If you’ve followed world news at all within the past year, then it’s almost certain that you’ve heard whispers about Palestine and Israel and their ongoing strife. What some people don’t know is that this conflict dates back over a hundred years. What’s the history, the background, and the relationship between these two sides and their people?

To fully understand what is currently happening, we need to rewind all the way to 1916 to the end of World War I. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the resolution of the first world war, the empire’s Arab territories were left unclaimed in the eyes of Britain and France. The Sykes-Picot Agreement was a treaty between the two countries to divide up the middle east. Britain gained control of Palestine, renaming it the “British mandate for Palestine” or British-Palestine. This is where the concept of ‘Zionism,’ a term recently gaining attention in the media, comes into play. Zionism, first coined in 1890, is the belief that Judaism is not just a religion but a nationality deserving of a nation. Jews who identified as Zionists reasoned that because their people had faced persecution for so long, the only way they’d be safe was in land of their own. They looked to Palestine as their historic homeland.

As waves of European Jewish settlers arrived in British-Palestine, the tension began to rise between the settlers and the local Arab population. Casualties and destruction affected both sides. It got to the point where Britain decided to limit the number of Jewish immigrants, but before they could put these limits in place, the Holocaust began in 1933. Fleeing the Holocaust, European Jews started pouring into British-Palestine once again, and tensions rose to an all time high. In response, the United Nations stepped in, issuing and approving a plan to divide British-Palestine into two separate states on May 14, 1948. Thus, the state of Israel was created. 

The Jews were satisfied with the UN plan, as they believed it granted them their rightful land. However, Palestine and the surrounding Arab countries were upset and saw the situation as yet another instance of European colonialism. Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia declared war on Israel and launched an attack on one of its cities, Tel Aviv. This kickstarted the ‘Six-Day War’ in 1967. During the conflict, Israel seized control of East Jerusalem, the Sinai Peninsula, Gaza, and the West Bank, which had previously been considered part of Egypt. Many Palestinian refugees fled to Lebanon. By the end of the war, Israel occupied all the Palestinian territories.

In 1978, despite all previous conflicts, Egypt and Israel signed a peace treaty brokered by US President Jimmy Carter in September, called the “Camp David Accords.” The outrage caused by this agreement ultimately led to the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat just a few years later. Over the following decades, the surrounding Arab countries gradually made peace with Israel.

The Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was formed in 1964 by Yasir Arafat to fight against Israel. It was created in Cairo during a summit where 13 Arab leaders vowed to fight for the liberation of Palestine. The PLO has operated as six groups, most notably Arafat’s Fatah faction, which is the dominant party. Its headquarters were located in the West Bank, but it is unclear if it survived the recent bombings. Conflict between Israel and the PLO has been ongoing for decades although the organization has “formally renounced violence.” 

In 1982, Israel’s military moved to invade Lebanon where they seized its capital, Beirut. While this attack was going on, Israelis moved into what was left of the Palestinian territories. This included Gaza and the West Bank. The citizens living there were forcibly removed from their homes to accommodate the incoming Israelis. This generated a mass wave of Palestinian refugees whose descendants now number around 7 million. The Jews quickly settled in, taking advantage of the affordable housing and claiming that it was their religious right to be there.     

Hamas was formed in 1987. They have controlled the Gaza Strip since 2006 after defeating Fatah. Hamas and the PLO, especially Fatah, have a long-standing feud mostly because of Hamas’ violent tactics in liberating Palestine. Many countries, including the United States, have labeled Hamas as a terrorist organization due to their attacks on Israel. However, it’s important to note that Israel has also launched its share of attacks on Palestine and surrounding Arab countries. The borders have remained relatively quiet, aside from rockets fired into Israel from Lebanon and the IDF’s 22,000 infiltrations of Lebanon’s airspace.

The unstable and divided leadership of Palestine, along with ongoing violence, has left Palestinians susceptible to the attacks launched by Israel. Whether or not you believe the IDF is actually targeting Hamas leaders, the civilian casualties have been catastrophic. The bombing on Oct. 7, which sparked the recent conflict, killed nearly 1,200 Israeli citizens and resulted in 251 hostages being taken, according to Israel. Since Israel declared war on Hamas, four of its leaders have been killed, and over 40,000 innocent Palestinians have died as of August 2024. This does not include the more than 90,000 injured, 2.5 million displaced, and thousands of people whose homes are now rubble.

Works Cited:

• Engel, R. (2011, July 5). Sadat’s assassination plotter remains unrepentant. NBC News. https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna43640995
• Maizland, L., Faskianos, I. A., Robinson, K., & Graham, T. (2024, August 19). What Is Hamas? Council on Foreign Relations. https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/what-hamas
• Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). (2016, September 1). ADL. https://www.adl.org/resources/backgrounder/palestine-liberation-organization-plo
• Salhani, J. (2023, October 17). Beyond Hezbollah: The history of tensions between Lebanon and Israel. Al Jazeera. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/17/beyond-hezbollah-the-history-of-tensions-between-lebanon-and-israel
• The British Army in Palestine. (n.d.). National Army Museum. https://www.nam.ac.uk/explore/conflict-Palestine