The Gaza Strip is, once again, at the epicenter of a war conflict with Israel.
On Saturday (7), the radical Islamic group Hamas launched surprise attacks in several parts of Israel. These attacks left more than 1,000 dead as of Tuesday (10), according to the Israeli embassy in the USA.
As a result, Israel officially declared war on Hamas and launched several attacks in Gaza, which left 830 people dead as of Tuesday in the territory where 2 million Palestinians live. In both cases, the number of injured reaches thousands: more than 4,200 in Gaza and more than 3,400 in Israel.
Gaza has been the center of conflict on several occasions since the last century. Why? What happened before? Below we present some information to learn about the recent history of this place.
History of Gaza: territory and changes
The history of Gaza is extremely long. It was an Egyptian base, a royal city for the Philistines, and the place where the Hebrew hero Samson died.
Despite being a small territory, 40 kilometers long and 11 kilometers wide, it is one of the most disputed places in history.
To measure this length, a marathon has a distance of 42 km, a distance greater than Gaza.
To understand this portion of land as we know it today, we must go back to the last century.
At the end of World War II in 1945, persecuted Jews left Europe in search of a new beginning after the horrors of the Holocaust.
They traveled to what was then entirely Palestinian territory and which, from 1920 to 1948, was under British control.
In 1947, the United Nations (UN) created a plan to divide Palestine into two main lands and a center that would have a system of international control: a Jewish state (Israel), an Arab state (which at the time included what it is now Gaza, the West Bank and elsewhere) and Jerusalem in the center.
With the support of Harry S. Truman, president of the United States at the time, David Ben-Gurion, founder of Israel, proclaimed the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948.
From that moment on, the conflict began and Egypt, an Arab state, attacked Israel through Gaza. Israel emerged victorious, but Gaza remained under Egyptian control and the arrival of Palestinian refugees began in that territory.
Egypt’s control over Gaza remained stable (except a brief takeover by Israel in 1956) until 1967, when the Six-Day War broke out, involving Israel, Egypt, Jordan and Syria.
After this war, Israel finally took control of Gaza, which lasted until 1994. Israeli troops only completely withdrew from the region in 2005.
Between these years, significant events occurred for Gaza, for example:
- In 1996, Palestinians in Gaza and parts of the West Bank elected a legislature and a president.
- In 2000, Israel and the Palestinians held peace talks, but were unable to resolve the main outstanding differences.
- That same year, the second intifada broke out (this word refers to the Palestinian uprising against Israeli forces, according to the RAE; remember that the first intifada was in 1987).
Following the complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza in 2006, Hamas — which was founded in 1987 as a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, originally established in Egypt in 1928 — won the Palestinian legislative elections by a landslide, with 76 seats out of a possible 132. .
With this, Hamas began to control Gaza, although Israel continued to be in possession of many access points to the territory.
Since then, Hamas and Israel have exchanged attacks. Israel claims that Hamas is a violent terrorist organization, while Hamas militants say they represent an oppressed people who are victimized by the Jewish state.
Hamas also came into conflict with the Paulestine Authority, led by Mahmoud Abbas, and with Fatah, an anti-Israel organization founded in the 1950s by Yasser Arafat.
As the international community pushes for a cessation of violence, both Palestinians in Gaza and Israelis are caught in the crossfire.
See also: Israel calls up reservists who are in South America
See images of the conflict between Israel and Hamas
Source: CNN Brasil
Bruce Belcher is a seasoned author with over 5 years of experience in world news. He writes for online news websites and provides in-depth analysis on the world stock market. Bruce is known for his insightful perspectives and commitment to keeping the public informed.
