Israel

The United Nations voted to create Israel. The land was taken from Palestine an Israel was formed. Israel is officially a Jewish country and it was created right after WWII as a safe place for Jewish people to live.

I will try to give you a short overview:

In the end of the 19th century first Jewish settlers came to Israel mainly from Europe to escape from Anti-semitism. Those settlers had huge problems, such as a low economic development standard, no available infrastructure, bad health care and dry land to grow food on.

At the end of the 19h century a Austrian Jewish journalist called Theaodor Herzl initiated a movement which is called Zionism (named after the hill Zion in Jerusalem which is used as a Synonym for Jerusalem). The aim of Zionism was to create a Jewish homeland to get a safe place for all of the Jews in the world. It was not planned by everyone to create this state in Palestine (South America or African states were discussed as well), but the historical and religious connection of the Jews with Palestine was very big.

After the British took control over Palestine in 1920 after World War I, Zionists worked together with the British closely and managed to establish a "State-in-a-state" during World War II. More and more Jews emigrated to Palestine (however, most Jews that left Europe went to the USA at that time), and their political influence grew gradually.

Even before the state of Israel was declared there were several fights between Jews and Arabs in Palestine and as time went on Arabs became more desperate about not getting enough political influence. Eventually both Jews and Arabs attacked British troops and institutions. Therefore in the 1940s the British handed over the Problem to the United Nations, which set up a plan for partition. Palestine would be divided in two states: One Palestinian and one Jewish (Israel).

After World War II ended, a civil war broke out in Palestine, which seamlessly merged in to the Israeli War of Independence. The War of Independence started after Israel declared independence in May 1948, when the state Israel was born. When the War of Independence ended in July 1949 Israel could live in peace for the first time, but it was a short time. Arabs and Palestinians are still fighting today.
The British slowed immigration during World War II, a time when Jews needed to get out of Europe. After the end of World War II and after the scale of the Holocaust became understood by world leaders. Palestinians started to sell there land for high prices that Jews can afford. After hundreds of hundreds of acres sold to Jews, Britain gave its province (palestine) to Jews and then thousands of Jews came and Israel became

The way the question is written is to assume that it is not theirs, which is not the case in the slightest. Nobody asks what "entitled" Poles to create a nation-state in Prussian, Russian, and Austrian land or what "entitled" British colonists to create a European-Style country in North America. The people who live in a certain area and have a connection to that area have an intrinsic right to that land. The Jews are no different as concerns Palestine.

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.

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, 17:104, and 26:59.) 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.

Israeli Answers

(1) The Gaza Strip is not so important. Until 2005, Israelis lived on the strip and used the land to grow produce and live peacefully. In 2005, Israel made the mistake of expelling all of the Jewish residents. Gaza now produces nothing. In the four years since the withdrawal, over 8000 rockets have been fired by Palestinian terrorists at Israeli targets. Fortunately, most of these rockets are not very good at hitting targets. One missile misfired and caused a major crisis in the Gaza strip when the sewer system backed up as a result.

(2) The Gaza Strip is one of the few places where the British Mandate of Palestine did not overlap with the historically Jewish region called the Land of Israel. Similar to how Palestinians have never made direct references to Tel Aviv being sacred to them, Jews have never made references about Gaza being sacred to them. By and large, for Israelis, the Gaza Strip is significant specifically because it is insignificant.

Palestinian Answer

What makes Gaza important is nothing other than history. It was the first territory that Israel finally conceded as a contiguous region (the West Bank territory conceded was non-contiguous) for a Palestinian State from what used to be the British Mandate of Palestine. It is also a place that shows just how horribly Israel can collectively punish the Palestinian people even when they supposedly wish for a two-state solution on account of the blockade both on land and by sea. The above answer describes how Gaza produces nothing and I would agree with him that Gaza produces nothing. However, this has nothing to do with laziness. When a location has one of the highest population densities in the world, is constantly bombed (Operation Cast Lead was symbolic of more common targeted-strikes), receives minimal raw materials, and has no access to export markets, it is impossible to produce anything.

Framing the question as why Israel occupies Palestine already sets the question as having a certain desired answer and also the lack of a definition for what constitutes "Palestine" makes the question difficult to answer.

"Palestine" is typically interpreted one of two ways. The first way is to refer to all of the land in the British Mandate of Palestine which includes the Modern State of Israel (except for the Golan Heights), the Gaza Strip, and the West Bank. The second way is to refer to exclusively those territories which the Palestinian Authority claims will serve as a basis for a future Palestinian State: the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Understandably, it changes the argument fundamentally if 78% of the territory in question is exempted from the discussion.

Additionally, the term "occupy" can be seen in either a neutral sense, i.e. that a group of people are in a certain piece of land, or in a negative sense, i.e. that a group of people are preventing a different group of people from exerting control over a piece of land. This answer will proceed under the understanding that "occupy" refers to the first, neutral definition.

As for the 78% of Mandatory Palestine which is now the State of Israel, this came about through Israel's acceptance of UN Resolution 181 and its border defense against Arab aggression to counter international laws that they did not like. As a result, the acquisition in the 1947-1949 of war was not an illegal act since self-defense is not a criminal act unless it is grossly disproportionate to the attack and the war was a relatively balanced affair as well as being resolved at the moment that each Arab state was willing to engage in an armistice. Just to clarify, this means that the 1949 borders of Israel belong to Israel.

As for the remaining Palestinian areas that were acquired in 1967, the situation becomes murkier, but as concerns the West Bank, Jordan attacked Israel first and Israel retaliated. Again the self-defense doctrine comes to the fore. Israel would have the rights to those territories acquired in self-defense. However, Israel was willing to concede some of those rights pursuant to a final, lasting peace with its neighbors, which is all that UN Resolution 242 discusses. Those states that have made peace with Israel since 1967 (Egypt and Jordan) have seen the return of territory (in Egypt's case) or the cession of the rights to occupied territory with tertiary partners (Jordan to the Palestinian Authority).

As for Gaza specifically, at this point in history, there are only two parties that claim it, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Since Hamas is not recognized as an independent government by any country, it retains exclusively de facto control of the area while the Palestinian Authority retains de jurecontrol pursuant to the Oslo Accords of 1993.

As for the West Bank specifically, since Israel ceded the possible claim to the West Bank to Jordan in UN Resolution 242 and Jordan then agreed to cede its rights to claim the land in full to the Palestinian Authority, the Palestinian Authority has the right to claim the lands of the West Bank. There are certainly Israelis who disagree with the extent of these rights, their viability vis à vis their religion, or use the doctrine of terra nullius to disavow the Palestinian Authority of these rights, but this is the minority of Israelis. Most Israelis want the majority of the West Bank to revert to the Palestinian Authority with a guarantee of peaceful coexistence.

To read more about Israeli-West Bank Issues, please read the Related Question below.

There are two operative parts of this question which must be discussed before any viable answer can be given.

1) What is Palestine? Palestine, prior to 1949, was never used in the context of describing an actual nation or state. It was a regional term that came from the Roman Province Syria-Palaestina. From the 1500s-1919, Palestine was part of several different Ottoman governates like the Vilayet of Beirut, the Vilayet of Damascus and the Mutasaffirat of Jerusalem. The British Mandate of Palestine was the way that the British merely decided to redraw the lines. While there is certainly a legitimate Arab nationalist aspiration to create a Palestinian Arab state, there never was such a state in the past.

2) What does "take" mean? Take in this context traditionally means to forcibly assume control of something that was previously controlled by someone else. Since the British, a foreign power, were in control of Palestine, not the indigenous Arabs, the Israelis could not take Palestine from the Arabs. This is similar to how the United States annexing Texas is not construed as taking over Mexican land. Texas and the United States were states separate from the Mexican population of Texas even though the majority of Texans at the time of annexation were Mexicans. Israelis fought the British for the control of a region of land. That land just happened to be called Palestine because of the way the map was drawn.

Result:

As this explains, Israel did acquire the territory of the British Mandate of Palestine as the result of a war that was declared against it. However, this does not mean that Jews took Palestine if we hold to the definitions that we have already reasonably established. It bears mentioning that from its inception, Israel has sought to establish peaceful relations with everyone else. Unfortunately, it has had the need to defend its civilians almost constantly, all the while maintaining the strongest efforts to mitigate collateral harm.

Answer 1

Arabs and Jews fought over and continue to fight over the territory of the former British Mandate of Palestine and the Golan Heights (which was part of the former French Mandate of Syria). Currently, the fighting is more or less concentrated in the Palestinian Territories of Gaza and the West Bank.

Answer 2

Jews and Arabs are currently fighting over the "holy land". The holy land is divided up into the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and Golan Heights.

Answer 3

All the Land of Israel, the Holy Land, Palestine is disputed by the Arabs.

Despite the matter having been resolved at San Remo by the League of Nations in 1922 the Arabs have never accepted a Jewish state in the middle east.

The Arabs do not abide by International Law and Treaty, only Sharia. Sharia says that any land once conquered in the name of Islam is Islamic land in perpetuity. The Koran also requires Muslims to lie if it furthers their purpose.

And lie they do. Big lies. They have created a fake nation, Palestinians, with a fake history and then deny the Jewish connection to the land and accuse Israel of being racist, apartheid and state terrorism - all of course lies. They rage about settlements, occupation and a brutal regime which enacts genocide against them - all of course lies.

But the anti-Semitic west and the gullible illiterate Arab masses believe the lies and act as if they were true.

You have only to read the Balfour Declaration, the Paris Agreement, the San Remo treaty, the British Mandate for Palestine and the Anglo-American Treaty to find the truth. Oh you could also check out the Bible and the Koran for the truth about who owns the land.

Answer 4

The Land of Palestine is the center of The Arab- Zionist conflict. The Zionist consider The land between the Nile and The Euphrates as the Land of Israel, which is inhabitant with Arabs. In 1917, the Balfour declaration was sent from Balfour (British Minister of foreign affairs) to gave the Jews a homeland in Palestine which was a home for more than 1 million Palestinian back then. Please note that 1917 is 25 years before the Holocaust. The Land of Israel was planned many years before. In 1948, The British Empire gave a Land they do not own to a people who does not deserve to live there making around 1 million Palestinian pay for the Holocaust. Now-a-days around 5 million Palestinians live around the world as refugees waiting for the time they go back home, To Palestine.

Palestine was inhabitant by Canaanites since 2000 B.C. and proven Jewish Kingdoms since 1000 B.C.E. When the Islamic conquests came, The freedom of religion was preserved there thus Jerusalem was not Islamized completely.

It was fought in three main locations:

1. The Sinai Desert
2. The Airfields of Egypt, Syria and Jordan
3. The Golan heights on the Israel/Syria border

Answer 1

Palestine

Answer 2

Israel gained its independence from the UNITED KINGDOM.

Israel was previously the BRITISH MANDATE FOR PALESTINE, which was a territory in the Middle East under British Occupation. Contrary to the view that Israel became independent from "Palestine", the territory was not an autonomous country or region called Palestine prior to independence. To say this would be as absurd as saying that the United States gained independence from the Native Americans instead of saying that it got independence from Great Britain.

Answer 1

The war of 6 to 26 October 1973 between Israel and Egypt, Syria and Iraq which began with a surprise attack on Israel on Yom Kippur.

It was a combined Egyptian-Syrian attack on Israel to retake the land taken in 1967 war. It is also known as the October War and Ramadan War.

While the war started with initial gains on both the Egyptian and Syrian fronts, Israel reversed both of these gains before an armistice was signed. The end result of the war showed that the Arabs could not destroy Israel or recover the territory lost in the Six Day War by military force. This led to Egyptian President Anwar Sadat making peace with Israel in order to recover the Sinai Peninsula.

Answer 2: Pro-Egyptian Perspective

In order to answer such a question you need to consider the objectives of the Egyptians and Syrians. A war is won if the objectives of the country are fulfilled. The Egyptians KNEW their air force was inferior to that of the Israelis, since the Israelis had top American technology, as opposed to the Egyptians, whom the soviets didn't want to give high tech war material too.

Therefore, they knew that they would not be able to liberate the entire Sinai desert, rather, they could only hope to win a limited victory that would restore control of the canal to Egypt, and then force Israel to the negotiating table, where they would be able to negotiate the return of the Sinai in return for peace (something Israel refused to do prior to the war). The objective was NOT to destroy Israel.

Now, before i continue, let me make it clear that if given the opportunity, Israel will take more land, as they demonstrated in 1967, as well as during the 1973 war (on the Syrian front). The Crossing was a complete success, as the Israelis had confidence in their Bar lev line, and didn't see the need for more than 500 soldiers to guard the Israeli positions. they boasted that for Egypt to cross, they would need combined American and soviet help, and even with this help, casualties would be massive. The reality: Egyptians crossed the canal in record time with no help and suffering only 120 casualties.

They secured a foothold on the opposite bank, and then halted, with the Israeli air force unable to effectively react due to the Egyptian SAM shield. Then "the turning point" occurred. Israelis slipped through the gap between the two Egyptian armies, and swung down to cut off the Egyptian third army. To completely cut off the army, they had to capture the town of Suez, which they COMPLETELY failed to do, due to the effectiveness of the RPG- wielding civilians of Suez. The Israelis withdrew, with the 3rd army still not completely cut off. I will not lie, the third army was in a tough spot. the Israelis demanded for the Egyptians to withdraw back to the pre-war borders. Sadat (president of Egypt) refused. If you think about it logically, the ISRAELIS were screwed.

Don't forget, Israel was unable to gain air superiority even after destroying much of Egypt's anti air defense, and so could not help Sharon's division stuck inside Egypt. Egypt still had the entire second army, as well as massive reserves within Egypt that could be called up. If Israel could not take over Suez, a small town, how could they take on the rest of the country? Sadat only agreed to a ceasefire because he wanted to save the 100,000 soldiers of the third army, not because he thought he was screwed. Point is, if they destroyed the 3rd army, Egypt would destroy them, and when comparing populations of the respective countries (67 million at the time for Egypt, with only 4 million for israel), we all know israel would not be able to sustain such massive losses.

What did they do? They withdrew back across the canal, with Egypt retaining control of the land they won. Perhaps if the Israelis had captured Suez, the outcome would have been different, but they could not. If they could have indeed destroyed the 3rd army without sustaining any losses, there's no WAY they would agree to Egypt retaining that land. Now, with respect to the Syrian front, yes, they could not hold their gains, as the Israelis focused their efforts on the Golan heights, being of more strategic importance than the Sinai (Tel Aviv could be shelled from the Golan).

Not only that, they seized 18 more Syrian villages (as i said, if they can they will take more land). The Syrians blame this loss on the Egyptians, saying that Egypt did not stick to the agreement and advance across the Sinai, something that was never agreed upon. Anyways, point is, Egypt achieved their objectives, achieved a spectacular military victory in the Crossing as well as defending their earned positions, and over the course of 8 years, the Sinai was returned to them.

Netanyahu is an Israeli. He wants to pursue Israeli interests and wants the US to support everything that Israel does. Obama is not an Israeli and he has a more balanced viewpoint about the conflicts that Israel constantly gets involved in.


From Netanyahu's viewpoint and that of many conservative Israelis, Obama has very little understanding of the dominant political views and ideals of Arabs in the Middle East. From their viewpoint, Obama completely miscalculated the Arab Spring (which many in Israel term "the Arab Winter"), the Libyan Civil War (which has become increasingly unstable), and had limited understanding of how to prevent the rise of Islamist Extremism in Iraq and Syria (which may eventually pose a threat to Israel if they gain control of the Damascus area). Obama's inability to understand the Arab cultural psyche means that he cannot be relied upon to effectively understand what the Palestinian leadership is advocating and what goals they have set. In each case, he has seen Arab developments with rose-colored glasses, which is very problematic for a country that is seriously worried about existential threats.

To give a clear idea about where this position comes from, it would be helpful to remember when US liberals laughed (quite properly) when US President Bush said that he looked into Russian President Putin's soul and saw a good man. This was a gross miscalculation of Russian intentions and policy which resulted in key diplomatic losses for the US. Israel cannot afford similar losses.


First, this is a complicated question. Reports on anti-Obama websites and partisan blogs that Mr. Obama "hates" Israel or "wants to abandon Israel" are false. Barack Obama's support for Israel has been quite consistent, and in line with what previous presidents, both Republicans and Democrats, have done.

The problem with Benjamin Netanyahu and Barack Obama has two strands: one is that Mr. Netanyahu has a longtime friendship with Mitt Romney and came very close to inserting himself into the 2012 presidential US campaign, since he believed a Romney administration would be more "hawkish" than an Obama administration. And that leads to the other strand: while President Obama supports Israel's right to exist and its right to defend itself, he is more of a moderate: that is, he does not support building more settlements, and he does support a two-state solution. It is not clear that Mr. Netanyahu sincerely wants a two-state solution. Conservative Israelis got him into power, and he feels that he needs to keep their support by promoting tough and very conservative policies.

After the holocaust, people in Europe stopped their disregard for the Jews and their plight and that is one of the main factors behind the creation of Israel.

There were numerous effects of the Holocaust in building both the Jewish State of Israel and the Arab opposition to it. The following are the three most important of them.

State of Israel: This is probably the most common answer. The Zionist project existed long before the Holocaust. (The first Halutzim came to the territory of the British Mandate of Palestine while it was still under Ottoman control -- late 1800s and early 1900s and Ze'ev Jabotinsky encouraged Polish Jews to immigrate to the British Mandate of Palestine in 1937.) However, after the Holocaust, it became clear to the International Community that the Jews needed a place to exist freely and without fear of persecution where previously this sentiment was confined to radicals in the Jewish community. (Most Jews were anti-Zionist or at least not pro-Zionist before the Holocaust.) As a direct result of the Holocaust, the United Nations convened and proposed the UN Partition of the British Mandate in 1947 which gave Israel a legal claim to statehood in 1948.

Nazification of Arab Nationalism: This is usually glossed over, but the root causes of the Holocaust like the Nazi ideology were important in the development of Arab Nationalism. During the Colonial Period in the Arab World, the Arabs felt that while they were the sons of conquerors who ruled vast empires, they were now humiliated and conquered by the British and the French. This feeling of subjugated superiority matched the Nazi profile and as a result, Arabs began pilfering Nazi doctrine and adding it to their own Nationalist sentiments. This caused Arab Nationalism to have a more militaristic and violent character in addition to giving it a more anti-Semitic character. Pogroms and violent persecution of both Jewish and Christian minorities ensued, especially in nations that had direct dealings with the Axis Power like Iraq. The legacy of the Nazification of Arab Nationalism is still quite strongly ingrained in the Arab World.

Mizrahi Jewish Exodus: Because of the two above results of the Holocaust, the overwhelming majority of Jews who lived in Arab countries were forced out of their homes or felt compelled to leave to avoid further persecution and went to Israel, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Canada, in addition to other regions. The amount of Jews in the entire Arab World in 1945 is over ten times the number in 1975.