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History of the Middle East
Located at the juncture of Asia, Africa and Europe, the Middle East has been one of the centers of ancient civilization. Today it continues its historic significance as it provides much of the world's energy through its oil resources.
5,104 Questions
How did the Middle East War start?
There is not one Middle East War but hundreds. Please specify which war you are asking about and resubmit the question.
Does Israel still have a monarchy?
Israel had a king over 3,000 years ago...
Right now it is ruled by a democratic government and has a president that has only representative duties.
Israel has a unicameral, multiparty parliament, with members elected by vote of all
citizens, including Christian, Druze, Muslim, Baha'i, Jewish, atheist, and others, both
male and female. At the time of this writing (February 2011), the coalition government
is headed by the Likud party, and the Prime Minister is Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel
has not had a revolution or a military takeover since its founding 63 years ago ...
something odd by Middle East standards.
A lot of this can be found in newspapers. We recommend them.
Which four countries are the most oil rich in southwest Asia?
what 4 countries are the most oil-rich in the southwestern Asian region
What is Mecca and why is it important to Muslims?
Mecca is the birth place of Muhammed, the founder of the religion islam. It is also the religious place where the kaabar is. Muslims make a pilgrimage (or Hajj) to Mecca at least once in their life.
Between which countries in southwest Asia is Kuwait located?
State of Kuwait is a sovereign Arab emirate on the coast of the Persian Gulf, enclosed by Saudi Arabia to the south and Iraq to the north and west
When did the violence first start in palestine?
Conflict is a general term but if this refers to when did the Israel/Palestines begin fighting it all stems from the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The war came after Arab rejection of the 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine (UN General Assembly Resolution 181) that would have created an Arab state and a Jewish state. The State of Israel declared itself as an independent nation, and was quickly recognized by the United States, Iran, the Soviet Union, and many other countries. Over the next few days, approximately 1,000 Lebanese, 5,000 Syrian, 5,000 Iraqi, and 10,000 Egyptian troops invaded the newly-established state. Israel launched a series of military operations in order to drive out the Arab armies and secure the borders of Israel. On January 7th 1949 a truce was reached. In December 1948, the UN General Assembly passed Resolution 194 which declared (amongst other things) that in the context of a general peace agreement "refugees wishing to return to their homes and live in peace with their neighbors should be permitted to do so" and that "compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return." However, parts of the resolution were never implemented, resulting in the Palestinian refugee crisis. Thus resulting in todays Gaza/Israel on going battle.
Issues of Moving Parts
This question has a number of moving parts, which makes it difficult to answer. For example, if I ask "Is the sky blue?" there are two things for which I need a definition. Thankfully the definitions for "sky" and "blue" are almost universally agreed upon, making the question answerable. The terms "steal" and "Palestine" are far more nebulous.
As for theft, theft requires proper ownership. The first view of ownership is the literal definition of possessing something. Therefore whatever persons, companies, organizations, or governments own something with proper title as viewed by recognized governments are those who have "ownership". (This is like any typical sale.) The second definition is the perceived Color of Right of Title, which is to say that a certain person, organization, or government should have proper title but does not have it on account of an illegal activity (such as theft). (This case would come for example if A owned a book and B stole it. While B has physical possession of the book, A still retains ownership since stealing, the act of transfer and acquisition, is illegal.) Understandably, most Israelis claim that no illegal act took place and therefore title properly belongs to them. Palestinians and their sympathizers often (but not always) argue that their land was stolen and therefore, they retain proper ownership.
This difference in opinion is very important to acknowledge. If Israel is correct in its assertion that it came into existence as an independent State with rights to the lands of that state, then there is no theft. If the Arabs are correct in asserting that the land was theirs originally and it was stolen, then the question stands.
As for "Palestine" this term 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 (Palestinian Territories). Understandably, it changes the argument fundamentally if 78% of the territory in question is exempted from the discussion.
Legal Discussion
According to International Law, Israel exists as a legal and viable state with de facto borders along the 1949 ceasefire lines. The lands acquired in the Six Day War of 1967 are considered occupied-in-trust and should be devolved to Arab States as soon as a long-term peace deal is viable.
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 and since there was no act of theft it is impossible to say how an act of theft occurred in this instance.
As for the Palestinian Territories, there is more of a discussion to be had. There are two general ways that Israeli Jews have acquired land in the West Bank in contravention to International Law. The first is urban expansion of Jewish residences beyond the 1949 boundaries (especially in Jerusalem) and the second is the establishment of settlements in the West Bank and formerly in the Gaza Strip. Israel has maintained the West Bank for over 40 years, which was far longer than originally contemplated in UN Resolution 181. Therefore, there is a question about whether Israel has the ability to negotiate urban planning in cities that were wholly or partially divided due to the armistice. Unfortunately, some areas of a city may gentrify, populations move and reorganize, and it is natural for Jews and Arabs to live in areas that they did not live in 40 years ago. This has resulted in some Jews buying Arab houses in up-and-coming districts and re-zoning in order to accommodate changes in the city.
As for the settlements, these are usually taken by a legal showing that the Palestinians living there do not actually own the land that they live on and that the Israeli Jews were able to purchase the land and construct on it. This is probably the most indefensible of the Israeli positions. The International Courts have clearly ruled against such settlements.
What did the Arabs introduce to Western Europe?
The Arabs passed on the scientific concepts of Greeks after corrections and additions to the Europeans.
No.
Israel is Israel and Palestine is Palestine. Confusion occurs because both things refer to an extant piece of land with people living on it, a nationality, an ethnicity, and a prior piece of land which no longer exists.
Israel is a Jewish State that contains territory from the former British Mandate of Palestine. The remainder of the British Mandate of Palestine belongs to the modern Palestinian State. Israel is a majority Jewish population who returned from their Exile in Europe and the Middle East. Palestinians are a majority Arab population whose families lived in the region for centuries. Palestinians did not simply become Israelis (except for those who did not flee during the Israeli-Arab War of 1948-9) or vice versa.
How did the United Nations attempt to resolve the conflict between Jews and Arabs?
The U.N. has passed a number of resolutions concerning peace in the Middle East; notably among them, resolution 181, which partitioned the Holy Land in 1947. The U.N. has also sent peacekeeping forces to the Middle East, such as UNIFIL in Lebanon.
What is the us presence and interest in south west Asia?
How did the US presence and interest in Southwest Asia, including in the Persian Gulf Conflict and Invasions of Afghanistan Iraq, do what?
This question does not have sufficient information to be answered as it does not ask for the way a process (not mentioned) is affected by the aforementioned. Please resubmit your question in a way that people could answer it.
What is Muhammad's journey from Mecca to Medina in 622 called?
Answer 1
It is known as Hjra or The Migration. The year of Hjra marks the beginning of the Islamic calendar known as the Hjri Calendar.
The reason behind this journey was increasing tensions between his believers and Mecca's rulers. As Medina rulers wanted to become more powerful, they opened hands to Muhammad and it's followers.
Answer 2
Muhammad's journey from Mecca to Medina is called the Hijrah (هجرة).
Answer 3
The original journey is called the Hegira or Hijra (that means immigration in English)
What resources led people to settle in Southwest Asia?
Three major Tectonic plates converge in Western Asia, the African, Eurasia, and Arabian plates. The boundaries between the tectonic plates make up the Azores-Gibraltar Ridge, extending across North Africa, the Red sea, and into Iran. The Arabian Plate is moving northward into the Anatolian plate (Turkey) at the East Anatolian plate, and the boundary between the Aegean and Anatolian plate in eastern Turkey is also seismically active.
What year did the PLO recognize Israel's right to exist?
In 1993 the PLO recognized Israel's right to exist in peace, at the culmination of the Oslo Accords. In return, Israel immediately recognized the PLO as the official representative of the Palestinian People and the basis for a Palestinian State.
Why do many Middle East counties have -istan in their names?
Actually, there is no single country in the Middle East that has istan in its name. Most of the Central Asian countries end with istan such as Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. ^ That's what the question was asking. TurkmenISTAN, AfghanISTAN, UzbekISTAN, PakISTAN.
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Its a Turkish word that bounds them meaning 'where x people live'. Kürd-istan, Türkmen-istan etc.
Answer 1
In the olden days of 1364, Palestine was a large nation of Jordan, Syria and Israel. Then Israel ran away which made the Palestinians unhappy. 500 years later the Israelis were treated very badly and needed a place to stay, so the Palestinians let them stay with them. Little did they know, Israelis would flood into their land and have the UN on their side, which allowed them to become a free nation in 1948. So basically the Palestinians were unhappy because they had to share their land.
Answer 2
Palestinian Arabs ... particularly those who don't live in Israel ... are unhappy with Israel largely because the entire concept of a Jewish country in that otherwise totally Muslim region is unacceptable to them. Had there been any whose resolve on the matter might have wavered during the past 60 or 70 years, government policy, government propaganda, and the educational system have united to firm it up.
Answer 3
The Palestinians were initially unhappy with the State of Israel because they believed that the land that had physically belonged to their parents and grandparents should have been there's for inheritance. In their minds, it did not make sense that a group of German, Polish, French, English, and Russian speaking people should claim land that their ancestors had not even visited for centuries. Even by the time of Israel's Declaration of Statehood, less than half of the land within the UN proscribed borders of Resolution 181 was owned by Jews. Therefore, the idea of Jewish State being even more physically expansive than the land already taken was alarming.
During the Jewish-Arab engagement (the term is nebulous because it was a conflict fought by militias as opposed to proper armies) of 1947-1949, both Arab and Jewish soldiers committed acts against civilians and tried to assist in the removal of the "undesirable party". This resulted in numerous Palestinian towns being attacked, rapes occurring, and murders on numerous occasions. Fear of further attacks and incitement by Arab Mullahs drove many Palestinians away from their homes. After the conflict, Israel, in order to maintain its Jewish character, has not permitted any Palestinian refugee to reclaim land inside of Israel. Palestinians are very angry both at the Jewish malfeasance during the Jewish-Arab engagement and the continuing lack of their Right to Return or (although less desirable to most Palestinians) compensation for their lost property.
Those Palestinians who did not flee were naturalized as Israeli citizens, but they shoulder a lot of hurt over the Israeli actions in the Jewish-Arab Engagement. In addition, they feel (similar to the Blacks in the United States) that even though they have equality on paper and politicians who represent their interests, there is a clear prejudice against them in the job market, housing market, and as concerns education. A famous example was how on Jerusalem's 40th reunification anniversary, there were massive rainstorms and badly constructed Arab sewers of East Jerusalem which had not been modified since Jordan controlled the region flooded up and out of many people's toilets. The same did not happen in the Jewish neighborhoods which did have more modern construction. This angers a number of Israeli Arabs who self-identify as Palestinians.
Finally, Palestinians are angry with Israeli treatment of the Palestinian Territories, namely the blockade/starvation of Gaza and the direct military occupation of the West Bank. These military activities prevent Palestinian self-realization and governance. Furthermore, the military occupation of the West Bank is accompanied by a proliferation of settlements (economically incentivized by the Israeli government) and illegal settlements (by lack of Israeli governmental opposition to such moves). This is seen by many Palestinians as a Jewish land-grab and a denial of their Right to a State as well.
Note: This is not to say that even if all of these grievances were atoned for in some way or another that Palestinians would suddenly accept Israel as there are numerous Palestinians and Arabs who have vowed to never accept Israel as a valid state for many different reasons. However, the above are the most prevalent and common grievances cited by Palestinians concerning Israeli treatment.
Why did Britain give Palestine to the Jews?
Politically, the British wanted Jewish Militias in Palestine as well as wealthy pro-Zionist patrons to join the British War Effort and therefore promoted the Balfour Declaration as a way of getting that aid.
When did the Arab-Israeli Conflict take place?
Since the Palestinians first started being called "Palestinians" in 1948. Before that, there were skirmishes with the local Arab people as far back as the 1920's.
Since the concept of "Palestinians" was invented, around the late 1940s.
What are the names and causes of all of the Arab-Israeli Wars?
There are numerous Conflicts and Quasi-Conflicts in the Arab Israeli Conflict.
Arab-Israeli War of 1947-1949
Neutral Name: Arab-Israeli War of 1948
Israeli Name: Israeli War of Independence
Arab Name: Nakba (Great Catastrophe)
Cause: Jews intended to establish a Jewish State in the borders granted by UN Resolution 181 and the Arabs did not intend for such a state to exist.
Arab-Israeli War of 1956
Neutral Name: Suez Crisis
Israeli Name: Sinai War
Arab Name: The War of Tripartite Aggression
Cause: Egypt blocked Israeli shipping through the Suez Canal when it nationalized the canal. This nationalization also caught the ire of the British and the French who joined Israel in the fight.
Arab-Israeli War of 1967
Neutral Name, Israeli Name, and Arab Name: Six-Day War
Cause: Egypt blocked the Israeli outlet to the Red Sea, the Straits of Tiran in violation of international law. Israel attacked Egypt to regain control. Israel also retaliated against Jordan and Syria once those countries began attacking Israel.
Arab-Israeli War of 1967-1970
Neutral Name, Israeli Name, and Arab Name: War of Attrition
Cause: Egyptians tried to weaken Israeli resolve to hold the Sinai Peninsula by attacking Israeli positions in a way that would not merit a full-scale retaliation.
Arab-Israeli War of 1973
Neutral Name: Arab-Israeli War of 1973
Israeli Name: Yom Kippur War
Arab Name: Ramadan War, October War
Cause: Egypt and Syria wished to regain lands lost in the Arab-Israeli War of 1967.
Lebanese Civil War 1975-1982 (Israeli involvement from 1981-1982)
Neutral Name: Lebanese Civil War
Israeli Name: First Lebanon War
Arab Name: Lebanese Civil War
Cause: The War was primarily not an Israeli conflict, but an internal Lebanese struggle. However, militants from Lebanon attacked Israel in 1981 and 1982, prompting an Israeli military response.
Palestinian Intifadas (Uprisings) of 1987-1993 and 2000-2005
Neutral Name, Israeli Name, and Arab Name: First & Second Intifadas
Cause: Palestinian dissatisfaction with the Israeli Martial Law in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
2006 Lebanon War
Neutral Name: 2006 Lebanon War, Israel-Hezbollah War
Israeli Name: Second Lebanon War, War with Hezbollah
Arab Name: July War, Israeli-Invasion of Lebanon
Cause: Hezbollah conducted a cross-border raid and absconded with two Israeli soldiers. Israel entered Lebanon to pursue Hezbollah.
Gazan War of 2008-2009
Neutral Name: Gazan War of 2008-2009
Israeli Name: Operation Cast Lead
Arab Name: Gaza Massacre
Cause: Hamas fired rockets into Israel, prompting an Israeli attack on Hamas militants in Gaza.
Who established Israel as a Jewish state?
After world war 2 The United Nations gave The Jewish people land in Israel. This idea was first proposed by Theodor Herzl.
What is the long-disputed area between the Arabs and Israelis?
Next time you're at the library, go to the reference section, and have a look at a
large globe or world atlas. At the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea, you'll
see a sliver of a territory that comes to a point at the bottom, labeled "Israel".
That's what was left of the piece of the British Mandate in Palestine that was
designated for Jewish administration by the UN partition resolution of 1947,
declared a sovereign nation in 1948, and attacked and partially conquered
immediately after the declaration by the armies of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and
Jordan.
Now, if you can get ahold of some elementary school textbooks from around the
Palestinian and Arab part of the world, you'll find several that do not depict Israel
at all in that place. As far as what those children are taught, no such nation exists,
and Jews are monkeys and pigs.
The land in dispute between Israel and Arab nations is Israel itself. And what adds
fuel to the dispute and makes it even more rancorous and emotional is Israel's
shameless and unapologetic public display of its intention to continue to exist,
defend its citizens, determine its own fate, and participate in the political, economic,
and social matters of the world as an equal partner among nations.
Where did the name Middle East come from?
According to an article in Foreign Affairs (Davison, 1960) the term Middle East was popularized by an American naval officer named Alfred Thayer Mahan in 1902, but it might have been used by the British during their years of colonialism in the region. China and Japan for example were considered to be the Far East so the region between the Far East and The West then became the Near East or the Middle East. Although at times in history the Near East denoted the Balkans, it now generally means the Middle East plus Turkey and Iran. The terms Middle East and Near East are eurocentric because they describe a region in relation to Europe or The West. Despite this, the term is now accepted and even people in the Middle East call it that (Al-Sharq Al-Awasat means Middle East in Arabic). The issue of why the Middle East is called the Middle East is an interesting example how simple geographic names are emeshed in geopolitics and can shift in meaning over time.
For a more detailed history read: Roderic H. Davison, "Where is the Middle East?" Foreign Affairs, Vol. 38, p. 665 -675. July 1960
When the US did not return former Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi in 1979, the American embassy in Iran was attacked and several of its members were taken hostage for 444 days. This has been termed the "Iran Hostage Crisis."
Which three major religions were originated in the Middle East?
The three major God religions that were born in the Middle East are:
- Judaism; per Torah God revelation to Moses
- Christianity; per Bible God revelation to Jesus
- Islam; per Quran God revelation to Muhammad
Refer to related question below.
