Israel, renounce violence and accept previous peace pacts. Israel refused to negotiate with Hamas, since Hamas never renounced its beliefs that Israel has no right to exist and that the entire State of Israel is an illegal occupation which must be wiped out.
In June 2006 during a well-planned operation, Hamas managed to cross the border from Gaza, attack an Israeli tank, kill two IDF soldiers and kidnap wounded Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit
back into the Gaza Strip. Following the incident and in response to numerous rocket firings by Hamas from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel, fighting broke out between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip (see 2006 Israel-Gaza conflict
).
In the summer of 2007 a Fatah–Hamas conflict
broke out, which eventually led Hamas taking control of the Gaza strip, which in practice divided the Palestinian Authority into two. Various forces affiliated with Fatah engaged in combat with Hamas, in numerous gun battles. Most Fatah leaders escaped to Egypt and the West Bank, while some were captured and killed. Fatah remained in control of the West Bank, and President Abbas formed a new governing coalition, which some critics of Fatah said subverts the Palestinian Constitution and excludes the majority government of Hamas.
In November 2007 the Annapolis Conference
was held. The conference marked the first time a two-state solution
was articulated as the mutually agreed-upon outline for addressing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The conference ended with the issuing of a joint statement from all parties.
A fragile six-month truce between Hamas and Israel
expired on December 19, 2008. Hamas and Israel could not agree on conditions to extend the truce. Hamas blamed Israel for not lifting the Gaza Strip blockade, and for an Israeli raid on a purported tunnel, crossing the border into the Gaza Strip from Israel on November 4, which it held constituted a serious breach of the truce. Israel accuses Hamas of violating the truce citing the frequent rocket and mortar attacks on Israeli cities.
The Israeli operation began with an intense bombardment of the Gaza Strip
, targeting Hamas bases, police training camps, police headquarters and offices. Civilian infrastructure, including mosques, houses, medical facilities and schools, were also attacked. Israel has said many of these buildings were used by combatants, and as storage spaces for weapons and rockets. Hamas intensified its rocket and mortar attacks against targets in Israel throughout the conflict, hitting previously untargeted cities such as Beersheba
and Ashdod. On January 3, 2009, the Israeli ground invasion began.
The operation resulted in the deaths of more than 1,300 Palestinians. The IDF released a report stating that the vast majority of the dead were Hamas militants. The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights
reported that 926 of the 1,417 dead had been civilians and non-combatants.
Since 2009, the Obama administration
has repeatedly pressured the Israeli government led by Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu
to freeze the growth of Israeli settlements in the West Bank
and reignite the peace process between Israel and the Palestinian people
. During President Obama's Cairo speech
on June 4, 2009 in which Obama addressed the Muslim world
Obama stated, among other things, that "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements". "This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop." Following Obama's Cairo speech Netanyahu immediately called a special government meeting. On June 14, ten days after Obama's Cairo speech, Netanyahu gave a speech at Bar-Ilan University in which he endorsed, for the first time, a "Demilitarized Palestinian State", after two months of refusing to commit to anything other than a self-ruling autonomy when coming into office. The speech was widely seen as a response to Obama's speech. Netanyahu stated that he would accept a Palestinian state if Jerusalem were to remain the united capital of Israel
, the Palestinians would have no army, and the Palestinians would give up their demand for a right of return
. He also claimed the right for a "natural growth" in the existing Jewish settlements
in the West Bank
while their permanent status is up to further negotiation. In general, the address represented a complete turnaround for his previously hawkish positions against the peace process. The overture was quickly rejected by Palestinian leaders such as Hamas
spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri
, who called the speech "racist".
On 25 November 2009, Israel imposed a 10-month construction freeze on all of its settlements in the West Bank. Israel's decision was widely seen as due to pressure from the Obama administration, which urged the sides to seize the opportunity to resume talks. In his announcement Netanyahu called the move "a painful step that will encourage the peace process" and urged the Palestinians to respond. However, the Palestinians rejected the call and refused to enter negotiations, despite Israeli appeals to do so. Eventually, on September 2, United States launched direct negotiations between Israel and the PA in Washington
. Nevertheless, soon afterwards, when Israeli partial moratorium on settlement construction in the West Bank was about to expire, the Palestinian leadership announced that they plan to leave the negotiations if the moratorium is not renewed. Israel state that it would not renew this gesture of goodwill and urged the Palestinian leadership to continue the negotiations. Later on Israel offered to renew the moratorium in exchange for a PA recognition of Israel as the national homeland of the Jewish people. This request was rejected by the Palestinians leadership.
During September 2011 the Palestinian Authority (PA) led a diplomatic campaign
aimed at getting the recognition of the 66th Session
as the UN in the State of Palestine
within the 1967 borders
with East Jerusalem
as its capital. On September 23 PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas delivered a harsh speech against Israel in the General Assembly of the United Nations in which he stated that the Palestinians would not recognize a Jewish state. That same day President Mahmoud Abbas
submitted a request to recognize the State of Palestine
as the 194th UN member to the Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
. The Security Council
has yet to vote on it. The decision has been labeled by the Israeli government as a unilateral step.
In October 2011, a deal was reached
between Israel and Hamas
, by which the kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit
would be released in exchange for 1,027 Palestinians and Arab-Israeli prisoners, of them 280 were sentenced to life in prison for planning and perpetrating various terror attacks against Israeli targets. The military Hamas
leader Ahmed Jabari was quoted later as confirming that the prisoners released as part of the deal were collectively responsible for the killing of 569 Israeli civilians.
populations in Palestine
, Israel
and the Palestinian territories
spaning through the last two centuries which has been taken from census
results and official documents which mention demographic composition. See Demographics of Israel
and Demographics of the Palestinian territories
for a more detailed overview of the current demographics.
Israeli-Palestinian conflict
The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is the ongoing conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. The conflict is wide-ranging, and the term is also used in reference to the earlier phases of the same conflict, between Jewish and Zionist yishuv and the Arab population living in Palestine under Ottoman or...
centers on conflicting, often mutually exclusive claims to the area called Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
by the Palestinians and the Land of Israel
Land of Israel
The Land of Israel is the Biblical name for the territory roughly corresponding to the area encompassed by the Southern Levant, also known as Canaan and Palestine, Promised Land and Holy Land. The belief that the area is a God-given homeland of the Jewish people is based on the narrative of the...
by Israeli Jews.
Historical overview
The historical overview below is divided into the main six time periods of the conflict which fundamentally differ from each other (see Periods of the conflict).National movements
Before World War IWorld War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, the Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
region, including Palestine, was under the control of the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
for nearly 400 years. Towards the end of the 19th century, Palestine, divided between the Vilayets of Damascus and Beirut and the Mustafiyyet of Jerusalem, was inhabited predominantly by Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
Muslims, both farmers and Bedouin
Bedouin
The Bedouin are a part of a predominantly desert-dwelling Arab ethnic group traditionally divided into tribes or clans, known in Arabic as ..-Etymology:...
(principally in the Negev
Negev
The Negev is a desert and semidesert region of southern Israel. The Arabs, including the native Bedouin population of the region, refer to the desert as al-Naqab. The origin of the word Neghebh is from the Hebrew root denoting 'dry'...
and Jordan valley
Jordan Rift Valley
The Jordan Rift Valley is an elongated depression located in modern-day Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian territories. This geographic region includes the Jordan River, Jordan Valley, Hula Valley, Lake Tiberias and the Dead Sea, the lowest land elevation on Earth...
), with smaller numbers of Christians
Eastern Orthodox Church
The Orthodox Church, officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the second largest Christian denomination in the world, with an estimated 300 million adherents mainly in the countries of Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece,...
(predominantly Arab), Druze
Druze
The Druze are an esoteric, monotheistic religious community, found primarily in Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan, which emerged during the 11th century from Ismailism. The Druze have an eclectic set of beliefs that incorporate several elements from Abrahamic religions, Gnosticism, Neoplatonism...
, Circassians and Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
(predominantly Sephardic
Sephardi Jews
Sephardi Jews is a general term referring to the descendants of the Jews who lived in the Iberian Peninsula before their expulsion in the Spanish Inquisition. It can also refer to those who use a Sephardic style of liturgy or would otherwise define themselves in terms of the Jewish customs and...
). At that time most of the Jews worldwide lived outside of Palestine, predominantly in eastern
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
and central Europe
Central Europe
Central Europe or alternatively Middle Europe is a region of the European continent lying between the variously defined areas of Eastern and Western Europe...
, with significant communities in the Mediterranean, the Middle East and the Americas.
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
and Arab nationalism
Arab nationalism
Arab nationalism is a nationalist ideology celebrating the glories of Arab civilization, the language and literature of the Arabs, calling for rejuvenation and political union in the Arab world...
. Though the Jewish aspiration to return to Zion had been part of Jewish religious thought for a millennia, the Jewish population of Europe and to some degree Middle East began to more actively discuss immigration back to the Land of Israel
Land of Israel
The Land of Israel is the Biblical name for the territory roughly corresponding to the area encompassed by the Southern Levant, also known as Canaan and Palestine, Promised Land and Holy Land. The belief that the area is a God-given homeland of the Jewish people is based on the narrative of the...
, and the re-establishment of the Jewish Nation in its national homeland, only during the 1870s
1870s
The 1870s continued the trends of the previous decade, as new empires, imperialism and militarism rose in Europe and Asia. America was recovering from the Civil War. Germany declared independence in 1871 and began its Second Reich. Labor unions and strikes occurred worldwide in the later part of...
and 1880s
1880s
The 1880s was the decade that spanned from January 1, 1880 to December 31, 1889. They occurred at the core period of the Second Industrial Revolution. Most Western countries experienced a large economic boom, due to the mass production of railroads and other more convenient methods of travel...
, largely as a solution to the widespread persecution of Jews due to anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
in Russia
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
and Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
. As a result, the Zionist movement, the modern movement for the creation of a homeland for the Jewish people, was established as a political movement in 1897.
The Zionist movement called for the establishment of a nation-state
Nation-state
The nation state is a state that self-identifies as deriving its political legitimacy from serving as a sovereign entity for a nation as a sovereign territorial unit. The state is a political and geopolitical entity; the nation is a cultural and/or ethnic entity...
for the Jewish people in Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
, which would serve as a haven
Sanctuary
A sanctuary is any place of safety. They may be categorized into human and non-human .- Religious sanctuary :A religious sanctuary can be a sacred place , or a consecrated area of a church or temple around its tabernacle or altar.- Sanctuary as a sacred place :#Sanctuary as a sacred place:#:In...
for the Jews of the world
Jewish population
Jewish population refers to the number of Jews in the world. Precise figures are difficult to calculate because the definition of "Who is a Jew" is a source of controversy.-Total population:...
and in which they would have the right for self-determination
Self-determination
Self-determination is the principle in international law that nations have the right to freely choose their sovereignty and international political status with no external compulsion or external interference...
. Zionists increasingly came to hold that this state should be in their historic homeland, which they referred to as the Land of Israel
Land of Israel
The Land of Israel is the Biblical name for the territory roughly corresponding to the area encompassed by the Southern Levant, also known as Canaan and Palestine, Promised Land and Holy Land. The belief that the area is a God-given homeland of the Jewish people is based on the narrative of the...
. The World Zionist Organization
World Zionist Organization
The World Zionist Organization , or WZO, was founded as the Zionist Organization , or ZO, in 1897 at the First Zionist Congress, held from August 29 to August 31 in Basel, Switzerland...
and the Jewish National Fund
Jewish National Fund
The Jewish National Fund was founded in 1901 to buy and develop land in Ottoman Palestine for Jewish settlement. The JNF is a quasi-governmental, non-profit organisation...
encouraged immigration
Aliyah
Aliyah is the immigration of Jews to the Land of Israel . It is a basic tenet of Zionist ideology. The opposite action, emigration from Israel, is referred to as yerida . The return to the Holy Land has been a Jewish aspiration since the Babylonian exile...
and funded purchase of land, both under Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
rule and under British rule, in the region of Palestine. While Arab nationalism
Arab nationalism
Arab nationalism is a nationalist ideology celebrating the glories of Arab civilization, the language and literature of the Arabs, calling for rejuvenation and political union in the Arab world...
, at least in an early form, and Syrian nationalism
Syrian nationalism
Syrian nationalism refers to the nationalism of Syria, or the Fertile Crescent as a cultural or political entity. It should not be confused with the Arab nationalism that is the official state doctrine of the Syrian Arab Republic's ruling Baath Party, nor should it be assumed that Syrian...
were the dominant tendencies along with continued loyalty to the Ottoman state.
According to Benny Morris, among the first recorded violent incidents between Arabs and Jews in Palestine was the accidental shooting dead of an Arab man in Safed
Safed
Safed , is a city in the Northern District of Israel. Located at an elevation of , Safed is the highest city in the Galilee and of Israel. Due to its high elevation, Safed experiences warm summers and cold, often snowy, winters...
, during a wedding in December 1882, by a Jewish guard of the newly formed Rosh Pina. In response, about 200 Arabs descended on the Jewish settlement throwing stones and vandalizing property. Another incident happened in Petach Tikva, where in early 1886 the Jewish settlers demanded that their tenants vacate the disputed land and started encroaching on it. On March 28, a Jewish settler crossing this land was attacked and robbed of his horse by Yahudiya Arabs, while the settlers confiscated nine mules found grazing in their fields, though it is not clear which incident came first and which was the retaliation. The Jewish settlers refused to return the mules, a decision viewed as a provocation. The following day, when most of the settlement's men folk were away, fifty or sixty Arab villagers attacked Petach Tikva, vandalizing houses and fields and carrying off much of the livestock. Four Jews were injured and a fifth, an elderly woman with a heart condition, died four days later.
By 1908, thirteen Jews had been killed by Arabs, with four of them killed in what Benny Morris calls "nationalist circumstances", the others in the course of robberies and other crimes. In the next five years twelve Jewish settlement guards were killed by Arabs. Settlers began to speak more and more of Arab "hatred" and "nationalism" lurking behind the increasing depredations, rather than mere "banditry".
Zionist ambitions were increasingly identified as a threat by the Arab leaders in Palestine region. Certain developments, such as the acquisition of lands from Arab owners for Jewish settlements, leading to the eviction of the fellaheen from the lands which they cultivated as tenant farmer
Tenant farmer
A tenant farmer is one who resides on and farms land owned by a landlord. Tenant farming is an agricultural production system in which landowners contribute their land and often a measure of operating capital and management; while tenant farmers contribute their labor along with at times varying...
s, aggravated the tension between the parties and caused the Arab population in the region of Palestine to feel dispossessed of their lands. Ottoman land purchase regulations were brought in after local complaints in opposition to increasing immigration. Ottoman policy makers in the late 19th century were apprehensive of the increased Russian and European influence in the region, partly as a result of a large immigration wave from the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
. The Ottoman authorities feared that the loyalty of immigrants was primary to their country of origin, Russia, with whom the Ottoman Empire had a long history of conflicts, and therefore it might undermine Turkish control in the region of Palestine. The main reason for this concern was the dismantling of Ottoman authority in the Balkan region. The main reason for the initial hostility, in the 1880s, towards the Jewish immigration was on the grounds of their being Russian and European, rather than Jewish. European immigration was considered by local residents as a threat to the cultural make-up of the region. The regional significance of the anti-Jewish riots
Anti-Jewish pogroms in the Russian Empire
The term pogrom as a reference to large-scale, targeted, and repeated antisemitic rioting saw its first use in the 19th century.The first pogrom is often considered to be the 1821 Odessa pogroms after the death of the Greek Orthodox patriarch Gregory V in Constantinople, in which 14 Jews were killed...
(pogroms) in Russia
Pale of Settlement
The Pale of Settlement was the term given to a region of Imperial Russia, in which permanent residency by Jews was allowed, and beyond which Jewish permanent residency was generally prohibited...
in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and anti-immigration legislation being enacted in Europe was that Jewish immigration waves began arriving in Palestine (see First Aliyah
First Aliyah
The First Aliyah was the first modern widespread wave of Zionist aliyah. Jews who migrated to Palestine in this wave came mostly from Eastern Europe and from Yemen. This wave of aliyah began in 1881–82 and lasted until 1903. An estimated 25,000–35,000 Jews immigrated to Ottoman Syria during the...
and Second Aliyah
Second Aliyah
The Second Aliyah was an important and highly influential aliyah that took place between 1904 and 1914, during which approximately 40,000 Jews immigrated into Ottoman Palestine, mostly from the Russian Empire, some from Yemen....
). As a result of the extent of the various Zionist enterprises which started becoming apparent, the Arab population in the Palestine region began protesting against the acquisition of lands by the Jewish population. As a result, in 1892 the Ottoman authorities banned land sales to foreigners. By 1914 the Jewish population in Palestine had risen to over 60,000, with around 33,000 of these being recent settlers.
WWI and its aftermath
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, during World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
joined the Central Powers
Central Powers
The Central Powers were one of the two warring factions in World War I , composed of the German Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Bulgaria...
and therefore the Ottoman Empire was now embroiled in a conflict with Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
and France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. The possibility of releasing Palestine from the control of the Ottoman Empire led the Jewish population and the Arab population in Palestine to support the alignment of the United Kingdom, France, and Russia
Triple Entente
The Triple Entente was the name given to the alliance among Britain, France and Russia after the signing of the Anglo-Russian Entente in 1907....
during World War I. In 1915, the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
The McMahon–Hussein Correspondence, or the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence, was a protracted exchange of letters during World War I, between the Sharif of Mecca, Husayn bin Ali, and Sir Henry McMahon, British High Commissioner in Egypt, concerning the future political status of the lands under the...
was formed as an agreement with Arab leaders to grant sovereignty to Arab lands under Ottoman control to form an Arab state in exchange for the Great Arab Revolt
Arab Revolt
The Arab Revolt was initiated by the Sherif Hussein bin Ali with the aim of securing independence from the ruling Ottoman Turks and creating a single unified Arab state spanning from Aleppo in Syria to Aden in Yemen.- Background :...
against the Ottomans. However, the Balfour Declaration
Balfour Declaration, 1917
The Balfour Declaration of 1917 was a letter from the British Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour to Baron Rothschild , a leader of the British Jewish community, for transmission to the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland.The statement was issued through the efforts of Chaim...
in 1917 proposed to "favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, but that nothing should be done to prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine." In 1916, the Anglo-French Sykes-Picot Agreement
Sykes-Picot Agreement
The Sykes–Picot Agreement of 1916 was a secret agreement between the governments of the United Kingdom and France, with the assent of Imperial Russia, defining their respective spheres of influence and control in Western Asia after the expected downfall of the Ottoman Empire during World War I...
allocated to the British Empire the area of present day Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
, the area of present day Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
and the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
, and the area of present day Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
. The Balfour Declaration was seen by Jewish nationalists as the cornerstone of a future Jewish homeland on both sides of the Jordan River, but increased the concerns of the Arab population in the Palestine region.
In 1917, the British succeeded in defeating the Ottoman Turkish forces and occupied the Palestine region. The land remained under British military administration
Military administration
Military administration identifies both the techniques and systems used by military departments, agencies, and Armed Services involved in the management of the armed forces...
for the remainder of the war.
On January 3, 1919, future president of the World Zionist Organization
World Zionist Organization
The World Zionist Organization , or WZO, was founded as the Zionist Organization , or ZO, in 1897 at the First Zionist Congress, held from August 29 to August 31 in Basel, Switzerland...
Chaim Weizmann
Chaim Weizmann
Chaim Azriel Weizmann, , was a Zionist leader, President of the Zionist Organization, and the first President of the State of Israel. He was elected on 1 February 1949, and served until his death in 1952....
and the future King Faisal I of Iraq
Faisal I of Iraq
Faisal bin Hussein bin Ali al-Hashemi, was for a short time King of the Arab Kingdom of Syria or Greater Syria in 1920, and was King of the Kingdom of Iraq from 23 August 1921 to 1933...
signed the Faisal-Weizmann Agreement
Faisal-Weizmann Agreement
The Faisal–Weizmann Agreement was signed on January 3, 1919, by Emir Feisal , who was for a short time King of the Arab Kingdom of Syria or Greater Syria in 1920, and was King of the Kingdom of Iraq from August 1921 to 1933, and Chaim Weizmann as part of the Paris Peace Conference, 1919 settling...
for Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
-Jewish cooperation in the Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
in which Faisal conditionally accepted the Balfour Declaration based on the fulfillment of British wartime promises of development of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Faisal's agreement with Weizmann led the Palestinian Arab population to reject the Syrian-Arab-Nationalist movement led by Faisal (in which many previously placed their hopes) and instead to agitate for Palestine to become a separate state with an Arab majority.
At the 1919 Paris Peace Conference
Paris Peace Conference, 1919
The Paris Peace Conference was the meeting of the Allied victors following the end of World War I to set the peace terms for the defeated Central Powers following the armistices of 1918. It took place in Paris in 1919 and involved diplomats from more than 32 countries and nationalities...
and Treaty of Versailles
Treaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...
, Turkey's loss of its Middle East Empire was formalized.
1920-48: British Mandate of Palestine
After World War IWorld War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
, in April 1920 the Allied Supreme Council meeting at San Remo
San Remo conference
The San Remo Conference was an international meeting of the post-World War I Allied Supreme Council, held in Sanremo, Italy, from 19 to 26 April 1920. It was attended by the four Principal Allied Powers of World War I who were represented by the prime ministers of Britain , France and Italy and...
granted to Britain the mandates for Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
and Transjordan
Transjordan
The Emirate of Transjordan was a former Ottoman territory in the Southern Levant that was part of the British Mandate of Palestine...
(the territories that include the area of present day Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
, West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
and the Gaza Strip
Gaza Strip
thumb|Gaza city skylineThe Gaza Strip lies on the Eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The Strip borders Egypt on the southwest and Israel on the south, east and north. It is about long, and between 6 and 12 kilometres wide, with a total area of...
), endorsing the terms of the Balfour Declaration. In August 1920, this was officially acknowledged in the Treaty of Sèvres
Treaty of Sèvres
The Treaty of Sèvres was the peace treaty between the Ottoman Empire and Allies at the end of World War I. The Treaty of Versailles was signed with Germany before this treaty to annul the German concessions including the economic rights and enterprises. Also, France, Great Britain and Italy...
. Both Zionist and Arab representatives attended the conference, where they met and signed an agreement to cooperate. The agreement was never implemented. The borders and terms under which the mandate was to be held were not finalised until September 1922. Article 25 of the mandate specified that the eastern area (then known as Transjordan
Transjordan
The Emirate of Transjordan was a former Ottoman territory in the Southern Levant that was part of the British Mandate of Palestine...
or Transjordania) did not have to be subject to all parts of the Mandate, notably the provisions regarding a Jewish national home. This was used by the British as one rationale to establish an autonomous Arab state under the mandate, which it saw as at least partially fulfilling the undertakings in the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
Hussein-McMahon Correspondence
The McMahon–Hussein Correspondence, or the Hussein-McMahon Correspondence, was a protracted exchange of letters during World War I, between the Sharif of Mecca, Husayn bin Ali, and Sir Henry McMahon, British High Commissioner in Egypt, concerning the future political status of the lands under the...
. On 11 April 1921 the British passed administration of the eastern region of the British Mandate to the Hashemite
Hashemite
Hashemite is the Latinate version of the , transliteration: Hāšimī, and traditionally refers to those belonging to the Banu Hashim, or "clan of Hashim", a clan within the larger Quraish tribe...
Arab dynasty from the Hejaz
Hejaz
al-Hejaz, also Hijaz is a region in the west of present-day Saudi Arabia. Defined primarily by its western border on the Red Sea, it extends from Haql on the Gulf of Aqaba to Jizan. Its main city is Jeddah, but it is probably better known for the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina...
region (a region located in present day Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia , commonly known in British English as Saudi Arabia and in Arabic as as-Sa‘ūdiyyah , is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab World...
) and on 15 May 1923 recognized it as a state, thereby eliminating Jewish national aspirations on that part of the British Mandate of Palestine. The mandate over Transjordan ended on 22 May 1946 when the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan (later Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
) gained independence.
Palestinian nationalism
Palestinian nationalism
Palestinian nationalism is the national movement of the Palestinian people. It has roots in Pan-Arabism and other movements rejecting colonialism and calling for national independence. More recently, Palestinian Nationalism is expressed through the Israeli–Palestinian conflict...
was marked by a reaction to the Zionist movement
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
and to Jewish settlement in Palestine as well as by a desire for self-determination by the Arab population in the region. Jewish immigration to Palestine continued to grow significantly during the period of the British Mandate in Palestine, mainly due to the growth of anti-Semitism in Europe. Between 1919 and 1926, 90,000 immigrants arrived in Palestine because of the anti-Semitic manifestations, such as the pogroms in Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
in which 100,000 Jews were killed. Some of these immigrants were absorbed in Jewish communities established on lands purchased legally by Zionist agencies from absentee landlords. In some cases, a large acquisition of lands, from absentee landlords, led to the replacement of the fellah
Fellah
Fellah , also alternatively known as Fallah is a peasant, farmer or agricultural laborer in the Middle East and North Africa...
in tenant farmer
Tenant farmer
A tenant farmer is one who resides on and farms land owned by a landlord. Tenant farming is an agricultural production system in which landowners contribute their land and often a measure of operating capital and management; while tenant farmers contribute their labor along with at times varying...
s with European Jewish settlers, causing Palestinian Arabs to feel dispossessed. Jewish immigration to Palestine was especially significant after the rise of the Nazis to power in Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
, following which the Jewish population in Palestine doubled.
Yishuv
The Yishuv or Ha-Yishuv is the term referring to the body of Jewish residents in Palestine before the establishment of the State of Israel...
and the British Pro-Zionist policies began to use violence
Violence
Violence is the use of physical force to apply a state to others contrary to their wishes. violence, while often a stand-alone issue, is often the culmination of other kinds of conflict, e.g...
and terror
Terror
Terror may refer to:*Fear, an emotional response to threats and danger*Terror, a political strategy of the asymmetrical use of threats and violence against enemies using means that fall outside the routine forms of political struggle operating within some current regime*Terrorism, the fact of...
against the Jewish population. Arab gangs committed terrorism and murder against Jewish convoys and Jewish residents.
From 1920 to 1948 the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem
Grand Mufti of Jerusalem
The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem is the Sunni Muslim cleric in charge of Jerusalem's Islamic holy places, including the Al-Aqsa Mosque.-Ottoman era:...
Mohammad Amin al-Husayni
Mohammad Amin al-Husayni
Haj Mohammed Effendi Amin el-Husseini was a Palestinian Arab nationalist and Muslim leader in the British Mandate of Palestine. From as early as 1920, in order to secure the independence of Palestine as an Arab state he actively opposed Zionism, and was implicated as a leader of a violent riot...
became the leader of the Palestinian Arab movement
Palestinian nationalism
Palestinian nationalism is the national movement of the Palestinian people. It has roots in Pan-Arabism and other movements rejecting colonialism and calling for national independence. More recently, Palestinian Nationalism is expressed through the Israeli–Palestinian conflict...
and played a key role in inciting religious riots against the Jewish population in Palestine. The Mufti stirred religious passions against Jews by alleging that Jews were seeking to rebuild the Jewish Temple
Jewish temple
Jewish temple:*Jewish temple or The Jewish Temple, may refer to the original two ancient Jewish Temples in Jerusalem.**The First Temple was destroyed by the ancient Babylonians in 586 BCE.**The Second Temple was destroyed by Rome in 70 CE....
on the site of the Dome of the Rock
Dome of the Rock
The Dome of the Rock is a shrine located on the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem. The structure has been refurbished many times since its initial completion in 691 CE at the order of Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik...
and Al-Aqsa Mosque
Al-Aqsa Mosque
Al-Aqsa Mosque also known as al-Aqsa, is the third holiest site in Sunni Islam and is located in the Old City of Jerusalem...
. He tried to gain control of the Western Wall
Western Wall
The Western Wall, Wailing Wall or Kotel is located in the Old City of Jerusalem at the foot of the western side of the Temple Mount...
(the Kotel), saying that it was sacred to the Muslims.
The first major riots against the Jewish population in Palestine were the Jaffa riots
Jaffa riots
The Jaffa riots were a series of violent riots in Palestine on May 1–7, 1921, which began as a fight between two Jewish groups but developed into an attack by Arabs on Jews during which many were killed...
in 1921. As a result of the Jaffa riots, the Haganah
Haganah
Haganah was a Jewish paramilitary organization in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine from 1920 to 1948, which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces.- Origins :...
was founded as a defense force for the Jewish population of the British Mandate for Palestine. Religious tension over the Kotel
Kotel
Kotel may refer to:Bulgaria:* Kotel, Bulgaria, a town in Bulgaria* Kotel Pass, a mountain pass in the Balkan Mountains in Bulgaria...
and the escalation of the tensions between the Arab and Jewish populations led to the 1929 Palestine riots
1929 Palestine riots
The 1929 Palestine riots, also known as the Western Wall Uprising, the 1929 Massacres, , or the Buraq Uprising , refers to a series of demonstrations and riots in late August 1929 when a long-running dispute between Muslims and Jews over access to the Western Wall in Jerusalem escalated into violence...
. In these religious-nationalist riots, Jews were massacred in Hebron
1929 Hebron massacre
The Hebron massacre refers to the killing of sixty-seven Jews on 23 and 24 August 1929 in Hebron, then part of the British Mandate of Palestine, by Arabs incited to violence by rumors that Jews were massacring Arabs in Jerusalem and seizing control of Muslim holy places...
. Devastation also took place in Safed
1929 Safed massacre
The 1929 Safed pogrom took place on 29 August during the 1929 Palestine riots. Eighteen Jews were killed and eighty wounded. The main Jewish street was looted and burned...
and Jerusalem. In 1936, as Europe was preparing for war, the Supreme Muslim Council
Supreme Muslim Council
The Supreme Muslim Council was the highest body in charge of Muslim community affairs in Mandate Palestine under British control. It was established to create an advisory body composed of Muslims and Christians with whom the High Commissioner could consult...
in Palestine, led by Amin al-Husayni, instigated the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine in which Palestinian Arabs rioted and murdered Jews in various cities. In 1937 Amin al-Husayni, who was wanted by the British, fled Palestine and took refuge successively in Lebanon, Iraq, Italy and finally Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
.
The British responded to the outbreaks of violence with the Haycraft Commission of Inquiry
Haycraft Commission of Inquiry
The Haycraft Commission of Inquiry was set up to investigate the Jaffa riots of 1921, but its remit was widened and its report entitled "Palestine: Disturbances in May 1921"...
(1921), the Shaw Report
Shaw Report
The Report of the Commission on the Palestine Disturbances of August 1929 or Shaw Report of March 1930 was a British report of a Commission of Inquiry, chaired by Sir Walter Shaw, a distinguished jurist, and consisting of three members of the British parliament, Sir Henry Betterton , R.Hopkin...
(1930), the Peel Commission of 1936-1937, the Woodhead Commission
Woodhead Commission
The Woodhead Commission, properly known as the Palestine Partition Commission, was established in 1938 in the British Mandate of Palestine to investigate the implementation of the Peel Commission's plan for a partition of Palestine....
(1938) and the White Paper of 1939
White Paper of 1939
The White Paper of 1939, also known as the MacDonald White Paper after Malcolm MacDonald, the British Colonial Secretary who presided over it, was a policy paper issued by the British government under Neville Chamberlain in which the idea of partitioning the Mandate for Palestine, as recommended in...
.
The Peel Commission of 1937 was the first to propose a two-state solution
Two-state solution
The two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the consensus solution that is currently under discussion by the key parties to the conflict, most recently at the Annapolis Conference in November 2007...
to the conflict, whereby Palestine would be divided into two states: one Arab state and one Jewish state. The Jewish state would include the coastal plain
Coastal plain
A coastal plain is an area of flat, low-lying land adjacent to a seacoast and separated from the interior by other features. One of the world's longest coastal plains is located in eastern South America. The southwestern coastal plain of North America is notable for its species diversity...
, Jezreel Valley
Jezreel Valley
-Etymology:The Jezreel Valley takes its name from the ancient city of Jezreel which was located on a low hill overlooking the southern edge of the valley, though some scholars think that the name of the city originates from the name of the clan which founded it, and whose existence is mentioned in...
, Beit She'an and the Galilee
Galilee
Galilee , is a large region in northern Israel which overlaps with much of the administrative North District of the country. Traditionally divided into Upper Galilee , Lower Galilee , and Western Galilee , extending from Dan to the north, at the base of Mount Hermon, along Mount Lebanon to the...
, while the and Arab state would include Transjordan
Transjordan
The Emirate of Transjordan was a former Ottoman territory in the Southern Levant that was part of the British Mandate of Palestine...
, Judea and Samaria
Judea and Samaria
Judea and Samaria Area is the official Israeli term roughly corresponding to the territory usually known outside Israel as the West Bank and to the Israeli settlements there that are not governed as part of Jerusalem.-Terminology:...
, the Jordan Valley
Jordan Valley (Middle East)
The Jordan Valley forms part of the larger Jordan Rift Valley. It is 120 kilometers long and 15 kilometers wide, where it runs from Lake Tiberias in the north to northern Dead Sea in the south. It runs for an additional 155 kilometer south of the Dead Sea to Aqaba, an area also known as Wadi...
, and the Negev
Negev
The Negev is a desert and semidesert region of southern Israel. The Arabs, including the native Bedouin population of the region, refer to the desert as al-Naqab. The origin of the word Neghebh is from the Hebrew root denoting 'dry'...
. The Jewish leadership in Palestine had differences of opinion regarding the proposal of the Peel Commission. The Arab leadership in Palestine rejected the conclusions and refused to share any land in Palestine with the Jewish population. The rejection of the Peel Commission's proposal by both parties led to the establishment of the Woodhead Commission
Woodhead Commission
The Woodhead Commission, properly known as the Palestine Partition Commission, was established in 1938 in the British Mandate of Palestine to investigate the implementation of the Peel Commission's plan for a partition of Palestine....
, which rejected the non-applicable proposal of the Peel Commission.
In May 1939 the British government released a new policy paper
White Paper of 1939
The White Paper of 1939, also known as the MacDonald White Paper after Malcolm MacDonald, the British Colonial Secretary who presided over it, was a policy paper issued by the British government under Neville Chamberlain in which the idea of partitioning the Mandate for Palestine, as recommended in...
which sought to implement a one-state solution in Palestine, significantly reduced the number of Jewish immigrants allowed to enter Palestine by establishing a quota for Jewish immigration which was set by the British government in the short-term and which would be set by the Arab leadership in the long-term. The quota also placed restrictions on the rights of Jews to buy land from Arabs, in an attempt to limit the socio-political damage. These restrictions remained until the end of the mandate period, a period which occurred in parallel with World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
and the Holocaust, during which many Jewish refugees tried to escape from Europe. As a result, during the 1930s and 1940s the leadership of the Yishuv
Yishuv
The Yishuv or Ha-Yishuv is the term referring to the body of Jewish residents in Palestine before the establishment of the State of Israel...
arranged a couple of illegal immigration
Illegal immigration
Illegal immigration is the migration into a nation in violation of the immigration laws of that jurisdiction. Illegal immigration raises many political, economical and social issues and has become a source of major controversy in developed countries and the more successful developing countries.In...
waves of Jews to the British Mandate of Palestine
Palestine (mandate)
The British Mandate for Palestine, also known as the Palestine Mandate, The British Mandate of Palestine and the Mandate for Palestine, was a legal commission for the administration of Palestine, the draft of which was formally confirmed by the Council of the League of Nations on 24 July 1922 and...
(see also Aliyah Bet), which caused even more tensions in the region.
Ben-Gurion said he wanted to "concentrate the masses of our people in this country [Palestine] and its environs." When he proposed accepting the Peel proposals in 1937, which included a Jewish state in part of Palestine, Ben-Gurion told the twentieth Zionist Congress, "The Jewish state now being offered to us is not the Zionist objective. [...] But it can serve as a decisive stage along the path to greater Zionist implementation. It will consolidate in Palestine, within the shortest possible time, the real Jewish force, which will lead us to our historic goal. In a discussion in the Jewish Agency he said that he wanted a Jewish-Arab agreement "on the assumption that after we become a strong force, as a result of the creation of the state, we shall abolish partition and expand to the whole of Palestine."
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
in Germany. These connections led to cooperation between the Palestinian national movement and the Axis powers
Axis Powers
The Axis powers , also known as the Axis alliance, Axis nations, Axis countries, or just the Axis, was an alignment of great powers during the mid-20th century that fought World War II against the Allies. It began in 1936 with treaties of friendship between Germany and Italy and between Germany and...
later on during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. In May 1941 Amin al-Husayni issued a fatwa
Fatwa
A fatwā in the Islamic faith is a juristic ruling concerning Islamic law issued by an Islamic scholar. In Sunni Islam any fatwā is non-binding, whereas in Shia Islam it could be considered by an individual as binding, depending on his or her relation to the scholar. The person who issues a fatwā...
for a holy war
Religious war
A religious war; Latin: bellum sacrum; is a war caused by, or justified by, religious differences. It can involve one state with an established religion against another state with a different religion or a different sect within the same religion, or a religiously motivated group attempting to...
against Britain. In 1941 during a meeting with Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
Amin al-Husayni asked Germany to oppose, as part of the Arab struggle for independence, the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine. He received a promise from Hitler that Germany would eliminate the existing Jewish foundations in Palestine after the Germans had gained victory in the war. During the war Amin al-Husayni joined the Nazis, serving with the Waffen SS in Bosnia
13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Handschar (1st Croatian)
The 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Handschar was one of the thirty-eight divisions fielded as part of the Waffen-SS during World War II. Its recruits were composed of Muslim Bosniaks. The Handschar division was a mountain infantry formation, the equivalent of the German "Gebirgsjäger" ...
and Yugoslavia. In addition, during the war a joint Palestinian-Nazi military operation
Operation ATLAS
Operation ATLAS was the code name for a failed operation carried out by a special commando unit of the Nazi Waffen SS which was held in October 1944 ands aimed at poisoning the Drinking water resources of the residents of Tel Aviv - specifically the water extraction facility of the Rosh HaAyin...
was held in the region of Palestine. These factors caused a deterioration in the relations between the Palestinian leadership and the British, which turned to collaborate with the Yeshuv during the period known as the 200 days of dread.
After World War II, as a result of the British policies, the Jewish resistance organizations united and established the Jewish Resistance Movement
Jewish Resistance Movement
The Jewish Resistance Movement , sometimes called United Resistance Movement , was an umbrella group for Jewish Resistance movements in the British Mandate of Palestine...
which coordinated armed attacks against the British military which took place between 1945 and 1946. Following the King David Hotel bombing
King David Hotel bombing
The King David Hotel bombing was an attack carried out by themilitant right-wing Zionist underground organization Irgun on the King David Hotel in Jerusalem on 22 July 1946...
(in which the Irgun
Irgun
The Irgun , or Irgun Zevai Leumi to give it its full title , was a Zionist paramilitary group that operated in Mandate Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of the earlier and larger Jewish paramilitary organization haHaganah...
blew up the King David Hotel
King David Hotel
The King David Hotel is a 5-star hotel in Jerusalem, Israel. Opened in 1931, the hotel was built with locally quarried pink limestone and was founded by Ezra Mosseri, a wealthy Egyptian Jewish Banker. To this day the hotel remains one of the most prominent and prestigious hotels in Israel, and...
in Jerusalem, the headquarters of the British administration), which shocked the public because of the deaths of many innocent civilians, the Jewish Resistance Movement was disassembled in 1946. The leadership of the Yishuv decided instead to concentrate their efforts on the illegal immigration and began to organize a massive immigration of European Jewish refugees to Palestine using small boats operating in secrecy, many of which were captured at sea by the British and imprisoned in camps on Cyprus. About 70,000 Jews were brought to Palestine in this way in 1946 and 1947. Details of the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
had a major effect on the situation in Palestine and propelled large support for the Zionist cause.
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
recommended that Mandatory Palestine be split into three parts—a Jewish State with a majority Jewish population, an Arab State with a majority Arab population, and an International Zone comprising Jerusalem and the surrounding area where the Jewish and Arab populations would be roughly equal. Resolution 181 decided the size of land allotted to each party. The Jewish State was supposed to be roughly 5700 square miles (14,762.9 km²) in size and was supposed to contain a sizable Arab minority population. The Arab state was supposed to comprise roughly 4300 square miles (11,136.9 km²) and would contain a tiny Jewish population. Neither state would be contiguous. Jerusalem and Bethlehem
Bethlehem
Bethlehem is a Palestinian city in the central West Bank of the Jordan River, near Israel and approximately south of Jerusalem, with a population of about 30,000 people. It is the capital of the Bethlehem Governorate of the Palestinian National Authority and a hub of Palestinian culture and tourism...
were to be put under the control of the United Nations. Neither side was satisfied with the Partition Plan. The Jews disliked losing Jerusalem—which had a majority Jewish population at that time—and worried about the tenability of a noncontiguous state. However, most of the Jews in Palestine accepted the plan, and the Jewish Agency (the de facto government of the Yishuv
Yishuv
The Yishuv or Ha-Yishuv is the term referring to the body of Jewish residents in Palestine before the establishment of the State of Israel...
) campaigned fervently for its approval. The more extreme Jewish groups, such as the Irgun
Irgun
The Irgun , or Irgun Zevai Leumi to give it its full title , was a Zionist paramilitary group that operated in Mandate Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of the earlier and larger Jewish paramilitary organization haHaganah...
, rejected the plan. The Arab leadership argued that it violated the rights of the majority of the people in Palestine, which at the time was 67% non-Jewish (1,237,000) and 33% Jewish (608,000). Arab leaders also argued a large number of Arabs would be trapped in the Jewish State. Every major Arab leader objected in principle to the right of the Jews to an independent state in Palestine, reflecting the policies of the Arab League.
The UN General Assembly voted on the Partition Plan on November 29, 1947. Thirty-three states voted in favor of the Plan, while 13 countries opposed it. Ten countries abstained from the vote. The Yishuv accepted the plan, but the Arabs in Palestine and the surrounding Arab states rejected the plan. The Arab countries (all of which had opposed the plan) proposed to query the International Court of Justice
International Court of Justice
The International Court of Justice is the primary judicial organ of the United Nations. It is based in the Peace Palace in The Hague, Netherlands...
on the competence of the General Assembly to partition a country against the wishes of the majority of its inhabitants, but were again defeated. The division was to take effect on the date of British withdrawal from the territory (May 15, 1948).
The approval of the plan sparked attacks carried out by Arab irregulars against the Jewish population in Palestine. Fighting began almost as soon as the plan was approved. Shooting, stoning, and rioting continued apace in the following days. The consulates of Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
and Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
, both of whose governments had voted for partition, were attacked. Bombs were thrown into cafes, Molotov cocktail
Molotov cocktail
The Molotov cocktail, also known as the petrol bomb, gasoline bomb, Molotov bomb, fire bottle, fire bomb, or simply Molotov, is a generic name used for a variety of improvised incendiary weapons...
s were hurled at shops, and a synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
was set on fire. As the British evacuation from the region progressed, the violence became more prevalent. Murders, reprisals, and counter-reprisals came fast on each others' heels, resulting in dozens of victims killed on both sides in the process. The sanguinary impasse persisted as no force intervened to put a stop to the escalating cycles of violence. During the first two months of the war, about 1,000 people were killed and 2,000 injured. By the end of March, the figure had risen to 2,000 dead and 4,000 wounded.
David Ben-Gurion
' was the first Prime Minister of Israel.Ben-Gurion's passion for Zionism, which began early in life, led him to become a major Zionist leader and Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization in 1946...
declared the establishment of the State of Israel
Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel
The Israeli Declaration of Independence , made on 14 May 1948 , the day before the British Mandate was due to expire, was the announcement by David Ben-Gurion, the Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization and chairman of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, that the new Jewish state named the...
. The declaration of the state referred to the decision of the UN General Assembly as a legal justification for the establishment of the state. In accordance with the UN Resolution, the Declaration promised that the State of Israel would ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex, and guaranteed freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture.
1948-67
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
, Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
, Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
and Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
invaded the newly self-declared state followed not long after by units from Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
. While Arab commanders ordered villagers to evacuate for military purposes in isolated areas, there is no evidence that the Arab leadership made a blanket call for evacuation and in fact most urged Palestinians to stay in their homes. Assaults by the Haganah
Haganah
Haganah was a Jewish paramilitary organization in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine from 1920 to 1948, which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces.- Origins :...
on major Arab population centers like Jaffa and Haifa as well as expulsions carried out by groups like the Irgun
Irgun
The Irgun , or Irgun Zevai Leumi to give it its full title , was a Zionist paramilitary group that operated in Mandate Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of the earlier and larger Jewish paramilitary organization haHaganah...
and Lehi
Lehi
Lehi refers to:In Mormonism:* Lehi , a prophet in the Book of Mormon of the 7th-6th centuries BC* Lehi, son of Helaman, another prophet in the Book of Mormon of the late 1st century BC...
such as at Deir Yassin
Deir Yassin
Deir Yassin was a Palestinian Arab village of around 600 people near Jerusalem. It had declared its neutrality during the 1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine between Arabs and Jews...
and Lydda led to the exodus of large portions of the Arab masses. Factors such as the earlier flight by the Palestinian elite and the psychological effects of Jewish atrocities (stories which both sides propagated) also played important roles in the Palestinian flight.
1949 Armistice Agreements
The 1949 Armistice Agreements are a set of agreements signed during 1949 between Israel and neighboring Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria. The agreements ended the official hostilities of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, and established armistice lines between Israeli forces and the forces in...
with Israel. The remaining territories, the Gaza Strip
Gaza Strip
thumb|Gaza city skylineThe Gaza Strip lies on the Eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The Strip borders Egypt on the southwest and Israel on the south, east and north. It is about long, and between 6 and 12 kilometres wide, with a total area of...
and the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
, were occupied by Egypt
Occupation of the Gaza Strip by Egypt
The administration of the Gaza Strip by Egypt occurred between 1948 and October 1956, and again from March 1957 to June 1967. Egypt did not annex the Gaza Strip but left it under Egyptian military rule as a temporary arrangement pending the resolution of the Palestine Question.-Background:After...
and Transjordan
Rule of the West Bank and East Jerusalem by Jordan
The West Bank and East Jerusalem were occupied by Jordan for a period of nearly two decades starting from the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. In 1950, the British extended formal recognition to the union between the Hashemite Kingdom and of that part of Palestine under Jordanian occupation and control -...
, respectively. Jordan also annexed East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem or Eastern Jerusalem refer to the parts of Jerusalem captured and annexed by Jordan in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and then captured and annexed by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War...
while Israel administered west Jerusalem
West Jerusalem
West Jerusalem refers to:*The section of Jerusalem captured by Israel following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.*The western neighborhoods of Jerusalem today.-Division in 1948:...
. In 1950, The West Bank was unilaterally incorporated into Jordan.
Due to the 1948 Arab–Israeli war, about 856,000 Jews fled or were expelled
Jewish exodus from Arab lands
The Jewish exodus from Arab and Muslim countries was a mass departure, flight and expulsion of Jews, primarily of Sephardi and Mizrahi background, from Arab and Muslim countries, from 1948 until the early 1970s...
from their homes in Arab countries and most were forced to abandon their property. Jews from Libya
Libya
Libya is an African country in the Maghreb region of North Africa bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
, Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
, Yemen
Yemen
The Republic of Yemen , commonly known as Yemen , is a country located in the Middle East, occupying the southwestern to southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, and Oman to the east....
, Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
, Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
and North Africa
North Africa
North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...
left due to physical and political insecurity, with the majority being forced to abandon their properties. 260,000 reached Israel in 1948-1951, 600,000 by 1972. Additionally, due to the war, between 700,000 and 750,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled
1948 Palestinian exodus
The 1948 Palestinian exodus , also known as the Nakba , occurred when approximately 711,000 to 725,000 Palestinian Arabs left, fled or were expelled from their homes, during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and the Civil War that preceded it. The exact number of refugees is a matter of dispute...
from the area that became Israel and became what is known today as the Palestinian refugee
Palestinian refugee
Palestinian refugees or Palestine refugees are the people and their descendants, predominantly Palestinian Arabic-speakers, who fled or were expelled from their homes during and after the 1948 Palestine War, within that part of the British Mandate of Palestine, that after that war became the...
s. The Palestinian refugees were not allowed to return to Israel and most of the neighboring Arab states, with the exception of Transjordan
Transjordan
The Emirate of Transjordan was a former Ottoman territory in the Southern Levant that was part of the British Mandate of Palestine...
, denied granting them - or their descendants - citizenship. In 1949, Israel offered to allow some members of families that had been separated during the war to return, to release refugee accounts frozen in Israeli banks, and to repatriate 100,000 refugees. The Arab states rejected this compromise, at least in part because they were unwilling to take any action that might be construed as recognition of Israel. As of today, most of them still live in refugee camps and the question of how their situation should be resolved remains one of the main issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
While most of the Palestinian Arab population that remained in Israel after the war was granted an Israeli citizenship
Israeli nationality law
Israel's nationality law defines the terms through which one can be granted citizenship of the state of Israel. It also includes the Right of return for Jewish diaspora...
, Arab Israelis were subject to martial law up to 1966. A variety of legal measures facilitated the transfer of land abandoned by Arabs to state ownership. In 1966, security restrictions placed on Arab citizens of Israel were lifted completely, the government set about dismantling most of the discriminatory laws, and Arab citizens of Israel
Arab citizens of Israel
Arab citizens of Israel refers to citizens of Israel who are not Jewish, and whose cultural and linguistic heritage or ethnic identity is Arab....
were granted the same rights as Jewish citizens.
After the 1948 war, some of the Palestinian refugees who lived in camps in the West Bank within Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
ian controlled territory, the Gaza Strip Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
ian controlled territory and Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
tried to return by infiltration
Palestinian immigration (Israel)
Palestinian immigration refers to the movement of Palestinians into the territory of Israel. Since 1948, most Palestinians crossing into Israel have come to live, reside and/or work, some of them continuing the lives they lived prior to their displacement in the Palestinian exodus...
into Israeli territory, and some of those Palestinians who had remained in Israel were declared infiltrators by Israel and were deported. Ben-Gurion emphatically rejected the return of refugees in the Israeli Cabinet decision of June 1948 reiterated in a letter to the UN of August 2, 1949 containing the text of a statement made by Moshe Sharett on August 1, 1948 where the basic attitude of the Israeli Government was that a solution must be sought, not through the return of the refugees to Israel, but through the resettlement of the Palestinian Arab refugee population in other states.
The buildup of the conflict along the Jordanian border went through gradual stages. Building up from small Israeli raids with Palestinian counter raids through to the major Israeli incursions, Beit Jalla
1952 Beit Jala raid
The Beit Jala Raid was an Israeli attack on Beit Jala, an Arab town on the border between Jordan and Israel on January 6, 1952. Seven Palestinian Arab civilians were killed in the attack...
, Qibya massacre
Qibya massacre
The Qibya massacre, also known as the Qibya incident, occurred in October 1953 when Israeli troops under Ariel Sharon attacked the village of Qibya in the West Bank. Sixty-nine Palestinian Arabs, two thirds of them women and children were killed. Forty-five houses, a school, and a mosque were...
, Ma'ale Akrabim massacre
Ma'ale Akrabim massacre
The Ma'ale Akrabim massacre was an attack on an Israeli civilian passenger bus, carried out the night of 16–17 March 1954. Eleven passengers were shot dead by the attackers who ambushed and boarded the bus...
, Nahalin reprisal raid, Rantis and Falameh reprisal raid. The Lavon Affair
Lavon Affair
The Lavon Affair refers to a failed Israeli covert operation, code named Operation Susannah, conducted in Egypt in the Summer of 1954. As part of the false flag operation, a group of Egyptian Jews were recruited by Israeli military intelligence for plans to plant bombs inside Egyptian, American and...
led to a deeper distrust of Jews in Egypt, from whose community key agents in the operation had been recruited, and as a result Egypt retaliated against its Jewish community. It was only after Israel's raid on an Egyptian military outpost in Gaza in February 1955 that the Egyptian government began to actively sponsor, train, and arm the Palestinian volunteers from Gaza as Fedayeen
Fedayeen
Fedayeen is a term used to describe several distinct militant groups and individuals in West Asia at different times in history. It is sometimes used colloquially to refer to suicide squads, especially those who are not bombers.-Overview:...
units which committed raids into Israel.
Following years of attacks by the Palestinian Fedayeen, the Palestine Liberation Organization
Palestine Liberation Organization
The Palestine Liberation Organization is a political and paramilitary organization which was created in 1964. It is recognized as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people" by the United Nations and over 100 states with which it holds diplomatic relations, and has enjoyed...
(PLO) was established in 1964. Its goal was the liberation of Palestine through armed struggle. The original PLO Charter stated the desire for a Palestinian state established within the entirety of the borders of the British mandate
British Mandate
British Mandate may refer to:*British Mandate for Palestine*British Mandate of Mesopotamia...
prior to the 1948 war (i.e. the current boundaries of the State of Israel) and said it is a "national duty ... to purge the Zionist presence from Palestine." It also called for a right of return
Right of return
The term right of return refers to a principle of international law, codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, giving any person the right to return to, and re-enter, his or her country of origin...
and self-determination
Self-determination
Self-determination is the principle in international law that nations have the right to freely choose their sovereignty and international political status with no external compulsion or external interference...
for Palestinians.
An Israeli raid on an Egyptian military outpost in Gaza in February 1955, resulted in 37 Egyptian soldiers killed. Soon after, the Egyptian government began to actively sponsor, train and arm the Palestinian volunteers from Gaza as Fedayeen
Fedayeen
Fedayeen is a term used to describe several distinct militant groups and individuals in West Asia at different times in history. It is sometimes used colloquially to refer to suicide squads, especially those who are not bombers.-Overview:...
units, which committed raids into Israel. In 1967, after years of Egyptian-aided Palestinian Fedayeen attacks stemming from the Gaza Strip
Gaza Strip
thumb|Gaza city skylineThe Gaza Strip lies on the Eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The Strip borders Egypt on the southwest and Israel on the south, east and north. It is about long, and between 6 and 12 kilometres wide, with a total area of...
, the Egyptian expulsion of UNEF, Egypt's amassing of an increased number of troops in the Sinai Peninsula
Sinai Peninsula
The Sinai Peninsula or Sinai is a triangular peninsula in Egypt about in area. It is situated between the Mediterranean Sea to the north, and the Red Sea to the south, and is the only part of Egyptian territory located in Asia as opposed to Africa, effectively serving as a land bridge between two...
, and several other threatening gestures from other neighboring Arab nations, Israel launched a preemptive strike
Preemptive strike
A preemptive strike refers to a surprise attack launched with the stated intention of countering an anticipated enemy offensive. Preemptive strike may also refer to:...
against Egypt. The strike and the operations that followed became known as the Six-Day War
Six-Day War
The Six-Day War , also known as the June War, 1967 Arab-Israeli War, or Third Arab-Israeli War, was fought between June 5 and 10, 1967, by Israel and the neighboring states of Egypt , Jordan, and Syria...
. At the end of the Six-Day War, Israel had captured, among other territories, the Gaza Strip
Gaza Strip
thumb|Gaza city skylineThe Gaza Strip lies on the Eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The Strip borders Egypt on the southwest and Israel on the south, east and north. It is about long, and between 6 and 12 kilometres wide, with a total area of...
from Egypt and the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
from Jordan (including East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem or Eastern Jerusalem refer to the parts of Jerusalem captured and annexed by Jordan in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and then captured and annexed by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War...
). Shortly after Israel seized control over Jerusalem, Israel asserted sovereignty over the entire city of Jerusalem and the Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem were given a permanent resident status in Israel. The status of the city as Israel's capital and the disputed status
Status of territories captured by Israel
The United Nations Security Council and the International Court of Justice both describe the West Bank and Golan Heights as "occupied territory" under international law, Israel's government calls all of them "disputed" rather than "occupied",...
of the West Bank and Gaza Strip created a new set of contentious issues in the conflict. This meant that Israel controlled the entire former British mandate of Palestine that under the Balfour Declaration was supposed to allow a Jewish state within its borders. The fact that Palestine was never a sovereign state gave the Israelis subsequent support for their argument that they did not occupy these territories, and therefore did not break the Fourth Accord of the Geneva Conventions
Geneva Conventions
The Geneva Conventions comprise four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish the standards of international law for the humanitarian treatment of the victims of war...
and international law. Following the Six-Day War, the United Nations Security Council
United Nations Security Council
The United Nations Security Council is one of the principal organs of the United Nations and is charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. Its powers, outlined in the United Nations Charter, include the establishment of peacekeeping operations, the establishment of...
issued a resolution
United Nations Security Council Resolution 242
United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 was adopted unanimously by the UN Security Council on November 22, 1967, in the aftermath of the Six Day War. It was adopted under Chapter VIof the United Nations Charter...
with a clause affirming "the necessity ... for achieving a just settlement of the refugee problem," referring to the Palestinian refugee
Palestinian refugee
Palestinian refugees or Palestine refugees are the people and their descendants, predominantly Palestinian Arabic-speakers, who fled or were expelled from their homes during and after the 1948 Palestine War, within that part of the British Mandate of Palestine, that after that war became the...
problem.
1967-93
The defeat of the Arab countries in the Six-Day War prompted fractured Palestinian political and militant groups to give up any remaining hope they had placed in pan-ArabismPan-Arabism
Pan-Arabism is an ideology espousing the unification--or, sometimes, close cooperation and solidarity against perceived enemies of the Arabs--of the countries of the Arab world, from the Atlantic Ocean to the Arabian Sea. It is closely connected to Arab nationalism, which asserts that the Arabs...
. In July 1968 armed, non-state actors such as Fatah
Fatah
Fataḥ is a major Palestinian political party and the largest faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization , a multi-party confederation. In Palestinian politics it is on the left-wing of the spectrum; it is mainly nationalist, although not predominantly socialist. Its official goals are found...
and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine is a Palestinian Marxist-Leninist organisation founded in 1967. It has consistently been the second-largest of the groups forming the Palestine Liberation Organization , the largest being Fatah...
achieved the majority of the Palestinian National Council votes, and on February 3, 1969, at the Palestinian National Council
Palestinian National Council
The Palestinian National Council is the legislative body of the Palestine Liberation Organization and elects its Executive Committee, which assumes leadership of the organization between its sessions. The Council normally meets every two years. Resolutions are passed by a simple majority with a...
in Cairo
Cairo
Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...
, the leader of the Fatah, Yasser Arafat
Yasser Arafat
Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini , popularly known as Yasser Arafat or by his kunya Abu Ammar , was a Palestinian leader and a Laureate of the Nobel Prize. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization , President of the Palestinian National Authority...
was elected as the chairman of the PLO. From the start, the organization used armed violence against civilian and military targets in the conflict with Israel. The PLO tried to take over the population of the West Bank, but the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) deported them into Jordan where they began to act against the Jordanian rule (Palestinians in Jordan comprised about 70% of the total population, which mostly consisted of refugees) and from there attacked Israel numerous times, using the infiltration of terrorists and shooting Katyusha rockets. This led to retaliation from Israel.
In the late 1960s, tensions between Palestinians and the Jordanian government increased greatly. In September 1970
Black September in Jordan
September 1970 is known as the Black September in Arab history and sometimes is referred to as the "era of regrettable events." It was a month when Hashemite King Hussein of Jordan moved to quash the militancy of Palestinian organizations and restore his monarchy's rule over the country. The...
a military struggle was held between Jordan and the Palestinian armed organizations. King Hussein of Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
was able to quell the Palestinian revolt. During the armed conflict, tens of thousands of people were killed, the vast majority of whom were Palestinians. The fighting continued until July 1971 with the expulsion of the PLO to Lebanon. A large number of Palestinians immigrated to Lebanon after Black September and joined the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees already there. The center of PLO activity then shifted to Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
, where the 1969 Cairo agreement
Cairo agreement
The Cairo agreement or Cairo accord was an agreement reached on 2 November 1969 during talks between Yassir Arafat and the Lebanese army commander General Emile Bustani...
gave the Palestinians autonomy within the south of the country. The area controlled by the PLO became known by the international press and locals as "Fatahland" and contributed to the 1975-1990 Lebanese Civil War
Lebanese Civil War
The Lebanese Civil War was a multifaceted civil war in Lebanon. The war lasted from 1975 to 1990 and resulted in an estimated 150,000 to 230,000 civilian fatalities. Another one million people were wounded, and today approximately 350,000 people remain displaced. There was also a mass exodus of...
.
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine is a Palestinian Marxist-Leninist organisation founded in 1967. It has consistently been the second-largest of the groups forming the Palestine Liberation Organization , the largest being Fatah...
waged an international campaign against Israelis, primarily in Europe. In an attempt to publicize the Palestinian cause, frustrated Palestinian guerrilla groups in Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
attacked Israeli civilian 'targets' like school
School
A school is an institution designed for the teaching of students under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of formal education, which is commonly compulsory. In these systems, students progress through a series of schools...
s, bus
Bus
A bus is a road vehicle designed to carry passengers. Buses can have a capacity as high as 300 passengers. The most common type of bus is the single-decker bus, with larger loads carried by double-decker buses and articulated buses, and smaller loads carried by midibuses and minibuses; coaches are...
es and apartment blocks, with occasional attacks abroad—for example, at embassies or airports—and with the hijacking of airliners. The peak of the Palestinian terrorism wave against Israelis occurred in 1972 and took form in several acts of terrorism, most prominently the Sabena Flight 572 hijacking, the Lod Airport massacre
Lod Airport massacre
The Lod Airport massacre was a terrorist attack that occurred on May 30, 1972, in which three members of the Japanese Red Army, on behalf of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine , killed 26 people and injured 80 others at Tel Aviv's Lod airport...
and the Munich massacre
Munich massacre
The Munich massacre is an informal name for events that occurred during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Bavaria in southern West Germany, when members of the Israeli Olympic team were taken hostage and eventually killed by the Palestinian group Black September. Members of Black September...
.
1972 Summer Olympics
The 1972 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XX Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Munich, West Germany, from August 26 to September 11, 1972....
in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
. 11 members of the Israeli team were taken hostage by Palestinian terrorists
Black September (group)
The Black September Organization was a Palestinian paramilitary group, founded in 1970. It was responsible for the kidnapping and murder of eleven Israeli athletes and officials, and fatal shooting of a West German policeman, during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, their most publicized event...
. A botched German rescue attempt led to the death of all 11 Israeli athletes and coaches. Five of the terrorists were shot and three survived unharmed. The three surviving Palestinians were released without charge by the German authorities a month later. The Israeli government responded with an assassination campaign
Operation Wrath of God
Operation Wrath of God ,This title was an invention of later writers, and was most likely not used by the Mossad itself. also called Operation Bayonet, was a covert operation directed by Israel and the Mossad to assassinate individuals alleged to have been directly or indirectly involved in the...
against the organizers and a raid on the PLO headquarters in Lebanon. Other notable events include the hijacking of several civilian airliners, the Savoy Hotel attack
Savoy Operation
The Savoy Hotel Attack was a terrorist attack by members of the Palestine Liberation Organization against the Savoy Hotel in Tel Aviv, Israel, on March 4–5, 1975.- The attack :...
, the Zion Square explosive refrigerator
Ben Yehuda Street Bombing
The Ben Yehuda Street bombings refer to a series of attacks by Palestinians and suicide bombers on civilians in downtown Jerusalem, Israel in 1948...
and the Coastal Road massacre
Coastal Road massacre
The Coastal Road massacre of 1978 was an attack involving the hijacking of a bus on Israel's Coastal Highway in which 38 Israeli civilians, including 13 children, were killed, and 71 were wounded. The attack was planned by Abu Jihad and carried out by the PLO faction Fatah...
. During the 1970s and the early 1980s, Israel suffered attacks from PLO bases in Lebanon, such as the Avivim school bus massacre
Avivim school bus massacre
The Avivim school bus massacre was a terrorist attack on an Israeli school bus on May 8, 1970 in which 12 Israeli civilians were killed, nine of them children, and 25 were wounded. The attack took place on the road to Moshav Avivim, near Israel's border with Lebanon. Two bazooka shells were fired...
in 1970 and the Ma'alot massacre
Ma'alot massacre
The Ma'alot massacre was a terrorist attack which included a two-day hostage-taking of 115 people which ended in the deaths of over 25 hostages. It began when three armed Palestinian terrorists of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine entered Israel from Lebanon...
in 1974 in which Palestinians attacked a school in Ma'alot killing twenty-two children.
In 1973 The Syrian and Egyptian armies launched the Yom Kippur War
Yom Kippur War
The Yom Kippur War, Ramadan War or October War , also known as the 1973 Arab-Israeli War and the Fourth Arab-Israeli War, was fought from October 6 to 25, 1973, between Israel and a coalition of Arab states led by Egypt and Syria...
, a well-planned surprise attack against Israel. The Egyptians and Syrians advanced during the first 24–48 hours, after which momentum began to swing in Israel's favor. Eventually a Disengagement of Forces agreement was signed between the parties and a ceasefire took effect that ended the war. The Yom Kippur War paved the way for the Camp David Accords
Camp David Accords
The Camp David Accords were signed by Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin on September 17, 1978, following thirteen days of secret negotiations at Camp David. The two framework agreements were signed at the White House, and were witnessed by United States...
in 1978, which set a precedent for future peace negotiations.
In 1974 the PLO adopted the Ten Point Program
PLO's Ten Point Program
PLO's Ten Point Program , is the name the plan accepted by the Palestinian National Council , the legislative body of the Palestine Liberation Organization , during the 12th meeting of the PNC which was held in Cairo on 8 June 1974.The plan called for the establishment of a national authority "over...
, which called for the establishment of a national authority "over every part of Palestinian territory that is liberated" with the aim of "completing the liberation of all Palestinian territory". The program implied that the liberation of Palestine may be partial (at least, at some stage), and though it emphasized armed struggle, it did not exclude other means. This allowed the PLO to engage in diplomatic channels, and provided validation for future compromises made by the Palestinian leadership.
In the mid-1970s many attempts were made by Gush Emunim
Gush Emunim
Gush Emunim was an Israeli messianic and political movement committed to establishing Jewish settlements in the West Bank. While not formally established as an organization until 1974 in the wake of the Yom Kippur War, Gush Emunim sprang out of the conquests of the Six-Day War in 1967, encouraging...
movement to establish outposts or resettle former Jewish areas in the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
and Gaza
Gaza
Gaza , also referred to as Gaza City, is a Palestinian city in the Gaza Strip, with a population of about 450,000, making it the largest city in the Palestinian territories.Inhabited since at least the 15th century BC,...
Strip. Initially the Israeli government forcibly disbanded these settlements. However, in the absence of peace talks to determine the future of these and other occupied territories, Israel ceased enforcement of the original ban on settlement, which led to the founding of the first settlements in these regions.
In July 1976, an Air France
Air France
Air France , stylised as AIRFRANCE, is the French flag carrier headquartered in Tremblay-en-France, , and is one of the world's largest airlines. It is a subsidiary of the Air France-KLM Group and a founding member of the SkyTeam global airline alliance...
plane carrying 260 people was hijacked by Palestinian
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - External Operations
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - External Operations or Special Operations or Special Operations Group were organizational names used by Palestinian radical Wadie Haddad when engaging in international attacks, that were regarded as terrorism, and were not sanctioned by the...
and German
Revolutionary Cells (RZ)
Revolutionary Cells was a German left-wing political militancy of self-described "urban guerillas" who were active from 1973 to 1993. According to the office of the German Federal Prosecutor, the RZ claimed responsibility for 186 attacks, of which 40 were committed in West Berlin...
terrorists and flown to Uganda. There, the Germans separated the Jewish passengers from the Non-Jewish passengers, releasing the non-Jews. The hijackers threatened to kill the remaining 100-odd Jewish passengers (and the French crew who had refused to leave). Israel responded with a rescue operation
Operation Entebbe
Operation Entebbe was a counter-terrorist hostage-rescue mission carried out by the Special Forces of the Israel Defense Forces at Entebbe Airport in Uganda on 4 July 1976. A week earlier, on 27 June, an Air France plane with 248 passengers was hijacked by Palestinian and German terrorists and...
in which the kidnapped Jews were freed.
The rise of the Likud party to the government in 1977
Israeli legislative election, 1977
The Elections for the ninth Knesset were held on 17 May 1977. For the first time in Israeli political history, the right-wing, led by Likud, won the election, ending almost 30 years of rule by the left-wing Alignment and its predecessor, Mapai...
led to the establishment of a large number of Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
On March 11, 1978, a force of nearly a dozen armed Palestinian terrorists landed their boats near a major coastal road in Israel. There they hijacked a bus
Coastal Road massacre
The Coastal Road massacre of 1978 was an attack involving the hijacking of a bus on Israel's Coastal Highway in which 38 Israeli civilians, including 13 children, were killed, and 71 were wounded. The attack was planned by Abu Jihad and carried out by the PLO faction Fatah...
and sprayed gunfire inside and at passing vehicles, killing thirty-seven civilians. In response, the IDF launched Operation Litani three days later, with the goal of taking control of Southern Lebanon up to the Litani River. The IDF achieved this goal, and the PLO withdrew to the north into Beirut. After Israel withdrew from Lebanon, Fatah forces resumed firing rockets into the Galilee region of Israel. During the years following operation Litani, many diplomatic efforts were made which tried to end the war on the Israeli-Lebanese border, including the effort of Philip Habib
Philip Habib
Philip Charles Habib was a Lebanese-American career diplomat known for work in Vietnam, South Korea and the Middle East...
, the emissary of Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
who in the summer of 1981 managed to arrange a lasting cease-fire between Israel and the PLO which lasted about a year.
Israel ended the ceasefire after an assassination attempt on the Israeli Ambassador in the Britain, Shlomo Argov, in mid-1982 (which was made by Abu Nidal's organization that was ostracized from the PLO). This led Israel to invade Lebanon in the 1982 Lebanon War
1982 Lebanon War
The 1982 Lebanon War , , called Operation Peace for Galilee by Israel, and later known in Israel as the Lebanon War and First Lebanon War, began on 6 June 1982, when the Israel Defense Forces invaded southern Lebanon...
on June 6, 1982 with the aim to protect the North of Israel from terrorist attacks. IDF invaded Lebanon and even occupied Beirut. To end the siege, the US and European governments brokered an agreement guaranteeing safe passage for Arafat and Fatah – guarded by a multinational force – to exile in Tunis
Tunis
Tunis is the capital of both the Tunisian Republic and the Tunis Governorate. It is Tunisia's largest city, with a population of 728,453 as of 2004; the greater metropolitan area holds some 2,412,500 inhabitants....
. During the war, Israeli allied Phalangist Christian Arab militias carried out the bloody Sabra and Shatila Massacre
Sabra and Shatila massacre
The Sabra and Shatila massacre took place in the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut, Lebanon between September 16 and September 18, 1982, during the Lebanese civil war. Palestinian and Lebanese civilians were massacred in the camps by Christian Lebanese Phalangists while the camp...
in which 700-3,500 unarmed Palestinians were killed by the Phalangist militias while the Israeli troops surrounded the camps with tanks and checkpoints, monitoring entrances and exits. For its involvement in the Lebanese war and its indirect responsibility for the Sabra and Shatila Massacre, Israel was heavily criticized, including from within. An Israeli Commission of Inquiry found that Israeli military personnel, among them defense minister and future prime minister
Prime Minister of Israel
The Prime Minister of Israel is the head of the Israeli government and the most powerful political figure in Israel . The prime minister is the country's chief executive. The official residence of the prime minister, Beit Rosh Hamemshala is in Jerusalem...
Ariel Sharon
Ariel Sharon
Ariel Sharon is an Israeli statesman and retired general, who served as Israel’s 11th Prime Minister. He has been in a permanent vegetative state since suffering a stroke on 4 January 2006....
, had several times become aware that a massacre was in progress without taking serious steps to stop it, leading to his resignation as Israel's Defense Minister. In June 1985, Israel withdrew most of its troops from Lebanon, leaving a residual Israeli force and an Israeli-supported militia
South Lebanon Army
The South Lebanon Army , also "South Lebanese Army," was a Lebanese militia during the Lebanese Civil War. After 1979, the militia operated in southern Lebanon under the authority of Saad Haddad's Government of Free Lebanon...
in southern Lebanon as a "security zone
Israeli Security Zone
The Israeli Security Zone in southern Lebanon was a strip of territory of varying width, , from the Israeli border and the Golan Heights, occupied by Israeli forces from 1985 to 2000. Additional regions controlled by the South Lebanon Army are sometimes included under the term...
" and buffer against attacks on its northern territory.
Meanwhile, the PLO led an international diplomatic front against Israel in Tunis. Following the wave of terror attacks including the murder on MS Achille Lauro
MS Achille Lauro
MS Achille Lauro was a cruise ship based in Naples, Italy. Built between 1939 and 1947 as MS Willem Ruys, a passenger liner for the Rotterdamsche Lloyd. It is most remembered for its 1985 hijacking...
in October 1985, Israel bombed the PLO commandership in Tunis during Operation Wooden Leg
Operation Wooden Leg
Operation Wooden Leg was an attack by Israel on the Palestine Liberation Organization headquarters in Hammam al-Shatt, Tunisia, 12 miles from the capital of Tunis. It took place on October 1, 1985. Taking place 1,280 miles away, this was the furthest operation from Israel undertaken by the...
.
The continuing establishment of the Israeli settlements and continuing Israeli occupation in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip led to the first Palestinian Intifada
First Intifada
The First Intifada was a Palestinian uprising against the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories. The uprising began in the Jabalia refugee camp and quickly spread throughout Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem....
(uprising) in December 1987, which lasted until the Madrid Conference of 1991
Madrid Conference of 1991
The Madrid Conference was hosted by the government of Spain and co-sponsored by the USA and the USSR. It convened on October 30, 1991 and lasted for three days. It was an early attempt by the international community to start a peace process through negotiations involving Israel and the Palestinians...
, despite Israeli attempts to suppress it. It was a partially spontaneous uprising, but by January 1988, it was already under the direction from the PLO headquarters in Tunis, which carried out ongoing terrorist attacks targeting Israeli civilians. The riots escalated daily throughout the territories and were especially severe in the Gaza Strip. The Intifada was renowned by its stone-throwing demonstrations by youth against the heavily-armed Israeli Defense Forces. Over the course of the First Intifada, a total 1,551 Palestinians and 422 Israelis were killed. In 1987, Ahmed Yassin
Ahmed Yassin
Sheikh Ahmed Ismail Hassan Yassin was a founder of Hamas, an Islamist Palestinian paramilitary organization and political party. Yassin also served as the spiritual leader of the organization...
co-founded Hamas
Hamas
Hamas is the Palestinian Sunni Islamic or Islamist political party that governs the Gaza Strip. Hamas also has a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades...
with Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi
Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi
Dr. Abdel Aziz Ali Abdulmajid al-Rantissi ; 23 October 1947 – 17 April 2004) was the co-founder of the militant Palestinian Islamist organization Hamas with Sheikh Ahmed Yassin....
. Since then, Hamas has been involved in what it calls "armed resistance" against Israel, which includes mainly terrorist acts against Israeli civilian population.
On November 15, 1988, a year after the outbreak of the first intifada, the PLO declared the establishment of the Palestinian state in Algiers
Algiers
' is the capital and largest city of Algeria. According to the 1998 census, the population of the city proper was 1,519,570 and that of the urban agglomeration was 2,135,630. In 2009, the population was about 3,500,000...
. The proclaimed "State of Palestine" is not and has never actually been an independent state, as it has never had sovereignty over any territory in history. The declaration is generally interpreted to have recognized Israel within its pre-1967 boundaries, and its right to exist. Following this declaration, the United States and many other countries recognized the PLO.
Prior to the Gulf War
Gulf War
The Persian Gulf War , commonly referred to as simply the Gulf War, was a war waged by a U.N.-authorized coalition force from 34 nations led by the United States, against Iraq in response to Iraq's invasion and annexation of Kuwait.The war is also known under other names, such as the First Gulf...
in 1990-91, Arafat supported Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...
's invasion of Kuwait
Kuwait
The State of Kuwait is a sovereign Arab state situated in the north-east of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south at Khafji, and Iraq to the north at Basra. It lies on the north-western shore of the Persian Gulf. The name Kuwait is derived from the...
and opposed the US-led coalition attack on Iraq. Arafat's decision also severed relations with Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
and many of the oil
Oil
An oil is any substance that is liquid at ambient temperatures and does not mix with water but may mix with other oils and organic solvents. This general definition includes vegetable oils, volatile essential oils, petrochemical oils, and synthetic oils....
-producing Arab states that supported the US-led coalition. Many in the US also used Arafat's position as a reason to disregard his claims to being a partner for peace. After the end of hostilities, many Arab states that backed the coalition cut off funds to the PLO and bringing the PLO to the brink of crisis.
In the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War, the coalition's victory in the Gulf War opened a new opportunity to advance the peace process. The U.S launched a diplomatic initiative in cooperation with Russia which resulted in the October 1991 Madrid peace conference
Madrid Conference of 1991
The Madrid Conference was hosted by the government of Spain and co-sponsored by the USA and the USSR. It convened on October 30, 1991 and lasted for three days. It was an early attempt by the international community to start a peace process through negotiations involving Israel and the Palestinians...
. The conference was hosted by the government of Spain and co-sponsored by the USA and the USSR. The Madrid peace conference was an early attempt by the international community to start a peace process
Peace process
Peace process may refer to:* in general:** Peacebuilding** Conflict resolution* specifically:** Northern Ireland peace process, efforts from c.1993 to end "the Troubles"...
through negotiations involving Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
and the Palestinians, as well as Arab countries including Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
, Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
, and Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
. The Palestinian team, due to Israeli objections, was initially formally a part of a joint Palestinian-Jordanian delegation and consisted of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza without open PLO associations.
1993-2000: Oslo peace process
Oslo
Oslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
. On September 9, 1993, Yasser Arafat sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
Yitzhak Rabin
' was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the fifth Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms in office, 1974–77 and 1992 until his assassination in 1995....
, stating that the PLO officially recognized Israel's right to exist and officially renouncing terrorism
Terrorism
Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...
. On September 13, Arafat and Rabin signed a Declaration of Principles in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, on the basis of the negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian teams in Oslo, Norway. The declaration was a major conceptual breakthrough achieved outside of the Madrid framework, which specifically barred foreign-residing PLO leaders from the negotiation process. After this, a long process of negotiation known as the "Oslo peace process" began.
During the Oslo peace process throughout the 1990s, as both sides obligated to work towards a two-state solution
Two-state solution
The two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the consensus solution that is currently under discussion by the key parties to the conflict, most recently at the Annapolis Conference in November 2007...
, Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization negotiated, unsuccessfully, and tried to reach to a mutual agreement.
One of the main features of the Oslo Peace Process was the establishment of the autonomous governmental authority, the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its associated governing institutions to administer Palestinian communities in the Gaza Strip
Gaza Strip
thumb|Gaza city skylineThe Gaza Strip lies on the Eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The Strip borders Egypt on the southwest and Israel on the south, east and north. It is about long, and between 6 and 12 kilometres wide, with a total area of...
and the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
. During the Oslo peace process throughout the 1990s, the Palestinian Authority was ceded authority from Israel over various regions of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. This process gave it governmental and economic authority over many Palestinian communities. It also gave the PA many of the components of a modern government and society, including a Palestinian police force, legislature, and other institutions. In return for these concessions, the Palestinian Authority was asked to promote tolerance for Israel within Palestinian society, and acceptance of Israel's right to exist.
One of the most contentious issues surrounding this peace process is whether the PA in fact met its obligations to promote tolerance. There is specific evidence that the PA actively funded and supported many terrorist activities and groups. Palestinians stated that any terrorist acts stemmed from Israel not having conceded enough land and political power to win support among ordinary Palestinians. Israelis stated that these acts of terrorism were because the PA openly encouraged and supported incitement against Israel, and terrorism. There was increasing disagreement and debate among Israelis about the amount of positive results and benefits produced by the Oslo process. Supporters said it was producing advances leading to a viable Palestinian society which would promote genuine acceptance of Israel. Opponents said that concessions were merely emboldening extremist elements to commit more violence in order to win further concessions, without providing any real acceptance, benefits, goodwill, or reconciliation for Israel in return.
In February 1994 during the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre
Cave of the Patriarchs massacre
The Cave of the Patriarchs massacre was a terrorist attack that occurred when Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli settler and member of the far-right Israeli Kach movement, opened fire on unarmed Palestinian Muslims praying inside the Ibrahim Mosque at the Cave of the Patriarchs site in Hebron in the...
a follower of the Kach
Kach and Kahane Chai
Kach was a far-right political party in Israel. Founded by Rabbi Meir Kahane in the early 1970s, and following his Jewish nationalist ideology , the party entered the Knesset in 1984 after several electoral failures...
movement killed 25 Palestinian-Arabs at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron
Hebron
Hebron , is located in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judean Mountains, it lies 930 meters above sea level. It is the largest city in the West Bank and home to around 165,000 Palestinians, and over 500 Jewish settlers concentrated in and around the old quarter...
. As an act of revenge to the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre, in April 1994, Hamas launched suicide bomber attacks targeting Israeli civilian population in many locations throughout Israel, however, once the Hamas started to the use these means it became a regular pattern of action against Israel.
On September 28, 1995, Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
Yitzhak Rabin
' was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the fifth Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms in office, 1974–77 and 1992 until his assassination in 1995....
and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat
Yasser Arafat
Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini , popularly known as Yasser Arafat or by his kunya Abu Ammar , was a Palestinian leader and a Laureate of the Nobel Prize. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization , President of the Palestinian National Authority...
signed the Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in Washington. the agreement marked the conclusion of the first stage of negotiations between Israel and the PLO. The agreement allowed the PLO leadership to relocate to the occupied territories and granted autonomy to the Palestinians with talks to follow regarding final status. In return the Palestinians recognized Israel's right to exist and promised to abstain from use of terror. However the agreement was opposed by the Hamas and other Palestinian factions, whom at this point were already committing suicide bomber attacks throughout Israel.
Tensions in Israel, arising from the continuation of terrorism and anger at loss of territory, led to the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin
Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin
The assassination of Yitzhak Rabin took place on November 4, 1995 at 21:30, at the end of a rally in support of the Oslo Accords at the Kings of Israel Square in Tel Aviv...
by a right-wing Jewish radical on November 4, 1995. Upon Rabin's assassination, the Israeli prime minister's post was filled by Shimon Peres
Shimon Peres
GCMG is the ninth President of the State of Israel. Peres served twice as the eighth Prime Minister of Israel and once as Interim Prime Minister, and has been a member of 12 cabinets in a political career spanning over 66 years...
. Peres continued Rabin's policies in supporting the peace process.
In 1996, increasing Israeli doubts about the peace process, led to Benjamin Netanyahu
Benjamin Netanyahu
Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu is the current Prime Minister of Israel. He serves also as the Chairman of the Likud Party, as a Knesset member, as the Health Minister of Israel, as the Pensioner Affairs Minister of Israel and as the Economic Strategy Minister of Israel.Netanyahu is the first and, to...
of the Likud Party winning the election, mainly due to his promise to use a more rigid line in the negotiations with the Palestinian Authority. Netanyahu raised many questions about many central premises of the Oslo process. One of his main points was disagreement with the Oslo premise that the negotiations should proceed in stages, meaning that concessions should be made to Palestinians before any resolution was reached on major issues, such as the status of Jerusalem, and the amending of the Palestinian National Charter. Oslo supporters had claimed that the multi-stage approach would build goodwill among Palestinians and would propel them to seek reconciliation when these major issues were raised in later stages. Netanyahu said that these concessions only gave encouragement to extremist elements, without receiving any tangible gestures in return. He called for tangible gestures of Palestinian goodwill in return for Israeli concessions.
In January 1996 Israel assassinated the chief bombmaker of Hamas, Yahya Ayyash
Yahya Ayyash
Yahya Abd-al-Latif Ayyash was the chief bombmaker of Hamas and the leader of the West Bank battalion of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades...
. In reaction to this, Hamas carried out a wave of suicide attacks in Israel. Following these attacks the Palestinian Authority began to act against the Hamas and oppress their activity.
In January 1997 Netanyahu signed the Hebron Protocol with the Palestinian Authority, resulting in the redeployment of Israeli forces in Hebron
Hebron
Hebron , is located in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judean Mountains, it lies 930 meters above sea level. It is the largest city in the West Bank and home to around 165,000 Palestinians, and over 500 Jewish settlers concentrated in and around the old quarter...
and the turnover of civilian authority in much of the area to the Palestinian Authority.
In 1997, after two deadly suicide attacks in Jerusalem by the Hamas, Israeli secret agents were sent to Jordan to eliminate the political head of the Department of Hamas, Khaled Mashal
Khaled Mashal
Khaled Mashal, also known as Khaled Mashaal, Khaled Meshaal, and Khalid Mish'al, has been the main leader of Hamas since the assassination of Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi in 2004. In addition, Mashal heads the Syrian branch of the political bureau of Hamas.Mashal was born in Silwad, a village north of...
, using a special poison (See the assassination attempt on Khaled Mashal). Nevertheless, the operation entangled and the secret agents were captured. In return of their release Israel sent over the medicine which saved his life and freed a dozen of Palestinian prisoners including Sheikh Ahmad Yassin. This release and the increase of the security forces of the Palestinian Authority, led to a cease-fire in the suicide attacks until the outbreak of the Second Intifada.
Eventually, the lack of progress of the peace process led to new negotiations, which produced the Wye River Memorandum
Wye River Memorandum
The Wye River Memorandum was an agreement negotiated between Israel and the Palestine Authority to implement the earlier Interim Agreement of 28 September, 1995...
, which detailed the steps to be taken by the Israeli government and Palestinian Authority to implement the earlier Interim Agreement of 1995. It was signed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, and on November 17, 1998, Israel's 120 member parliament, the Knesset
Knesset
The Knesset is the unicameral legislature of Israel, located in Givat Ram, Jerusalem.-Role in Israeli Government :The legislative branch of the Israeli government, the Knesset passes all laws, elects the President and Prime Minister , approves the cabinet, and supervises the work of the government...
, approved the Wye River Memorandum by a vote of 75-19.
In 1999, Ehud Barak
Ehud Barak
Ehud Barak is an Israeli politician who served as Prime Minister from 1999 until 2001. He was leader of the Labor Party until January 2011 and holds the posts of Minister of Defense and Deputy Prime Minister in Binyamin Netanyahu's government....
was elected prime minister. Barak continued Rabin's policies in supporting the peace process. In 2000, 18 years after Israel occupied Southern Lebanon in the 1982 Lebanon War
1982 Lebanon War
The 1982 Lebanon War , , called Operation Peace for Galilee by Israel, and later known in Israel as the Lebanon War and First Lebanon War, began on 6 June 1982, when the Israel Defense Forces invaded southern Lebanon...
, the occupation ended as Israel unilaterally withdrew its remaining forces from the "security zone
Israeli Security Zone
The Israeli Security Zone in southern Lebanon was a strip of territory of varying width, , from the Israeli border and the Golan Heights, occupied by Israeli forces from 1985 to 2000. Additional regions controlled by the South Lebanon Army are sometimes included under the term...
" in southern Lebanon.
As the violence increased with little hope for diplomacy, in July 2000 the Camp David 2000 Summit
Camp David 2000 Summit
The Middle East Peace Summit at Camp David of July 2000 took place between United States President Bill Clinton, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, and Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat...
was held which was aimed at reaching a "final status" agreement. The summit collapsed after Yasser Arafat would not accept a proposal drafted by American and Israeli negotiators. Barak was prepared to offer the entire Gaza Strip, a Palestinian capital in a part of East Jerusalem, 73% of the West Bank (excluding eastern Jerusalem) raising to 90-94% after 10–25 years, and financial reparations for Palestinian refugees for peace. Arafat turned down the offer without making a counter-offer.
2000-2005: Second Intifada
The failure of the peace process and the eruption of the Second Intifada, which included increased Palestinian terror attacks being made against Israeli civilians, led much of the Israeli public and political leadership to lose confidence in the Palestinian Authority as a peace partner. Due to an increase in terror attacks during the Second Intifada, mainly carried out by Hamas against Israeli civilians, Israeli troops began conducting regular raids and arrests inside the West Bank. In addition, Israel increased the selective assassinations, initially aimed at active terrorist fighters and later on aimed at the terrorist leadership as well, including Sheikh Ahmad Yassin. This policy spurred controversy within Israel and worldwide.
After the collapse of Barak's government, Ariel Sharon
Ariel Sharon
Ariel Sharon is an Israeli statesman and retired general, who served as Israel’s 11th Prime Minister. He has been in a permanent vegetative state since suffering a stroke on 4 January 2006....
was elected Prime Minister on February 6, 2001. Sharon invited the Israeli Labor Party into the coalition to shore up support for the disengagement plan. Due to the deterioration of the political situation, he refused to continue negotiations with the Palestinian Authority at the Taba Summit
Taba Summit
The Taba summit were talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, held from January 21 to January 27, 2001 at Taba in the Sinai peninsula...
, or under any aspect of the Oslo Accords.
At the Beirut Summit in 2002, the Arab League
Arab League
The Arab League , officially called the League of Arab States , is a regional organisation of Arab states in North and Northeast Africa, and Southwest Asia . It was formed in Cairo on 22 March 1945 with six members: Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan , Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. Yemen joined as a...
proposed an alternative political plan
Arab Peace Initiative
The Beirut Summit was a meeting of the Arab League in Beirut, Lebanon in March 2002 to discuss the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The meeting became especially noteworthy for the adoption, by the Arab states attending, of a proposal offering a comprehensive peace between the Arab countries and...
aimed at ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but it was rejected by Israel (mostly because it demanded a Palestinian right of return
Palestinian right of return
The Palestinian right of return is a political position or principle asserting that Palestinian refugees, both first-generation refugees and their descendants, have a right to return, and a right to the property they or their forebears left or which they were forced to leave in what is now Israel...
).
Following a period of relative restraint on the part of Israel, after a lethal suicide attack in the Park Hotel in Netanya
Passover massacre
The Passover massacre was a suicide bombing carried out by Hamas at the Park Hotel in Netanya, Israel on March 27, 2002, during a Passover seder. Thirty civilians were killed in the attack and 140 were injured...
which happened on March 27, 2002, in which 30 Jews were murdered, Sharon ordered Operation Defensive Shield
Operation Defensive Shield
Operation Defensive Shield was a large-scale military operation conducted by the Israel Defense Forces in 2002, during the course of the Second Intifada. It was the largest military operation in the West Bank since the 1967 Six-Day War. The operation was an attempt by the Israeli army to stop the...
, a large-scale military operation carried out by the Israel Defense Forces
Israel Defense Forces
The Israel Defense Forces , commonly known in Israel by the Hebrew acronym Tzahal , are the military forces of the State of Israel. They consist of the ground forces, air force and navy. It is the sole military wing of the Israeli security forces, and has no civilian jurisdiction within Israel...
between March 29 until May 10, 2002 in Palestinian cities in the West Bank. The operation contributed significantly to the reduction of Palestinian terror attacks in Israel.
As part of the efforts to fight Palestinian terrorism, in June 2002, Israel began construction of the West Bank Fence
Israeli West Bank barrier
The Israeli West Bank barrier is a separation barrier being constructed by the State of Israel along and within the West Bank. Upon completion, the barrier’s total length will be approximately...
along the Green Line
Green Line (Israel)
Green Line refers to the demarcation lines set out in the 1949 Armistice Agreements between Israel and its neighbours after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War...
border. After the barrier went up, Palestinian suicide bombings and other attacks across Israel dropped by 90%. However, this barrier became a major issue of contention between the two sides.
Following the severe economic and security situation in Israel, the Likud Party headed by Ariel Sharon won the Israeli elections in January 2003 in an overwhelming victory. The elections led to a temporary truce between Israel and the Palestinians and to the Aquba summit in the May 2003 in which Sharon endorsed the Road Map for Peace
Road map for peace
The roadmap for peace or "road map" for peace is a plan to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict proposed by a "quartet" of international entities: the United States, the European Union, Russia, and the United Nations. The principles of the plan, originally drafted by U.S. Foreign Service...
put forth by the United States, European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
, and Russia, which opened a dialogue with Mahmud Abbas, and announced his commitment to the creation of a Palestinian state in the future. Following the endorsing of the Road Map, the Quartet on the Middle East
Quartet on the Middle East
The Quartet on the Middle East, sometimes called the Diplomatic Quartet or Madrid Quartet or simply the Quartet, is a foursome of nations and international and supranational entities involved in mediating the peace process in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Quartet are the United Nations, the...
was established, consisting of representatives from the United States, Russia, EU and UN as an intermediary body of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
On March 19, 2003, Arafat appointed Mahmoud Abbas
Mahmoud Abbas
Mahmoud Abbas , also known by the kunya Abu Mazen , has been the Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation since 11 November 2004 and became President of the Palestinian National Authority on 15 January 2005 on the Fatah ticket.Elected to serve until 9 January 2009, he unilaterally...
as the Prime Minister. The rest of Abbas's term as prime minister continued to be characterized by numerous conflicts between him and Arafat over the distribution of power between the two. The United States and Israel accused Arafat of constantly undermining Abbas and his government. Continuing violence and Israeli "target killings" of known terrorists forced Abbas to pledge a crackdown in order to uphold the Palestinian Authority's side of the Road Map for Peace. This led to a power struggle with Arafat over control of the Palestinian security services; Arafat refused to release control to Abbas, thus preventing him from using them in a crackdown on militants. Abbas resigned from the post of Prime Minister in October 2003, citing lack of support from Israel and the United States as well as "internal incitement" against his government.
In the end of 2003, Sharon embarked on a course of unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip
Israel's unilateral disengagement plan
Israel's unilateral disengagement plan , also known as the "Disengagement plan", "Gaza expulsion plan", and "Hitnatkut", was a proposal by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, adopted by the government on June 6, 2004 and enacted in August 2005, to evict all Israelis from the Gaza Strip and from...
, while maintaining control of its coastline and airspace. Sharon's plan has been welcomed by both the Palestinian Authority and Israel's left wing as a step towards a final peace settlement. However, it has been greeted with opposition from within his own Likud party and from other right-wing Israelis, on national security, military, and religious grounds. In January 2005, Sharon formed a national unity government
National unity government
A national unity government, government of national unity, or national union government is a broad coalition government consisting of all parties in the legislature, usually formed during a time of war or other national emergency.- Canada :During World War I the Conservative government of Sir...
that included representatives of Likud, Labor, and Meimad and Degel HaTorah as "out-of-government" supporters without any seats in the government (United Torah Judaism parties usually reject having ministerial offices as a policy). Between 16 and 30 August 2005, Sharon controversially expelled 9,480 Jewish settlers from 21 settlements in Gaza and four settlements in the northern West Bank. The disengagement plan was implemented in September 2005. Following the withdrawal, the Israeli town of Sderot
Sderot
Sderot is a western Negev city in the Southern District of Israel. According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics , at the end of 2009 the city had a total population of 20,700. The city has been an ongoing target of Qassam rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip...
and other Israeli communities near the Gaza strip became subject to constant shelling
Qassam rocket
The Qassam rocket is a simple steel artillery rocket developed and deployed by the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military arm of Hamas. Three models have been produced and used between 2001 and 2011....
and mortar
Mortar (weapon)
A mortar is an indirect fire weapon that fires explosive projectiles known as bombs at low velocities, short ranges, and high-arcing ballistic trajectories. It is typically muzzle-loading and has a barrel length less than 15 times its caliber....
bomb attacks from Gaza with only minimal Israeli response.
Following the November 2004 death of long-time Fatah party PLO leader and PA chairman Yasser Arafat
Yasser Arafat
Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini , popularly known as Yasser Arafat or by his kunya Abu Ammar , was a Palestinian leader and a Laureate of the Nobel Prize. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization , President of the Palestinian National Authority...
, Fatah member Mahmoud Abbas was elected President of the Palestinian National Authority
President of the Palestinian National Authority
The President of the Palestinian National Authority is the highest-ranking political position in the Palestinian National Authority ....
in January 2005.
2005 until today: The strengthening of Hamas
One key allegation which emerged against the PA was that Arafat and Fatah had received billions of dollars in aid from foreign nations and organizations and had never used this money to develop Palestinian society. It was alleged that the money was used for Arafat's personal expenses. These allegations gradually grew in prominence, which increased Palestinian popular support for the group Hamas, which was often seen as being more efficient and honest and had built various institutions and social services. Hamas also stated clearly that it did not recognize Israel's right to exist and did not accept the Oslo process nor any other peace process with Israel. It openly stated that it had encouraged and organized acts of terrorism and many attacks.The strengthening of the Hamas organization amongst the Palestinians, the gradual disintegration of the Palestinian Authority and the Fatah organization, and the Israeli disengagement plan and especially the death of Yasser Arafat led to the policy change of the Hamas movement in early 2005 which started putting greater emphasis to its political characteristics.
In 2006 Palestinian legislative elections
Palestinian legislative election, 2006
On January 25, 2006, elections were held for the Palestinian Legislative Council , the legislature of the Palestinian National Authority . Notwithstanding the 2005 municipal elections and the January 9, 2005 presidential election, this was the first election to the PLC since 1996; subsequent...
Hamas won a majority in the Palestinian Legislative Council
Palestinian Legislative Council
The Palestinian Legislative Council, the legislature of the Palestinian Authority, is a unicameral body with 132 members, elected from 16 electoral districts in the West Bank and Gaza...
, prompting the United States and many European countries to cut off all funds to the Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, insisting that the Hamas must recognize Israel, renounce violence and accept previous peace pacts. Israel refused to negotiate with Hamas, since Hamas never renounced its beliefs that Israel has no right to exist and that the entire State of Israel is an illegal occupation which must be wiped out.
In June 2006 during a well-planned operation, Hamas managed to cross the border from Gaza, attack an Israeli tank, kill two IDF soldiers and kidnap wounded Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit is an Israeli – French citizen and Israel Defense Forces soldier. On 25 June 2006, he was captured inside Israel by Hamas militants in a cross-border raid via underground tunnels near the border with Gaza. The Hamas militants held him for over five years, until he was released on...
back into the Gaza Strip. Following the incident and in response to numerous rocket firings by Hamas from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel, fighting broke out between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip (see 2006 Israel-Gaza conflict
2006 Israel-Gaza conflict
The 2006 Israel–Gaza conflict refers to the series of battles between Palestinian militants and the Israel Defense Forces . Large-scale conventional warfare beyond the peripheries of the Gaza Strip began when Israel launched Operation Summer Rains , the codename for an IDF military operation in the...
).
In the summer of 2007 a Fatah–Hamas conflict
Fatah–Hamas conflict
The Fatah–Hamas conflict , also referred to as the Palestinian Civil War , and the Conflict of Brothers , i.e...
broke out, which eventually led Hamas taking control of the Gaza strip, which in practice divided the Palestinian Authority into two. Various forces affiliated with Fatah engaged in combat with Hamas, in numerous gun battles. Most Fatah leaders escaped to Egypt and the West Bank, while some were captured and killed. Fatah remained in control of the West Bank, and President Abbas formed a new governing coalition, which some critics of Fatah said subverts the Palestinian Constitution and excludes the majority government of Hamas.
In November 2007 the Annapolis Conference
Annapolis Conference
-Attendees:U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice organized and hosted the conference. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and U.S. President George W. Bush attended the meeting...
was held. The conference marked the first time a two-state solution
Two-state solution
The two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the consensus solution that is currently under discussion by the key parties to the conflict, most recently at the Annapolis Conference in November 2007...
was articulated as the mutually agreed-upon outline for addressing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The conference ended with the issuing of a joint statement from all parties.
2008 Israel–Hamas ceasefire
-Background: After its victory in the 2006 municipal legislative elections, Hamas assumed administrative control of Gaza. Hamas consolidated this control over Gaza after a military conflict with Fatah. Israel and Egypt then partially sealed their border crossings with Gaza, on the grounds that...
expired on December 19, 2008. Hamas and Israel could not agree on conditions to extend the truce. Hamas blamed Israel for not lifting the Gaza Strip blockade, and for an Israeli raid on a purported tunnel, crossing the border into the Gaza Strip from Israel on November 4, which it held constituted a serious breach of the truce. Israel accuses Hamas of violating the truce citing the frequent rocket and mortar attacks on Israeli cities.
Gaza Strip
thumb|Gaza city skylineThe Gaza Strip lies on the Eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The Strip borders Egypt on the southwest and Israel on the south, east and north. It is about long, and between 6 and 12 kilometres wide, with a total area of...
, targeting Hamas bases, police training camps, police headquarters and offices. Civilian infrastructure, including mosques, houses, medical facilities and schools, were also attacked. Israel has said many of these buildings were used by combatants, and as storage spaces for weapons and rockets. Hamas intensified its rocket and mortar attacks against targets in Israel throughout the conflict, hitting previously untargeted cities such as Beersheba
Beersheba
Beersheba is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. Often referred to as the "Capital of the Negev", it is the seventh-largest city in Israel with a population of 194,300....
and Ashdod. On January 3, 2009, the Israeli ground invasion began.
The operation resulted in the deaths of more than 1,300 Palestinians. The IDF released a report stating that the vast majority of the dead were Hamas militants. The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights
Palestinian Centre for Human Rights
The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights is an independent Palestinian human rights organization based in Gaza City, founded and directed by Raji Sourani...
reported that 926 of the 1,417 dead had been civilians and non-combatants.
Since 2009, the Obama administration
Presidency of Barack Obama
The Presidency of Barack Obama began at noon EST on January 20, 2009 when he became the 44th President of the United States. Obama was a United States Senator from Illinois at the time of his victory over Arizona Senator John McCain in the 2008 presidential election...
has repeatedly pressured the Israeli government led by Prime Minister
Prime Minister of Israel
The Prime Minister of Israel is the head of the Israeli government and the most powerful political figure in Israel . The prime minister is the country's chief executive. The official residence of the prime minister, Beit Rosh Hamemshala is in Jerusalem...
Benjamin Netanyahu
Benjamin Netanyahu
Benjamin "Bibi" Netanyahu is the current Prime Minister of Israel. He serves also as the Chairman of the Likud Party, as a Knesset member, as the Health Minister of Israel, as the Pensioner Affairs Minister of Israel and as the Economic Strategy Minister of Israel.Netanyahu is the first and, to...
to freeze the growth of Israeli settlements in the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
and reignite the peace process between Israel and the Palestinian people
Palestinian people
The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza...
. During President Obama's Cairo speech
A New Beginning
"A New Beginning" is the name of a speech delivered by United States President Barack Obama on June 4, 2009, from the Major Reception Hall at Cairo University in Cairo, Egypt. Al-Azhar University co-hosted the event...
on June 4, 2009 in which Obama addressed the Muslim world
Muslim world
The term Muslim world has several meanings. In a religious sense, it refers to those who adhere to the teachings of Islam, referred to as Muslims. In a cultural sense, it refers to Islamic civilization, inclusive of non-Muslims living in that civilization...
Obama stated, among other things, that "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements". "This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop." Following Obama's Cairo speech Netanyahu immediately called a special government meeting. On June 14, ten days after Obama's Cairo speech, Netanyahu gave a speech at Bar-Ilan University in which he endorsed, for the first time, a "Demilitarized Palestinian State", after two months of refusing to commit to anything other than a self-ruling autonomy when coming into office. The speech was widely seen as a response to Obama's speech. Netanyahu stated that he would accept a Palestinian state if Jerusalem were to remain the united capital of Israel
Positions on Jerusalem
There are differing legal and diplomatic positions on Jerusalem held within the international community. Governments and scholars alike are divided over the legal status of Jerusalem under international law. Most countries of the world do not recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Many do not...
, the Palestinians would have no army, and the Palestinians would give up their demand for a right of return
Palestinian right of return
The Palestinian right of return is a political position or principle asserting that Palestinian refugees, both first-generation refugees and their descendants, have a right to return, and a right to the property they or their forebears left or which they were forced to leave in what is now Israel...
. He also claimed the right for a "natural growth" in the existing Jewish settlements
Israeli settlement
An Israeli settlement is a Jewish civilian community built on land that was captured by Israel from Jordan, Egypt, and Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War and is considered occupied territory by the international community. Such settlements currently exist in the West Bank...
in the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
while their permanent status is up to further negotiation. In general, the address represented a complete turnaround for his previously hawkish positions against the peace process. The overture was quickly rejected by Palestinian leaders such as Hamas
Hamas
Hamas is the Palestinian Sunni Islamic or Islamist political party that governs the Gaza Strip. Hamas also has a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades...
spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri
Sami Abu Zuhri
Sami Abu Zuhri is a senior spokesman for the Palestinian political party Hamas. Zuhri, a relatively unknown member of Hamas, gained notoriety on May 19, 2006, when Palestinian security and customs officials discovered he had 640,000 euros on his person; another report claimed he held a larger sum...
, who called the speech "racist".
On 25 November 2009, Israel imposed a 10-month construction freeze on all of its settlements in the West Bank. Israel's decision was widely seen as due to pressure from the Obama administration, which urged the sides to seize the opportunity to resume talks. In his announcement Netanyahu called the move "a painful step that will encourage the peace process" and urged the Palestinians to respond. However, the Palestinians rejected the call and refused to enter negotiations, despite Israeli appeals to do so. Eventually, on September 2, United States launched direct negotiations between Israel and the PA in Washington
Direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians in 2010
Direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority have been taking place since September 2010, between United States President Barack Obama, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and ended when Netanyahu refused to extend...
. Nevertheless, soon afterwards, when Israeli partial moratorium on settlement construction in the West Bank was about to expire, the Palestinian leadership announced that they plan to leave the negotiations if the moratorium is not renewed. Israel state that it would not renew this gesture of goodwill and urged the Palestinian leadership to continue the negotiations. Later on Israel offered to renew the moratorium in exchange for a PA recognition of Israel as the national homeland of the Jewish people. This request was rejected by the Palestinians leadership.
During September 2011 the Palestinian Authority (PA) led a diplomatic campaign
Palestine 194
Palestine 194 is the name given to a diplomatic campaign by the Palestinian National Authority to gain membership for the State of Palestine in the United Nations at its 66th Session in September 2011. It seeks to effectively gain collective recognition for a Palestinian state based on the borders...
aimed at getting the recognition of the 66th Session
Sixty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly
The sixty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly opened on 13 September 2011 at 15:00 and is presided over by former Qatari permanent representative to the UN Nassir Abdulaziz Al-Nasser.-Organisation for the session:...
as the UN in the State of Palestine
State of Palestine
Palestine , officially declared as the State of Palestine , is a state that was proclaimed in exile in Algiers on 15 November 1988, when the Palestine Liberation Organization's National Council adopted the unilateral Palestinian Declaration of Independence...
within the 1967 borders
Green Line (Israel)
Green Line refers to the demarcation lines set out in the 1949 Armistice Agreements between Israel and its neighbours after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War...
with East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem or Eastern Jerusalem refer to the parts of Jerusalem captured and annexed by Jordan in the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and then captured and annexed by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War...
as its capital. On September 23 PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas delivered a harsh speech against Israel in the General Assembly of the United Nations in which he stated that the Palestinians would not recognize a Jewish state. That same day President Mahmoud Abbas
Mahmoud Abbas
Mahmoud Abbas , also known by the kunya Abu Mazen , has been the Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation since 11 November 2004 and became President of the Palestinian National Authority on 15 January 2005 on the Fatah ticket.Elected to serve until 9 January 2009, he unilaterally...
submitted a request to recognize the State of Palestine
State of Palestine
Palestine , officially declared as the State of Palestine , is a state that was proclaimed in exile in Algiers on 15 November 1988, when the Palestine Liberation Organization's National Council adopted the unilateral Palestinian Declaration of Independence...
as the 194th UN member to the Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
Ban Ki-moon
Ban Ki-moon is the eighth and current Secretary-General of the United Nations, after succeeding Kofi Annan in 2007. Before going on to be Secretary-General, Ban was a career diplomat in South Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in the United Nations. He entered diplomatic service the year he...
. The Security Council
United Nations Security Council
The United Nations Security Council is one of the principal organs of the United Nations and is charged with the maintenance of international peace and security. Its powers, outlined in the United Nations Charter, include the establishment of peacekeeping operations, the establishment of...
has yet to vote on it. The decision has been labeled by the Israeli government as a unilateral step.
In October 2011, a deal was reached
Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange
The Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange followed an agreement between Israel and Hamas to release Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in exchange for 1,027 prisoners – mainly Palestinians and Arab-Israelis, though among the prisoners released there was also a Ukrainian prisoner, a Jordanian prisoner, and a...
between Israel and Hamas
Hamas
Hamas is the Palestinian Sunni Islamic or Islamist political party that governs the Gaza Strip. Hamas also has a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades...
, by which the kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit
Gilad Shalit is an Israeli – French citizen and Israel Defense Forces soldier. On 25 June 2006, he was captured inside Israel by Hamas militants in a cross-border raid via underground tunnels near the border with Gaza. The Hamas militants held him for over five years, until he was released on...
would be released in exchange for 1,027 Palestinians and Arab-Israeli prisoners, of them 280 were sentenced to life in prison for planning and perpetrating various terror attacks against Israeli targets. The military Hamas
Hamas
Hamas is the Palestinian Sunni Islamic or Islamist political party that governs the Gaza Strip. Hamas also has a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades...
leader Ahmed Jabari was quoted later as confirming that the prisoners released as part of the deal were collectively responsible for the killing of 569 Israeli civilians.
Jewish and Arab populations
The following section presents the demographic history of the Jewish and ArabArab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
populations in Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
, Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
and the Palestinian territories
Palestinian territories
The Palestinian territories comprise the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Since the Palestinian Declaration of Independence in 1988, the region is today recognized by three-quarters of the world's countries as the State of Palestine or simply Palestine, although this status is not recognized by the...
spaning through the last two centuries which has been taken from census
Census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...
results and official documents which mention demographic composition. See Demographics of Israel
Demographics of Israel
The State of Israel has a population of approximately 7,798,600 inhabitants as of September 2011. 75.3% of them are Jewish , 20.5% are Arabs , while the remaining 4.3% are defined as "others" The State of Israel has a population of approximately 7,798,600 inhabitants as of September 2011. 75.3% of...
and Demographics of the Palestinian territories
Demographics of the Palestinian territories
This article is about the demographic features of the population of the Palestinian territories, including ethnicity, education level, health of the populous, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population....
for a more detailed overview of the current demographics.
19th century - 1948
EWLINE
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1949-67
EWLINE
1The decrease in the Arab population between 1947 and 1949 is due to the 1948 Palestinian exodus 1948 Palestinian exodus The 1948 Palestinian exodus , also known as the Nakba , occurred when approximately 711,000 to 725,000 Palestinian Arabs left, fled or were expelled from their homes, during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and the Civil War that preceded it. The exact number of refugees is a matter of dispute... . |
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1967-until today
EWLINE
2 - data which currently includes the Israeli settlement Israeli settlement An Israeli settlement is a Jewish civilian community built on land that was captured by Israel from Jordan, Egypt, and Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War and is considered occupied territory by the international community. Such settlements currently exist in the West Bank... s in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as well. |
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Jewish and Arab populations in Jerusalem
| Year | Jews Jews The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation... |
Arabs Palestinian people The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza... |
Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1860 | 6,000 | 6,000 | 12,000 |
| 1892 | 26,000 | 16,000 | 42,000 |
| 1922 | 34,000 | 29,000 | 63,000 |
| 1942 | 86,000 | 54,000 | 140,000 |
| 1948 | 99,830 | 65,170 | 165,000 |
| 1967 (July) | 200,032 | 65,968 | 266,000 |
| 1995 | 417,000 | 174,400 | 591,400 |
| 2000 | 437,240 | 220,260 | 657,500 |
See also
- Israeli-Palestinian conflictIsraeli-Palestinian conflictThe Israeli–Palestinian conflict is the ongoing conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. The conflict is wide-ranging, and the term is also used in reference to the earlier phases of the same conflict, between Jewish and Zionist yishuv and the Arab population living in Palestine under Ottoman or...
- Israeli-Palestinian conflict timeline
- Peace process in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict
- Israeli views of the peace process in the Israeli-Palestinian conflictIsraeli views of the peace process in the Israeli-Palestinian conflictThis article examines Israeli views of the peace process that is ongoing concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There are a multitude of opinions and views of the peace process elicited at various points during Israel’s history and by a variety of people...
- History of the Arab-Israeli conflictHistory of the Arab-Israeli conflictThe Arab–Israeli conflict is a modern phenomenon, which has its roots in the end of the 19th century. The conflict became a major international issue with the birth of Israel in 1948. The Arab-Israeli conflict has resulted in at least five major wars and a number of minor conflicts...
- History of the Jews in the Land of IsraelHistory of the Jews in the Land of IsraelThe history of the Jews in the land of Israel can be traced from the first appearance of the name "Israel" in the historic record, an Egyptian inscription of c.1200 BCE where it refers to an ethnic group apparently located in the northern part of the central highlands between the Mediterranean and...
- Palestinian political violencePalestinian political violencePalestinian political violence refers to acts of violence undertaken to further the Palestinian cause. These political objectives include self-determination in and sovereignty over Palestine, the liberation of Palestine and establishment of a Palestinian state, either in place of both Israel and...
- Fedayeen (Palestinian)
- Israeli settlementIsraeli settlementAn Israeli settlement is a Jewish civilian community built on land that was captured by Israel from Jordan, Egypt, and Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War and is considered occupied territory by the international community. Such settlements currently exist in the West Bank...
- Israel and the United NationsIsrael and the United NationsIssues relating to the state of Israel, the Palestinian people and other aspects of the Arab-Israeli conflict occupy a large amount of debate time, resolutions and resources at the United Nations....
- Zionist and Palestinian Arab attitudes before 1948Zionist and Palestinian Arab attitudes before 1948As used here, "Zionists" refers to members of the movement for a "Jewish Homeland" in Palestine, and "Palestinian Arabs" refers to the non-Jewish population of Palestine at the same time...
- Israeli casualties of war