According to the Torah, the period of the three Patriarchs has been placed shortly after 2,000 BC,^[36] and the first Kingdom of Israel was established around 1100 BC. Subsequent Israelite kingdoms and states ruled intermittently over the next four hundred years, and are known from various extra-biblical sources.^{[37][38][39][40]}

Between the fall of the northern Kingdom of Israel in 722 BC and the Muslim conquests of the 7th century AD (a period of over 1500 years), the region came under Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Sassanid, and Byzantine rule.^[41][42] Jewish presence in the region significantly dwindled after the failure of the Bar Kokhba revolt against the Roman Empire in 132 AD.^[43] Nevertheless, there was a continuous small Jewish presence and Galilee became its religious center.^[44][45] The Mishnah and part of the Talmud, central Jewish texts, were composed during the 2nd to 4th centuries AD in Tiberias and Jerusalem.^[46] In 635 AD, the region, including Jerusalem, was conquered by the Arabs and was to remain under Muslim control for the next 1300 years.^[47] Control of the region transferred between the Umayyads,^[47] Abbasids,^[47] and Crusaders throughout the next six centuries,^[47] before being conquered by the Mamluk Sultanate, in 1260.^[48] In 1516, the region was conquered by the Ottoman Empire, and remained under Turkish rule until the 20th century.^[48]

After the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492, some communities settled in Palestine.^[53] Various migrations to Palestine occurred over the centuries including 40,000 between 1904-14. Austro-Hungarian journalist Theodor Herzl is credited with founding political Zionism,^[59] a movement which sought to establish a Jewish state in the Land of Israel, by elevating the Jewish Question to the international plane.^[60] In 1896, Herzl published Der Judenstaat (The State of the Jews), offering his vision of a future Jewish state.

During World War I, British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour sent a letter that stated:^[64]

His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."^[65]

The British conquered Palestine in 1917. Arab opposition to British rule and Jewish immigration led to the 1920 Palestine riots. In 1922, the League of Nations granted Britain a mandate over Palestine under terms similar to the Balfour Declaration.^[67] The population of the area at this time was predominantly Arab and Muslim, with Jews accounting for about 11% of the population.^[68]

Finally, the rise of Nazism and the increasing persecution of Jews in the 1930s led to the Fifth Aliyah, with an influx of a quarter of a million Jews. This was a major cause of the Arab revolt of 1936–1939 and led the British to introduce restrictions on Jewish immigration to Palestine with the White Paper of 1939. With countries around the world turning away Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust, a clandestine movement known as Aliyah Bet was organized to bring Jews to Palestine.^[58] By the end of World War II, the Jewish population of Palestine had increased to 33% of the total population.^[69


After World War II, Britain found itself in fierce conflict with the Jewish community, and there was an armed struggle against British rule.^[70] At the same time, thousands of Jewish Holocaust survivors and refugees from Europe sought a new life in Palestine, but were turned away or rounded up and placed in detention camps by the British. In 1947, the British government announced it would withdraw from the Mandate of Palestine, stating it was unable to arrive at a solution acceptable to both Arabs and Jews.^[71] A plan was proposed to replace the British Mandate with "Independent Arab and Jewish States" and a "Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem" administered by the United Nations. On 29 November 1947 the General Assembly adopted a resolution recommending the adoption and implementation of the Plan of Partition with Economic Union as Resolution 181 (II).^[72]