Israel

Answer 1 - Listing

There are numerous causes to this conflict and the list below is not exhaustive.

1) "Wipe Israel off the Map" Statements: Arab Nationalists, especially Charismatic Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt, were pushing strongly for Israel's elimination and made daily speeches about how the Arab States were going to invade and remove Israel from the map to form a unified Arab State. He began to coordinate military strategy with Syria and Jordan (to a lesser degree) as to how to invade Israel effectively. These threats were made daily and consistently in 1967. Additional troops were added to the Egyptian Army and that army began to be arrayed closer and closer to the Israeli border.

2) Removal of UNEF Forces: As a condition of the Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai Peninsula in 1956, the UN deployed security forces to the Sinai Peninsula to prevent Egypt from massing troops in the Sinai. Nasser evicted the UNEF (the UN security force) from the Sinai Peninsula in contravention of the Armistice for the 1956 Suez Crisis and placed large numbers of Egyptian soldiers and armored divisions on the Israeli-Egyptian border.

3) Arab Military Coordination: Nasser coordinated military strategy quite closely with Syria and Jordan. It was clear to many at the time that these forces would not sit idle for long. A number of Syrian battalions were positioning themselves in the Golan Heights above the Sea of Galilee and Jordanian positions in the West Bank were becoming more entrenched.

4) Closure of Waterways: Egypt, counter to the armistice ending the 1956 War, closed the Suez Canal to Israeli shipping and then proceeded to close the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping, cutting Israel off from trade with Iran which was Israel's greatest ally in the Middle East at the time and primary supplier of petroleum. This had the effect of strangling Israel and is considered by Israel to be the primary causus belli.

5) Best Defense is a Good Offense: Israel realized that its borders were too close to for them to risk an Arab Invasion of Israel before retaliating. Israel would have to fight a pre-emptive war in order to secure the best probability of success in a military engagement. The first act of open warfare was when Israel destroyed 2/3 of the Egyptian Air Force on the tar mac on June 5, 1967.

6) Imperialist Israel: (Written by someone else) It's when Israel wanted to occupy "their" land, and decided to attack their neighboring Arab countries for it.

Answer 2 - Discussion

The Six-Day War had a number of proximate and chronic causes.

Chronic Causes: Israel and the Arab States were only in Armistice for 18 years and during that time Arab Nationalism really developed. One of its cornerstones was Pan-Arab Unity and a non-Arab State (like Israel) that divided Arabs from each other (not to mention the Palestinian Exodus) was a wedge in that dream. Therefore, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser repeatedly threatened to push Israel "into the sea." Israel was also very jumpy in the sense that they had little in the way of international protection (as the United States did not become a strong backer of Israel until after the Six-Day War) and very indefensible borders.

Proximate Causes: Egypt made a number of overt threats to the peace and security of Israel. They closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli Shipping which cut off Israel from Iran (who at that time was ruled by the Shah and in Alliance with Israel) and other South Asian Nations. This severely diminished Israel's ability to procure petroleum. Also the armies of Egypt, Syria and Jordan mobilized their troops to surround Israel and kicked out the UN observers who had been maintaining the Armistice.

Between the fear of a slow death (because of the lack of petroleum) and the fear of a quick death (because of the mobilized armies on its borders) Israel decided that a surprise attack was the best way to deal with these threats. Israel never expected the attack to be the overwhelming success that it was.

The discussion was moved to the discussion area.

Answer 1

One of the answers to the Arab-Israeli conflict involves is that Abraham's descendants are still fighting over the Promised Land given to them by God.

1948 by U.N decision.

War broke as some Arab countries didn't like the idea of Jewish settlement in the middle east.

Palestine was a Colony under British rule. The British made a "deal" granting Arab independence in Palestine and granting them control from the Euphrates to the Nile.

Answer 2

The Jewish tribes (who originated from the Arab tribes) decided to find their own homeland in ancient times and sometimes use force to find it. The other Arab tribes have not really ever agreed with their reasoning or their methods. The Western powers tried resolving the dispute by creating the new state of Israel but the Arab states still didn't agree - partially because some of Israel is on holy Arab land. As the West is seen as the reason for the brutal Crusades (against ancient Muslim occupation of Jerusalem and the Holy Land), the Arabs have never taken kindly to Israel having Western allies. Also, Israel's tough methods of altering their boundaries ever since the West's intervention a few decades ago -mostly against the wishes of the West- have angered the other Arab tribes all over again. The ancient conflict over who owns the holy lands still wages. So these other Arab tribes to this day still demonstrate their anger strongly (with threats to remove Israel from the map and with terrorism, etc.) and this in turn leads to Israel responding to their threats more strongly. It is difficult to ever see an end.

Answer 1

Israel does not take anyone´s land.

Answer 2

It depends on how the term "Palestinian Land" is understood. There are two competing definitions for this term and based on each definition there is a different answer.

1) All lands of the Mandate for Palestine: Israel is occupying the majority of these lands because it has the legal, historical, and political to do so. According to UN Resolution 181, a Jewish State could be formed out of part of the British Mandate for Palestine. Since the territory was controlled by the British at that time who had willfully ceded jurisdiction to the United Nations and the vote passed at 2/3, this UN Resolution has legal effect. As much as the Arab Nations may not like it or approve of it, International Law remains law.

2) Parts of the West Bank: The creation of the British Mandate for Palestine did not erase many of the older Ottoman Laws, nor did it change the actual ownership of property in the various areas of the Mandate. As a result, there were large areas of Palestinian territory that had no villages and whose owners lived in other countries. Several Israeli Settlements in the West Bank, such as Ariel, were built on lands in the West Bank that had not been occupied or used by the Palestinian Arabs at all. There are also numerous Palestinian cities with historic Jewish sites such as Hebron, Nablus (Shchem in Hebrew), etc. where Jews wish to be in order to be closer to their ancestors. The Settlers believe that they have the right to live closer to the various holy sites in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. For many of them, this is part of why God allowed Israel to conquer the West Bank in the first place. They want to raise their children and build a life near where Jewish civilization actually began, in the hills of Judea and Samaria which form the West Bank.

Answer 1

Not all Jews hate Palestinians and not all Palestinians hate Jews, but the ones that do have many reasons. One reason of hatred that arises between them is that many of the Palestinians have ties with Hamas, and some other terrorist organizations. The reason that Jews have hatred toward those involved with Hamas and terrorist organizations is mainly because of goals of the organizations, and also because of their deceitful manor, especially in treaties and agreements with Israel. Another reason can be because of the hatred many of the Palestinians have toward the Jews, much of which comes from the Palestinians beliefs in Islam.

One reason for Jews' problem with Islam is because of the teachings of the prophet Muhammad. Many of these teachings called for the destruction of all other religions, and especially the Jews' religion because of the very decent of Muhammad's followers, fellows, and perhaps Muhammad himself. The very split between the religions, Islam, and Judaism, comes from Ishmael, and Isaac. The children of Isaac mainly became Jews and were promised a certain land. The children of Ishmael mainly became Islamic, and lived in the lands and the lands surrounding, that the Jews were promised. Many times the Jews forced the children of Ishmael, and others, out of their promised land, through war.

Palestinians today usually identify themselves as Palestinians for two reasons. Firstly the land known as Israel today was once known as part of Trans-Jordan, and also Palestine. After the end of the war between the Allies and the Ottoman Empire, the British Empire declared the territory of Palestine to become a home of the Jews, however there were some Arabs living in the area. Thousands of Jews moved into the area and began improving the land and the area prospered. Secondly came the Arab-Israeli war of 1948 where many Arabs were displaced from their home countries where many came in as refugees to the future Israel. People affected by either of these reasons, who were, or are, Arabs, often identify themselves as Palestinians. It is for the reason that the Jews believe that these Palestinians are trying to take the lands of the Jews of Israel for themselves that the Jews have begun to hate the Palestinians; because many of the Jews believe that the Palestinians are claiming current Israeli, and Jewish, lands for themselves, and through violent means are taking their lands, do some of the Jews hate the Palestinians.

Answer 2

Because the Jews want all the lands that Palestinians are living on.

Answer 3

Jews do not hate Palestinians, it is Palestinian terrorists that hate the Jews. Forcing Israelis to take undesirable action to protect their citizens from attacks.

Answer 4

Not ALL Jews hate Palestinians. Of course there will always be a group of people who hate another group. SOME Jews hate Palestinians because of the events that is going on over there. Palestinians felt threatened; their homeland was taken away from them, they were kicked out of their homes and out of the countries, and people looked down on them. Over the years, sadness and anger was formed over the lose of their land, the deaths of family members and friends, and the destruction of their land. You can't blame the Palestinians to be anger. Some retaliated and that retaliation is why some Jews hate Palestinians.

Answer 5

Not all Jews hate Palestinians and not all Palestinians hate Jews, but the ones that do have various reasons. The problems began with the advent of Zionism which is an ideology calling for a homeland for all Jews in historic Palestine. Up until this time, Jews who have always lived in historic Palestine existed in relative harmony among both Muslim and Christian Palestinians.

Prior to Israel's 1948 declaration of Independence mass Jewish immigration to Palestine began. Thousands upon thousands of European Jews flooded into Palestine. The native Palestinians were of course dismayed by this especially seeing as the Jews showed great hostility towards the natives often excluding them from jobs. Similarly American settlers who arrived to the Americas showed great hostility toward the Native Americans. This is a common trend in all colonial conquests.

In 1948 Israel declared 'Independence' in what was once Palestine. Over 400 Palestinian villages were destroyed and their peoples forced to flee their homeland. There are many recorded instances of massacres being carried out by Jewish terrorist organisations such as the Irgun and Stern Gang against Palestinian civilians. The hatred & violence between Palestinians and Zionist Jews was born.

It must be noted that not all Palestinians are Muslim. Prior to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948 nearly 20% of Palestine's population were Christians. These Christians were mainly to be found in Bethlehem and Nazareth. This is why many argue that the hatred between Palestinians and Zionist Jews is not a religious but national struggle. Many of the first Palestinian "terrorists" or "freedom fighters" [depending on which view you take] were Palestinian Christians. Today Palestinian Christian makeup only 2% of the Palestinian population. Research has shown that the dwindling numbers are due the Israel's continued occupation and oppression of the Palestinians. Palestinian Christians find it easier to move the western countries as they find more tolerance toward them because of their shared Christian faith.

Many Israeli Jews believe that the Palestinians main goal is to "drive the Jews into the sea". However Palestinians believe that Israel's continued settlement expansion into Palestinian land is slowly destroying any hope of an independent Palestinian homeland promised to them by both Israel and the International Community. The Irony is that Palestinians often cite that it is the Israeli state through continued expansionism which is actively driving the Palestinians into the sea. This can be one reason as to why the two parties may hate each other.

Another reason why Israeli Jews may hate Palestinians is because of the relatively recent phenomenon of suicide bombers which targeted Israeli civilians. However the Palestinians see such actions as a natural reaction by an oppressed people and often cite statistical figures such as; on average 15 Palestinian civilians are killed by Israel's military to every one Israeli who is killed by a Palestinian militant. For this reason organizations like Hamas are seen as 'freedom fighters' by many Palestinians including Christian Palestinians but are viewed as 'terrorists' by the vast majority of Israeli Jews.

There are more reasons why the two parties may hate each other. The following list is just a few:

1) Palestinian children may grow up hating Jews as in most cases the only Jew they have seen has been an Israeli soldier.

2) Israeli Jews often have never met any Palestinians (except for the 20% of Palestinians who live in Israel). All they know of Palestinians is what they have seen or read in the news. This may be explained through the segregation policies of the Israeli Government.

3) Thousands of Palestinians are held in Israeli jails often without charge or trial for months on end. This includes many children.

4) Israeli Jews may see the Palestinians as a burden to the realization of a 'Jewish state' as they tend to have higher birth rates.

5) Palestinians often feel humiliated as they are often held at Israeli checkpoints for hours on end and in many cases are harassed by Israeli soldiers. One extreme case was the recent footage of Israeli soldiers shooting a unarmed bound and blind folded Palestinian in the foot for no reason. There have been reports by human rights organizations of pregnant Palestinian women giving birth at checkpoints because Israeli soldiers have refused the woman entry to get to a hospital. The Israel Human Rights Organisation B'tsalem has many reports on Palestinians who have died at Israeli checkpoints because they were refused access to medical treatment.

These are of course not all the factors which are involved in the causes of hatred in the Holy Land. Religious ignorance may also play a part. For example many Israeli Jews believe that Islam which most Palestinians follow is intolerant toward other faiths. However Judaism and Christianity have thrived in Palestine for over 1500 years under Islamic rule. This is the reason why Synagogues and Churches still remain standing today in holy cities such as Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Palestinian Christians have existed in historic Palestine for well over 2000 years. They live in relative harmony with Muslim Palestinians and often regard each other as brothers. Some Palestinians believe that all Jews wish to ethnically cleanse Palestine of all non-Jews. This is because many religious Jews in Israel view Palestine-Israel as a land for the Jews only. They believe that the land was promised to them by God. They also believe that they have divine permission to drive the Palestinians out from their homeland. However there are many secular Jews who do not hold these fundamental Jewish tenants. There are also some (1%) of Orthodox Jews who are completely anti-Zionist meaning they do not recognize the state of Israel. These Jews are even have a seat within Palestinian parliament.

Conclusion:

As we can see the conflict between in Palestine-Israel is very complex as are the reasons for hatred. As was the case with South Africa peace and reconciliation can only be achieved among equals. An end to Apartheid in South Africa saw in end to violence and paved the way for reconciliation. Desmond Tutu the South African archbishop has compared the current treatment of Palestinians under the Israeli Government as being worse than that of Apartheid South Africa. Unless a similar solution which freed the blacks of South Africa from oppression and brutality is found in Palestine-Israel the cycle of hatred will continue.

Answer 6

What Jews are angry about as concerns Palestinians is their consistent denial of historical wrongdoing and segregation (such as the dhimmi status, the jizya and kharaj taxes, and humiliation in general) towards Jews (preferring to believe like Answer 5 that everything was perfect under Muslim rule), their failure to educate their children in the virtue of tolerance (instead teaching them literalist Qur'anic interpretations which inform them that Jews are the children of swine and that jihad will not end until all Jews die), the promulgation of anti-Semitic teachings (such as the Protocols of Zion and Holocaust-Denial), their desecration of Jewish holy sites, repression of their Christian minorities and other vast human rights abuses in their native countries, their tacit or explicit endorsement of violence against the State of Israel, and a failure to accept the validity of a Jewish State.

Palestinians are angered primarily, as concerns the Jews, with the issue of Jews forcibly resettling Palestinians and having eliminated hundreds of Palestinian cities. This grave violation of the Rights of the Palestinians greatly incenses them. Another issue that bothers the Palestinians and other Arabs is the Jews have, in spite of their numbers, garnered an important place in the world economy. Even though most rational Arabs realize that Jews do not actually control the economy, there are a disproportionate number of Jews in prominent economic and political positions, whereas Palestinians have been almost completely excluded from the World Economy, even by their fellow Arabs. Palestinians are also angry that Israel appears to be expanding its territory with its annexation of East Jerusalem (in contravention of the Arab understanding of UN Resolution 242) and continued settlement of the West Bank. Jews outside of Israel do not criticize these actions.

At the end of WW2, the United Nations gave the land of Israel to the Jewish people to be their homeland. After seeing the evidence of the Holocaust, the world was horrified at the death and torture that the Jews had endured. Even still, many nations were still prejudiced enough that they didn't what them "in my back yard", so the Jews and Allies agreed that the land of Israel would be given to the jews. Immediately the rest of the Middle East vowed that the Jews would not be welcome as neighbors and that Islam would drive the Jews into the Sea. They tried. Since that time, Islam has continuously tried different methods to destroy the Jews and since the Holocaust, the Jews have vowed, "Never again." The problem goes back to well before the Holocaust. In 1917 the British government promised the Jews a "national home" in Palestine, which was under Ottoman (Turkish) rule. British forces were advancing into the region at the time. There were problems.

• It was unclear what "national home" meant.
• The area was already inhabited by Arabs.
• There was a widespread view among Arabs that they had been promised independence by Britain.

So when Britain gained control of Palestine/Israel there were all the ingredients for serious trouble. After all Britain seemed to have promised the same territory to two groups of people!

Having said this, one needs to remember that in 1917, with the collapse of Tsarist rule in Russia, it was widely (but mistakenly) assumed that there would be a sharp fall in antisemitism and that therefore relatively few Jews would want to settle in Palestine/Israel.

The trigger for the UN establishing the state of Israel in 1948 was that the area had been under British rule since 1918 and had been in a state of civil war (Arabs versus Jews) from 1936-1939 and again from the end of WW2. In 1948 Britain informed the UN that it just couldn't cope with the situation any more.

It is misleading to say that the UN gave Israel to the Jews as some kind of present or consolation for the Holocaust. The point was that Britain just could not cope with the problems in Palestine/Israel and in effect handed the territory to the UN, which then split it into two parts, which fought one another.

This mess was largely of Britain's own making. As the author Arthur Koestler, a Jew who spent some years in the area, once remarked of the 1917 Balfour Declaration:

• "One nation promised another the land of a third nation".

[Please see the Discussion Section to see other views as to what started the conflict between the Israeli and Palestinian people as well as the Related Questions below.]

Pro-Palestinian Answer

Israel does not deserve Palestine. They don't even deserve Israel. The Palestinians gave some of their land to the Jews after the Second World War out of generosity because nobody else wanted the Jews and they had nowhere to go. They named this land Israel. But a certain group from within those Jews, otherwise known as Zionists, have decided to repay this generosity by killing thousands of Palestinians so they can take the rest of the land and wipe Palestine off the map. Now, who can say that what they are doing is right and they deserve Palestine??? No one. So the correct answer to this question is that Israel doesn't deserve Palestine and that they don't even deserve Israel which is also part of Palestine.

Pro-Israeli Answer

Or alternatively, it is true that Jews have lived in Israel for some 3500 years (longer than most ethnic groups have lived wherever they are living) and have a well established claim to that territory, and that they also did arrange to have control ceded to them by the British colonial power that controlled the region following WW II (although the British had actually promised the same territory to both the Jews and the Palestinians, creating confusion and conflict that has persisted to this day). Jews have no other country; Israel is the only Jewish country that there has ever been. In comparison, Palestinians are a major ethnic group in Jordan, a nation larger than Israel, and the only reason why they have been refugees for the past 64 years (as of the year 2012) is that they have been kicked out of all the Arab nations in the region, and then blame their problems on Israel. All the terrible violence of the Arab-Israeli conflict has come about because of continual Arab attacks on Israel. When Israel dares to defend itself, as any nation would do, this is denounced as Israeli aggression, an accusation which the many enemies of Israel always accept as accurate, requiring no proof or logic. However, Israel refuses to commit national suicide despite all the demands of Palestinians and their many allies, and this is understandable, since Jews are also human beings, despite any claims to the contrary emanating from the Muslim world.

Pro-Israeli Answer 2

The way the question is written is to assume that it is not theirs, which is not the case in the slightest. According to historical, religious, legal, and political grounds, the territory of the British Mandate of Palestine at least partially, if not entirely, belongs to the Jewish people and their State of Israel.

1) Historically: The Jews have an undeniable presence in the land from at least 700 BCE until 70 CE and this is proven not only by the Biblical account, but from Assyrian Ruins, Babylonian documents, Hellenistic inscriptions, and Roman volumes. Jews had a continuous presence in the land from 70 CE until the present day (even though they were nowhere near the majority) even though they were forcibly deported from the territory. The fact that they survived, as opposed to the Arameans or Hittites who were similarly exiled does not illegitimate their claims.

In addition to the population-part of the historical claim, Jews have physical ruins and cities that are very sacred to them in the territory of the British Mandate of Palestine. The city of Jerusalem is mentioned over 700 times in the Jewish Bible. The city of Nablus used to be the Northern Metropolis of Shechem. Hebron was the first capital of Ancient Israel whence Saul ruled and David ruled until he conquered Jerusalem from the Jebusites. Even more recent sites like Masada document the Jewish presence and struggle to persevere.

2) Religiously: The Jewish claim to have a connection to the land of the British Mandate of Palestine is firmly grounded in their religion. Jews as early as the Babylonian exiles wrote about returning to the land because God had promised it to them. According to the Pentateuch, God promised Abraham that piece of land. (This promise is even acknowledged in the Qur'an 5:20-21 and 17:104.) Many Jewish Holy Sites are in Israel such as the Kotel Hama'aravi (Western Wall).

3) Legally: By international law, the Ottoman Empire took the territory from the Seljuks and Abbassids by internationally recognized conquest. The territory was ceded to the British as a Mandate by the Ottomans as a term of surrender in World War I. (Even though the British had promised the territory to both the Arabs and Jews during the War, neither promise is legally binding.) According to the terms of the Mandate, even though the British were in control, the League of Nations had official jurisdiction. In 1947, the British gave direct authority to the League of Nations' successor, the United Nations, in accordance with the terms of their Mandate. The UN passed the 1947 Partition Plan that gave both a Jewish State and an Arab State the Right to Declare Statehood. The fact that the Arabs decided not to immediately declare such a state does not make the Israeli declaration any less valid. (It is important to note that Palestine did declare statehood on these grounds in 1988, which further cements the legality of this view.)

4) Politically: Jews invested a lot in building the political and physical infrastructure of the land even before they had control. Jews built farms, trained military brigades, created political parties, studied government, and defended themselves. This created a system that was able to repel the Arab Attacks in the Arab-Israeli War of 1948-9, secure expanded borders in the Six Day War of 1967, and hold those borders in the Arab-Israeli War of 1973. Israelis were actually able to exert control over this territory.

Of course, this list is not exhaustive, but should capture the sentiment of the question.

It is also worth noting that the "generosity" spoken about in the Pro-Palestinian Answer above is a farce. Arabs in Palestine did not take in Jews by choice; they British allowed them to immigrate. Palestinian Arabs were actually adamant that the Jewish immigration needed to stop. They first began by forming militias that targeted the Yishuv (Zionist Jewish Settlements), demanded that the British cease permitting Jewish immigration, and revolted from 1936-1939 when their demands were not taken seriously. In 1939, with Palestinian Arab support, the British released the White Paper of 1939 which effectively closed off Palestine to Jewish immigration throughout World War II and the Holocaust. Palestinian leaders such as Haj Amin al-Husseini also contributed to thousands of Jewish deaths in the Holocaust by alerting Nazis to Jews who were trying to make their way to Palestine illegally to save themselves and scuttling any plans to engage in "prisoner" exchanges that would release European Jews from the Camps. Jewish immigration to the area only resumed in earnest when Israel declared independence and finally allowed European Jews who were languishing in detention centers for nearly 3 years to come and settle down.