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United Nations Resolution 181, resolution passed by the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in 1947 that called for the partition of Palestine into Arab and Jewish states, with the city of Jerusalem as a corpus separatum (Latin: “separate entity”) to be governed by a special international regime.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Overview
- 1948–49: Israel’s War of Independence and the Palestinian Nakba
- 1956: Suez Crisis
- 1967: Six-Day War
- 1973: Yom Kippur War
- 1982: Lebanon War
- 2006: Second Lebanon War
Arab-Israeli wars, series of military conflicts between Israeli forces and various Arab forces, most notably in 1948–49, 1956, 1967, 1973, 1982, and 2006. This article focuses on those conflicts that involved Arab forces based outside of Palestine. For coverage of conflicts specific to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, see Israel, Palestine, intifa...
On November 29, 1947, the United Nations (UN) voted to partition the British mandate of Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state (see United Nations Resolution 181). Clashes broke out almost immediately between Jews and Arabs in Palestine, beginning with the Arab ambush of a bus carrying Jewish passengers from Netanya to Jerusalem on November 30. As British troops prepared to withdraw from Palestine, conflict continued to escalate, with both Jewish and Arab forces committing hostile acts. Among the most infamous events was the attack on the Arab village of Deir Yassin on April 9, 1948. The news of a massacre there by Irgun Zvai Leumi and the Stern Gang forces spread widely and inspired both panic and retaliation. Days later, Arab forces attacked a Jewish convoy headed for Hadassah Hospital, killing 78.
Arab-Israeli wars events
Six-Day War
June 5, 1967 - June 10, 1967
Yom Kippur War
October 6, 1973 - c. November 1973
Tensions mounted again with the rise to power of Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, a staunch Pan-Arab nationalist. Nasser took a hostile stance toward Israel. In 1956 Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal, a vital waterway connecting Europe and Asia that was largely owned by French and British concerns. France and Britain responded by striking a deal with Israel—whose ships were barred from using the canal and whose southern port of Elat had been blockaded by Egypt—wherein Israel would invade Egypt; France and Britain would then intervene, ostensibly as peacemakers, and take control of the canal.
In October 1956 Israel invaded Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. In five days the Israeli army captured Gaza, Rafaḥ, and Al-ʿArīsh—taking thousands of prisoners—and occupied most of the peninsula east of the Suez Canal. The Israelis were then in a position to open sea communications through the Gulf of Aqaba. In December, after the joint Anglo-French intervention, a UN Emergency Force was stationed in the area, and Israeli forces withdrew in March 1957. Though Egyptian forces had been defeated on all fronts, the Suez Crisis, as it is sometimes known, was seen by Arabs as an Egyptian victory. Egypt dropped the blockade of Elat. A UN buffer force was placed in the Sinai Peninsula.
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Arab and Israeli forces clashed for the third time June 5–10, 1967, in what came to be called the Six-Day War (or June War). In early 1967 Syria intensified its bombardment of Israeli villages from positions in the Golan Heights. When the Israeli Air Force shot down six Syrian MiG fighter jets in reprisal, Nasser mobilized his forces near the Sinai border, dismissing the UN force there, and he again sought to blockade Elat. In May 1967 Egypt signed a mutual defense pact with Jordan.
Israel answered this apparent Arab rush to war by staging a sudden air assault, destroying Egypt’s air force on the ground. The Israeli victory on the ground was also overwhelming. Israeli units drove back Syrian forces from the Golan Heights, took control of the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula from Egypt, and drove Jordanian forces from the West Bank. Importantly, the Israelis were left in sole control of Jerusalem.
The sporadic fighting that followed the Six-Day War again developed into full-scale war in 1973. On October 6, the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur (thus, “Yom Kippur War”), Israel was caught off guard by Egyptian forces crossing the Suez Canal and by Syrian forces crossing into the Golan Heights. The Arab armies showed greater aggressiveness and fighting ability than in the previous wars, and the Israeli forces suffered heavy casualties. The Israeli army, however, reversed many of its early losses and pushed its way into Syrian territory and encircled the Egyptian Third Army by crossing the Suez Canal and establishing forces on its west bank. Still, it never regained the seemingly impenetrable fortifications along the Suez Canal that Egypt had destroyed in its initial successes.
The fighting, which lasted through the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, came to an end on October 26. Israel signed a formal cease-fire agreement with Egypt on November 11 and with Syria on May 31, 1974. A disengagement agreement between Israel and Egypt, signed on January 18, 1974, provided for Israeli withdrawal into the Sinai west of the Mitla and Gidi passes, while Egypt was to reduce the size of its forces on the east bank of the canal. A UN peacekeeping force was established between the two armies. This agreement was supplemented by another, signed on September 4, 1975.
On June 5, 1982, less than six weeks after Israel’s complete withdrawal from the Sinai, increased tensions between Israelis and Palestinians resulted in the Israeli bombing of Beirut and southern Lebanon, where the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) had a number of strongholds. The following day Israel invaded Lebanon, and by June 14 its land ...
In July 2006 Hezbollah launched an operation against Israel in an attempt to pressure the country into releasing Lebanese prisoners, killing a number of Israeli soldiers in the process and capturing two. Israel launched an offensive into southern Lebanon to recover the captured soldiers. The war lasted 34 days but left more than one thousand Lebane...
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May 10, 2024 · 1948 Arab-Israeli War, an existential war fought between Israel and Arab forces from Egypt, Transjordan ( Jordan ), Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. The war formally began on May 15, 1948, and ended on July 20, 1949, although it followed a civil war that began after the passage of United Nations partition plan on November 29, 1947.
Kashmir - India, Pakistan, Conflict: As long as the territory’s existence was guaranteed by the United Kingdom, the weaknesses in its structure and along its peripheries were not of great consequence, but they became apparent after the British withdrawal from South Asia in 1947.
3 days ago · It was first used in the United States by the American financier and presidential adviser Bernard Baruch in a speech at the State House in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1947. A brief treatment of the Cold War follows. For full treatment, see international relations.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
3 days ago · The union territory is part of the larger region of Kashmir, which has been the subject of dispute between India, Pakistan, and China since the partition of the subcontinent in 1947. Legislation passed in August 2019 set the stage for downgrading Jammu and Kashmir from statehood to union territory status and splitting off a part of it, known as ...
In the 1947 constitution drafted by MacArthur’s staff Japan renounced war and limited its military to a token force. During the Korean War a majority of the Allies signed a separate peace treaty and the United States entered into a mutual security pact with Japan (September 8, 1951). These policies laid the foundation for a peaceful and ...
