Palestine Facts

Palestine Facts and History

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Palestinian autonomous territories – still no state of their own

On November 29, 2012, the time had come: the UN General Assembly passed resolution 67/19. With this resolution, the Palestinian Autonomous Territories were granted the status of a non-member observer state. At the United Nations, this new status is regarded as a preliminary stage to full membership. But the areas between the Mediterranean Sea and Jordan are not yet a state, even if the PLO proclaimed a state of Palestine in 1988 and gained recognition from around 130 states. Since October 31, 2011, Israel, the USA and other predominantly western states have not been recognized “Palestine” member of UNESCO.

The so-called Palestinian Autonomous Areas are currently made up of the Gaza Strip and several settlement areas in the West Bank (also known as the West Bank), which are separated from one another by the sovereign territories of the State of Israel. The autonomy authority continues to claim control over the border to Jordan. But this lies with Israel. While the Gaza Strip can be fully counted among the autonomous areas, this is not so easy in the case of the West Bank: as a result of the 1995 interim agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, it was divided into three zones – Zone A (18%), Zone B. (20%) and Zone C (62%). The Palestinian Authority and the Israeli military each have different powers in these zones. Some autonomy regulations also include Zone C, so that many of these are also included in the autonomous areas. The agreement stipulated that the areas of Zone C (with certain exceptions) would gradually be transferred to Palestinian autonomy.

The Gaza Strip is now again anything but autonomous. While Israel controls the external borders on the northern and eastern land, the western sea side and the indirect control of passenger traffic in cooperation with Egyptand the European Union on the south side, water and electricity supplies as well as telecommunications are not autonomous, but depend on aid from abroad or on the Palestinian Authority. Israel also controls all access to Gaza by air and the Mediterranean. Since the Israelis withdrew their military and their settlements, the Gaza Strip has been under indirect control of Israel, which, like Egypt, has repeatedly restricted the movement of people and goods and at times brings it to a complete standstill. This creates supply bottlenecks and partially collapses the economy and labor market in the Gaza Strip.

What makes it more difficult for an independent state is that the autonomous areas are de facto divided not only geographically, but also politically. For a long time they were ruled by the PLO under Yasser Arafat, today Hamas rules in the Gaza Strip and Fatah in the West Bank. Reconciliation and reunification of both parties did not take place until June 2014. Another problem is peace with Israel and the related transfer of the autonomous areas into an economically viable state.

So it remains to be seen when an independent, sovereign state of Palestine appears on the map of the world.

In July 2014, Israel began first air strikes and then ground forces against the Hamaz in the Gaza Strip.

Since Israel claimed that there were rocket bunkers beneath hospitals, they too were bombed. With that, the rest of the Palestinians’ medical care collapsed.

By the ceasefire on August 5, 2014, around 1,900 Plestinians and 67 Israelis had died and large parts of the infrastructure were destroyed – with 65,000 homeless.

The trigger for the attack on Israel was the murder of three Israeli youths and the rocket shelling of Israeli cities.

In response to the murder of the three youths, Israeli right-wing extremists poured gasoline into a Palestinian and then burned him alive. Six of the perpetrators were arrested.

Name of the country Palestinian AutonomousAreas as-Sulṭa al-waṭaniyya al-filasṭīniyya

(السلطة الوطنية الفلسيينية)

Form of government State with observer status (“non member observer state”)On November 29, 2012, the General Assembly of the UN passed resolution 67/19, which gave Palestine the above-mentioned status.
Geographical location The Palestinian Autonomous Territories are made up of several settlement areas,which are separated from one another by various Israeli territories and spread across the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

These areas border Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean.

In addition, the Palestinian Authority claims control of the border to Jordan, which is currently still with Israel.

Head of state head ofgovernment President Mahmud AbbasPrime Minister, i.e. head of government, is Salam Fayyad

(However, the Gaza Strip is controlled by a “counter-government” under Ismail Haniyya.)

Houses of Parliament Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC)
Government Palestinian Authority
National anthem Bilādī (Arabic بلادي; German: Mein Land)
Population Approx. 4.3 million (West Bank: 2.6 million and Gaza Strip: 1.7 million) (Credit: Countryaah: Palestine Population)
Ethnicities 83% Palestinian Arabs17% Israelis

(Approx. 310,000 Israeli settlers live in Area C.)

Religions In the Gaza Strip: Sunni Islam (approx. 99.3%) and 0.7% ChristiansIn the West Bank: Sunni Islam 75%, Judaism 17% and Christians 8%

(In addition, several hundred Samaritans live in Nablus, West Bank. There are also estimated Israeli-Jewish people Settlers in the West Bank.)

Languages The official language is Palestinian Arabic.English is only understood in the larger cities.
Capital Gaza and Ramallah are the two (provisional) capitals(East Jerusalem is claimed as the capital.)
Surface Approx. 3,065 km²(Gaza Strip: 365 km²

West Bank or Zones A and B: 2,700 km²)

Longest river Jordan (320 km)
Largest lake Dead Sea (1,020 km²)
Currency The New Israeli Shekel (NIS) is the official currency.The Jordanian dinar is also used in the West Bank.
Difference to CET +2 h
Deepest region Dead Sea, with a water surface height of 400 m below sea level
International phone code The country code is 00970.Telephone calls from Germany must be made using the 00972 area code.
Mains voltage, frequency 220 volts and 50 hertz(an adapter is required)
Internet TLD (Top Level Domain) .ps

Palestinian History

Introduction

If one deals with the historical developments of the Palestinian Autonomous Territories, one has to start at the time of the First World War and the fall of the Ottoman Empire.

According to Abbreviationfinder website, even if the history of this region goes back many millennia and numerous Jews from this time claim a claim on the territory of Palestine. But this time is not to be shown here.

One must always keep in mind that the area of Palestine, because of the many holy places, is not only in a political but also in a religious area of tension between Islam, Judaism and Christianity.

The potential for conflict is therefore particularly great.

In the 20th century

Between 1915 and 1916 the so-called Hussein-McMahon correspondence took place, an exchange of letters between Hussein ibn Ali, Sherif of Mecca and leader of the then State of Hejaz, and Sir Henry McMahon, the British High Commissioner in Egypt.

The content of the exchange of letters was the political future of the Arab countries of the Middle East. In it Great Britain declared its desire to stir up an Arab revolt against the supremacy of the Ottoman Empire.

McMahon’s statements were seen by the Arabs as a clear promise of future independence for Arabia.

In the so-called Sykes-Picot Agreementbetween the French diplomat François Georges-Picot and the British Mark Sykes from May 16, 1916 but there was a secret plan of Britain and France,

set the colonial interests of both countries in the Middle East – without the involvement of Arab interests.

The Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917, named after British Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour, declared Great Britain’s consent to the Zionist aspirations in Palestine and support for the creation of a “national home” for the Jewish people. However, the rights of existing non-Jewish communities should be preserved.

At the time of all these considerations, however, Palestine was still completely under Ottoman rule and was not conquered by the British until December 1917.

On October 30, 1918, the Ottoman Empire then had to agree to the Mudros armistice.

At the Sanremo Conference between April 19 and 26, 1920, the Supreme Council of the Allied Powers decided to divide the abolished Ottoman Empire into various mandates in the Middle East.

France then maintained the League of Nations mandate for Lebanon and Syria, while Great Britain maintained the British mandate for Mesopotamia (Iraq) and across Palestine on both sides of the Jordan.

The Arabs, whose interests were not taken into account, felt betrayed.

British mandate period

Great Britain wanted to implement the Balfour Declaration of 1917 with its mandate for Palestine.

At that time, the prerequisites were created which made the establishment of the partially autonomous emirate Transjordan (now Jordan) possible in 1923.

The strong waves of immigration by Jews were viewed with great skepticism by the local Arab population and were increasingly the cause of harsh conflicts.

The British responded to this fact with the White Paper of 1939, with which they severely restricted immigration of Jews – despite the raging Second World War at the time.

If the Arabs viewed the White Paper as a fair policy towards them, the Jewish settlers perceived it as an injustice.

These events formed the background against which the situation continued to worsen towards the end of the British mandate.

The 1930s and 1940s in particular saw numerous bloody clashes between Jews and Arabs and more and more resistance to the mandate power from Europe.

In 1947 Great Britain turned to the UN because it no longer saw itself in a position to ensure peace and quiet in Palestine.

In the same year, the UN put forward a partition planbefore who wanted to hand over half of Palestine to both parties. The Gaza Strip, West Bank, and in some areas of the Upper Galilee and the northern Negev, an Arab state was to be established.

Jerusalem wanted to place the UN under international administration. While the Jewish side accepted this plan, the Arab leaders rejected it because they wanted to counter any land claims from the Jewish side.

Israeli War of Independence (Palestine War)

As soon as the UN decision became known, there was fighting between Jewish and Arab units. When the British Palestine Mandate ended on May 14, 1948, the State of Israel was proclaimed in Tel Aviv on the same day. The Arab side did not declare a state because they generally rejected the partition. That same night the Israeli War of Independence, also known as the War of Palestine, began. Neighboring armies from Syria and Egypt, among others, advanced. As early as January 1949, however, the Israeli army succeeded in being victorious and gaining large areas.

The remaining areas in the West Bank and in the so-called Gaza Strip were not united into a state of Palestine, as they were occupied by Egypt and Jordan in violation of international law.

Jordanian and Egyptian occupation

In the 1967 Six Day War, Israel occupied the Gaza Strip, which had been captured by Egypt, and the West Bank, which was occupied by Jordan, in accordance with a League of Nations resolution.

In the same year the UN passed resolution 242, with which it was urged Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories.

However, the UN stated that all states in the Middle East were entitled to the recognition of sovereignty and secure borders.

While the Arab states, on the one hand, continued to deny Israel’s right to exist, from 1967 onwards a turning point occurred in terms of realpolitik.

Because the Arab heads of state announced at a summit conference that they wanted to work politically towards the Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories.

Israel, on the other hand, began building settlements back then. These fortified villages in the occupied territories were subsidized by the state.

The occupied territories themselves were not officially annexed – in contrast to later East Jerusalem and the Golan in 1981. However,

while the occupied Sinai Peninsula was returned to Egypt after the Yom Kippur War (and after the Israeli-Egyptian treaty), it remained West Bank and the Gaza Strip with Israel,

because they wanted neither Jordan nor Egypt back.

Autonomy status

After the Oslo Agreement of 1993 between Israel and the PLO, the Palestinian Territories were established in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

They were intended as a preliminary stage to a separate state of Palestine, which by the way is recognized by Arab states.

Palestinian suicide bombings, Israeli retaliatory measures, occupation of the autonomous cities and the unabated continued construction of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories made the formation of a separate state more and more difficult.

With the year 2000 things got even more complicated. It was then that the so-called Al-Aqsa Intifada began, during which the suicide attacks and Israeli military interventions increased further.

Since then, the autonomous areas have been cordoned off as far as possible. The living conditions of the Palestinian population have deteriorated considerably.

Due to the ongoing violence, the willingness to talk has come to a standstill on both sides. In addition, the Israeli barrier fence has largely separated the West Bank from the rest of the region.

In addition, it cuts deep into the Palestinian territories over long stretches and reduces the chances of a state of Palestine. The Gaza Strip is blocked and effectively sealed off from the outside world.

In the Gaza Strip, since the election of the radical Islamic Hamas, the situation there has worsened, almost like a civil war.

The Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmerthad offered negotiations with the aim of establishing a Palestinian state of its own.

The condition for this, however, was that the great loss of territory due to the illegal course of the barrier fence had to be accepted by the Palestinian side.

After Palestinian President Yasser Arafat died on November 11, 2004, Mahmoud Abbas was elected to succeed him – a long-time confidante of Arafat.

In May 2011 there was a reconciliation agreement between Ismail Haniyya (Hamas) and Abbas (Fatah).

This agreement had been drawn up a year and a half earlier by the Egyptian leadership on behalf of the Arab League and was very surprising, because Hamas in particular had long resisted signing it.

Observer state of the UN

In September 2011, Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, submitted a motion to the UN General Assembly in New York calling on the League of Nations to recognize a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders.

On November 29, 2012, the General Assembly of the UN passed resolution 67/19, which granted Palestine observer status (‘non member observer state’).

This provision was adopted 138 to 9 – with 41 abstentions (including from Germany) and 5 absences. The new status of Palestine is considered to be a preliminary stage to full membership of the United Nations.

Israel responded to the recognition of the Palestinian state with a massive increase in the construction of settlements.

Current area

The so-called Palestinian Autonomous Areas are currently made up of the Gaza Strip and several settlement areas in the West Bank, which are separated from each other by the territories of Israel. The autonomy authority continues to claim control over the border to Jordan. But this lies with Israel. While the Gaza Strip can be fully counted as one of the autonomous areas, this is not so easy in the case of the West Bank: as a result of the 1995 interim agreement on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, it was divided into three zones – Zone A (18%), Zone B. (20%) and Zone C (62%). The Palestinian Authority and the Israeli military each have different powers in these zones. Some autonomy regulations also include Zone C, so that this is partly attributed to the autonomous areas by many. The agreement stipulated that the areas of Zone C (with certain exceptions) would gradually be transferred to Palestinian autonomy. The Israeli settlement policy and the Israeli barrier, which is also being built within Zone C, make these efforts more difficult.

Attack on Gaza

In July 2014, Israel began first air strikes and then ground forces against the Hamaz in the Gaza Strip.

Since Israel claimed that there were rocket bunkers beneath hospitals, they too were bombed. With that, the rest of the Palestinians’ medical care collapsed.

By the ceasefire on August 5, 2014, around 1,900 Plestinians and 67 Israelis had died and large parts of the infrastructure were destroyed – with 65,000 homeless.

The trigger for the attack on Israel was the murder of three Israeli youths and the rocket shelling of Israeli cities.

In response to the murder of the three youths, Israeli right-wing extremists poured gasoline into a Palestinian and then burned him alive. Six of the perpetrators were arrested.

In response to the murder of the three youths, Israeli right-wing extremists poured gasoline into a Palestinian and then burned him alive. Six of the perpetrators were arrested.

In an interview with Der Spiegel on July 21, 2014, the ex-head of the Israeli domestic secret service Juval Diskin saw in about 5 years the great danger that the military and the secret services, in addition to the police, would be dominated by national-religious Israelis.

Then radical right-wing views and actions against the Palestinians will increase considerably – also against their own Palestinian citizens. Even Isrelis from the peace movement are being insulted, threatened and physically attacked.

Palestinian Territories (with Israel)

The Palestinian Autonomous Areas are marked on the map with the diagonal lines. The areas are in the Middle East.

geography

Area and land use

The Palestinian Territories have an area of approximately 3,065 km². On the one hand, this consists of the Gaza Strip with a size of 365 km². In addition, there are zones A and B of the West Bank, which corresponds to around 40% of the total area. Since the West Bank is about 6,020 km², the Palestinian Territories account for 2,700 km². The remaining 60% of the West Bank is occupied by Israel. Contrary to the current geographic reality, the Palestinian Authority claims the entire West Bank and East Jerusalem as its capital.

The West Bank is divided into three zones. While Zone A is administered entirely by the Palestinian Authority, which is allowed to make decisions there alone, such an approach for Zone B is only possible with the permission of the Israelis. This applies to building permits, etc. Zone C is solely subject to the Israeli military administration. This makes up 60% of the West Bank.

In short form it looks like this:

Zone A (18%): Under Palestinian self-government

Zone B (20%): Palestinian Authority control of the Israeli military

zone C (62%): Locked by Israeli military and do not belong to the Palestinian territories

, the The Gaza Strip is 40 km long, between 6 and 14 km wide and around 365 km² in size. With these dimensions it is slightly smaller than the state of Bremen. It consists mainly of sand and dunes. Only 14% of the area can be used for agricultural purposes. By having Israela security zone up to 300 meters wide behind the fence, which one is not allowed to enter, furthermore 62.6 km² of the agricultural area cannot be used.

The West Bank (also known as the West Bank), already known from the Bible as the settlement area of the Hebrews and Samaritans, was part of the former British League of Nations mandate for Palestine and was awarded to the potential Arab state by the UN in the partition plan of 1947. It was later conquered by Israel. Since 1993, 40% of the West Bank belong to the Palestinian Territories.

The agricultural products in the West Bank are typically Mediterranean. Avocados, dates and citrus fruits in particular are grown, as are wine and cut flowers. There is also a little cattle breeding.

The main agricultural product in the Palestinian Territories is olive oil. 45% of the agricultural area is planted with olive trees.

National borders

Gaza Strip

The coastal area on the eastern Mediterranean, known as the Gaza Strip due to its geographical shape, borders Israel to the north and east and Sinai (Egypt) to the south. In the west lies the Mediterranean Sea, which is controlled by Israel at this point. The national borders of the Gaza Strip are surrounded by a security fence on both the Egyptian and Israeli sides. Apart from the official border crossings, there are an estimated 800 smugglers’ tunnels between Egypt and the Gaza Strip.

West Bank:

The 40% of the West Bank that make up the autonomous territories is completely enclosed by Israel.

Coastline

Only the Gaza Strip has a coast. It borders on the Mediterranean Sea for 40 km.

Tidal range

On the coast of the Palestinian Territories, the tidal range is between 0.2 and 0.4 m.

For detailed explanations of ebb and flow, see Tides, Ebb and Flow.

Compare

The world’s highest tidal range can be found in the Bay of Fundy in Canada, where it is up to 16 meters, and at spring tide even over 20 meters. The Bay of Fundy is located on the Atlantic between the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, which is called Nova Scotia in German and whose capital is Halifax. On the German North Sea coast it varies between one and three meters. In the western Baltic Sea, on the other hand, the tidal range is only 0.3 meters, while it is barely noticeable in the eastern Baltic Sea.

Longitude and latitude

Since the Palestinian Authority consists of areas (Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank) that do not belong together, they must be described separately. The stated values are rounded up or down.

The maximum extent of the Gaza Strip is as follows:

Δφ = from 31 ° 13 ‘to 31 ° 35’ northΔλ = from 034 ° 13 ‘to 034 ° 16’ east

And the extension of the West Bank:

Δφ = from 31 ° 19 ‘to 32 ° 32’ northΔλ = from 035 ° 00 ‘to 035 ° 34’ east

You can find detailed information on this subject under Longitude and Latitude.

Legal time

For the Palestinian Autonomous Territories, the following value applies to Central European Time (CET), i.e. the time (excluding daylight saving time). A minus sign means that it is earlier there, a plus sign that it is later than CET.

Δt (CET) = + 2 h

Further and detailed explanations of the time can be found under Time zones, time.

The highest point of the sun in Ramallah

Ramallah lies at a northern latitude of around φ = 32 °. If the sun is at the tropic, i.e. at 23.5 °, summer will start in Ramallah, this is June 21. Then, for the highest position of the sun at noon, according to Eq. 1 (see position of the sun):

32 ° = (90 ° – h) + 23.5 °

so:

H = 81.5 °

At 81.5 °, the sun in Ramallah has the highest level of the entire year above the horizon (more precisely: above the horizon).

mountains

The highest point in the Gaza Strip is the 105 meter high Abu Auda. Also known as Abu ‘Awdah and Joz Abu’ Auda, the mountain rises in the southeast of Rafah Governorate.

Waters and rainfall

While the Gaza Strip has between 500 and 600 mm of rain per year, which falls particularly between October and April, it rains more in the West Bank. In places up to 900 mm fall. There, too, most of the precipitation falls in the winter months – rarely also as snow. On the other hand, there is no rain in the West Bank between June and September. The Gaza Strip suffers from very high humidity in midsummer.

Jordan

The famous Jordan flows 251 km through Israel and the Palestinian Territories. Its source rivers are the Hasbani im.

Palestine Facts