Study Guide for. Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Transcription

1 Study Guide for Israeli-Palestinian Conflict This study guide gives you a basis for understanding the situation. Your research should continue from here; there are further resources at the back of the guide. For finding positions of the country that you are representing, you are advised to contact embassies or relevant thinks tanks, politely explaining that you are a part of Model United Nations conference, and that you would like to get information about what position to take in order to represent your country correctly. Please prepare your country s position at least one day before the meeting. This will be helpful for you to make sure that we can have a good argumentative debate. 1

2 Until 2012 The struggle between the Israelis and the Palestinians is one of the longest and most enduring of the world's conflicts. For the Palestinians the last 100 years have brought colonization and military occupation, followed by a long and difficult search for selfdetermination. For the Jewish Israelis, they believe to be the land of their fathers, after centuries of persecution around the world. They returned to this self proclaimed "home land" which however has not brought peace or security. After decades of living under occupation, a popular Palestinian uprising (Intifada ) against Israeli rule, brought about various peace negotiations. The idea of Jewish people having their own state goes back to at least the Middle Ages. The part of the world that has been thought of as the right place for the Jewish people to live in is the territory of Israel, becuase of the mountain of Zion. This mountain plays an important role in Old Testaments and so, is an important symbol for the basis of the religion. The name for the movement which developed in the 20th century and which expressed the will to create a homeland for the Jewish people derives from the name of the mountain; Zionism. Today this geographical area is divided into Israel (established in May 1948 by western powers using the UN all without consulting with the local Palestinian population), the West Bank (including eastern Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip (on the south western corner of the country bordering Egypt). For many centuries, Palestine territory was occupied by the Ottoman Empire. The Empire broke up after the World War I and Great Britain had the most troops in Palestine when this happened. Therefore, the British Governemnt got its mandate administer Palestine, while other territories became independent. In 1917 Britain enforced the Balfour Declaration, which showed Britain s support for creationg of Jewish homeland in Palestine. Due to this Decleration, large number of Jewish people started to migrate, accelerating in 1930s and 1940s, during Holocaust. This started to create tensions. Majority of the people who had been already living in Palestine were Muslims. They had problems accepting a huge amount 2

3 of new neighbours, who were of a different religion. The Jewish Europeans immigrated to Palestine caused the Jewish population to grow from a tiny minority to over 30% of the population. In the late 30s, Palestinians started to rebel in order to be granted the same independence like the surrounding countries. Great Britaing was trying to find a way to satisfy everyone, but was not succesful. When the World War II ended it decided to pass the problem to the newly created United Nations. The U.N. proposed side-by-side Israeli and Palestinian states, with Jerusalem being part of both. After Holocaust, the immigration of Jewish people increased dramatically. Israel proclaimed its independence in 1948 and set about occupying three-quarters of the Palestinian state, including part of Jerusalem. Jordan and Egypt occupied the other part, and most of the Palestinians fled. Tensions flared between the neighboring nations for years. In 1967, Israel struck out against Egypt and Jordan. This was the Six-Day War, and it resulted in the expansion of Israel into all of Palestinian territory and land formerly claimed by Egypt and Jordan, including the Sinai Peninsula, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights, and all of Jerusalem. The United Nations called on Israel to give back the territory it had seized, but this did not work out and Israel controls this territory until the present day. Israel continued to insist that it had earned the right to occupy these territories, while Palestinians, beleived in their right to live in a land that the U.N. recognized as theirs. Both sides had some representatives who regarded violence as the only the answer. In Palestine it was Yasser Arafat (leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization) and Fatah (a guerilla movement that had violence as its goal). It should be noted that members of Fatah were responsible for the slaughter of Israeli athletes at the Olympic Games in Munich in Israeli leaders also tended to make statements and take actions that inflamed the situation. For example, Israeli Prime Ministers refused to address Arafat as the Palestinian leader. 3

4 An increase in Israeli attacks on Palestinian leaders and territory led to the declaration of an intifada in This uprising lasted six years, and it led Palestinian people to question Israeli people and methods with guns and bombs and widespread distrust. On the other hand, Israeli demonstrations of force and power aimed at keeping Palestinian guerrillas in line led to civilian casualties. Arafat addressed the U.N. in 1988, and renounced that terrorism is a way to reclaim land for his people. This statement created mixed feelings. Some observers found it to be quite meaningful; others dismissed it as rhetoric not to be trusted. With Yitzhak Rabin becoming the Prime Minister of Israel came a new era in peace talks. Rabin and Arafat negotiated in secret, resulting in the historic Oslo Accord It gave the Palestinians living in Israel-occupied territory much more of the say in their daily affairs and recognized Arafat as a partner in the peace process. The first notable negotiation on the conflict was the Oslo (Madrid) peace process in Palestinian cities, villages, and most of the 19 official refugee camps were transferred to a self-governing Palestinian Authority under the Oslo 'peace process.' The area, however, remained under Israeli occupation with full Israeli military control. Arafat and Rabin stood on the same stage at the American White House and shook hands on Sept. 13, The very next year, Arafat and Rabin shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres. In 1994, Arafat returned to the Gaza Strip after 26 years in exile. Things looked positive for the Palestinian people for a while in the late 1990s, despite the assassination of Rabin in Arafat and the Israeli government signed an agreement that provided for the removal of Israeli settlers and soldiers from most of the West Bank city of Hebron in And in 1998, another agreement was signed by both sides, furthering the peaceful settlement of the West Bank problem. But with the coming of the new millenium, the peace process unraveled again. Frustrated by the lack of real progress, Arafat and the PLO declared a second intifada. It is still in effect. In response, Israel moved tanks and soldiers into position around Arafat's 4

5 headquarters in Ramallah, effectively putting him under siege. He was allowed to leave only when he was too ill to survive in West Bank hospitals. For Israel, the story hasn't changed in many years. Israelis have settled in to lands that Palestinians call home, and these Israelis believe that they have the right to live there and call it home themselves. Palestinians want the Israeli "occupiers" to leave, and they desperately want a homeland of their own, a country of their own. That is something that Yasser Arafat could not deliver. Further information and resources: %20%202006lecture_b.pdf

6 This year, Israel was heavily criticized for spreading the settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The UK government representatives stated that Israel s moves are violations of their promises and that they go against the possibility of the two-state solution. In May, many countries of the EU joined the official criticism. According to Israeli officials, violence and hatred among Palestinians intensified after this. Another criticism was directed at the Palestinian way of raising children toward resistance including using questionable tactics such as praising Holocaust. The number of traditional military weapons used against Israel by Palestine quadrupled in 2012 in comparison to Gaza, controlled by Hamas, continues to be a major place of military clashes. In March 2011, a killing of five Jewish people in the Itamar settlement in the West Bank led to intensified Israeli criticism of Palestinian approach; this worsened with glorification of the act by some Palestinians. According to a poll, a third of Palestinians agreed with the attack. Despite the publicity focusing on such terrorist incidents, Palestinian casualties in the conflict have remained to be not less than ten times higher than Israeli casualties since However, a poll conducted by the Hebrew University in Israel in 2011 was not entirely pessimistic. It showed that support for the two-state solution is growing among both Israelis and Palestinians. Palestinians support the idea a bit less with a 50% result in the poll. There is also huge support for agreeing on the two-state solution in order to later proceed to asking for more land until the whole country is in the Palestinian power. Significant number of people from the both sides, but more from the Palestinian one, think that violence is the main mean suitable for accomplishing results. 6

7 Recent Happenings This fall, the situation escalated. In the beginning of November 2012, Palestinian president Abbas stated that he is willing to negotiate about the two-state solution and peace. Israeli president Peres welcomed this. However, only a few days after this, open military conflict has started again. Israel continued in systematic undermining of Palestinian terrorist authorities. For example, in October, a leader of a group connected to Al-Qaeda was killed. A month after that, also Hamas leader Jabari was assassinated; the action angered Muslim terrorist organizations. Palestinian extremists started a rocket fire against Israel around that time; Israel responded with air raids. Prime Minister Netanyahu stated that Israel was ready to launch a bigger attack if necessary. The US president Obama supported Israel in their response, but also warned before ground offensive about which Israeli executives were in that time thinking. The other option was a cease-fire. The latter was chosen after a few days with the diplomatic help of the US and Egypt. Despite opposition created by the US and Israel, the UN granted Palestine an observer status in the UN. The conflict is in a circle from which it seems to be impossible to escape hope for a solution is followed by a conflict situation. With contradicting plans, the problem seems to be unable to solve. Further information and resources: Read independent news such as BBC. Many of these sites have a section devoted to the Middle East. Here is the article about Palestine getting an observer status in the UN Encyclopedic overviews may help you to gain some knowledge of the background of the conflict t 7