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Palestine (Latin: Syria Palæstina; Hebrew: פלשתינה Palestina, ארץ־ישראל Eretz Yisrael; Arabic: فلسطين Filasṭīn), is a region in the Middle East extending inland from the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. Its political status is hotly disputed. See Region of Palestine.
In present-day usage, the term is used in political advocacy to refer to land the speaker considers as belonging to the Palestinians, particularly the State of Palestine, recognized by two-thirds of the world's nations since its declaration of independence in the 1980s. The Palestinian Authority considers itself the forerunner of a Palestinian state. The boundaries that a Palestinian state would or should have are hotly disputed. Areas typically cited include (at the lower end) the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and part of Jerusalem, and (at the higher end), the whole of Israel as well.
See also:
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In the West Bank and Gaza Strip, many citizens live under the administration of the Palestinian Authority (PA). The United Nations and many Western governments describe the Israeli-controlled portions of these territories as "Occupied territories" or sometimes "disputed territories." Most of the Israeli public refers to them as "territories"; others by their Hebrew names of Judea (Yehuda), Samaria (Shomron), and Gaza (Aza), or by the acronym for these names (YeSHA).
A large portion of the international community considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank to be in violation of international law, particularly given the adoption of United Nations Security Council Resolution 446 in March 1979, declaring them illegal. The Israeli government cites provisions of the Oslo accords, Declaration of Principles, and resolutions of the San Remo Conference as evidence that the areas in question are "disputed" and not "occupied."
The territories captured by Israel in the Six-Day War are:
The government of Israel does not use the term "occupied territory" to describe the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Golan Heights. (See Occupation of Palestine for details and points of view).
Israel annexed East Jerusalem in 1967 and the Golan Heights in 1981. However, the Israeli annexations are not recognized by the United Nations nor by most states, which regard them as territories under Israeli military occupation. Egypt withdrew its claim for the Gaza Strip in 1979 as a part of a peace treaty, the Camp David Accords (1978) and Israeli forces withdrew from the Sinai Peninsula in stages finalized by 1982 (excluding Taba which was returned to Egypt in 1989 following an international tribunal's adjudication of conflicting Israeli and Egyptian territorial claims). Israel signed a peace treaty with Jordan for the West Bank in 1988 and Jordan abrogated claims to the territory in favor of a future Palestinian state. These treaties paved the way for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. After increasing international pressure and the first Intifada, Israel and the PLO entered negotiations that were made public with the Oslo accords followed by numerous other rounds of negotiations. Since the Six-Day War, Israeli settlements have been constructed in the territories; many countries contend these settlements are illegal.
It should be noted that neither the Gaza Strip, nor the West Bank are formally claimed by any universally recognized state - both Egypt and Jordan revoked their demands to them at the signing of peace treaties with Israel. The "State of Palestine", whose independence was declared by the PLO in the 1980s, claims these territories, and two-thirds of the world's nations recognize the "State of Palestine" as a state, though it lacks the characteristics of a nation state, such as monetary independence, an economic system, a legislative system, or clear borders. According to the 1993 Oslo Accords, the final status of the West Bank and Gaza is subject to a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians; temporary agreements are currently in place. The status of the Golan Heights is subject to negotiations with Syria.
UN Security Council Resolution 242 (1967) and Resolution 338 (1973) state that the differences need to be resolved by negotiations, and requires Israel to withdraw from "territories occupied in the recent conflict". The Israeli government and some critics worldwide maintain that the wording of these resolutions, as well as clarifications by the drafters, make it clear that not all territories are intended by these resolutions, and that in any event they are no longer relevant due to the changing political situation in the region. Many Palestinians and other critics worldwide maintain that all the territories are intended, and that the Resolutions remain not only relevant but essential.
Under the 1994 Oslo I Interim Agreement, Israel turned over administrative control of the Gaza Strip and the Jericho area to the Palestinian Authority. [1] (http://www.palestinecenter.org/cpap/maps/peace_gaza.html) Under the terms of the 1995 Oslo II Interim Agreement, Israel turned over further areas of the West Bank to the Palestinian Authority administrative control [2] (http://www.palestinecenter.org/cpap/maps/peace_oslo2.html). The 1997 Hebron Protocol called for Israel to turn over areas of the West Bank surrounding the city of Hebron to the Palestinian Authority[3] (http://www.palestinecenter.org/cpap/maps/peace_hebron.html). The 1998 Wye River Memorandum and the 1999 and 2000 Sharm el-Sheikh Memoranda called for Israel's further withdrawal from the West Bank territories. [4] (http://www.palestinecenter.org/cpap/maps/peace_sharm1.html) [5] (http://www.palestinecenter.org/cpap/maps/peace_sharm2.html).
Palestine has been recognized as a state (in the de jure sense) by 94 countries[6] (http://www.pna.gov.ps/Government/gov/recognition_of_the_State_of_Palestine.asp), and there is a seat for "Palestine" in the League of Arab States and the Organization of Islamic Conference. At the United Nations, Palestine is listed under "Entities and Intergovernmental Organizations having received a standing invitation to participate as observers in the sessions and the work of the General Assembly and maintaining permanent offices at Headquarters"
The area of the West Bank has been divided to three zones:
See Proposals for a Palestinian state for a discussion of the current argument for the future development of this situation.
The International Olympic Committee has recognized Palestine’s National Olympic Committee and team since 1993. In comparison, the IOC has also recognized Puerto Rico’s NOC since 1948.[7] (http://slate.msn.com/id/2105234/) However, both are different situations. Puerto Rico is an established political territory of the United States; Palestine is partially located in previously politically unclaimed territory.
See Palestinian refugees.
The Palestinian refugees left their homes during two events, first in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war and secondly after Israel's invasion of the West Bank in the Six-day war.
On November 29, 1947, the United Nations General Assembly recommended adoption of the UNSCOP plan to divide the western part of the British mandate in Palestine into a Jewish State and an Arab State (Resolution 181). That resolution was accepted by the Jewish leaders, but not by the Arab leaders, and the following day Palestinian Arabs started a guerilla war against the local Jewish population. Five months into the fighting, on midnight on May 14, 1948, the last British soldiers departed and the new state of Israel was proclaimed. In response to the declaration of the State of Israel, armies from the surrounding Arab states of Egypt, Syria, TransJordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon invaded Palestine, thus beginning the 1948 war, which the Arab armies lost.
By the end of this war, there were between 400,000 and 850,000 Arab refugees. (Progress Report of the United Nations Mediator on Palestine, Submitted to the Secretary-General for Transmission to the Members of the United Nations, General Assembly Official Records: Third Session, Supplement No.11 (A/648), Paris, 1948) The Palestinian refugees have not been permitted to return home. According to the UNRWA there are now over 5 million Palestinian refugees (including descendants).
A fiercely contested question is exactly how the refugees came to flee the country. Some hold that most Palestinian Arabs left their homes because they were encouraged to do so by the surrounding Arab states, through various media, such as radio broadcasts in order to clear the area for operations by the invading Arab armies. Some international observers and historians have stated that most of them left because some were driven out by force from the Haganah and the Jewish undergrounds or fled as a result of reports of massacres such as Deir Yassin. Separate articles exist on Palestinian refugees, Jewish refugees and the Palestinian Exodus.
In the Six-day War 1967, 300,000 additional Palestinians were displaced from their homes, including 180,000 formerly resettled refugees from the 1948 war.
The UN's agency, UNRWA defines Palestinian refugees as "persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict" and their descendants[8] (http://www.un.org/unrwa/refugees/whois.html). This differs from the later-established UN definition of a refugee as people who are outside their country of origin (or their habitual residence, in the case of stateless people) and who, due to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for race, religion, nationality, a group membership or political opinion, cannot or will not avail themselves of the protection to which they are entitled [9] (http://www0.un.org/cyberschoolbus/treaties/refugees.asp), which excludes the descendants of refugees (other than dependents) from refugee status.
For a list of camps, see: List of Palestinian refugee camps
It is recognized that all refugees have a right to return home. The United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 (December 1948) Paragraph 1, states:
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that "every person has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country."
In the negotiations between the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli government, both parties signed an agreement saying that financial compensation was a necessary and legitimate way of dealing with many of the refugees from both sides. None has, however, been given, and many Israelis argue that such compensation should be counterbalanced by compensation to Jewish refugees who fled or were expelled from Arab states, often as a result of anti-Jewish incidents and persecution which increased in reaction to the founding of the State of Israel.
Some of the links below represent Palestinian points of view; others represent Israeli points of view. Unfortunately much of the
information on this issue, from both points of view, is closer to propaganda
than unbiased factual reporting.
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