Palestine and Israel Ethnic Conflicts

Thesis Statement

The research examines the history of Israeli-Palestine conflict, its origin, and its time of prevalence. The next section discusses the role of United Nations towards the resolution of the conflict. A negotiation dispute is needed on this issue. Israel also must not hesitate to negotiate for peace, because events are moving rapidly, including Arab uprisings and the looming U.N. vote on Palestinian statehood.

Introduction

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict was activated in 1948 when the land of Israel came into existence. This dispute is a diversified issue that covers the territorial, religious and political clash between two nations: The Arabs and the Jews. The ancient land called Palestine has been settled by both Arabs and Jews since biblical times (Abu-Lughod, 21). A movement called Zionism, designating Palestine as a new nation for the scattered Jewish people, was started in the 1890s by the Austrian journalist Theodor Herzl and quickly began to focus Jewish ambition and Arab discontent. Jews from Eastern Europe began to immigrate to Palestine. Before this, Jews and Arabs (mainly Muslims) lived side-by-side, with all the ordinary attendant difficulties associated with two different cultures in close contact.

Profound detachments exist over how to resolve the Israeli-Palestine conflict that covers cultural, religious and political variances along with territorial and natural resources disagreements. While a two-state resolution remains at the frontline of a probable tenacity, neither party has been able to grasp an acceptable agreement. No dialogues and conversations among the two parties have bought any effective and favorable resolution.

Discussion

In contemporary times, Palestine was first used by the Ottoman Empire (until 1918) and then controlled by Great Britain, under an internationally sanctioned mandate (1919-48) following World War I. The policy of the Ottomans toward Palestine was benign neglect of both Arabs and Jews. The British looked with favor alternately on one side or the other. Arabs and Jews clung to legitimate claims to the land by way of two documents: the McMahon-Hussein Correspondence for the Arabs and the Balfour Declaration for the Jews (Shipler, 164).

The McMahon-Hussein Correspondence assured for a place of a new Arab nation in the domains of the previous Ottoman Empire where the Balfour Declaration stated: "His Majesty's Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people." Each new wave of Zionist immigration to Palestine in the 1920s and 1930s evoked increasingly violent Arab reactions. The culmination of these responses was the Arab insurrection of 1936 against both the Jews and the British; it lasted three years. World War II followed, and its aftermath saw a set of initiatives to reach a peaceful solution. United Nations Resolution 181, mediating Arab and Jewish claims, asked for Palestine partition into distinct states. The Jews agreed but the Arabs did not approve the idea of this kind of partitions.

Historical Combats between Israel and Palestine

Israel and most of its Arab neighbors have been in an almost constant state of conflict, and Israel's border areas have been debated. The ultimate future of ...