The Expulsion of Jews and the Founding of Israel
According to the Bible, Moses led some of the Israelites out of Egypt and conquered the tribal city-state of Canaan under the leadership of Joshua. Later, around 1000 BC, King David occupied Jerusalem and established the kingdom of Israel in most of Canaan, including Transjordan. After the death of Solomon, David's son, the kingdom was divided into two, Judea in the south and Israel in the north. Until 133 AD, Jerusalem was the political and religious center of the Jewish people.
The Assyrians conquered Israel in 722 BC, and the Babylonians occupied Judah in 586 BC. They burned Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem and drove out large numbers of Jews. Since then, Jerusalem has changed hands many times and has been destroyed and rebuilt countless times. The Jews have since been displaced and scattered everywhere. Around 61 BC, the Roman legions of Pompei captured Judah and captured Jerusalem. Jesus was born in Bethlehem, a Roman city. Roman rulers extinguished the fire of Jewish uprisings twice in AD 70 and 132, and expelled all Jews from Jerusalem in AD 135. After that, Jerusalem was renamed Palestine by the Romans.
During the Byzantine period (4th century AD), a large influx of Christians came to Palestine. At that time, the population of Palestine consisted of Christians, Jewish-converted Christians and paganism, as well as Romans and indigenous peoples. Around the 7th century AD, Muslim Arab armies marched north and occupied most of the Middle East, including Palestine, and Muslim control of Palestine continued until the early 20th century. During this long period of Muslim rule, the Ottoman Empire in Turkey incorporated Palestine into its territory in 1517. During this period, the Sultan of Turkey also invited the diaspora Jews to settle in various cities in Palestine. When Napoleon invaded at the end of the 18th century, the Arabs of Palestine took the opportunity to rebel against Egyptian and Turkish rule, which led to the further opening of the borders of the Turkish Empire, the simultaneous growth of the Jewish and Arab populations, and the growth of the national consciousness of the two peoples. the ascension. By 1880, the population of Palestine had reached 400,000, of which the Jewish population was about 24,000. At this time, the Ottoman government began to take severe measures to restrict Jewish immigration, but Jews moved into Palestine by various means.
At this time, in 19th century Europe, anti-Semitic waves and European Jewish liberation movements grew in succession. The idea of the modern nation-state was intertwined with the longing for a traditional Jewish homeland. In the hearts of the diaspora Jews in Europe, Zionism was ignited ( Zionism) fire. In particular, the anti-Semitic and anti-Semitic policies of Eastern European countries accelerated the migration of European Jews to Palestine. It was also at this time that European Jews began to systematize Zionist ideology. Rabbi Yehuda Alcalay, a Jewish priest, published many Hebrew articles on Zionism in the 1840s. In addition, in 1896 the Hungarian Jewish lawyer Theodore Herzl published the book The Jewish State, which fully explained Zionism. In August of the following year, the Zionists convened the "First World Zionist Congress" in Basle, Switzerland, which hoped to establish a Jewish state in Palestine according to Herzl's ideas. The Zionists at the meeting expected that millions of European Jews would immigrate to Palestine to form an absolute majority of the population. As for the local Arabs, it was not in their consideration. As of 1914, Palestine had a population of about 700,000, of which 610,000 were Arabs and less than 100,000 Jews.
After the outbreak of World War I, the rulers of Palestine, the Ottoman Empire, allied with Germany. When cholera and typhoid fever broke out in Palestine, the Turkish military chief decided to expel all foreigners, and a large number of Jews were expelled from Palestine again. During this period, only Jews of Russian nationality were exempted from expulsion. These remaining Jews became British collaborators and later provided help for the British army to fight against Turkey. At the same time, Britain also needs the help of the Arabs. The British government made a wish to the Arabs that as long as they supported the Allies to fight the Turks, the Arabs would be independent after the war. In 1916, the Arabs, under TE Lawrence, really rose up against the Turks. But after the war, the United Kingdom denied its commitment to the Arabs, and Palestine became the "entrusted territory" of the United Kingdom. The population of postwar Palestine was about 70 percent Arab and 30 percent Jewish and Christian.
At this time in Britain, a group of Zionists lobbied the British Parliament, which eventually led to the signing of the famous "Balfour Declaration" in November 1917, which promised to establish a Jewish homeland while ensuring non-profit The rights and beliefs of the Jewish community are not violated. The main reason why Britain did this was to consider that if Germany made a similar commitment to the Jews, it would draw the international Jews to Germany's side. The British move was strongly opposed by Palestinian Arabs, who insisted that Palestine is Arab land and put pressure on the British authorities through riots and strikes. At the same time, the Arabs also instigated the United States to intervene in this matter in order to influence Britain's Middle East policy. The Arab leader Aref Pasha Dajani once stated to the representative sent by the United States: History has proved that it is impossible to live with Jews, and Jews are not welcome in all countries because they suck the blood of all people. In this situation, the Jews also realized that conflict with the Arabs in Palestine could not be avoided. David Ben Gurion, who later became the Prime Minister of the State of Israel, said in a speech in 1919: No one can find any solution, We want this land to be our own country, and the Arabs want to do the same.
At this time, the United Kingdom did an incredible thing. In order to thank Abdul, the son of Hussein, the chief executive of Mecca, who fought bravely for the United Kingdom, the then British Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill in 1921. "Sunday afternoon" on a whim, handed over to Abdul the management of the area east of the Jordan, three-quarters of the total area of Palestine under British jurisdiction. Abdul immediately renamed the area the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, and in 1946 received the title of King. While the size of Palestine is shrinking dramatically, Zionists in the United States and Britain are still agitating Jews to emigrate to Palestine, where only a quarter of the original territory remains. By 1929, the increasing density of the Palestinian population resulted in increased competition and economic depression. Wealthy and well-educated Jews were highly competitive, buying land in large quantities, displacing Arab farmers and flooding the cities. The Arabs began to sense that the influx of European and American Jews would gradually crowd out the Arabs who lacked commercial competitiveness. Moreover, the immigrant showing off that they have a different way of life than most Arabs also arouses the envy of the locals. In 1929, 1930 and 1931, Jewish settlements were attacked and terrorized by Arabs.
It was at this time that the Nazis came to power in Germany and began their atrocities against the Jews. When what happened to the Jews began to become known, the British government had to relax the quotas for Jewish immigration to Palestine. Between 1933 and 1935, more than 130,000 Jews were allowed to immigrate, while tens of thousands of illegal immigrants. Palestine has since become an active volcano of violence and terror. Terrorism is spreading across the region, and the British authorities are simply unable to maintain basic order. In 1942, American Zionists rallied in New York and adopted the Biltmore Program, calling for the establishment of a Jewish state and a Jewish army in Palestine. Before long, the Arabs and the Jews entered full-scale preparations for war, and both sides began to kill, and Palestine became a battlefield of burning, killing, looting, and looting.
After World War II, large numbers of Jewish refugees were liberated from concentration camps across Europe. Western countries are reluctant to accept these refugees, so the British government's immigration control over Palestine has come under enormous pressure from all sides. The United States continued to demand an increase in the immigration quota for Jews, while both Arabs and Jews were pressuring the British authorities through violent means. Arabs terrorized Jewish settlements, while Jews bombed roads and broken bridges and assassinated British officials to stop British authorities from pursuing illegal Jewish immigrants. In the end, the British government decided to get rid of the hot potato of Palestine. In April 1947, the British government submitted the question of Palestine to the United Nations for settlement, and announced that it would end the entrusted rule one year later and withdraw all troops stationed there. On November 29, 1947, the second UN General Assembly passed Resolution 181, which stipulated the establishment of two states on the land of Palestine, namely the Arab state and the Jewish state, with the city of Jerusalem under the special management of the United Nations. However, the Arab side refused to accept the UN resolution, because the Arabs accounted for more than two-thirds of the Palestinian population, but only 43% of the barren land; while the Jewish state accounted for only one-third of the population, but received 57% of the fertile coastal areas land. On May 15, 1948, the Jewish Provisional Government unilaterally announced the establishment of the State of Israel (without using the "Jewish State" as the name of the country), and in February of the following year, the Constituent Assembly was convened, and a provisional constitution was passed, declaring the country a democratic republic. Ben Gurion became Israel's first prime minister.
On the second day after Israel announced the establishment of the state, the Arab League countries Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Transjordan (later renamed Jordan) refused to recognize Israel and declared war on Israel, and the first Middle East war broke out. .
2. The First Middle East War (1948-1949)
From May 1948, the armies of the Arab League countries entered Palestine one after another and launched a regular war against the new state of Israel. First, Egypt took part of the territory in southern Palestine, and then Transjordan occupied the Old City of Jerusalem. However, due to mutual suspicion and internal discord among the Arab countries, the attack soon stopped. In June, under the good offices of the United Nations, a four-week ceasefire was successfully achieved. But the ceasefire was broken following a massive Israeli counteroffensive in July. Sporadic fighting continued until the end of 1948. A sharp Israeli offensive in January of the following year isolated the Egyptian army, forcing the Afghan army to accept a ceasefire (January 7, 1949).
In July 1949, Afghanistan and Israel signed an armistice agreement, but did not achieve peace. About 400,000 Palestinian Arab refugees have fled Israel and are stranded in refugee camps on the Israeli border, which has become an important cause of the Arab-Israeli conflict in the future. In the first Middle East war, the United States and Britain supported the Arab League behind the scenes out of long-term interests, while the Soviet Union supported Israel, which was very different from the pattern of the subsequent wars. After the war, Arab countries were disappointed and humiliated by their military failures. Political turmoil and power alternation occurred in Syria, Jordan, Egypt and other countries successively, resulting in a completely new pattern of geopolitics in Arab countries.
2. The Second Middle East War (1956)
From 1949 to 1956, the United Nations supervised the implementation of the ceasefire between Afghanistan and Israel, which delayed the arrival of the conflict. During this period, the great powers have adjusted their Middle East policies, with the United States, Britain and France supporting Israel, while the Soviet Union turned to the Arab states. In July 1956, Egyptian leader Abdal Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal and expropriated the property of the owners of the canal (mainly British and French). In retaliation, Britain and France instigated Israel to attack Egypt.
On October 29, 1956, Israel assembled its air force and army and invaded Egypt's Sinai peninsula. At the same time, Britain and France also directly intervened in the war, causing an uproar in the world's public opinion, unanimously condemning the Israeli invasion and the British and French intervention. This incident almost led to a crisis threatening the world. On November 6, with the support of the United States and the Soviet Union, the United Nations mediated a ceasefire between the two sides. By this time, Israel had occupied the Gaza Strip and the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba. But in 1957, Israel had to hand over the Gaza Strip to the UN.
3. The Third Middle East War: Six-Day War (1967)
Throughout the 1960s, border conflicts between Afghanistan and Israel continued. Syria trains Palestinian guerrillas to carry out terror attacks on Israel, and Egyptian leader Nasser forges an alliance with Jordan and Syria to say Israel must be wiped off the map. In May 1967, Nasser demanded the complete withdrawal of United Nations forces from Egypt and the closure of the Gulf of Aqaba, Israel's only access to the Red Sea. Israel responded by launching a blitzkrieg against Egypt and its Arab coalition.
On June 5, 1967, Israel launched a massive airstrike that destroyed the air power of the Arab League in one fell swoop. Relying on air superiority, the Israeli infantry occupied the Sinai Peninsula in three days, and the soldiers marched straight into the Jordanian border. In just 6 days until June 10, the Israeli army captured the Old City of Jerusalem (which was later permanently annexed as Israeli territory), occupied the strategically important Golan Heights, and Chen Bing's Syrian border. This war is known as the "Six Day War".
The Egyptian and Syrian armies were battered within six days, and Syria accepted a ceasefire that allowed Israel to occupy territories in the Gaza Strip, the Syrian peninsula and the West Bank, and Egypt's Suez Canal was closed due to the war. Israel has also declared that it will not give up Jerusalem and other occupied territories. Nasser's policies ended in disaster, and he himself died three years later. And Israel was victorious, and national sentiment was high. This war sowed bitter fruit for the endless Arab-Israeli conflict that would follow. To this day, the core content of the Palestinian-Israeli negotiation is still the key areas that Israel has won in the past six days. The Palestinian side demands that Israel return these strategically important places, but Israel will not let it go easily. The consequences of this war cast a bleak shadow over the future of Israeli-Palestinian relations.
4. The Fourth Middle East War: Yom Kippur War (1973-1974)
In October 1973, Arab countries felt that their voices condemning Israel were not taken seriously by the international community, and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat decided to take advantage of the October 1973 On the 6th of the Jewish Day of Atonement, a surprise attack on Israel was launched. Egypt and Syria attacked Israel on the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights respectively, and Iraq joined in. Unprepared and unprepared, Israel took days to complete its mobilization for war. But soon, Israel drove out Syria and Egypt again, and at the last moment of the war, successfully broke into the enemy's original defense line on the west bank of the Suez Canal, but the Israeli army paid a heavy price.
The 17-day fierce battle ended under the joint pressure of the United States and the Soviet Union. The Arab side achieved little success, but it showed that Israel's absolute military advantage began to decline. Egypt and Israel reached an agreement in stages in 1974 and 1975, which stipulated that the two sides would not fight in the Suez Canal Zone, that Israel would return the Sinai oil fields to Egypt, and that Egypt would open the Suez Canal to Israel. In November 1977, Sadat visited Israel, and the relations between Egypt and Israel eased. At the same time, Egypt and Syria have also resumed diplomatic relations with the United States, and the situation in the Middle East has undergone profound changes.
5. The Fifth Middle East War (1982)
Since 1978, Palestinian guerrillas have used Lebanon as a base to carry out terror and destruction on Israel. At the same time, the Palestine Liberation Organization has gradually developed and expanded. Yasser Allah Fatt's shrewdness made him later become a world-famous figure. The tough Israeli government decided to launch a punitive expedition against Palestine in June 1982. Begin's defense minister, Sharon, announced the goal of creating a 40-kilometer buffer to protect Israel's northern border, while surreptitiously planning to eliminate the PLO. Heavily armed Israeli forces have invaded battered Lebanon, splitting the tiny country in two after a melee. Syria intervened in the war to protect its water rights. Israel brought the fighting to Beirut and massacred hundreds of Muslim civilians in two concentration camps. In the end, Sharon succeeded in driving the PLO out of Lebanon.
From the long process of the founding of Israel to the five tragic Middle East wars, Arabs and Jews have experienced very complicated historical entanglements around Palestine. Both sides believe that their existence has greater legitimacy and seek to defend their living space through violence. Historians on both sides also used historical narratives to justify their existence, and Jewish historians tended to emphasize biblical records, Britain's Balfour Declaration, and UN Resolution 181 when telling this history, trying to prove that Jews have legal rights over Palestine. Arab historians tend to emphasize the immigration of Jews and the displacement of Arabs. It is difficult for the two sides to reach a consensus. It is worth noting that major powers such as Britain, France, the United States, and the Soviet Union are always playing the image of a just and selfless adjudicator. But in fact, in different historical periods, they always use the contradictions between the two sides to achieve their goals according to their own interests at that time. Although the former Egyptian President Sadat and the PLO Executive Committee Chairman Arafat have successively acknowledged the reality of Israel's existence, the core of the current dispute between Afghanistan and Israel is still that the Afghan side demands the return of the goods lost in the third Middle East war. land, which is impossible for Israel. The post-Arafat era is not optimistic, and the future road for Palestinian-Israeli relations is still long and bumpy.
(adaptation)
View more about The Roundup reviews
