This is a summary
of what the Israel-Palestinian conflict is about.
Oct 10 (Reuters)
- The fighting between Israel and Hamas, which launched a surprise attack on
Saturday, is the latest in seven decades of war and conflict between Israelis
and Palestinians that has drawn in outside powers and destabilised the wider
Middle East.
WHAT ARE THE
ORIGINS OF THE CONFLICT?
The conflict
pits Israeli demands for security in what it has long regarded as a hostile
region against Palestinian aspirations for a state of their own.
Israel's founding
father David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the modern State of Israel on May 14, 1948,
establishing a safe-haven for Jews fleeing persecution and seeking a national
home on land to which they cite deep ties over generations.
Palestinians
lament Israel's creation as the Nakba, or catastrophe, that resulted in their
dispossession and blocked their dreams of statehood.
In the war that
followed, some 700,000 Palestinians, half the Arab population of what was
British-ruled Palestine, fled or were driven from their homes, ending up in
Jordan, Lebanon and Syria as well as in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Israel, a close
U.S. ally, contests the assertion it drove Palestinians from their homes and
points out it was attacked by five Arab states the day after its creation.
Armistice pacts halted the fighting in 1949 but there was no formal peace.
Palestinians who
stayed put in the war today form the Arab Israeli community, making up about
20% of Israel's population.
WHAT MAJOR WARS
HAVE BEEN FOUGHT SINCE THEN?
In 1967, Israel
made a pre-emptive strike against Egypt and Syria, launching the Six-Day War.
Israel has occupied the West Bank, Arab East Jerusalem, which it captured from
Jordan, and Syria's Golan Heights ever since.
In 1973, Egypt
and Syria attacked Israeli positions along the Suez Canal and Golan Heights,
beginning the Yom Kippur War. Israel pushed both armies back within three
weeks.
Israel invaded
Lebanon in 1982 and thousands of Palestinian fighters under Yasser Arafat were
evacuated by sea after a 10-week siege. In 2006, war erupted in Lebanon again
when Hezbollah militants captured two Israeli soldiers and Israel retaliated.
In 2005 Israel
quit Gaza, which it had captured from Egypt in 1967. But Gaza saw major
flare-ups in 2006, 2008, 2012, 2014 and 2021 that involved Israeli air raids
and Palestinian rocket fire, and sometimes also cross border incursions by
either side.
As well as wars,
there have been two Palestinian intifadas or uprisings between 1987-1993 and
again in 2000-05. The second saw waves of Hamas suicide bombings against
Israelis.
WHAT ATTEMPTS
HAVE THERE BEEN TO MAKE PEACE?
In 1979, Egypt
and Israel signed a peace treaty, ending 30 years of hostility. In 1993,
Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Arafat shook hands on the Oslo Accords
on limited Palestinian autonomy. In 1994, Israel signed a peace treaty with
Jordan.
The Camp David
summit of 2000 saw President Bill Clinton, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak
and Arafat fail to reach a final peace deal.
In 2002, an Arab
plan offered Israel normal ties with all Arab countries in return for a full
withdrawal from the lands it took in the 1967 Middle East war, creation of a
Palestinian state and a "just solution" for Palestinian refugees.
Peace efforts
have been stalled since 2014, when talks failed between Israelis and
Palestinians in Washington.
Palestinians
later boycotted dealings with the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump
since it reversed decades of U.S. policy by refusing to endorse the two-state
solution - the peace formula that envisages a Palestinian state established in
territory that Israel captured in 1967.
WHERE DO PEACE
EFFORTS STAND NOW?
The
administration of U.S. President Joe Biden has focused on trying to secure a
"grand bargain" in the Middle East that includes normalisation of
relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, custodian of Islam's two holiest
shrines.
The latest war
is diplomatically awkward for Riyadh as well as for other Arab states,
including some Gulf Arab states next to Saudi Arabia, that have signed peace
deals with Israel.
WHAT ARE THE
MAIN ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN ISSUES?
A two-state
solution, Israeli settlements, the status of Jerusalem, and refugees are at the
core of the dispute.
Two-state solution
- an agreement that would create a state for the Palestinians in the West Bank
and Gaza Strip alongside Israel. Hamas rejects the two-state solution and is
sworn to Israel's destruction. Israel has said a Palestinian state must be
demilitarised so as not to threaten Israel.
Settlements -
Most countries deem Jewish settlements built on land Israel occupied in 1967 as
illegal. Israel disputes this and cites historical and Biblical ties to the
land. Their continued expansion is among the most contentious issues between
Israel, the Palestinians and the international community.
Jerusalem -
Palestinians want East Jerusalem, which includes sites sacred to Muslims, Jews
and Christians, to be the capital of their state. Israel says Jerusalem should
remain its "indivisible and eternal" capital. Israel's claim to the
eastern part of Jerusalem is not recognised internationally. Trump recognised
Jerusalem as Israel's capital – without specifying the extent of its
jurisdiction in the disputed city - and moved the U.S. embassy there in 2018.
Refugees - Today
about 5.6 million Palestinian refugees - mainly descendants of those who fled
in 1948 - live in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the Israeli-occupied West Bank and
Gaza. About half of registered refugees remain stateless, according to the
Palestinian foreign ministry, many living in crowded camps.
Palestinians
have long demanded that refugees should be allowed to return, along with
millions of their descendants. Israel says any resettlement of Palestinian
refugees must occur outside of its borders.
Compiled by
Reuters journalists; Editing by Edmund Blair
Ray Gruszecki
October 10, 2023
No comments:
Post a Comment