Israel declared its independence on 1948. At present, its population has exceeded 7 million, mainly from the Jewish nation, and it is also the only country in the world with Jews as the main body. Jerusalem is the capital of Israel and the seat of the central government. Israel is the only free and democratic country in the Middle East, and its citizens enjoy various political rights and civil liberties. In addition, Israel is regarded as the country with the highest degree of economic development, commercial freedom, press freedom and overall human development in the Middle East.
Historical origin
Jewish lampstands were looted from Jerusalem. Israel originally refers to a nation rather than a place name, and the earliest record can be found in BC 12 1 1. In the past 3000 years of history, Jews regarded Israel as the core of their national and spiritual life, calling it "holy land" or "promised land". Israel has a special meaning in Judaism, including temple relics and related religious ceremonies, which are the important foundation of modern Jewish tradition. Since 1200 BC, a series of Jewish dynasties have existed in this area for more than 1000 years.
After the rule of Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome, Byzantium and other ancient countries, Jews gradually declined and were expelled in this area. Especially after a large-scale uprising was suppressed in A.D. 132, the Roman Empire expelled the Jews from this area and changed the place name to "Syria-Palestine" in an attempt to erase the traces of the thousands of years of ties between Jews and this land. Even so, a few Jews remain in Palestine, but the main Jewish population has moved from southern Israel to the north. Messina and Talmud, the two most important Jewish classics, were also written in this period. In 638 AD, Muslims seized control of the region from the Byzantine Empire, and then several Muslim countries ruled the region. Including Umayyad Dynasty, Abbasi Dynasty, Huameizi and Mongolia, it was ruled by Mamluk from 1260 to 15 16, and later became a province of the Ottoman Empire in 15 17.
Zionism and the return of Jews
For centuries, many exiled Jews have been trying to return to Israel. /kloc-there were several small waves of return in the 0/8th century, with numbers ranging from several hundred to several thousand. 1878, the first large Jewish farm colony appeared in petatikva. The first wave of large-scale regression began at 188 1. In order to escape persecution, Jews scattered in other parts of the world began to return to Palestine, the land of this ancient Jewish country. Jews bought land from the Ottoman Empire and Arabs and settled there. With the increase of Jewish residents, their relationship with Arabs is becoming increasingly tense.
1896, theodor herzl, a Viennese journalist and playwright, launched the Zionist movement (also known as the "Zionist movement"), calling on Jews all over the world to return to their homeland and resume their way of life. 1897 On August 29th, in Basel, Switzerland, he convened the first "World Zionist Congress", which decided to establish "a homeland (or country) recognized by the public and guaranteed by law". The Jewish National Fund and the Palestinian Land Development Corporation were established to help Jews from all over the world immigrate to Palestine.
The development of Zionism promoted the second wave of return (1904- 19 14), and about 40,000 Jews returned to China to settle down. 19 17, British foreign secretary Belfo issued the Balfour declaration: "Your Majesty's government is in favor of establishing a Jewish national state in Palestine and will do its utmost to promote its realization". From 65438 to 0920, the League of Nations entrusted Britain with jurisdiction over Palestine. 1922, Britain divided the trusteeship into two parts: the east (now Jordan) was inhabited by Arabs and the west by Jews.
After World War I, Jews set off the third and fourth waves of return. In a Palestinian uprising that broke out in 1929, Arabs killed 133 Jews. Then there were several riots in 1936-1939. In response, Britain issued a white paper in 1939, limiting the number of Jewish immigrants to 75,000 and restricting Jews from buying land. This white paper is regarded by many Jews and Zionists as a betrayal of Jews and a violation of the Balfour Declaration. Arabs didn't stop there, they wanted to stop Jewish immigration completely.
From 65438 to 0933, the Nazis came to power in Germany and set off the fifth wave of Jewish return. 1940, Jews accounted for 30% of the total local residents. Later, the Jewish Holocaust in Europe further promoted the return of Jews. From 1944 to 1948, more than 200,000 Jews came to Palestine through various channels. After World War II, there were 600,000 Jewish residents in Palestine.
Revive the country
1947, in view of the escalating violence between Jews and Arabs and the frustration of peace efforts, the British government decided to leave the Palestinian trust territory. Since the end of 19, the number of Jewish immigrants has been increasing steadily. Influenced by the Holocaust in World War II, the idea of Jewish revival has gained more and more international support. The United Nations established the "Special Committee on Palestine", and in 10, the United Nations General Assembly voted "1947 United Nations partition plan", with 33 countries in favor (including the United States and the Soviet Union), 13 countries against, 10 countries abstained and passed the resolution:
1947165438+1October 29th, the day when the United Nations adopted the partition plan, David Ben-Gurion accepted the plan, but it was flatly rejected by the Arab League. The top leaders of the Arab League Committee ordered a three-day violent attack on Jewish civilians in Israel, attacking buildings, shops and residential areas, and then the underground militia forces of Jewish organizations fought back. These battles quickly spread to large-scale conflicts, which led to the Israeli war of independence of 1948.
1948 18 On May 4th, the day before the end of the British trusteeship period, the State of Israel was formally proclaimed. Israel was admitted to the United Nations on May 6th.
1948 War of Independence
After the founding of Israel, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon declared war on Israel, and Israel's war of independence began from 65438 to 0948. Syrian, Lebanese and Iraqi troops in the north were blocked near the border, while Jordanian troops from the east occupied the east of Jerusalem and attacked the west of the city. However, the Jewish militia forces successfully stopped the Jordanian army, while the underground Ilgen forces also stopped the Egyptian army from the south. Since June, the United Nations has declared a one-month ceasefire order, during which the Israel Defense Forces were formally established. After several months of fighting, the two sides reached a cease-fire agreement at 1949, and delineated a temporary border called "green line". Israel gained an additional 23.5% jurisdiction west of the Jordan River, while Jordan occupied a mountainous area in southern Israel and Samaria, which was later called the West Bank. Egypt occupied a small piece of land in the coastal area, which was later called the Gaza Strip.
A large number of Arabs fled the newly established Jewish state, and Palestinians called this exile a "catastrophe" (? ), it is estimated that there are 400,000 to 900,000 Palestinian refugees in exile, and the United Nations estimates that there are 7 1 1, 000. The unresolved conflict between Israel and Arab countries and the problem of Palestinian refugees continue to this day. With the 1948 war, the Jewish population in the West Bank and Gaza began to evacuate to Israel, and a large number of Jewish refugees from Arab countries tripled the population of Israel. In the next few years, nearly 850,000 Spanish Jews fled or were expelled from Arab countries, of which about 600,000 emigrated to Israel, while others emigrated to Europe and the United States.
The 1950s and 1960s.
During the period of 1954- 1955, Israeli Prime Minister Moshe Sharett failed to bomb Egypt, and a scandal broke out, which made Israel politically humiliated. Egypt nationalized the Suez Canal in 1956, and Britain and France were quite dissatisfied with it. After being attacked by a series of Arab underground militia, Israel secretly allied with Britain and France and declared war on Egypt. After the Suez Canal crisis, three countries were condemned by the United Nations, and Israel was forced to withdraw its troops from Sinai Peninsula.
1955, David Ben-Gurion became the Israeli prime minister again, and he remained in office until 1963. After Gurion resigned, levi eshkol succeeded as Prime Minister.
196 1 year, adolf eichmann, a Nazi war criminal and one of the masterminds of the European Jewish massacre, was arrested by Israeli Mossad intelligence agents in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and sent back to Israel for trial. Eichmann became the only criminal in Israeli history who was sentenced to death by the court.
On the political stage, the relationship between Israel and Arab countries became tense again in May 1967. Syria, Jordan and Egypt revealed their intention to go to war, and Egypt expelled the United Nations peacekeeping force in Gaza. Egypt violated the previous treaty, blocked Israel's strategic straits of tiran, and then deployed a large number of chariots and fighter planes on the Israeli border, so Israel launched a pre-emptive attack on Egypt on June 5, citing Egypt's provocation. In this six-day war, Israel defeated the armies of all Arab neighbors and won a complete victory in the air force battlefield. Israel captured the whole West Bank, Gaza Strip, Sinai Peninsula and Golan Heights in one breath, and the green line drawn by 1949 became the administrative dividing line between the domestic territory under Israel's jurisdiction and the occupied areas. Later, after signing the peace agreement, Israel returned the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt.
During the war, the Israeli Air Force mistakenly bombed an American intelligence ship "Freedom", killing 34 American soldiers. Investigations in the United States and Israel concluded that the accident was caused by a mistake because it was difficult to identify freedom.
1969, Israel's first (and only) female prime minister, Mrs Meir, was elected.
70 s
The period from 1968 to 1972 was called the war of attrition, and many small-scale conflicts broke out frequently on the borders of Israel, Syria and Egypt. In addition, in the early 1960s, the Palestinian armed forces launched an unprecedented terrorist attack on Jews in Israel and other countries. 1972 Summer Olympics, the Munich Massacre broke out, and Palestinian armed militia took members of the Israeli delegation hostage, and all the hostages were killed. Israel launched a retaliatory "Action of God's Wrath", and a group of agents of Israel's Mossad intelligence agency assassinated the people behind the Munich massacre all over the world.
Finally, on June 6th of 1973 10, which is the traditional Jewish Yom Kippur, Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Israel. Although the Arab countries successfully attacked the unprepared Israeli army at the beginning of the war, Egypt and Syria were finally repelled by Israel. In the years after the war, the situation was relatively calm, and Israel and Egypt finally reached a peace agreement.
1974, yitzhak rabin succeeded Mrs Meyer as the fifth prime minister. The parliamentary election of 1977 became a major turning point in Israeli political history. Trade union (? ) was defeated by the United Party led by menachem begin, and this election was also called an Israeli "revolution".
Then in June of that year, 5438+065438+ 10, Egyptian President Sadat visited Israel and delivered a speech in the Knesset, which was the first time that Israel was recognized by Arab countries since its founding. Reserve officers of the Israeli army also set up a peace movement to support the peace talks. After Sadat's visit, the peace talks between the two countries finally signed the David Peace Camp Treaty. 1979 In March, Beijing and Saudi Arabia reached an Israel-Egypt peace treaty in Washington, D.C. ... With the signing of this treaty, Israel withdrew its troops from Sinai Peninsula and the settlements built there since 1970 ... Israel also agreed to grant Palestinian autonomy according to the Green Line delineated by 1949.
The 1980s
198 1 On June 7th, 2008, the Israeli air force bombed the nuclear reactor built by Iraq in Ausilla, which stopped Iraq's attempt to manufacture nuclear weapons. This mission is also known as Operation Babylon.
1982, Israel launched an attack on Lebanon and was involved in the Lebanese civil war that has been going on since 1975. Israel went to war to protect the colonial area in northern Israel, which was often attacked by terrorists from Lebanon. After establishing a 40-kilometer obstacle zone, the IDF continued to advance and even captured the capital Beirut. The Israeli army expelled the Palestine Liberation Organization from Lebanon, forcing it to transfer its base to Tunisia. Unable to bear the pressure brought by the war, Beijing, the prime minister, resigned in 1983 and was succeeded by yitzhak shamir. Israel finally withdrew most of its troops from Lebanon 1986, and the border buffer zone was maintained until Israel unilaterally withdrew its troops in 2000.
/kloc-in the 1980s, the right-wing government led by yitzhak shamir was replaced by the left-wing Simon Perez. Perez served as general manager from 1984, but was replaced by Chamir in 1986, and Shah Milda became a political party alliance agreement. 1987 The Palestinian uprising ignited a series of riots in the occupied territories. After the riots, Chamir was re-elected as Prime Minister in the election of 1988.
1990s
In the Persian Gulf War, although Israel was not one of the anti-Iraq allies and did not actually participate in the Iraq war, it was still hit by 39 Scud missiles. The missile did not directly kill any Israeli citizens, but some people died because of improper use of prepared gas masks. In addition, an Israeli was killed by Patriot missile fragments. During the war, Israel also provided gas masks to Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza to prevent them from being attacked by Iraqi chemical and biological weapons. Despite this, the PLO still expressed its support for Saddam Hussein's regime, and some Palestinian residents even stood on the roofs cheering for the incoming Scud missiles, although in the end they still used gas masks provided by the Israelis.
In the early 1990s, a large number of Jews from the Soviet Union began to immigrate to Israel. According to Israel's Law of Reunification, these people can obtain Israeli citizenship upon their arrival in Israel. 1990- 199 1 about 380,000 people arrived in Israel. Although the Israeli public initially supported the unification law, many problems caused by new immigrants were used by the Labor Party as a handle in the election campaign, criticizing the ruling United Party for failing to solve their work and housing problems. As a result, in the election of 1992, a large number of new immigrants voted for the Labour Party, which made the left rise again.
After the election, Yitzhak Rabin became prime minister. During the general election, the Labour Party promised to greatly improve Israel's internal security and relations with Arab countries. By the end of 1993, the Israeli government abandoned the Madrid agreement framework of 199 1 and signed the Oslo Agreement with the PLO. 1994, Jordan became the second Arab country after Egypt that promised to live in peace with Israel.
At first, the Israeli public widely supported the Oslo agreement. However, after the signing of the agreement, the Israelis continued to be frequently attacked by armed groups in Hamas, and their support for the agreement began to decrease greatly. 1995+065438+1On June 4th, Rabin was assassinated by Israeli ultra-nationalists.
As a result of Rabin's assassination, the public's view of the Oslo Accords also improved slightly, which greatly enhanced the support of Simon Perez and made him win the general election with 1996. However, a new wave of suicide bombings, coupled with Arafat's statement praising the bombers, turned public opinion around again and lost to Benjamin Netanyahu of the United Party in May 1996.
Although Netanyahu was regarded as a staunch opponent of the Oslo Accords, he decided to withdraw from Hebron and signed the Wye River Memorandum, giving the Palestinian National Authority greater autonomy. During Netanyahu's tenure, attacks by Palestinian groups on Israeli civilians have been greatly reduced, but his Coalition government still collapsed on 1999. In the 1999 election, ehud barak of the Labour Party defeated Netanyahu by a big margin and succeeded him as prime minister.
After 2000
Barak decided to unilaterally withdraw his troops from Lebanon in 2000, and this withdrawal was also aimed at obstructing Hezbollah's attack on Israel and forcing them to attack across the Israeli border. Barak and Yasser Arafat negotiated at Camp David in 2000 under the mediation of American President Bill Clinton, but the negotiations finally failed. Barak proposed a Palestinian state consisting of 73% of the West Bank and 100% of Gaza, and expanded the Palestinian territory in the West Bank to 90% (excluding the suburbs of Jerusalem, 94%) within 10 to 25 years.
On June 4, 2003, under the auspices of george walker bush, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and former Israeli Prime Minister Sharon met in Jordan. Shortly after the breakdown of negotiations and the visit of Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the second intifada broke out in Palestine, known as the Al-Aqsa People's Intifada. The failure of the negotiations and the outbreak of the new war made many Israelis disappointed with Barak's government and greatly reduced their support for the peace agreement.
After the special election of the Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon became the new Prime Minister at 5438+0 in March 2006 and was re-elected in the 2003 election. Sharon began to unilaterally withdraw from the Gaza Strip, which was completed in August and September 2005.
Israel has also built a fence in the West Bank to protect Israel from attacks by Palestinian armed groups. In order to build a 68 1 km fence, the buffer zone near the fence also reduced the area of the West Bank by 9.5%, which made the economic situation of Palestinian residents difficult. The establishment of the fence has been criticized by many international critics and some ultra-leftists in Israel. However, the fence has effectively reduced terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians.
After ariel sharon suffered a severe stroke, the power of the Prime Minister was transferred to Ehud Olmert. On April 14, 2006, after Kadima Party won the general election, Olmert was elected Prime Minister of Israel. Olmert's Kadima Party also won a majority in the 2006 election.
On June 28th, 2006, Hamas's militia forces dug tunnels from the Gaza Strip, sneaked into Israel and attacked the IDF stronghold, captured an Israeli soldier and killed two people. In response, it launched Operation Summer Rain, bombing Hamas targets and other bridges, roads and power stations. Israel also sent troops to occupy this area.
On June 13, 2006, the Israeli-Lebanese conflict broke out in northern Israel and Lebanon, mainly between Hezbollah and Israel. The conflict began when Hezbollah killed eight Israeli soldiers and captured two others in a cross-border terrorist attack. Israel believes that the Lebanese government must be responsible for this attack, so it bombed Lebanon from the sea and air and marched into southern Lebanon. Hezbollah continues to attack northern Israel with rockets and attacks the Israeli army with guerrilla tactics. Finally, Israel reached a ceasefire agreement on August 6, 2006. The conflict killed 1000 Lebanese civilians, 440 Hezbollah militia and 1 19 Israeli soldiers, and also caused great damage to the infrastructure of Lebanese cities.
geography
Israel borders Lebanon to the north, Syria and Jordan to the east and Egypt to the southwest. Israel's coastline is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea in the west and the Gulf of Eilat (also known as the Gulf of Aqaba) in the south.
Israel can be divided into four different regions: coastal plains, central hills, Jordan Rift Valley and Negev Desert. The coastal plain along the Mediterranean Sea extends from the Lebanese border in the north to Gaza in the south. The soil in this area is fertile and humid, and it is an important area for agriculture and fruit cultivation. The eastern part of the coastal plain is the central plateau, the northern part of the plateau is the hills of the Galilee Mountains, and the southern part is the Samaritan Mountains composed of many small and fertile valleys. Further south is the barren hilly area of Judea. To the east of the central plateau is the Jordan Rift Valley, which is a part of the 6,500 km East African Rift Valley. Israel's Rift Valley consists of the Jordan River, the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea. The Negev Desert consists of about 12000 square kilometers of desert, occupying half of Israel's land area. Geographically, the Negev Desert belongs to the extension of Sinai Peninsula.
In the Six-Day War of 1967, Israel conquered the West Bank of Jordan, the Golan Heights of Syria, the Gaza (occupied by Egypt at that time) and the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt. On 1982, Israel withdrew all its troops and colonies from Sinai Peninsula, and on September 12, 2005, it completely withdrew from Gaza. However, the ownership of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip remains unresolved. East Jerusalem has been under the jurisdiction of Israel since 1967 [23], and the Golan Heights has been under the jurisdiction of Israel since 198 1, although they are not the official territory of Israel.
Excluding all the territories occupied by Israel in 65,438+0,967, the sovereignty of the State of Israel is 20,777 square kilometers (65,438+0% water area). If the area under the jurisdiction of Israeli civil law is added, including the eastern part of Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, it is 22 145 square kilometers, and the water area is less than 1%. Including the West Bank, which is under the military control and autonomy of the Palestinian government, the territory controlled by Israel is 28,023 square kilometers.
Until 2006, the Israeli Census Bureau listed the following three metropolitan areas: Tel Aviv (population 3,040,400), Haifa (population 996,000) and Beersheba (population 5,365,438+0.600). Jerusalem, the capital, has a population of 7 1.99 million.