Israeli-Arab / Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Timeline, 1967-2007
from Brit Tzedek v'ShalomChronology: 40 Years of Occupation
1967. Israel fights the Six-Day War against several Arab armies, emerging victorious and in control of the Sinai Peninsula, Gaza Strip, West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights (June).
The Israeli government extends the municipal boundaries of Jerusalem 70 square kilometers incorporating Jordanian east Jerusalem, the Old City, and 28 outlying Arab villages. At 126 square kilometers, it is the largest city in Israel.
The Israeli military establishment — under Defense Minister Moshe Dayan — takes over authority in the occupied Arab territories, beginning what some in Israel call the "enlightened occupation" (July).
The Khartoum Summit of the Arab League declares that there will be no Arab recognition, negotiations, or peace with Israel, often referred to as "The Three No's" (September).
UN Resolution 242 establishes the "land for peace" formula, which serves as the basis for negotiations between Israel and her neighbors since the late 1970s. (November).
1968. The settler movement, calling itself Gush Emunim (Bloc of the Faithful), is founded on Passover in a hotel in occupied Hebron (April). Through an agreement with the government, the group later establishes the settlement of Kiryat Arba on an abandoned army base east of Hebron.
Within a year of the 1967 War, 14 settlements are established in the occupied territories, mostly in the Golan but also in northern Sinai, the Jordan valley, and Gush Etzion, to the south and southeast of Jerusalem, in the West Bank.
1968-1970. The undeclared War of Attrition starts with Egyptian attacks on Israel in an attempt to recapture the Sinai. Many Israelis had thought that the Arabs were so crushingly defeated in 1967 that they would actively seek peace; this war dented that optimism.
1970. Jordan kills thousands of Palestinians and expels the PLO and thousands of Palestinians to Lebanon in Black September. Israel's support of the Jordanian government during this crisis earns it the gratitude of the U.S. and marks the beginning of significant increases in U.S. foreign aid.
1973. Israel is attacked by Egypt and Syria on Yom Kippur; UN Resolution 338 calls for an immediate ceasefire and implementation of Resolution 242. U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger begins his shuttle diplomacy between the three countries (October).
Approximately 1500 settlers now reside in the occupied territories.
1974. Rabbi Yehuda Kook develops Gush Emunim into a prominent political force, calling on the Jewish people to fulfill the biblical commandment to settle the land of Israel, with special emphasis on those locations mentioned in the Bible.
1975. The government of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin grants a special 5% tax break to settlers. The rate increases to 7% under PM Menachem Begin in 1978.
1976. Prime Minister Rabin and Defense Minister Shimon Peres, leading a politically weakened Labor Party following the Yom Kippur War, allow the settlement project to continue.
1977. The Labor Party is upset in general elections by Menachem Begin's Likud Party, which stands openly committed to the settler ideology of Greater Israel (May).
Egyptian President Anwar Sadat visits Jerusalem (November).
1978. Encouraged by Agriculture Minister Ariel Sharon, the settler movement thrives, attracting both religious and secular Jews. Sharon begins implementation of his plan to double the number of settlements. Shalom Acshav (Peace Now) is founded by 348 IDF reservists (March).
1979. An Egypt-Israel peace treaty, signed on the White House lawn, includes a vague plan for Palestinian autonomy based on the "legitimate rights of the Palestinian people" (March). Settlers from Kiryat Arba establish a community within the Arab city of Hebron at "Beit Hadassah", creating a precedent for the establishment of additional Jewish enclaves with government approval and the protection of the IDE.
1980. The Knesset passes the "Jerusalem Law" declaring the complete and united city the capital of the state (July). Non-binding UN Security Council Resolution 478 calls on the law to be rescinded.The U.S. abstains from the vote (August).
The 'Civil Administration' is established by the regional commanders of the IDF to administer civilian life of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
1981. The Israeli parliament passes the Golan Law, extending Israeli law to the area of the Golan Heights, officially annexing it to the State of Israel (December).
Menachem Begin wins reelection, appoints Ariel Sharon Minister of Defense (July).
1982. Israel withdraws from Sinai, in accordance with the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty (April).
The Israeli army, under Ariel Sharon, invades Lebanon (June), forcing the PLO to relocate to Tunis.
1985. Israel withdraws from Beirut to South Lebanon, establishing and continuing to occupy a 10-mile wide "security zone" to the north of its international border with Lebanon (June).
1987. The first Palestinian uprising, or intifada, begins in Gaza and spreads to the West Bank, lasting five years The event marks the first time Palestinians in the occupied territories become significantly involved in the movement against Israeli occupation (December).
1988. PLO leader Yasser Arafat condemns all forms of terrorism and recognizes the state of Israel within pre- 1967-borders. Israel continues to refuse negotiations with the PLO, but the United States opens a dialogue with the group.
1991. The Madrid Peace Conference commences under the auspices of the US and the USSR, marking the first time that Israel and its Arab neighbors (with the exception of Egypt) engage in face-to-face negotiations. The Palestinians are represented in a joint delegation from Jordan. It is later revealed that Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir intended to drag the negotiations out for as long as 10 years, with no real intention of achieving a compromise.
94,000 Israeli settlers now live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
1993. Secret talks begun in 1991 culminate in the Oslo Agreements. Israeli PM Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yasser Arafat sign the Agreement's Declaration of Principles on the White House lawn, granting recognition of, and limited autonomy in the West Bank and Gaza to, the PLO. In return, the PLO gives up its claims to Israel's territory as defined by its borders before the 1967 war and agrees to end the intifada and establish security in the West Bank (September).
116,000 Israeli settlers now live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
1994. Israel and the PLO sign the Cairo agreement, in which both sides agree on limited self-rule for the Palestinians in the West Bank city of Jericho and 60% of Gaza (May).
Arafat leaves Tunis to take up residence in Gaza and assumes his new position as head of the Palestinian Authority (PA), the representative body formed under the Oslo Agreements (July).
Jordan and Israel sign a comprehensive peace treaty (October).
1995. Israel and the PA sign the "Oslo II" Agreement, creating a schedule for the withdrawal of the IDF from six West Bank cities and 400 villages by early 1996, after which Palestinian presidential and parliamentary elections would be held (September).
PM Yitzhak Rabin is assassinated by an orthodox Jewish student opposed to Israeli withdrawals from the West Bank (November).
13,000 Israelis now live in the Golan Heights.
1996. U.S.-mediated peace talks between Israel and Syria in Wye, Maryland, unravel following multiple Hamas suicide bombings in Tel Aviv (March).
1997. Israel — under PM Benjamin Netanyahu of Likud — and the PA sign the Hebron Agreement, requiring Israel to hand over 80% of the West Bank city of Hebron to Palestinian rule, but allowing Israel to maintain its hold on the remainder of the city because several hundred Jewish settlers live there, among 20,000 Palestinians. The city is to be monitored by a temporary international presence (January).
1998. Israel and the PA sign the Wye River Memorandum, outlining further Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank, after US pressure to end 18 months of stagnation on the Israeli-Palestinian peace track (October).
Israel suspends the Wye timetable pending early general elections due to collapse of Netanyahu's government coalition (January).
Under PM Ehud Barak of Labor, Israel and the Palestinians sign a revised deal aimed at reviving the Middle East peace process, based on the stalled Wye River Accord (September).
Final status talks between Israel and the Palestinians stall over Palestinian protest over settlement expansion in the West Bank. Israel responds the following day by announcing a freeze on the addition of 1,800 more houses to Jewish settlements around Jerusalem (December).
2000. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shara engage in U.S.-mediated final status peace talks in Shepherdstown, Virginia, but fail to agree on the demarcation of final borders (January).
A summit between Israelis and Palestinians breaks up over a disagreement on a promised Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank under the revised Wye Accord. Israel hands over West Bank territory to the Palestinians amounting to 6.1% of the West Bank --the last part of a transfer originally agreed upon at Wye River (February)
A personal meeting between U.S. President Clinton and Syrian President Hafez Assad in Geneva fails to salvage Israeli-Syrian negotiations (March).
The IDF withdraws unilaterally from Lebanon (May). Syrian President Hafez Assad dies (June).
A peace summit at Camp David between Israel and the Palestinians in the United States ends without agreement after two weeks of intensive negotiations. The negotiators are unable to come to complete agreement about the West Bank or to reconcile their competing claims to Jerusalem. Clinton sides with Barak in blaming Arafat for the failure of the negotiations. (July).
Ariel Sharon, the leader of Likud, visits the Temple Mount, sparking a violent and sustained uprising known as the second intifada (September).
The U.S. presides over a summit at the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, which produces a plan to bring to an end weeks of Palestinian-Israeli violence. The plan unravels soon after it is agreed upon (October).
174,000 Israelis live in areas of Jerusalem conquered in 1967. 16,000 live in the Golan Heights.
2001. Six days of intense peace talks between Israel and the PA in Taba, Egypt end without an agreement th Israeli Prime Minister Barak had hoped to present to voters for his re-election February 6th (January). It is widely agreed among negotiators that they were weeks from achieving a comprehensive peace, but were thwarted by the election campaign and subsequent election of Ariel Sharon as Prime Minister (February). Israeli troops seize territory controlled by the Palestinian Authority, including Gaza, marking the first time Israel reoccupies land ceded in the course of the Oslo process (April).
208,000 Israeli settlers now live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, nearly 100,000 more than at the signing of the Declaration of Principles.
2002. The members of the Arab League endorse a Saudi peace plan at their summit in Beirut, calling for Arab recognition of and normalization of relations with Israel, in exchange for a two-state resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, based on 1967 borders (March).
The government of Ariel Sharon begins construction of Israel's separation barrier, a network of fences and 25-foot high concrete walls, mostly in the West Bank, to the east of Israel's internationally recognized border.
The IDF moves to isolate Arafat, leveling his headquarters in Ramallah and besieging him there, and reoccupies major Palestinian cities for various periods of time, including Jenin, Jericho, Nablus, Ramallah, and Tulkarm, with the stated purpose of destroying terrorist infrastructure (August).
2003. The US, EU, Russia, and the UN, introduce the "Road Map for Peace", a plan for a two-state solution to be achieved by 2005.
Mediated by the US, Israel and Palestinians meet in Aqaba, Jordan, where Israel agrees to support a Palestinian state and to remove "unauthorized outposts" in the occupied territories (June).
Due to budgetary cutbacks the Finance Ministry cancels the 7% income tax break for settlers in the occupied territories, though other benefits and incentives remain in place (July).
A special investigation by Haaretz reveals that since 1967 the government has spent $10 billion on settlements. According to the report, $500 million is spent annually on settlers' civilian needs; the average settler family receives $10,000 more per year in government spending than Israeli families living inside the Green Line, Israel's internationally recognized border (September).
The Geneva Accord, a model peace plan negotiated by moderate Israeli and Palestinian political and security leaders outside of the framework of official contacts, is introduced. The details of the plan are published in wide-circulation Palestinian newspapers and mailed to every Israeli address as the basis of a grassroots campaign (December).
178,000 Israelis live in areas of Jerusalem conquered in 1967.
2004. Prime Minister Sharon and President Bush discuss unilateral Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, uncoordinated with the PA; the Bush administration publicly supports the withdrawal and states that final status negotiations will have to consider the reality of large Israeli settlements in the West Bank (April).
The Supreme Court of Israel rules that the separation barrier is legal, but orders that its route accommodate Palestinian human rights (June).
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) issues a non-binding advisory opinion that the separation barrier is a violation of international law. Israel states the ICJ has no jurisdiction over the state's political issues (July).
Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat dies (November).
2005. Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) is democratically elected President of the Palestinian Authority (January).
The Israeli parliament approves Ariel Sharon's proposal to disengage from Gaza while the finance committee approves legislation that would provide compensation for the settlers who are evacuated. The government continues to refuse to coordinate its withdrawal with the PA in any way (February).
An official government report by Talia Sasson details the extent of government complicity and corruption in the building of illegal settlements in the West Bank (March).
Israel withdraws unilaterally from Gaza (August).
2006. Hamas wins democratic parliamentary elections in the occupied territories (January).
Ehud Olmert wins general elections in Israel based on his proposal to withdraw the majority of settlements, and a total of some 70,000 settlers, from the West Bank unilaterally. This would leave roughly 170,000 settlers in large blocs (March).
A Hezbollah raid on an Israeli patrol and the Israeli response rapidly escalate into a full-scale war. This war has an unprecedented reach into Israel, with Hezbollah rockets falling on Haifa. The war has considerable civilian casualties, with more than a thousand dead, most of them Lebanese, and causes widespread infrastructure damage in southern Lebanon. (July-August).
Peace Now reports that 40% of West Bank settlements are built on privately owned Palestinian land (November).
2007. Syrian President Bashar Assad signals his readiness to resume peace talks without preconditions (January).
The Israeli newspaper Maariv reports that the government has allocated special subsidies in the 2007 budget for industries and agriculture in the West Bank and Golan expected to suffer financially under new EU tariffs on goods from the occupied territories (January).
Led by Saudi Arabia, the Arab League revives its 2002 plan for regional peace (March).
100 settlers move into a building in Hebron in an Arab neighborhood, testing the will of the Olmert government, significantly weakened by the second Lebanon War, to confront the settlers over settlement policy.
268,000 settlers live among over two million Palestinians in the West Bank.Another 184,000 live in neighborhoods of Jerusalem conquered in 1967 among 240,000 Palestinians and 17,000 settlers live in the Golan Heights.