3. TIMELINE
The following, by no means comprehensive, set of developments in the history of Palestine and Israel are pertinent to understanding the issues covered by Amnesty International’s report. Following the defeat of the Ottoman empire in the First World War, in 1922 the League of Nations placed Palestine under a British mandate, which lasted until 1947. The area of mandate Palestine covered what is now Israel and the OPT. In 1947, the UN recommended partition of Palestine into a Jewish state (comprising 55% of the territory) and an Arab state (45%), with international control over Jerusalem and its environs. At that time, Jews comprised around 30% of the population and Palestinians around 70%. The Palestinian leadership at the time, as well as Arab states, rejected the UN partition plan. In the 1947-49 conflict before and after the May 1948 declaration of the State of Israel, thousands of Palestinians and Jews were killed and more than 800,000 Palestinians were displaced from their homes in the context of attacks on civilians. This experience is known as the nakba (catastrophe) by Palestinians. Some were internally displaced from their villages and cities to other parts of what became Israel. Others fled to different parts of mandate Palestine (22% of which fell under the control of Jordan and Egypt following the conflict). Most of the rest fled to Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. Since then, Israel has prevented the Palestinian refugees and their descendants, as well as internally displaced persons within Israel, from returning to their homes. Palestinians who remained in Israel – around 150,000 people – became entitled to Israeli citizenship. However, from 1948 to 1966 they were placed under military rule. Meanwhile, between 1949 and 1952 the Jewish population more than doubled, mainly through immigration. After the establishment of Israel, two parts of mandate Palestine remained outside its control: the Gaza Strip, which was administered by Egypt; and the eastern area, which became known as the West Bank and was administered by Jordan. The Arab-Israel war in 1967, which Israel won in six days, led to Israel militarily occupying the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip. Together, these areas are known as the OPT. The war also resulted in the displacement of a further 350,000 refugees, the vast majority of them Palestinians from the OPT, mainly to Jordan. Israel also prevents these Palestinian refugees and their descendants from returning. In 1980, Israel unilaterally (and unlawfully under international law) formalized its 1967 annexation of East Jerusalem, including Palestinian parts of the city and a surrounding area of about 70km2 that belonged to about 28 Palestinian villages. The first intifada (uprising) by Palestinians against Israel’s occupation began in December 1987 and ended in 1993 with the signing of the first Oslo Accords. Between 1993 and 1995, further negotiations between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) led to more Oslo Accords. These established the Palestinian Authority and tasked it with limited self-governance of the Gaza Strip
ISRAEL’S APARTHEID AGAINST PALESTINIANS CRUEL SYSTEM OF DOMINATION AND CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY Amnesty International
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