I've been sitting here for far too long trying to compose a concise history of the conflict between Israel and Palestine. It's really hard. For one, I'm really bad at being brief. Secondly, it's sooo complicated. And third, it's impossible to be completely unbiased. Being unbiased has however been a top priority for me in my study of the conflict and even more than being unbiased, I have been trying to seek the truth. In doing this I have discovered how much effort goes into obscuring the truth through our politics and media, so I feel even more obliged to share the side and the stories of those whose voices are most unheard. So if I seem one-sided at all on this blog, know that this is why. What follows is actually a summary of a lecture I heard today from a Christian Palestinian professor at Bethlehem Bible College doing his doctoral thesis on the conflict. However, all of the information also lines up with everything else I have read.
Ok here goes. Please stick with me, it will most likely end up long, but if you care enough to be following my blog, please don't give up now. This is the basis for why we're here and for the many blog posts that will follow. Also, I welcome questions!
Zionism in general has been around for a really long time, but as it relates to the current conflict it was born at the end of the 1800's. Zionism, if you don't know, is the movement for and desire to establish a homeland for the Jewish people. At this time Zionist leaders around Europe began promoting the now infamous slogan that Palestine was "a land without a people for a people without a land." This was of course totally untrue. For some, it was blatant propaganda, and for others, maybe even most I don't know, it was just ignorance. Because at the turn of the century there were hundreds of thousands of Arabs living in the land of Palestine. What's more, people assume there is this inherent enmity between Arabs and Jews, but that is simply not true either. They thrived living side by side for thousands of years, even in Jerusalem at this time. I will do a separate post to expand on this though.
Anyways, around this time Europe was forming into distinct countries and cultures and the Jews dispersed throughout the continent were feeling increasing pressure. So they decided to enact their plan to declare Palestine, the Holy Land, as their homeland. Jews from throughout Europe started to immigrate to this land. Up until WWI the land of Palestine was controlled by the Ottoman Empire. Arabs had a deal with Britain, that if they helped them defeat the Turks (of the Ottoman Empire), they would give them the land. However, Britain also made a deal with Jews in Europe that they could use the land for their homeland. After WWI the land was under British Mandate. The Balfour Declaration in 1917 gave the Jews the right to the land, but also said the Arab population should maintain all of their rights as well. Arabs felt betrayed, Jews were disappointed and throughout the 1930's both groups protested against the British. In 1937 Britain put forth the Peel Commission which gave Jews, 15% of the population, almost half of the land and most of the coastline. Both sides rejected this solution so Britain gave up and left, handing things over to the UN. So in 1947 there was the UN's Partition Plan that now gave the minority population of the Jews over 50% of the land, even though they currently owned only 6.6% of the land. The Jewish population accepted this plan, but the Arabs rejected it, still reeling that any of their ancestral homeland could just be taken from them.
So the war of 1948 ensued. The Israelis call this their war of independence, while the Palestinians call it "the catastrophe." For the last few decades the Jews had been building, organizing and training an army, as well as collecting support, monetary and otherwise from the West and from Jews around the world. So they won the war and declared their statehood ending up with the land they have today (minus Gaza, which was controlled by Egypt and minus the West Bank, which was controlled by Jordan). The Jewish army had a guerilla group that went from village to village completing wiping out entire communities. Many refer to this as ethnic cleansing. Like Ilan Pappe, a Jewish scholar who wrote The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine. Between this time and 1967, the ethnic cleansing continued, wiping out over half of the villages within Israel's new borders. Another huge (huge) issue in this conflict is the refugees. From the 1948 war, there were over 750,000 Palestinian refugees that mostly went into surrounding Arab countries, fleeing the violence or anticipation of violence. Shortly after the war, the UN issued Resolution 194 which said that refugees should be able to return to their homes at the earliest possible date and that if they don't, they should be compensated according to international law. This however did not happen, and refugees are still to this day living in refugee camps throughout the area unable to return to their homes that Israeli's now inhabit. Many Palestinians living in Jerusalem at that time fled to Bethlehem, where their families have lived since. All that were forced into refugee camps here have remained in the same space, while their population continues to grow.
In 1967, Israel anticipated an attack from Egypt, who along with other Arab countries had been preparing to attack. Israel struck first and in six days defeated the militaries of Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. In this Six Day War, Israel took the lands previously controlled by Egypt and Jordan, occupying them with their military. Now is when the settlements begin. Israel began strategically building settlements throughout the West Bank, over water sources and near the greatest natural resources. Many had hope for the Oslo Peace Accords in the mid-90's, but during this process and after, instead of actively working towards peace, Israel increased the building of settlements by 200%. They figured they would eventually have to give up the West Bank, so they better claim what land they could while possible.
1987-1993 was the first Palestinian uprising, the First Intifada. This was a time of great unity and pride for the Palestinian people who organized continual showings of nonviolent resistance, unless of course you count throwing rocks as violent. Then in 1995 the Oslo peace talks started but only brought great disappointment. The Second Intifada began in 2000 and lasted until 2005. This uprising was, in contrast to the first, very violent. The Palestinians had gotten weapons and thousands across both sides were killed. Some look at this as a movement of the Palestinian Authority rather than a movement of the people, like the previous uprising. Many Palestinians look back at this time with regret because the more violence that occurred, the worse their image got in the media. The worst-worst of course being the suicide bombings of desperate individuals. While much of the conflict was continually left out of our news, these of course were covered. And in the wake of 9/11 the seemingly similar nature of these kinds of attacks, caused the Western world to view the Palestinians as terrorists. Their movement was purely a political one, and this event shifted that image to be one of warring, crazed religious extremists. When the truth is that, just like anywhere, you cannot generalize an entire people based on a few extremists. Violence cannot be condoned on either side, but you also cannot focus only on the violence of one side when it was on both.
So starting in 2002 Israel began construction on the separation wall around the West Bank. Israel made it seem like they were building the wall in response to an increase in suicide bombings and as a general measure of protection for the Israelis. What is interesting to note however, is that the wall does not just separate Israelis from Palestinians, but Palestinians from Palestinians. In many places the wall literally separates neighbor from neighbor. What's more, the wall does not follow the "green line," which is the border established in an armistice agreement after the 1948 war. It actually cuts much farther into Palestinian land, strategically separating villages and towns and making the lives of Palestinians unnecessarily hard. For instance, pre-wall, one could drive to Ramallah in 45 minutes, now, it takes over an hour and a half and includes at least two, but sometimes three checkpoints. I will talk more about checkpoints later.
It is so hard for me to stop here, there are many more details and so many implications from all of these things, so many things I want to expand on...but in due time I will, don't you worry :)
-M
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