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History and Government
History: The history of Israel may be traced back to 2000 BC, though the earliest recorded event derives from the era of Moses (around 1300 BC) when elements of the tribes of Israel escaped to Palestine from serfdom in the eastern Nile Delta. Once established there, the Jewish people maintained control of much of Palestine, despite occasional clashes with the neighbouring Assyrians and Philistines, until overrun by the Greek conqueror Alexander the Great in the fourth century BC. By AD 100 the country was under direct Roman rule. Palestine was subsequently occupied by Arabs, then retaken by the armies of the First Crusade (1096-1100). The Christians established several states, including the Kingdom of Jerusalem, which survived until the fall of Acre in 1291, although after the battle of Hattin in 1187 – in which Saladin comprehensively defeated the Crusader army – Jerusalem was no longer a permanent part of it.
After 1291 the area fell under the domination of the Mamelukes and subsequently the Ottoman Empire. Meanwhile, the Jews continued to spread across Europe, North Africa and the Middle East (and later the Americas). Few countries today lack a community descended from Jewish settlers and few of those communities have not suffered some form of persecution over the centuries. The Zionist movement emerged in the 19th century with the aim of re-establishing a separate Jewish nation in Palestine, building on the common sense of identity of the scattered Jewish communities and the insecurity caused by frequent persecution. The aspirations of the Zionist movement were ultimately recognised by the British government in the Balfour Declaration of 1917, which followed Britain’s occupation of Palestine after defeating the Turks in the Middle East during World War I.
The Balfour Declaration formed the basis of the 1920 mandate granted by the League of Nations, which acceded to British rule over the territory. The mandate laid the foundations of the modern Arab-Israeli conflict as the British struggled to balance their commitment to the Jews against their parallel promises to the indigenous Arab population. After World War II and the slaughter of Jews in Hitler’s concentration camps, the United Nations favoured the creation of a separate Jewish state carved out of Palestine. The Arabs refused to accept this, but the imminent expiry of the mandate and pressure, often violent, from Jewish immigrants – many of whom had moved to Palestine after the war – forced the British to withdraw. The Jewish leaders inaugurated the State of Israel in May 1948, bringing an immediate conflict with the Arab population, which escalated into full-scale war.
Although neighbouring Arab states, notably Jordan, intervened on the Arab side, the Israelis took control of and held about three-quarters of Palestine. The remainder – the largely Arab-peopled area between Jerusalem and the River Jordan commonly described today as the ‘West Bank’ – was occupied by the Jordanian army. Since the Six Day War of 1967, in which Israel defeated a combined force from several Arab countries, the West Bank has been occupied by the Israelis; similar territorial losses were suffered by the Egyptians in the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip, and by the Syrians in the Golan Heights. Efforts to recover these in the 1973 Yom Kippur War were repulsed by Israel.
Most of the Palestinian population were now stateless refugees driven from their traditional lands. Many thousands ended up in squalid refugee camps in Lebanon. Others sought out relatives in Jordan, over half of whose population is of Palestinian descent. Others moved further afield: as with the Jews, Palestinian communities with many of the same attributes (a focus on education, business and professional skills) have grown up throughout the world.
Politically, the main player in Palestinian politics since its formation in 1964 has been the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), an umbrella grouping of seven main factions. The leader of the largest faction, al-Fatah, is Yasser Arafat. Known among Palestinians as ‘Abu Ammar’ (the builder), Arafat is also the long-standing chair of the PLO and, from 1994, head of the Palestinian Authority (see below). The PLO and its affiliates embarked on an international campaign designed to highlight the plight of the Palestinian peoples. This mixed orthodox military operations with high profile urban guerrilla and terrorist activities. Israel responded in kind, and the underground war between the two has been uniquely unforgiving (apart from Arafat, all the key founding members of the PLO have been assassinated).
By the early 1980s, it was clear that the ‘armed struggle’ was of limited value. Moreover, the political environment was fast changing. In 1979, the largest Arab state, Egypt, signed the Camp David Accord. The Accord included not only a peace treaty but provisions for the return of occupied land to Egypt (which was effected) and for a transition to autonomous rule for West Bank Palestinians (which was never introduced). The attitude of the right-wing Israeli government of Menachem Begin (and that of Yitzhak Shamir which followed) was typified by the 1982 invasion of Lebanon.
The main purpose of the invasion was to destroy the PLO infrastructure that had developed in the southern part of the country since the 1960s, as well as its headquarters in Beirut. In this it was successful, but Israel then decided to maintain an occupation zone in the southern part of the country jointly controlled by the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) and their local proxies, the South Lebanon Army. Several indigenous guerrilla movements, notably Hezbollah, emerged and fought a highly effective campaign of attrition against the Israelis which led to Israel’s only military defeat when the IDF was forced to pull out of Lebanon in 1999.
From 1987, Palestinian activists wound down the armed struggle in favour of a more generalised campaign of civil disobedience, street disturbances and strikes known under the collective rubric of al-intifada (‘uprising’). This was allied with a diplomatic offensive by the exiled PLO leadership (now based in Tunis) and endorsement of UN resolutions 242 and 338 which implicitly recognise Israel’s right to exist. The right-wing Israeli government of Yitzhak Shamir seemed reluctant to reach a settlement and such dialogue as occurred was largely futile.
The 1991 war in Iraq seemed to offer an opportunity to break the impasse. The Israeli government was persuaded by the Americans to stay out of the fighting to keep the Arab members of the anti-Iraq coalition, including Saudi Arabia, Syria and Egypt, on side. But diplomatic manoeuvring after the war returned to its usual snail’s pace – in public at least. For at the same time, an exceedingly discreet diplomatic initiative brokered by the Norwegian government was making remarkable progress and had, by the end of the summer of 1993, brought an agreement between the Israelis and the PLO. The rest of the world was presented with a virtual fait accompli. The essence of the agreement, enshrined in a declaration of principles and signed by Rabin and Yasser Arafat on the lawn of the White House in September, was that the Israelis would relinquish control of the Gaza strip and an area around the West Bank town of Jericho. This would come under sole Palestinian control, administered by an elected Palestinian government of sorts. This was designed as the first stage of a process eventually extending throughout the occupied territories and leading to a complete and comprehensive settlement by the end of 1998.
In addition to Gaza and Jericho, the Palestinians took control of six major towns. That is as far as the process has gone. Political cold feet in Israel over the perennial issues of security, the status of Jerusalem and the future of the Jewish settlements has left the Palestinians with a disconnected patchwork of isolated pockets to which access, supplies and services are all under Israeli control. However, back in 1994/5, the deal also had important consequences for Israel’s relations with its neighbours. Jordan concluded a peace treaty with Israel during 1995 but Syria (upon whom the attitude of Lebanon also depends) has proved more intractable. The Syrians insist on the return of the Golan Heights, which the Israelis will find very difficult. The attitude of successive Israeli governments since the mid-1990s and the activities of militant Palestinian groups have been held largely responsible for most of the difficulties in implementing Oslo.
The assassination of Yitzhak Rabin in November 1995 by right-wing Jewish fundamentalists, angry at Rabin’s supposed sell-out to the Palestinians, sharply polarised the country and made the June 1996 election which followed one of the most fraught. The Likud leader, Binyamin Netanyahu, won a marginal victory with a strong campaign which negated much of the emotional effect of Rabin’s death. In May 1999, the electorate once again turned to Labour, now led by Ehud Barak (yet another ex-general), who won by over ten per cent, the largest margin in recent electoral contests.
Among the first actions of the Barak government was the widely popular withdrawal from south Lebanon. But he too was unable to make any progress on the outstanding issues with the Palestinians and amid a rapidly deteriorating security situation in which Israeli forces and Palestinian police and guerrillas were virtually at war, he called an election, facing near certain defeat, to be held in February 2001. His opponent was the notoriously hawkish Ariel Sharon, like Barak another in the long Israeli tradition of soldier-politicians.
Sharon was duly elected with almost two-thirds of the popular vote, although the Labour party agreed to join a coalition government to ensure a majority in the Knesset. Sharon was determined to reverse the Oslo-based process through a combination of economic strangulation and military action. The Palestinian response was al-intifada 2000, along with desperate appeals to the outside world (largely ignored) and, from the hard-liners, suicide bombs and gun attacks on illegal Israeli settlements. As usual in such conflicts, many more civilians than fighters have been killed and injured on both sides. Sharon was fortunate in having the strongly pro-Israeli Bush administration in White House from the beginning of 2001. Despite opposition from elsewhere, mainly Europe, he has been able to pursue his objectives with impunity and by the middle of 2002, the Palestinian Authority was all but finished. Many Palestinians now look to the Islamic militants of Hamas and a younger generation of secular fighters organised in such groups as the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade (named after Jersulam’s al-Aqsa mosque). In October 2002, policy divisions between the Labour Party on the one hand, and Sharon and Likud on the other, led the former to withdraw from the government. Elections are now due early in 2003. A hawkish right-wing government is the overwhelmingly likely result.
Sharon speaks to a rising constituency in Israeli society whose growth since the beginning of the 1990s has induced a fundamental change in the nature of Israeli politics. First was the influx of several hundred thousand Russian Jews, taking advantage of their birthright and keen to escape the deteriorating situation at home. Second was the growing influence of orthodox Jewry within the country, both fundamentalist and mainstream, which has gradually produced a schism between the religious and secular in Israeli society – what has become known as the ‘kulturkampf’ (literally, ‘culture war’) between the two.
Government: Israel has a parliamentary system of government, with a single chamber, the 120-seat Knesset, elected every four years by universal adult suffrage. The Knesset passes legislation and appoints a President as head of state. Executive power rests with the cabinet, led by the Prime Minister – normally the leader of the largest party – which takes office after a vote of confidence from the Knesset.
Copyright © 2003 Columbus Publishing Ltd.
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