Has Israel stolen land?
Israel has declared at least 26 percent of the West Bank as “state land”. Using a different interpretation of Ottoman, British and Jordanian laws, Israel stole public and private Palestinian land for settlements under the pretext of “state land”.
Why does Israel want the West Bank?
The Palestinians want the West Bank to form the main part of their future state. Most countries view the settlements as a violation of international law. Israel refers to the West Bank by its biblical name, Judea and Samaria, and considers it the heartland of the Jewish people.
How much land has Palestine lost to Israel?
During and immediately following the state's creation in 1948, Israel expropriated approximately 4,244,776 acres of Palestinian land. In the process, more than 400 Palestinian cities and towns were systematically destroyed by Israeli forces or repopulated with Jews.
Are Palestinians allowed in Israel?
Since 2008, they are not allowed to live or stay in Israel because of marriage with an Israeli. Israelis who want to visit their partner in Gaza need permits for a few months, and Israelis can visit their first‐degree relatives in Gaza only in exceptional humanitarian cases.
What was Israel before 1948?
In 1517, the Ottoman Empire conquered the region, ruling it until the British conquered it in 1917. The region was ruled under the British Mandate for Palestine until 1948, when the Jewish State of Israel was proclaimed in part of the ancient land of Israel.
Was Palestine a country before Israel?
Israel Becomes a State In May 1948, less than a year after the Partition Plan for Palestine was introduced, Britain withdrew from Palestine and Israel declared itself an independent state, implying a willingness to implement the Partition Plan.
Why did the British give Palestine to Israel?
In 1917, in order to win Jewish support for Britain's First World War effort, the British Balfour Declaration promised the establishment of a Jewish national home in Ottoman-controlled Palestine.
Where did Jews come from?
Jews originated as an ethnic and religious group in the Middle East during the second millennium BCE, in a part of the Levant known as the Land of Israel.
Why is Palestine not a member of the United Nations?
2015-2020 and Recognition By September 2012, with their application for full membership stalled due to the inability of Security Council members to 'make a unanimous recommendation', the Palestine Authority had decided to pursue an upgrade in status from "observer entity" to "non-member observer state".
Why is Israel so powerful?
Israel's cutting-edge arsenal today makes the IDF a powerhouse in the Middle East. In addition to its sophisticated domestic product capabilities, the Jewish state's enhancements and modifications of foreign technology shape its military potential.
Is Jerusalem in Israel or Palestine?
Jerusalem is a city that straddles the border between Israel and the West Bank. It's home to some of the holiest sites in both Judaism and Islam, and so both Israel and Palestine want to make it their capital.
Is Israel part of NATO?
Israel has enjoyed a special relationship with NATO for over three decades and was the third country to gain non-NATO alliance status as early as 1989.
What would happen if Israel annexed the West Bank?
Israeli law has been applied to Israeli settlements throughout the West Bank, leading to a system of "enclave law" and claims of "creeping annexation". Annexation of the West Bank would be condemned as illegal by the United Nations and would break international law.
What is the main cause of conflict between Israel and Palestine?
The history of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict began with the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948. This conflict came from the intercommunal violence in Mandatory Palestine between Arabs and Jews from 1920, and erupted into full-scale hostilities in the 1947–48 civil war.
Who Owns the West Bank in Israel?
Presently, most of the West Bank is administered by Israel though 42% of it is under varying degrees of autonomous rule by the Fatah-run Palestinian Authority. The Gaza Strip is currently under the control of Hamas.
Why is the West Bank not part of Israel?
Are Israel's West Bank settlements legal or not? Most legal experts and the United Nations agree that Israeli settlements in the West Bank violate international law. The 1949 Geneva Convention, which Israel signed, prohibits an occupying state from moving its own civilians into the territory it occupies.
Overview
The Pale of Settlement (Russian: Черта́ осе́длости, chertá osédlosti; Yiddish: דער תּחום-המושבֿ, der tchum-ha-moyshev; Hebrew: תְּחוּם הַמּוֹשָב, t'ẖum hammosháv) was a western region of the Russian Empire with varying borders that existed from 1791 to 1917 in which permanent residency by Jews was allowed and beyond which Jewish residency, permanent or temporary, was mo…
History
The territory that would become the Pale first began to enter Russian hands in 1772, with the First Partition of Poland. At the time, most Jews (and in fact most Russians) were restricted in their movements. The Pale came into being under the rule of Catherine the Great in 1791, initially as a measure to speed colonization of newly acquired territory on the Black Sea. Jews were allowed to expand the territory available to them, but in exchange Jewish merchants could no longer do bu…
Jewish life in the Pale
Jewish life in the shtetls (Yiddish: שטעטלעך shtetlekh "little towns") of the Pale of Settlement was hard and poverty-stricken. Following the Jewish religious tradition of tzedakah (charity), a sophisticated system of volunteer Jewish social welfare organizations developed to meet the needs of the population. Various organizations supplied clothes to poor students, provided kosher food to Jewis…
Territories of the Pale
The Pale of Settlement included the following areas.
The ukase of Catherine the Great of December 23, 1791 limited the Pale to:
• Western Krai:
• Little Russia (Ukraine):
• Novorossiya Governorate
In popular culture
• Fiddler on the Roof musical, later adapted into a film, located in the Pale of 1905 in the fictional town of Anatevka, Ukraine
• Yentl musical, later adapted into a film located in the Pale of 1873 Poland
• The novels of Isaac Bashevis Singer
See also
• The Pale (English Pale) around Dublin, Ireland
• Pale of Calais, English territory in France from 1360 to 1558
• Antisemitism in the Russian Empire
• Antisemitism in Ukraine
Further reading
• Abramson, Henry, "Jewish Representation in the Independent Ukrainian Governments of 1917–1920", Slavic Review, 50#3 (1991), pp. 542–550.
• Geraci, Robert. "Pragmatism and Prejudice: Revisiting the Origin of the Pale of Jewish Settlement and Its Historiography." Journal of Modern History 91.4 (2019): 776–814.
External links
• The Pale of Settlement (with a map) at Jewish Virtual Library
• The Pale of Settlement (with map and additional documents) at The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe
• Jewish Communities in the Pale of Settlement (with a map)