Following God’s summons, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob landed in Canaan, subsequently known as the Land of Israel, in the 17th and 16th centuries BC. The Israelite monarchy was founded by King Saul around 1000 BC, and it ultimately broke up into the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah. Judah acquired the name “Palestine” during the invasion of the Roman Empire in 63 BC.
At the fall of the Roman Empire, Christianity rose to prominence throughout this period. An Arab victory in year 636 marked the start of Islam’s global expansion. Since the 16th century, more and more Jews have joined a movement called Zionism that seeks to establish a Jewish national state in their historic homeland. In the 11th century, Christians in Europe mounted three crusades to return the Holy City to their control.
The World Wars
When World War I broke out in 1918, the Ottoman Empire fell. The British and French Empires carved out its territory in the Middle East. The area under British rule was referred to as the British mandate for Palestine. As tensions between the Jews and the Arabs who both claimed the territory rose, incidents of violence even occurred. Jerusalem was designated as an international zone with a special status when Palestine was divided into two sovereign states in 1947: a Jewish state and an Arab state.
Israel proclaimed its independence a little over a year later. The 1948 Arab-Israeli War broke out shortly after the declaration and ended with a cease-fire agreement in 1949, giving Israel control of more than two-thirds of historic Palestine, including West Jerusalem. More conflicts and fighting broke out in the ensuing decades, including the Six-Day War, which Israel won, the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, which forced the Palestine Liberation Organization to leave Beirut, the First Intifada, which was resolved by the Oslo Accords, and the Second Intifada, which was resolved by Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza.
The Arab Dilemma
Then, in 1987, the Sunni Islamist terrorist organization Hamas was created with the goal of destroying the state of Israel and establishing an Islamic state. Following the Battle of Gaza, in which Hamas and Fatah clashed, Hamas broke away from the Palestinian Authority and took control of Gaza, leaving the PLO in charge of the West Bank on its own. Israel imposed a strangling embargo on Gaza, sparking a series of brutal conflicts with Hamas, the armed organization still in charge of the Gaza Strip.
As the last weekend, have shown the world, what Hamas can do! The world is just trying to understand what went wrong and what could go worse. While Israel is trying to get international sympathy and support for their cause, Hamas is just being an out & out terrorist organization putting forward calls for a Global Jihad. Hamas is also trying to initiate talks by holding guns to the heads captured civilians.
The Holy War looks more likely and everyone has to pick a side. Usually people pick the side of the less fortunate and the underdogs. Here there is blood on both sides. Its the same story of God given right to live in the promised land. For the readers, who want to understand the religious and ideological conflict between Israel and Palestine, here are four documentaries available on YouTube for free.
[…] Also Read: The Unholy Conflict Of The Holy Land – Explained! […]