Palestine 3

1956 Attckes incursions by refugee guerrilla bands and attacks by Arab military units were made, Egypt refused to permit Israeli ships to use the Suez Canal and blockaded the Straits of Tiran erupted in the second Arab-Israeli War.

Great Britain and France joined the attack because of their dispute with Egypt's president Gamal Abdel Nasser, who had nationalized the Suez Canal. Seizing the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula within few days. The fighting was halted by the UN after a few days, and a UN Emergency Force (UNEF) was sent to supervise the cease-fire in the Canal zone. By the end of the year their forces withdrew from Egypt, but Israel refused to leave Gaza until early 1957.

1965 The Palestine Liberation Organization was established.

1967 Nasser's insistence in 1967 that the UNEF leave Egypt, led Israel to attack Egypt, Jordan, and Syria simultaneously on 5th of June.

The war ended six days later with an Israeli victory. Israel occuiped Gaza Strip, Sinai Peninsula, Arab East Jerusalem, West Bank, Golan Heights.

After 1967 war, several guerrilla organizations within the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) carried out guerrillas attacks on Israeli miletary targets, with the stated objective of "redeeming Palestine."

1973 Egypt joined Syria in a war on Israel to regain the territories lost in 1967. The two Arab states struck unexpectedly on October 6. After crossing the suez channel the Arab forces gain a lot of advanced positions in Sinai Peninsula and Golan Heights and manage to defeat the Israeli forces for more then three weeks. Israeli forces with a massive U.S. economic and military assistance managed to stop the arab forces after a three-week struggle. The Arab oil-producing states cut off petroleum exports to the United States and other Western nations in retaliation for their aid to Israel.

In an effort to encourage a peace settlement, U.S. secretary of state, Henry Kissinger, managed to work out military disengagements between Israel and Egypt in the Sinai and between Israel and Syria in the Golan Heights during 1974.

1974 The Arab Summit in Rabat recognized the PLO as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.

1982 Israel launched an invasion of Lebanon aimed at wiping out the PLO presence there. By mid-August, after intensive fighting in and around Bayrut, the PLO agreed to withdraw its guerrillas from the city. Israeli troops remained in southern Lebanon.

1987 Relations between Israel and the Palestinians entered a new phase with the intifada, a series of uprisings in the occupied territories that included demonstrations, strikes, and rock-throwing attacks on Israeli soldiers.

1988 The PNC meeting in Algiers declared the State of Palestine as outlined in the UN Partition Plan 181.

1990 Yasser Arafat addressed the UN Security Council In Geneva demanding UN emergency force to provide international protection for the Palestinian people to safeguard their lives, properties and holy places.

1991 The first comprehensive peace talks between Israel and delegations representing the Palestinians and neighboring Arab states

1993 Israel deported 415 Palestinian men to a buffer zone in southern Lebanon. The deported Palestinians were said by Israeli authorities to be active members of the militant Islamic resistance movement Hamas.

1993 Aftersecret negotiations, PM Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat signed an historic peace agreement. Israel agreed to allow for Palestinian self-rule, first in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank town of Jericho, and later in other areas of the West Bank.

Feb 1994 An American-born Jewish settler in Hebron, Baruch Goldstein, opened fire in al-Haran al-ebrahime crowded mosque, killing 29 Muslims and wounding 150 more.

May 1994 In Cairo - Egypt, Yasser Arafat, and Yitzhak Rabin, signed the final version of the Declaration of Principles. Within 24 hours of the signing, Israeli military forces were scheduled to leave the Gaza Strip and Jericho.

July 1994 Yasser Arafat returned to Palestine.

Oct 1994 The Nobel Committee in Oslo, Norway, announced that the peace prize was being awarded to Israel's Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, and to Yasser Arafat.