Palestine
Long ago, Palestine was called Canaan. Canaanite tribes controlled the area for more than 1,000 years. In about 1500 BC Hebrew, or Jewish, tribes began to enter the area. These tribes were united under King David, who established the kingdom of Israel in about 1000 BC. The capital of this kingdom was Jerusalem. After the death of David's son, Solomon, the kingdom split into two weaker kingdoms, Israel and Judah, or Judea. Both fell under the rule of more powerful neighbors. By the time when Jesus lived, the region had become a part of the Roman Empire. It continued to be the home of the Jewish people, however.
By the 4th century AD, the Eastern Roman Empire (also known as the Byzantine Empire) was ruled by Christian emperors. Many Christian pilgrims began arriving in Palestine, particularly in the city of Jerusalem. Christians made up the majority of the population by the time Muslim Arabs invaded the region in the 7th century.
For most of the period between the 7th and the 20th century, Palestine remained under Muslim control. It was part of the Ottoman Empire until 1917, when British forces took command of the region during World War I.
Following the war, Britain was charged with preparing the people of Palestine for self-rule. Part of the land that Britain controlled became the territory of Transjordan (now the country of Jordan) in 1921. In the remaining part of Palestine there were two main groups of people—Jews and Arabs. British officials supported a movement called Zionism, which called for a Jewish state to be formed in Palestine. The British encouraged Jewish people to move to Palestine so that the majority of the region's population would be Jewish. Zionists also tried to buy land from Arabs in Palestine, but the Arabs opposed these efforts.
Most Jewish immigrants came from eastern Europe. Many began coming to Palestine in the 1930s after Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany. Hitler supported laws designed to mistreat Jews. The sharp increase in Jewish immigration angered Arabs in Palestine. Between 1936 and 1939, they rebelled against British rule.
To win Arab cooperation on the eve of World War II, the British began limiting Jewish immigration to Palestine in 1939. This policy led to an armed conflict in Palestine between British and Zionist forces from 1945 onward. Zionist leaders appealed to other nations, especially the United States, for help in allowing European Jewish refugees of the war to move to Palestine.
In early 1947 Britain turned to the United Nations (UN) to help with the situation. A UN commission recommended creating separate Jewish and Arab states. The Arabs rejected the proposal. Nevertheless, the UN agreed to the plan, and the state of Israel was created on May 14, 1948. The Arab countries of the region immediately went to war with Israel. Israel defeated the Arab states and captured more territory.
As a result of the creation of Israel and the fighting, many Arabs fled or were forced to leave their homeland. Their situation led to an Arab movement that sought to reclaim Palestine. These Arabs formed the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in 1964. Tension between the various groups in the area remained strong, and over the years several other wars were fought.
For years the goal of the PLO was the destruction of the state of Israel. In the late 1980s, however, the group voted to accept UN resolutions that recognized Israel's right to exist. From then on the PLO called for the creation of separate Israeli and Palestinian states in Palestine. Nevertheless, Israel refused to deal with the PLO. Then, after several months of secret negotiations in 1993, Israel agreed to recognize the PLO. Limited self-rule was granted in certain areas of Palestine, and a body called the Palestinian National Authority was established to govern the Palestinian-controlled areas. Talks concerning how to put the peace plan into practice continued off and on throughout the 1990s. In late 2000, however, renewed fighting brought the negotiations to a halt.
A serious barrier to peace in Palestine was Israel's distrust of Yasir Arafat, the longtime leader of the Palestinians. Arafat became chairman of the PLO in 1968 and was elected president of the Palestinian Authority in 1996. Israel accused Arafat of sponsoring terrorist acts against its citizens. In response to international pressure, Arafat agreed in 2003 to share power in the Palestinian Authority with a prime minister. The change in Palestinian leadership brought some hope that the peace process could begin again.
