The 1948 Arab-Israeli War, also known as the War of Independence, was a deadly conflict that followed the civil war in Mandatory Palestine. Israel marks 30 November 1947 as the beginning of the War when 7 Israeli Jews as bus passengers were killed in an attack by Arabs. This marked the beginning of a long-standing conflict between the Arab states and the newly formed state of Israel. The war started as a six-month civil conflict between Jewish and Arab militias, which eventually turned into a full-scale war after several Arab armies intervened. The war resulted in the establishment of a set of agreements called the 1949 Armistice Agreements, which established the armistice lines between Israel and its neighbors, also known as the Green Line.

This war marked the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine War and, from the very beginning, it was characterized by intense hostility between the Arab and Jewish populations. The conflict formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine in May 1948, with the Israeli Declaration of Independence. In response, a military coalition of Arab states entered the territory of British Palestine, and a brutal 10-month war ensued.

The roots of the Arab-Israeli conflict can be traced back to the 1917 Balfour Declaration, which promised a Jewish homeland in Palestine. This declaration was seen as a direct affront by the Arab population, who considered themselves the rightful owners of the land. As a result, tensions between the two groups simmered for years, erupting into a full-scale revolt in 1936. While the Jewish population was able to mobilize and arm themselves with the help of the British, the Arab revolt was brutally suppressed.

The situation would continue to boil as more Jews immigrated to Palestine, believing they were fulfilling a biblical prophecy by returning to their ancestral homeland. This migration inflamed Arab resentment and led to increased acts of violence, including terrorist attacks by militant groups on both sides. When the United Nations proposed a partition plan for Palestine in 1947, it was initially accepted by the Jewish leadership but vehemently rejected by the Arab population.

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Allied Arab forces from Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, and Iraq invaded Palestine and took control of Arab areas. They immediately attacked Israeli forces and several Jewish settlements, which led to fierce battles across the territory of the British Mandate. The fighting was interrupted by several truces that were marred by isolated incidents of violence.

At the end of the conflict, the State of Israel emerged victorious and became the controlling force in the area. The UN's proposed plan for a Jewish state was implemented, with Israel controlling almost 60% of the area originally intended for an Arab state. Israel also took control of West Jerusalem, a city meant to be part of an international zone. Transjordan captured East Jerusalem and the West Bank, annexing it the following year, while the Egyptian military took control of the Gaza Strip.

Top photo: Tanks of the Israeli 8th Armoured Brigade. Album Yitzhak Sadeh 2, page 47, image 2449. www.Palmach.org.il. Source: Wikipedia, in the Public Domain.

Middle photo: Tel Aviv, 15 May 1948. During the War of Independence, an Egyptian plane shot down during the raid on the city. Source: Wikipedia, in the Public Domain.

Bottom photo: Negev, Israel, 1948. A Butterfly Haganah improvised Armored-car at Kibbutz Dorot. The Armored-car is based on CMP-15 truck and has brought supply to the Kibbutz. The Negev Kibbutz's children were later evacuated by these cars from their Kibbutz, before an expected Egyptian Army attack. Source: Wikipedia, in the Public Domain.

The war triggered significant demographic change throughout the Middle East and led to the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs, who fled or were expelled from their homes in the area that became Israel. They became known as Palestinian refugees and refer to the event as the Nakba, meaning "the catastrophe". A similar number of Jews immigrated to Israel during the three years following the war, with 260,000 coming from surrounding Arab states.

In 1949, Israel signed separate armistices with Egypt, Lebanon, Transjordan, and Syria, and the Armistice Demarcation Lines were set as per the agreements. Israel controlled territories of about one-third more than was allocated to the Jewish State under the UN partition proposal, with control over 78% of the territory that the British Mandate had administered. The IDF, Israel's military, had considered pushing into the West Bank to the Jordan River as Israel's natural defensible border. However, Prime Minister Ben-Gurion refused, fear more intense and complicated foreign relations. The country was left devastated, and its leaders had to navigate the challenges of building a functioning state amid the turmoil of war.

Following the ceasefire, the Palestinian Fedayeen insurgency erupted, marked by continuous attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers. In response, Israel launched a policy of reprisal operations, aiming to inflict a high "blood cost" on the enemy side as a deterrent. This policy led to a series of violent clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinian militants.

In 1956, Israel, along with Britain and France, launched the Suez Crisis in an attempt to occupy the Sinai Peninsula and take control of the Suez Canal. Egypt had nationalized the canal after an offer from Britain and the United States to fund the building of the Aswan Dam was withdrawn. Although the Israeli invasion of the Sinai was successful, the United States and USSR forced it to retreat.

The Six-Day War in 1967 saw Israel engage in fierce battles against Egypt, Jordan, and Syria, resulting in a significant expansion of Israel's territory. Israel captured the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) from Jordan, the Golan Heights from Syria, and Sinai and Gaza from Egypt. The War of Attrition, fought between Israel and forces of the Egyptian Republic, the USSR, Jordan, Syria, and the Palestine Liberation Organization from 1967 to 1970, was initiated by the Egyptians as an attempt to recapture the Sinai from Israel.

In 1971, the Palestine Liberation Organization relocated to South Lebanon from Jordan and began staging attacks on the Galilee. This led Israel to launch Operation Litani, the first large-scale invasion of Lebanon, in 1978.

The Yom Kippur War in 1973 was a conflict fought by a coalition of Arab states, led by Egypt and Syria, against Israel. The goal of the Arab states was to recapture territories that they had lost to Israel in the Six-Day War of 1967. The war began with a coordinated attack by Egypt and Syria on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur, catching the Israeli Defense Forces off guard. Egypt and Syria were able to penetrate Israeli defense lines and make significant territorial gains before being pushed back by Israeli counterattacks. The war lasted for three weeks and had major geopolitical implications. It marked a turning point in the Arab-Israeli conflict and led to the signing of the first-ever peace treaty between Israel and an Arab state, Egypt, in 1979.

In 1982, the Israel Defense Forces invaded southern Lebanon to expel the PLO from the territory in response to the assassination attempt against Israel's ambassador to the United Kingdom and the constant terror attacks made by Palestinian guerrilla organizations residing in Lebanon.

The South Lebanon conflict lasted from 1985 to 2000 and involved nearly 15 years of warfare between the Israel Defense Forces, its Lebanese Christian proxy militias, and Lebanese Muslim guerrilla groups, led by Iranian-backed Hezbollah, within what Israel defined as the "Security Zone" in South Lebanon. The First Intifada, a large-scale Palestinian uprising against Israel in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, occurred from 1987 to 1993.

In 2006, the abduction of two Israeli reserve soldiers by Hezbollah led to the beginning of the Lebanon War, which lasted until a United Nations-brokered ceasefire went into effect in August of that year. The Gaza War or Operation Cast Lead, a three-week armed conflict between Israel and Hamas in the winter of 2008-2009, was initiated in response to ongoing rocket fire from the Gaza Strip.

In 2023, Hamas terrorists brutally attacked and murdered more than 1300 Israeli citizens leading to the latest war to be fought by the IDF.

Bibliography

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"The 1967 Six-Day War." Wilson Center. Accessed October 19, 2023. https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/the-1967-six-day-war.

Tessler, Mark. A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. 2nd ed. Indiana University Press, 2009. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1d10hf6.