Israel and Palestine’s conflicts together can be traced far back to the 19th century. In the late 1800s, Zionists wanted to establish a homeland for the Jewish people in Ottoman-controlled Palestine. Zionism is a nationalist movement to create a Jewish country in the region of Palestine. It was named after Zion, which is the hill of Jerusalem where the city of David was built. The Ottomans had been in control of this region for over 400 years. However, the Jews had been wanting to move to Zion for over a millennium.
Ottoman officials were apprehensive of Russian and European influence in the region. This was coming from the mass immigration of Jews from the Russian Empire. The Ottomans thought that they would be more loyal to Tsarist Russia than the Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans and Russians have had a long history of conflicts with each other.
According to an Israeli historian, the first violent incident between Jews and Arabs was in 1882 when a Jew accidentally shot an Arab at a wedding. This led to over 200 Arab Muslims to vandalize Jewish property. By 1913, around 25 Jews had been killed by these Arabs in the region of Palestine.
During WWI, the British supported the founding of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. This created a huge influx of Jews into the region. Before this Arabs mainly lived in Palestine, with Jews living elsewhere worldwide, predominantly in Europe. After WWII and the Holocaust, pressure was placed on the creation of a Jewish country in Zion. This eventually led to the founding of Israel in 1948.
The war that followed and preceded this unfortunately caused hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to be displaced. Palestinians want their own independent state in Israel, which Israel is making hard for them. Many terrorist attacks from Palestine and military operations from Israel have been causing casualties from both sides. The US and others have made an attempt at making peace in the region but to no avail.
