Recent Developments

In August and September 2020, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and then Bahrain agreed to
normalize relations with Israel, making them only the third and fourth countries in the region—
following Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994—to do so. The agreements, named the Abraham
Accords, came more than eighteen months after the United States hosted Israel and several
Arab states for ministerial talks in Warsaw, Poland, about the future of peace in the Middle
East. Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas has rejected the recent accords and recalled his
ambassador from Abu Dhabi; Hamas also rejected the agreements.

The peace announcements follow a tumultuous 2019–20 election season in Israel. After three
elections since December 2018, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of the Likud party and
Defense Minister and “Alternate Prime Minister” Benny Gantz of the Blue and White party
signed an agreement creating a unity government on April 20, 2020. The new government said
it would maintain Netanyahu’s campaign promise to extend Israel’s sovereignty over the West
Bank, a promise that has been condemned by Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammad
Shtayyeh.

Furthermore, despite the formation of a unity government and promises from Netanyahu that he
would step down after eighteen months, anti-government demonstrations swept across Israel
throughout the summer of 2020 with protestors demanding Netanyahu’s immediate resignation.
Netanyahu has been charged with bribery, fraud, and breach of trust, and the third session in his
corruption trial is scheduled for December 6, 2020.

Tensions also remain high between the Israeli military and Hamas. In August 2020, Hamas
launched helium balloons that carried incendiary material towards Israel’s southern border. In
response, Israel conducted air strikes against Hamas facilities in the Gaza strip. Mediators have
Global Conflict Tracker
struggled to ease tensions and prevent further escalation.
Background

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict dates back to the end of the nineteenth century. In 1947, the
United Nations adopted Resolution 181, known as the Partition Plan, which sought to divide
the British Mandate of Palestine into Arab and Jewish states. On May 14, 1948, the State of
Israel was created, sparking the first Arab-Israeli War. The war ended in 1949 with Israel’s
victory, but 750,000 Palestinians were displaced and the territory was divided into 3 parts: the
State of Israel, the West Bank (of the Jordan River), and the Gaza Strip.

Over the following years, tensions rose in the region, particularly between Israel and Egypt,
Jordan, and Syria. Following the 1956 Suez Crisis and Israel’s invasion of the Sinai Peninsula,
Egypt, Jordan, and Syria signed mutual defense pacts in anticipation of a possible mobilization
of Israel troops. In June 1967, following a series of maneuvers by Egyptian President Abdel
Gamal Nasser, Israel preemptively attacked Egyptian and Syrian air forces, starting the Six-
Day War. After the war, Israel gained territorial control over the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip
from Egypt; the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan; and the Golan Heights from Syria.
Six years later, in what is referred to as the Yom Kippur War or the October War, Egypt and
Syria launched a surprise two-front attack on Israel to regain their lost territory; the conflict did
not result in significant gains for Egypt, Israel, or Syria, but Egyptian President Anwar al-Sadat
declared the war a victory for Egypt as it allowed Egypt and Syria to negotiate over previously
ceded territory. Finally, in 1979, following a series of cease-fires and peace negotiations,
representatives from Egypt and Israel signed the Camp David Accords, a peace treaty that
ended the thirty-year conflict between Egypt and Israel.

Even though the Camp David Accords improved relations between Israel and its neighbors, the
question of Palestinian self-determination and self-governance remained unresolved. In 1987,
hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza Strip rose up against
Global Conflict Tracker
the Israeli government in what is known as the first intifada. The 1993 Oslo I
Accords mediated the conflict, setting up a framework for the Palestinians to govern
themselves in the West Bank and Gaza, and enabled mutual recognition between the newly
established Palestinian Authority and Israel’s government. In 1995, the Oslo II Accords
expanded on the first agreement, adding provisions that mandated the complete withdrawal of
Israel from 6 cities and 450 towns in the West Bank.

In 2000, sparked in part by Palestinian grievances over Israel’s control over the West Bank, a
stagnating peace process, and former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s visit to the al-Aqsa
mosque—the third holiest site in Islam—in September 2000, Palestinians launched the second
intifada, which would last until 2005. In response, the Israeli government approved
construction of a barrier wall around the West Bank in 2002, despite opposition from the
International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court.

In 2013, the United States attempted to revive the peace process between the Israeli
government and the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. However, peace talks were
disrupted when Fatah—the Palestinian Authority’s ruling party—formed a unity government
with its rival faction Hamas in 2014. Hamas, a spin-off of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood
founded in 1987 following the first intifada, is one of two major Palestinian political parties
and was designated a foreign terrorist organization by the United States in 1997.

In the summer of 2014, clashes in the Palestinian territories precipitated a military

in 2015, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas announced that Palestinians would no longer be
bound by the territorial divisions created by the Oslo Accords. In March and May of 2018,
Palestinians in the Gaza Strip conducted weekly demonstrations at the border between the Gaza
Global Conflict Tracker
Strip and Israel. The final protest coincided with the seventieth anniversary of the Nakba, the
Palestinian exodus that accompanied Israeli independence. While most of the protesters were
peaceful, some stormed the perimeter fence and threw rocks and other objects. According to
the United Nations, 183 demonstrators were killed and more than 6,000 were wounded by live
ammunition.

Also in May of 2018, fighting broke out between Hamas and the Israeli military in what
became the worst period of violence since 2014. Before reaching a cease-fire, militants in Gaza
fired over one hundred rockets into Israel; Israel responded with strikes on more than fifty
targets in Gaza during the twenty-four-hour flare-up.

Since taking office, the Donald J. Trump administration has made achieving an Israeli-
Palestinian deal a foreign policy priority. In 2018, the Trump administration canceled funding
for the UN Relief and Works Agency, which provides aid to Palestinian refugees, and
relocated the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a reversal of a longstanding U.S.
policy. The decision to move the U.S. embassy was met with applause from the Israeli
leadership but was condemned by Palestinian leaders and others in the Middle East and Europe.
Israel considers the “complete and united Jerusalem” its capital, while Palestinians claim East
Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state. In January 2020, the Trump administration
released its long-awaited “Peace to Prosperity” plan, which has been rejected by Palestinians
due to its support for future Israeli annexation of settlements in the West Bank and control over
an “undivided” Jerusalem.

Concerns

There is concern that a third intifada could break out and that renewed tensions will escalate
into large-scale violence. The United States has an interest in protecting the security of its long-
term ally Israel, and achieving a lasting deal between Israel and the Palestinian territories,
Global Conflict Tracker
which would improve regional security.