outside looking in
<b>Registered Member</b>
This is taken from another forum I frequent. It is originally from an Arab site, so it may be biased. Some that have read it have pointed out that it goes perhaps a little to far in describing how "tolerant" the Palestinians have been throughout history. I'm no history buff, so I can't verify many of the "factual" claims myself.
Never-the-less, it is probably the best summary of its length I've seen.
Never-the-less, it is probably the best summary of its length I've seen.
Even before the Palestinians or the Jews were in Palestine, a group of people known as Canaanites had established themselves there.
By the third millennium BC they were living in cities, one of which was Jericho. They developed an alphabet from which other writing systems originated and their religion had a major influence on that of the Jews and through them on both Christianity and Islam.
A confederation of Hebrew tribes known as Israelites decisively defeated the Canaanites in about 1125BC. The Philistines, however, who had established an independent state along the southern coast, were another story. Because of their superior military organization and their iron weapons, in about 1050BC, they inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Israelites.
As a result of this defeat, the Israelites united and established a monarchy. The most famous of the Israeli kings, David, ultimately defeated the Philistines shortly after 1000BC.
King David took advantage of the weakness of adjacent states and the unity of his own people to establish a large independent country, with Jerusalem as its capital.
Peace and prosperity continued under David's son and successor, Solomon, but at his death in 922BC the country was divided: the north remained Israel and the south became Judah.
A weakened and divided country could not sustain its independence indefinitely; consequently, Israel fell to ******yria in about 722BC and the Babylonians conquered Judah in 586BC. This defeat resulted in the destruction of Jerusalem and the exile of most of the Jews to Babylon -- the so-called Babylonian captivity.
During their exile in Babylon and the destruction of Jerusalem, the Jews were allowed to maintain their national and religious identity. They did not allow themselves to forget the land of Israel and when the Persians under Cyrus the Great conquered Babylonia in 539BC, the Jews were allowed to return to Judaea, a district in Palestine.
Under Persian control, they were allowed considerable freedom. They rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem and codified their system of social life and religious observance into the Torah. The Jews worshipped a single God, Yahweh, to whom they were bound; indeed Judaism's most important contribution to civilization is perhaps their concept of one ethical God.
Persia ruled in Palestine until the country was captured by Alexander the Great in 333BC. His successors -- the Egyptian Ptolemies and the Syrian Seleucids -- tried without success to force Greek culture and religion on the people.
Eventually in the second century BC, the Jews revolted and established an independent state (141-63BC). This lasted until Pompey the Great conquered Palestine for Rome and made it a province of the Roman Empire ruled by Jewish kings.
After Pompey the Great conquered Palestine and it fell under Roman rule, two additional Jewish revolts also occurred -- one from AD66 to 73 and the other from AD132 to 135.
At the conclusion of the second revolt, many Jews were executed. A large number were sold into slavery and the remainder were forbidden to visit Jerusalem. This was the situation in Palestine until AD313 when the Emperor Constantine the Great legalized Christianity in the Roman Empire. His mother visited Jerusalem and Palestine subsequently became a focus of Christian pilgrimage.
The people in Palestine became Hellenized (following essentially Greek customs and traditions) and Christianized and the Byzantines (the Eastern Roman Empire) ruled the area from Constantinople. This lasted, except for a brief Persian occupation from AD614-629, until Palestine was invaded by Muslim Arab armies which captured Jerusalem in AD638.
Palestine was invaded by Muslim Arab armies which captured Jerusalem in AD638. Thus began 1300 years of Muslim presence in what became known as Filastin.
The land was holy to Muslims because the prophet Mohammed had first designated that his followers must face Jerusalem when praying. The prophet was believed to have ascended to Heaven on a night journey from the area in Jerusalem where the Dome of the Rock was later built. The city was therefore, after Makkah and Medina, the third holiest city of Islam.
The conquering Muslims did not force their religion upon the Palestinians and in fact, it was more than a century before most of them converted. Once they converted, however, they did adopt Arabic and Islamic culture as their own. The Christians and Jews remaining in the country were considered "People of the Book" and as such were allowed control of their communities and guaranteed security and freedom of worship. Such tolerance was -- and is -- rare in the history of religion.
At this time the Muslim empire was ruled by the Umayyads from Damascus and Palestine, as a close neighbor, profited from both trade and religious traffic. In 750, when the caliphate shifted to Baghdad with the Abbasids, Palestine experienced a decline in importance and was somewhat neglected by the new rulers. It suffered unrest and domination by various groups, including Europeans at the time of the Crusades, and later the Mamelukes from Egypt.
As with most of the Muslim world, however, Palestine shared in the golden age of Islam when the Muslim world enjoyed pre-eminence in science, art, philosophy and literature. Greek learning was preserved in no small part by Muslim scholars who, in that way, contributed to the European Renaissance
1517 the Mamelukes were defeated by the Ottomans, who ruled Palestine for the next four hundred years -- until the winter of 1917-18.
Under Ottoman rule, the country was divided into districts which were administered by native Palestinians. The Christian and Jewish communities were allowed a large measure of control and Palestine flourished as the Ottomans flourished and declined as the Ottoman Empire began the slow and ponderous progress toward its end.
Palestine's decline in trade, agriculture and population continued until the 19th century. As European powers sought raw materials, new markets and expanded strategic interests, they inevitably came to the Middle East. This in turn stimulated economic and social development.
In the 1830s, Mohammed Ali, the viceroy of Egypt, extended his control to Palestine where he modified the existing feudal order, increased agricultural production and improved the system of education. In 1840, the Ottomans once again took control of Palestine and set in motion reforms of their own.
With the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe in the 1880s, European Jews began to migrate to their so-called "promised land", Palestine.
In 1897 the World Zionist Organization was founded to solve Europe's "Jewish problem" through Zionism -- the return of the Jews to the area once known as Israel, but which had not existed as such for nearly 2000 years and which, in any case, was not an uninhabited country. As a result of the Zionist movement, Jewish immigration to Palestine increased dramatically.
This immigration, as well as Jewish purchases of Palestinian land and Jewish claims to be returning to "their land", were viewed with alarm by some Palestinian leaders who naturally became vigorously opposed to Zionism.
With Arab help, the British took Palestine from the Ottomans at the end of World War I in 1917-18. The Arabs willingly helped the British because they had been promised independence after the war.
Unfortunately, Britain had also made promises to the Jews -- and the two sets of promises were scarcely compatible. In the Sykes-Picot agreement made with France and Russia in 1916, Britain had promised to divide the regions and rule it with its allies. In 1917 in the notorious Balfour Declaration, Britain promised, in exchange for Jewish help, a Jewish "national home" in Palestine.
The Balfour Declaration of 2 November 1917 was originally a letter sent from the British Foreign Secretary, Arthur James Balfour, to Edmond J. Rothschild, a prominent British Jew and supporter of Zionism. The letter stated the British government's support for "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people."
It made a further commitment on the part of the British government to make "the best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."
With the Balfour Declaration, Britain's aim was to win the support of Jews for the Allied cause in World War I -- both those Jews in nations at war and those in neutral nations such as the United States. On 24 July 1922 the declaration was incorporated into the League of Nations mandate for Palestine which enumerated the terms under which Britain was given responsibility for temporary administration of the country on behalf of the Jews and Arabs living there.
The mandate lasted from 1922-1948, during which time the British found themselves, because of their contradictory promises, in a most difficult and untenable situation -- but one primarily of their own making. On one hand, the Zionists anticipated large numbers of Jews immigrating to Palestine and even begin to speak of the establishment of a Jewish state. On the other hand, the Palestinians feared dispossession at the hands of the Zionists and naturally rejected British promises to deliver their country into the hands of what were, by virtually any definition, outsiders.
Anti-Zionist attacks took place in both Jerusalem and Jaffa in 1920 and 1921, and a British policy statement in 1922 denied Zionist claims to all of Palestine, limited Jewish immigration but nonetheless supported the idea of a Jewish national home. The British proposed setting up a legislative council as had been done in many of their other territories, but the Palestinians, upon learning of how this was to be done, rejected the idea as discriminatory.
Despite British policy and its back-and-forth nature, first supporting one side and then the other, Jewish immigration did in fact increase. Indeed, after the Nazi victory in Germany in 1933, immigration rose sharply and in 1935 over 60,000 Jews came into Palestine. An Arab revolt based on fears of Jewish domination broke out in 1936 and lasted intermittently until 1939. By that date, Britain had once again limited Jewish immigration and purchases of land and by 1940, the struggle for Palestine had abated for the duration of World War II.
After the war, the struggle resumed and though Britain refused to admit 100,000 Jewish survivors of Nazi death-camps, large numbers gained entry to Palestine by illegal means. In 1947 Britain declared the mandate unworkable and p******ed the problem over to the United Nations.
After World War II, both Jews and Palestinians began to prepare for a decisive showdown.
Despite Palestinian numerical superiority (1,300,000 to 600,000), the Jews were better prepared. They had a working government under David Ben-Gurion and also possessed a well-trained and experienced army. The Palestinians were still in disarray from the Arab revolt and most of their leaders had been exiled.
The principal spokesman for the Palestinians, the Mufti of Jerusalem, refused to accept the existence of a Jewish state. The UN's suggestion of partition in 1947 was rejected by the Mufti, though the Jews agreed to it. Armed fighting by the military broke out and both sides used what is now called terrorism. The Palestinians were defeated.
The state of Israel was established as of 14 May 1948. At once, five Arab armies, in support of the Palestinians, attacked the new state but were ultimately defeated. At the end of what is known as the first Arab-Israeli War, Israel's victory gave it more territory while Jordan took the West Bank and Egypt the Gaza Strip.
As a result of the war, 780,000 Palestinians became refugees. About half that number left in fear and panic while those remaining were compelled to make room for Jewish immigrants from both European and Arab countries.
The refugees spread into neighboring countries where they have maintained their Palestinian identity plus the desire to return to their homeland. With the establishment of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in 1964, they had a governing authority. In 1967 during the war between Israel and the Arabs, Israel gained control of the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and other previously Arab-controlled areas.
Functioning as a Palestinian government, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was founded in 1964 as a political body representing the Palestinians in their efforts to reclaim their country from the Israelis.
Originally an umbrella organization of refugee and military groups, it was ultimately joined by professional, labour and student ******ociations and also by some individuals.
The purpose of the PLO is to help the Palestinians "to recover their usurped homes" and to replace Israel with a secular Palestinian state. To that end, it has been responsible for commando acts both in Israel and in other countries.
The PLO works through three parts:
the Executive Committee, a decision-making body
the Central Committee, an advisory body
the Palestine National Council which is generally viewed as an ******embly of the Palestinian people
Y******er Arafat has been the head of the PLO since 1968.
In 1974 at an Arab summit in Rabat, Morocco, the PLO was recognized as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people". Subsequent to this, Arafat addressed the United Nations where the organization was given official observer status.
In 1970 the PLO commandos fought a short but bloody war with the Jordanian army after which they were expelled from that country and settled in Lebanon. Little by little, they became a state within a state, and thus contributed to the disintegration of Lebanon after 1975.
The aftermath of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 was to disperse some 12,000 PLO members to Syria and other Arab countries. Those loyal to Arafat made their headquarters in Tunis, where an Israeli bombing raid in 1985 severely damaged their headquarters and other buildings.
All territorial claims to the Israeli-held West Bank were ceded to the PLO by King Hussein in 1988. In November of the same year at a meeting of the Palestinian National Council in Algiers, Arafat announced the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.
The council also decided to utilize UN Resolutions 242 and 338, together with the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, as the basis for an international peace conference. Then in December of 1988, the United States agreed for the first time to begin direct contact with the PLO.
Relations between the United States, pro-western Arab states and the PLO severely deteriorated, however, at the time of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and the subsequent Gulf War. The reason for the deterioration was a simple one: Arafat declared his support for Iraq.
After the Gulf War, in July 1991 the Syrian-backed Lebanese army forced the PLO to retreat from its positions in southern Lebanon.
In January 1993, Israel repealed its ban on contact with the PLO and later in the year, in September, Arafat and the Israeli prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, agreed to the signing of a peace accord that introduced some Palestinian self-rule in the occupied territories.
In 1993, after decades of violence, conflict and disagreement, PLO leader Y******er Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin met in the United States on 13 September to witness the signing of a peace accord between the two groups.
The plan stipulated Palestinian self-rule in Israeli-occupied areas, beginning with the Gaza Strip and Jericho. In May 1994, Palestinian control and administration of these areas began.
Pursuant to the January 1993 agreement, Israeli forces withdrew from Jericho and the Gaza Strip in May 1994. The Palestinian National Authority under Arafat's leadership, ******umed control of the areas.
Elections were promised for the West Bank but until they took place, Israel maintained military control over it. Palestinian autonomy was limited to control of taxation, communication, policing and travel documentation.
There were, on the other hand, some serious doubts about the PLO's ability to enforce its rule in the areas the Israelis had relinquished. Unfortunately, an anti-Arafat Palestinian splinter group, Hamas, instigated terrorist acts which led in turn to clashes with Israeli security forces.
As Israel prepared for elections in May 1996, most Arab leaders felt that the incumbent, Prime Minister Shimon Peres, would lead to new peace agreements such as those already concluded between the PLO and Jordan.
In fact, Peres was a strong supporter of peace between Arab and Jew and his party had dropped opposition to the formation of a Palestinian state. Peres had also indicated his willingness to return the Golan Heights in exchange for peace.
It was therefore an unpleasant shock for many when Peres was defeated at the polls. The winner was Binyamin Netanyahu, a far more conservative politician who was not in favour of returning the Golan Heights or of establishing a Palestinian state. In addition, he was against any division of Jerusalem and he supported new Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
Netanyahu's victory upset Arab leaders, who held a summit in June 1996. By presenting a united front, the Arabs hoped to convince Netanyahu to change his mind or at least to soften his stand on certain points. The Arabs called on the Israeli government to honor the agreements signed by the previous Prime Minister (Peres) and Arafat -- an obvious reference to the incomplete withdrawal of Israeli troops from Hebron in the West Bank.
An Arab statement at the summit also sought the establishment of a Palestinian state, with East Jerusalem as its capital, an Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights and southern Lebanon, and adherence to the land-for-peace principle first enunciated at the Madrid meeting in 1991.
In late July 1996 Netanyahu said the Arab statement was "one-sided". An imp******e has been reached and no immediate solution is in sight. By November 1996, it was clear that Netanyahu had definitely slowed the process with predictable results in all quarters most directly affected by it.
The peace process suffered many setbacks in the first few years of Netanyahu's administration, a breakthrough was needed to keep the peace process alive.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Y******er Arafat met at Aspen Institute's Wye River Conference Center on 15 October 1998 for intense peace negotiations. On 23 October 1998, the peace deal was signed, following a marathon 21 hour bargaining session and the mediation of US President Bill Clinton and King Hussein of Jordan. The land-for-security deal was hailed as a major breakthrough.
As one of the conditions set by the Wye Plantation agreement, on 14 December 1998 members of the Palestine National Council voted to remove clauses from the Palestine Liberation Organization's charter that call for the destruction of Israel.
In December 1998, the Netanyahu government failed to obtain a confidence vote by the Israeli Knesset. The Knesset voted to dissolve and hold early elections in May 1999, this was mainly in protest over the current government's handling of the peace process with the Palestinian authorities.
Israeli general elections were held on Monday 17 May 1999. Israelis elected a new Prime Minister, Ehud Barak, to lead them in the peace process with the Palestinians and neighboring states.
