The origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict - Essay Example

The essay establishes the basis and as well discusses the Arab-Israeli conflict and investigates basics involved in the Arab-Israeli conflict. At the core, the conflict is based on disagreement over the land of Palestine which characterised by irresolvable strive between competing nationalisms. Even though, the issue is complicated by religious and political diversity the dispute between the Arab-Israeli conflicts primarily involves competing claims to land. The essay establishes that resolve of competing claims to Palestine are complicated and reflect the complexities of Arab-Israeli history in the region (Shackelford 2012).

The Israeli-Arab or the Middle East conflict can be delineated into three distinct phases with the initial conflict between Arabs and Jews being, that which began as part of the Arab conquest of the 7th century. In this aspect of the conflict, Arabs conquered the land that previously was known by Romans as Judea and Palestina by Christian Byzantines. Later on, after hundreds of years beginning in the 1880s, the Jews mainly from Eastern Europe began streaming back to reclaim the land hence, the conflict resumed.

The second phase of the conflict was internationalized to involve the proximal Arab states that include Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon as well as Saudi Arabia and Iraq. Even though, these states nominally supported the Palestinian Arab inhabitants of the land, there is little doubt that the states too had their own state interests. (Allain 2010). For instance, Transjordan occupied what is currently known as west bank and annexed it, although the annexation was not internationally recognised and changed its name to Jordan.

Subsequently, in the further unsuccessful attempts in each decade from 1948 to 1982 by the Arab states to defeat the nascent State of Israel, in addition to, international involvement of the USSR and USA further internationalised the conflict. The last phase to the origin of the Arab-Israeli followed the defeat of the Arab states by Israel in the six-day war in 1967 resulting in the emergence of a militant Palestinian party, the PLO that sought to wage war on Israel without involvement of other states (Cohen 2011).

The Arab-Israeli conflict emerged from the rise of Jewish nationalism that did not exist in the region prior to Zionist activism. The Zionist objective in Palestine had a colonialist element one that the Palestinian Arabs recognised and opposed throughout the manoeuvring of international law and political negotiations. As the great powers (US and other allies) put in place the governing structures that enabled transformations in the region, they systematically ignored the rights of indigenous Arabs under international law.

The resulting disparity in rights during the decision-making process in Palestine produced an environment that resulted in the current configuration, putting the interests of the Israeli state against those of Palestinian Arabs (Cohen 2011). As British administration began its Mandate in 1922, the question of whom to vest finally the Palestinian sovereignty persistently lingered, since England was purely an occupying power. However, the continued Jewish immigration and the presence of a British policy that was favourable Zionists resulted in Arab riots (Schiff 2011).

England promised Palestine to the Arabs through diplomatic communications that rose to a secret treaty; however, this did not happen therefore resulting to difficulty in combining concurrent but opposing national aspirations of Palestinian Arabs and Zionists into a single Palestinian state. The lack of political equality in British decisions made Arabs lose faith in the political process and the England’s Peel commission recommend partition of Palestine in response to the escalating violence.

The Arabs were in opposition of the