With crisp analysis, Haganah Commander Yigal Allon, later a Prime Minister of Israel attributes Israel’s successes to multiple factors including the absence of a centralized Arab command, limited Arab military training, underestimating the potential fighting capabilities of local Arabs, and Israel’s success in integrating its citizens into the war effort.
Sharett gives an overview of Israeli foreign policy, key issues, and relationships with UN and Arab states.
One of four agreements Israel signed in 1949 with Arab neighbors, it does not end “state of war,” between Israel and Arab states. No treaty is signed until 1979.
This draft spoke eloquently about protecting individual, religious, and civil rights for all. Instead individual civil rights in Israel were protected by a series of Basic Laws.
The Declaration recounts the Jewish connection to the Land of Israel, the birth of Zionism and U.N. recognition of a Jewish state’s legitimacy. It also promises that the state will be a democracy for all its citizens.
The UN recommended establishing Arab and Jewish states in Palestine, with an international regime for Jerusalem. Zionists were jubilant; Arab states and the Palestinians were indignant and rejected two state solution. No Arab state is established, Israel is in 1948
No document better reveals the hostility which most Arab leaders and Arab states had in 1947 for Zionism and for a possible Jewish state. The Saudi King notes “that US support for Zionists in Palestine is an unfriendly act directed against the Arabs.” The King’s views were totally supported by US State Department officials including Loy Henderson and George Kennan who advocated strongly against Truman’s support of a Jewish state.
For information on accessing pre-1947 FRUS documents relating to Palestine, click here. FRUS 1947 Vol. V — The section on Mandatory Palestine, including the Arab-Zionist controversy and the United Nations, begins on Page 999 and ends…
Steady disintegration of Palestinian Arab society from 1945-1949 is detailed by five Arab and non-Arab historians citing local social cleavages, economic impoverishment, fear, indebtedness, and political dysfunction.
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