The history of the State of Palestine describes the creation and evolution of the State of Palestine in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The Churchill White Paper of 3 June 1922 was drafted at the request of Winston Churchill, then Secretary of State for the Colonies, partly in response to the 1921 Jaffa Riots. The official name of the document was Palestine: Correspondence with the Palestine Arab Delegation and the Zionist Organisation. The white paper was made up of nine documents and "Churchill's memorandum" was an enclosure to document number 5. While maintaining Britain's commitment to the Balfour Declaration and its promise of a Jewish national home in Mandatory Palestine, the paper emphasized that the establishment of a national home would not impose a Jewish nationality on the Arab inhabitants of Palestine. To reduce tensions between the Arabs and Jews in Palestine the paper called for a limitation of Jewish immigration to the economic capacity of the country to absorb new arrivals. This limitation was considered a great setback to many in the Zionist movement, though it acknowledged that the Jews should be able to increase their numbers through immigration rather than sufferance.
The Arab League was formed in Cairo on 22 March 1945 with six members: Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. Yemen joined on 5 May 1945. Since its formation the Arab League has promoted the Palestinian Arab cause in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, including by imposing the Arab League boycott of Israel. The Arab League opposed the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine in 1947. On 15 May 1948, the then seven Arab League members coordinated an invasion of what was by then the former British Mandate, marking the start of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.
The Arab–Israeli conflict began in the 20th century, evolving from earlier Intercommunal violence in Mandatory Palestine. The conflict became a major international issue with the birth of Israel in 1948. The Arab–Israeli conflict has resulted in at least five major wars and a number of minor conflicts. It has also been the source of two major Palestinian uprisings (intifadas).
Israeli law is based mostly on a common law legal system, though it also reflects the diverse history of the territory of the State of Israel throughout the last hundred years, as well as the legal systems of its major religious communities. The Israeli legal system is based on common law, which also incorporates facets of civil law. The Israeli Declaration of Independence asserted that a formal constitution would be written, though it has been continuously postponed since 1950. Instead, the Basic Laws of Israel function as the country's constitutional laws. Statutes enacted by the Knesset, particularly the Basic Laws, provide a framework which is enriched by political precedent and jurisprudence. Foreign and historical influences on modern-day Israeli law are varied and include the Mecelle and German civil law, religious law, and British common law. The Israeli courts have been influenced in recent years by American Law and Canadian Law and to a lesser extent by Continental Law.
The Palestine Police Force was a British colonial police service established in Mandatory Palestine on 1 July 1920, when High Commissioner Sir Herbert Samuel's civil administration took over responsibility for security from General Allenby's Occupied Enemy Territory Administration (South).
The modern borders of Israel exist as the result both of past wars and of diplomatic agreements between the State of Israel and its neighbours, as well as an effect of the agreements among colonial powers ruling in the region before Israel's creation. Only two of Israel's five total potential land borders are internationally recognized and uncontested, while the other three remain disputed; the majority of its border disputes are rooted in territorial changes that came about as a result of the 1967 Arab–Israeli War, which saw Israel occupy large swathes of territory from its rivals. Israel's two formally recognized and confirmed borders exist with Egypt and Jordan since the 1979 Egypt–Israel peace treaty and the 1994 Israel–Jordan peace treaty, while its borders with Syria, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories remain internationally recognized as contested.
The Defence (Emergency) Regulations are an expansive set of regulations first promulgated by the British authorities in Mandatory Palestine in 1945, The British repealed them before withdrawing from Palestine in 1948. Along with the entire body of Mandate legislation, they were incorporated into Israel's domestic legislation after the state's establishment in 1948, except for provisions explicitly annulled. They remain in force today with many amendments.
Palestinian people have a history that is often linked to the history of the Arab Nation. Upon the advent of Islam, Christianity was the major religion of Byzantine Palestine. Soon after the rise of Islam, Palestine was conquered and brought into the rapidly expanding Islamic empire. The Umayyad empire was the first of three successive dynasties to dominate the Arab-Islamic world and rule Palestine, followed by the Abbasids and the Fatimids. Muslim rule was briefly challenged and interrupted in parts of Palestine during the Crusades, but was restored under the Mamluks.
During the Mandate period in Palestine, between 1920 and 1948, when Palestine was governed by Britain under terms which were formalised in the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine of July 24, 1922, the de facto flag was the Union Jack or Union Flag of the United Kingdom, but several localised flags existed for Mandate government departments and government officials. The only Palestine-specific flag not restricted to official government use was the Palestine ensign, which was flown by ships registered in the British Mandate territory from 1927 to 1948. It was based on the British Red Ensign instead of the Blue Ensign since it was intended for use only at sea by non-government ships.
Jewish land purchase in Palestine was the acquisition of land in Ottoman and Mandatory Palestine by Jews from the 1880s until the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. By far the largest such arrangement was known as the Sursock Purchase. As of April 1st, 1945, Jews had acquired 5.67% of the land in Palestine.
Mandatory Palestine passports were travel documents issued by British authorities in Mandatory Palestine to residents between 1925 and 1948. The first brown-covered passport appeared around 1927, following the issue of the Palestinian Citizenship Order, 1925. From 1926 to 1935 alone approximately 70,000 of such travel documents were issued.
The Muslim National Associations (MNA) was a Zionist-inspired and funded organization founded in Mandatory Palestine in the 1920s. It had branch offices in a number of Palestinian towns, and was led by the mayor of Haifa, Hassan Bey Shukri and Sheikh Musa Hadeib, head of the farmers' party of Mount Hebron.
The Transjordan memorandum was a British memorandum passed by the Council of the League of Nations on 16 September 1922, as an addendum to the British Mandate for Palestine.
The Mandate for Palestine was a League of Nations mandate for British administration of the territories of Palestine and Transjordan, both of which had been conceded by the Ottoman Empire following the end of World War I in 1918. The mandate was assigned to Britain by the San Remo conference in April 1920, after France's concession in the 1918 Clemenceau–Lloyd George Agreement of the previously-agreed "international administration" of Palestine under the Sykes–Picot Agreement. Transjordan was added to the mandate after the Arab Kingdom in Damascus was toppled by the French in the Franco-Syrian War. Civil administration began in Palestine and Transjordan in July 1920 and April 1921, respectively, and the mandate was in force from 29 September 1923 to 15 May 1948 and to 25 May 1946 respectively.
Mandatory Palestine was a geopolitical entity established between 1920 and 1948 in the region of Palestine under the terms of the League of Nations Mandate for Palestine.
The All-Palestine Government was established on 22 September 1948, during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, to govern the Egyptian-controlled territory in Gaza, which Egypt had on the same day declared as the All-Palestine Protectorate. It was confirmed by the Arab League and recognised by six of the then seven Arab League members, with Transjordan being the exception. Though it claimed jurisdiction over the whole of the former Mandatory Palestine, its effective jurisdiction was limited to the All-Palestine Protectorate (which came to be called the Gaza Strip. The President of the protectorate was Hajj Amin al-Husseini, former chairman of the Arab Higher Committee, and the Prime Minister was Ahmed Hilmi Pasha. The legislative body was the All-Palestine National Council.
The Palestinian Citizenship Order 1925 was a law of Mandatory Palestine that created a Palestinian citizenship for residents of the territory of Palestine Mandate. It was promulgated on 24 July 1925 and came into force on 1 August 1925. The Order remained in effect until 14 May 1948, when the British withdrew from the Mandate, and Palestinian citizenship came to an end. Israel enacted a Citizenship Law in 1952, while West Bank residents came under Jordan’s nationality law.
The Department of Antiquities was a department of the British administration of Mandatory Palestine from 1920 to 1948 that was in charge of the protection and investigation of archaeological remains and artefacts in Palestine.
