|
Suicide Bombers
The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
For millennia, the region known as the Holy Land has been rife with change; a small area has been controlled by biblical kings, early Islamic leaders, and distant empires, among others. When the empires waned, the 20th century saw wars for the land between Jews and Arabs -- both of which cite religious and historical ties to the land. The strife continues today, and this timeline provides context behind the conflict.
Through 1914: Background
The distant past of what is now Israel and the Palestinian Territories is gleaned primarily from biblical texts and archeological evidence. Around the second millennium B.C.E., the land at the eastern edge of the Mediterranean existed as a collection of city-states under Egyptian rule. It was inhabited by Philistines, primarily in the southern area now known as Gaza, and Canaanites, extending northward into present-day Israel, Jordan, and Syria. It is thought that Abraham -- or Ibrahim, as Muslims call him -- came to Canaan in roughly 1800 B.C.E. In declaring his allegiance to a single god, he became the founding patriarch of what would come to be a group of religions, mostly monotheistic. Some of these, particularly Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, would vie for authority over the area for millennia, while others like the Bahá'i faith and Samaritanism would play a modest role in the region's history.
Amidst the dissolution of the Egyptian empire, around 1300 B.C.E. Jewish tribes led by Moses and Joshua conquered the area and established the first independent state of Israel. In the 11th and 10th centuries B.C.E., a unified Jewish kingdom was established by Saul, and ruled by and expanded under David. Israel then saw the prosperous reign of Solomon and the construction of the holiest temple in Judaism in Jerusalem on the Temple Mount. But strife followed Solomon's death in 926 B.C.E., and rule of the land soon shifted among conquering empires. First, the Assyrians conquered Israel in 721 B.C.E. Then the Babylonians overran the northern kingdom of Judah in 586 B.C.E., destroying the Temple of Jerusalem; many see the exile of Jews by the conquering as the first chapter in the long history of the Jewish Diaspora. In 539 B.C.E., the Babylonians themselves saw defeat at the hands of the Persians, who allowed Jews to return and rebuild the temple of Jerusalem. Centuries later, in 332 B.C.E., Alexander the Great's conquest of Persia brought Greek authority to the area. But his death, only a few years later, would lead to another century of shifting rule, this time among various Hellenic-Syrian powers. In 164 B.C.E., Jews rebelled against the Syrians and re-established Jewish rule. But it would be the last independent Jewish state on this land until the 20th century.
The next to invade were the Romans, who claimed the area around 61 B.C.E. Soon after, Jesus of Nazareth -- the Christ to his followers -- was born in Bethlehem and spread teachings that became the second of the major Abrahamic faiths. In coming decades, the Roman emperors put down repeated Jewish revolts. One such uprising, in 70 C.E., ended with the destruction of the Second Temple of Jerusalem, and another, in 132 C.E., with the expulsion of Jews. Until this point, the Romans had called the area Judea; afterwards -- some say in an effort to erode Jewish connection with the land -- it was called Palestine, after the Philistines. Roman rule saw further exile and persecution of the Jews, leading many to flee the land. The province of Palestine came under Byzantine rule following the east-west division of the Roman Empire in 395 C.E., and Christianity spread across the empire.
In 638 C.E., the expanding influence of Islam in the region brought the area under the Islamic Caliphate. Within a century, Muslims built upon the site in Jerusalem they called the Majed Mount, or Al-Haram ash Sharif (Noble Sanctuary), the same Temple Mount where the Jews' most holy site had been built and destroyed twice before. The first of these Muslim sites was the Dome of the Rock, built where Muhammad is believed to have ascended to heaven; the second is Al-Aqsa mosque, Islam's third holiest site behind Mecca and Medina. From the seventh to 10th centuries C.E., the Islamic Caliphate fragmented, and control of Jerusalem and former Roman Palestine passed among several dynasties and Muslim authorities.
The region's single period of Christian dominance came in 1099, when the Crusaders conquered the land, established the loosely feudal Kingdom of Jerusalem, and expanded to establish neighboring Crusader states. This kingdom, blending European and Middle Eastern traits, persisted for nearly a century until the area was retaken by Muslim forces under Salah ad Din (Saladin) in 1187. Muslim rule would continue, passing from the Mamluks to the Ottoman Turks in 1517. Both of these regimes encouraged some Jewish settlement of the area, a pattern that would become one the dominant forces shaping the region's history in the centuries to come.
The early part of the 1800s saw poor administration by Egyptians and Ottomans, leading to Arab riots and emigration of Jews. The situation improved for both groups later in the century, and by 1880, the presence of roughly 24,000 Jews in the region (of a total population of about 400,000) led Ottoman rulers to restrict Jewish immigration and land purchase. Yet these strictures would be evaded, particularly as Zionism grew among European Jews. The late 1800s saw increasing immigration by Jews fleeing persecution in Eastern Europe. And in 1897, the movement was formalized with the First Zionist Congress in Basel, Switzerland, organized by Theodor Herzl, the first to formulate a coherent call for a Jewish state in present-day Israel. The Zionist cause gained strength in the early 20th century, as Jews established numerous farm communities and the new city of Tel Aviv. By 1914, the population of what was once Palestine had reached about 700,000, with approximately 600,000 Arabs and 85,000 to 100,000 Jews.
1914-1949: WWI through Israeli Independance
As World War I unfolded, both Arabs and Jews would play a role in the eventual overthrow of Turkish rule in region. At the war's outset, the Ottoman Empire sided with Germany and the Axis powers, and the Turkish military governor ordered the deportation of foreign nationals, a large number of whom were Russian Jews. Yet some remained and provided information to the British as part of underground efforts against the Turks. Meanwhile, Arabs, led by the British archeologist and scholar T.E. Lawrence, with crucial backing of Sharif Husayn of Mecca, revolted against the Ottomans. The British made three ambiguous and contradictory promises to Arab, Jewish, and Western partners that left doubt regarding ultimate fate of the region, and Palestine in particular.
In 1915, Sir Henry McMahon, on behalf of the British Government, promised to Sherif Husayn independent Arab control of most of the area. But this Husayn-McMahon Correspondence left the fate of Palestine unclear. One year later, secret negotiations between Sir Mark Sykes of Britain and Georges Picot of France divided the Ottoman territories among the two European powers. Their agreement specified partially British and partially international control of Palestine, and gave modern-day Syria to the French -- both promises that arguably conflicted with the previous years' correspondence. In 1917, the "Balfour Declaration" -- a letter from Lord Balfour to Lord Rothschild, a powerful British Zionist -- announced Britain's support for a Jewish homeland in Palestine, adding to the claims and obligations that Britain had engendered.
In 1918, at the close of the war, Britain assumed control and called the area Palestine, as the Romans once did. Two years later, British authority was codified by League of Nations mandate over the areas that include present-day Israel, the Palestinian Territories, and Jordan, as well as neighboring lands.
Under this mandate, the British oversaw nearly three decades of rising tensions among Arabs and Jews. Zionist immigration, competing ethno-nationalist visions for the region, and the legacy of British promises would prove an increasingly volatile mix. The immigration of hundreds of thousands of Jews fleeing increasing persecution in Eastern Europe led to rioting and violence involving Arabs, Jews, and British authorities. The British issued periodic statements that attempted to resolve contradictory past promises, placate the Arabs, and maintain Britain's commitment to a Jewish homeland while controlling immigration. Still, in the 1930s, militant groups and angry populations rioted, fought, and conducted terror campaigns against one another and against the British. British authorities, initially caught unprepared, later responded with repressive measures.
The violence abated with the outbreak of World War II in 1939, as Arabs and Jews from British Palestine joined the Allied forces, and British authorities freed underground Jewish leaders. But growing knowledge of the Holocaust -- the Nazi genocide of roughly six million Jews -- added still more urgency to the Jewish cause for a national homeland. In 1942, leading Zionists met in New York to formulate plans for a Jewish state. And by 1944, Jewish guerilla groups had broken their truce with British authorities and resumed bombings and other terror attacks, culminating in the assassination in Cairo of Lord Moyne, British Secretary of State in the Middle East. Meanwhile, the ethno-nationalist plans of Arabs were developing apace. In 1944-45 seven Arab states and one Palestinian representative agreed to the Alexandria Protocol and formed the Arab League, forming a unified opposition both to further development of a Jewish homeland in British Palestine and to intervention of foreign powers in the area.
Rapid change and open warfare followed World War II. The United States put increasing pressure on the British to allow Jewish refugees into Palestine, but the British refused, acceding to Arab demands. Soon after, in 1947, Britain passed the Mandate over Palestine to the United Nations, which proposed a partition plan allocating roughly 44 percent of the area for an Arab state and 56 percent for a Jewish state, with Jerusalem under international administration. The U.N. General Assembly accepted the plan, as did the Jews. But the Arabs did not, and the plan was never implemented. Tensions over the potential for a Jewish state ran at their highest, and in late 1947, irregular Palestinian fighting units and underground Jewish groups carried out increasingly direct, militaristic attacks, including a Palestinian siege of Jerusalem.
The conflict came to a head when, in May of 1948, a Jewish state of Israel was declared, Britain withdrew its forces, and Arab armies from five neighboring countries invaded. The 1948 War (known to Israelis as the War of Independence) proceeded haltingly until Israelis, aided by clandestine arms shipments, repelled the Arab forces and broke the blockade of Jerusalem. The fighting created a wave of Palestinian refugees, numbering between 500,000 and 800,000, and came to be known as al-Nakba ("the Catastrophe") to Palestinians.
At then end of this short but decisive war, the 1949 Armistice established Israel's boundary well beyond that outlined by the U.N. partition plan, encompassing roughly 75 percent of formerly British Palestine. The West Bank would be controlled by Jordan, the Gaza Strip by Egypt, and the city of Jerusalem was divided between the western Israeli portion and the eastern Arab section. Israel's national boundary came to be known as the "Green Line." No permanent peace treaty was signed by the Arab nations, which refused to recognize Israel's existence.
1949-1973: A Region at War
In the early 1950s, a change of regime in Egypt opened the door to peace with Israel, but this opportunity would soon be lost in the wake of two events that would mar Israeli-Egyptian politics for decades. In 1954, an Israeli spy ring was caught trying to bomb U.S. and British institutions in Egypt with the intent of provoking animosity between Egypt and the Western powers. The resulting scandal and attempt to shift the blame among various Israeli officials became a complex, prolonged, and embarrassing fiasco reaching the highest levels of Israeli politics.
Growing suspicions between Egypt and Israel led to an arms buildup and, increasingly, border skirmishes. These became open hostilities upon Egypt's nationalization of the Suez Canal, closing it to Israeli shipping, in 1956. In response, Israel, France, and Britain colluded in a plan involving an Israeli invasion of the Sinai Peninsula; Britain and France hoped to re-establish European control of the Suez. In autumn of that year, after Israel quickly conquered Sinai, the U.S. became furious with the three countries and put a stop to the plan. Israeli forces retained possession of Sinai for some time, but the crisis left Egypt in control of the Canal and European influence in the Middle East greatly diminished.
In the 1960s, Israeli efforts to marshal the region's scarce water resources became a pivotal issue, along with the origins of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). In 1964, as Israel took concrete steps to utilize water from the Sea of Galilee for irrigation, Arab states gathered in two summits to lay the foundation for the PLO, an organization established to encourage terror attacks and eventually eliminate the state of Israel. Following these meetings, hostilities grew between Syria and Israel as Syria attempted to divert the water from Israel's program; Israel responded with attacks on Syrian equipment. At around this time, Egypt's president made bellicose statements about a coming war with Israel, echoed by the PLO.
Though many believe that neither Israel nor the Arab states truly wanted war, tensions escalated nonetheless. Arab states made reciprocal defense agreements; Egypt dismissed U.N. peacekeeping troops from Sinai and closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping; and Israel and its hostile neighbors generally mobilized for battle, with Egyptian, Syrian, and Jordanian troops massed near Israel's southern, northern, and eastern borders. With no sign that opposing states -- particularly Egypt -- would back down, Israel struck preemptively on June 5, 1967. Six days of battle dominated by Israel followed, ending in a cease-fire that extended its territory over Sinai, the West Bank and Gaza strip, and into the Golan Heights of Syria; the decisive event came to be known as the "Six-Day War." Soon after, U.N. resolution 242 passed, calling for rollback of Israeli borders to their pre-war state, though Israel held the territory.
The success of this campaign had far-reaching effects: Israel emerged more confident, and used the Occupied Territories to strengthen its bargaining position among its neighbors and as land for Israeli settlement. Arab resentment on behalf of those affected by Israel's advances grew, as many more Arabs had fallen under Israeli authority, and others fled in another wave of Palestinian refugees. Also, many Palestinians now doubted the ability of the Arab states to effectively oppose Israel; in contrast, the PLO -- of which Yasser Arafat assumed leadership in 1969 -- would develop effective armed guerrilla and terror operations against Israel, independent of neighboring Arab states.
In coming years, regime change in Egypt once again suggested possibilities for peace as Egypt's president, Anwar Sadat, made repeated efforts to regain territory in Sinai by diplomatic means. But in 1973, following Israeli rejections of these advances, Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on the Jewish Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur. This war, known as the Ramadan War or the Yom Kippur War, saw initial territorial gains by Egypt and Syria; these were eventually reversed, leaving Israel with still more land reaching deeper into both Egypt and Syria. A key feature of the war was involvement of the United States and the Soviet Union to an unprecedented degree -- both as suppliers to both sides, and in diplomatic efforts toward resolution. U.S. support of Israel led the latter to become increasingly dependent upon America, and provoked Saudi Arabia to lead an oil embargo with a major impact on the U.S. and world economies.
1973-1993: Seeds of Peace Admist Conflict
By the late 1970s, two of the opponents in the Arab-Israeli struggle were prepared to seek a peaceful resolution. U.S. "shuttle diplomacy" at the close of the October 1973 War had opened the way for further U.S.-brokered negotiations toward peace between Egypt and Israel. These were advanced with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat's historic trip to address the Israeli Parliament in 1977. The Camp David Accords in 1978 established a framework for a broader Mideast peace, which -- though never implemented -- suggested elements and principles that would arise in later negotiations, such as autonomy for Palestinians. And the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty, signed by Sadat and Menachem Begin in 1979, laid the plans for Israel's return of the entire Sinai Peninsula in 1982. Egypt became the first Arab nation to recognize the state of Israel and forge a lasting peace. Yet this came at great cost; Sadat was viewed as a traitor by much of the Arab world, and in 1981 he was assassinated by Islamist elements of his own army.
Throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) had become an umbrella group of militant organizations, based first in Jordan, and later in Lebanon. Elements within the PLO, including Chairman Yasser Arafat's Fatah organization, led terror attacks against targets in Israel and abroad. Among the most internationally visible of these were the murders of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics in 1972, and the massacre at an Israeli school in Maalot that led to the deaths of 26 Israelis, most of them children. Over time, the PLO's search for international recognition led to Arafat's first appearance at the United Nations in 1974, where he appealed for peace while at the same time denouncing Zionism and affirming the armed pursuit to "liberate all of Palestine."
By the late 1970s, for the first time in the nation's history, rightist politicians in Israel's Likud party assumed control of the Israeli government. Menachem Begin and others in this camp sought Israeli control of much of British Palestine and encouraged Jewish settlement in land beyond Israel's 1967 borders. Meanwhile, southern Lebanon had become a base for PLO attacks. In response, Israeli forces led by Ariel Sharon invaded in 1982 and succeeded in expelling the PLO, which moved to Tunisia. But Israel, and Sharon specifically, became associated with one of the worst atrocities in recent Mideast history when a Christian Phalangist militia allied with Israel killed hundreds of Palestinians at the Sabra and Shatilla refugee camps in Lebanon. Sharon eventually resigned his post as defense minister and Israel slowly withdrew from Lebanon, leaving in its wake one of the most extreme anti-Israeli terror groups, Hezbollah.
Having achieved peace with Egypt and driven the PLO to Tunis, Israel experienced years of relative peace with many of its neighbors. However, resentment among Palestinians within the Occupied Territories still simmered as it became clearer that the PLO, Egypt, and Jordan were unlikely to bring them independence, as unemployment rose under the Israeli occupation, and as Jewish settlement increased. In 1987, an intifada, or "uprising," began in Gaza and soon spread to the West Bank. The intifada combined protest and civil disobedience with rioting and violence -- most often stone throwing, but also including the use of makeshift and military weaponry. Over the next six years, clashes between Palestinians and more heavily armed Israeli Defense Forces resulted in more than 1,000 Palestinian deaths, captured international media attention, and caused polarization in Israeli politics.
Early in the intifada, the PLO and Palestinian diaspora had grown increasingly concerned about their waning influence over the Occupied Territories. The Palestinian National Council -- the multi-national group that had established the PLO -- convened in 1988 to unilaterally declare an independent Palestinian state, renounce terrorism, and call for Israeli withdrawal from the Occupied Territories. As the intifada wore on, changes abroad created additional opportunities for peace. Arafat's support for Iraq in the first Gulf War alienated wealthy supporters in the Gulf, while the U.S. victory allowed it to seek a broader Mideast peace. A dialogue began in 1991 in Madrid, leading to U.S.-sponsored talks in Washington. These expanded with the return to power of the left wing in Israel the following year, and eventually led to the Oslo peace talks facilitated by Norway.
The Oslo negotiations established a framework for a broader peace in 1993, with the Declaration of Principles. The two sides recognized each other's right to exist -- while making no statements regarding a Palestinian state -- and Israel agreed to some troop withdrawal, primarily from the Gaza Strip. Though the agreement was heralded as a breakthrough by many and garnered the Nobel Peace Prize for Arafat, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, it left much disappointment. Many on the pro-Palestinian side protested that a politically and financially weakened Arafat had negotiated poorly, achieving no end to Israeli settlement while consigning the Palestinians to live in artificially "autonomous" regions. Some Zionist critics, for their part, claimed that Israel had given away territory that rightly belonged to Israel, and was essential for security, in exchange for promises that Palestinians would not keep.
1993-2004: Uncertainty Reigns
The years following the Oslo process showed some conciliatory outcomes, including an Israel-Jordan peace treaty in 1994 and withdrawal of Israeli troops from portions of Gaza and the West Bank. Legislative elections of the newly formed Palestinian National Authority (PNA) were won by the Fatah faction, conferring upon Arafat the role of rais, or president. But the most contentious long-term issues -- namely the question of a future state of Palestine, the status of Jerusalem, and the fate of Palestinian refugees and their descendents -- remained unresolved.
Many Palestinians regarded the ongoing settlement, and related proliferation of roads and other security provisions for Israelis, as acts of aggression that undermined the integrity of a future Palestinian state. Many on the Israeli right wing saw the Oslo process as the forfeiture of God-given land and appeasement of those committed to the destruction of Israel. Their anger took shape in the massacre of 30 Muslims at prayer in Hebron in 1994 and the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995; though the perpetrator in each case was a lone gunman, some religious extremists embraced the acts. The familiar dynamic of Israeli settlement deeper into the West Bank and bombing campaigns by Palestinian groups would continue to inflame passions on both sides.
The mid and late 1990s saw a prolonged deadlock in the peace process. Yet, with pressure from the U.S., limited progress was achieved in the Wye River Memorandum, which pledged Israel to troop withdrawals and the PNA to honor its obligations under the Oslo agreements, including better policing of militants and reductions of weapons stockpiles. Another push toward resolution, in 2000, foundered on fundamental issues such as Israel's insistence on annexation of portions of the Occupied Territories and the Palestinian demand of the full "right of return" of millions of refugees to Israel proper, an influx almost certain to overwhelm the Israeli state.
Amidst frustration on the part of both Israelis and Palestinians at years of negotiations with few tangible results, veteran Israeli rightist Ariel Sharon returned to the political stage. Sharon's visit in September 2000 to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem -- also the Muslim holy site of Al-Aqsa Mosque -- triggered Palestinian protests that escalated into a prolonged uprising known as the Al-Aqsa intifada. Soon after, Israel's right wing took power with Sharon as prime minister, bringing a new emphasis on tough policies.
The unfolding conflict further reinforced each party's fear of and bitterness toward the other. After a series of attacks killed nearly 100 Israeli civilians in March 2002, Israel raided or re-occupied much of the West Bank, uncovering evidence linking Arafat and other Palestinian officials to terror groups and activities. Israeli raids at the Jenin refugee camp in April 2002 led to accusations of an Israeli massacre; in more than a week of violence, 52 Palestinians were killed there, at least 22 of them civilians. (In a report on Jenin, Human Rights Watch cited specific cases of unlawful killings by the Israeli military, but concluded that no massacres occurred.)
Nonetheless, 2002 saw important international developments toward a consensus regarding the most basic elements of a Mideast peace plan. The "Quartet" -- the U. S., Russia, the United Nations, and the European Union -- put forward a "roadmap" as the framework for progress toward peace. An evolving document, the roadmap came to incorporate a proposal by Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, agreed to by the Arab League, pledging an end to the long war against Israel in return for Israel's withdrawal from the Occupied Territories and Golan and an as-yet-unspecified resolution to the Palestinian refugee problem. The U.N. proposed a Palestinian state alongside Israel, echoed in June by U.S. President George W. Bush.
Other initiatives toward peace have begun. A non-binding, unofficial, yet possibly important peace agreement has been reached: the Geneva Accord, a detailed plan for resolving the thorniest issues of the conflict, including the fate of Jerusalem, the future of the Israeli settlements, and the Palestinian right of return. It was negotiated by Israelis and Palestinians who are politically influential, but do not represent the recognized leadership of either side. The Israeli government has denounced the agreement, as have Palestinian militants. Nevertheless, generally favorable remarks from officials as disparate as the U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and Yasser Arafat, and limited support from civilians on both sides, suggest that it may have some potential to shape a future peace.
Meanwhile, Israel's Likud leadership has largely pursued strategies that it can execute on its own terms. Two of these are ideas initially proposed by Labor politicians in recent elections: a "security barrier" dividing Israeli and Palestinian lands, and the unilateral withdrawal from parts of the Occupied Territories.
As of the summer of 2004, many important factors hold the Mideast peace process in a highly uncertain state. Sharon's governing coalition has seen opposition from within, and the future may bring a new coalition -- or new elections. Meanwhile, years of conflict and corruption have so weakened the Palestinian Authority that it is challenged to even maintain basic law and order in its territory, much less compel armed extremists to acquiesce to peace with Israel. A final source of uncertainty is the U.S. campaign in Iraq and the broader "war on terror," both of which, at the very least, have shifted international attention from a conflict that for so long held center stage.
© 2002-2007 Educational Broadcasting Corporation. All rights reserved. [an error occurred while processing this directive]