Table of Contents

Introduction
Land
People
History
- The Stone Age and the Copper Age
- The Bronze Age
  - Early Bronze Age
  - Middle Bronze Age
  - Late Bronze Age
- The Iron Age
  - The Israelites in Palestine
  - Assyrian and Babylonian rule
  - The Persian empire
- From Alexander the Great to 70 ce
  - The Ptolemies
  - The Seleucids
  - The Hasmonean priest-princes
  - The Herodian house and the Roman procurators
- Roman Palestine
- From the Arab conquest to 1900
  - The rise of Islam
  - ʿAbbāsid rule
  - The Fāṭimid dynasty
  - The Crusades
  - Ottoman rule
- From 1900 to 1948
  - World War I and after
  - The British mandate
  - The Arab Revolt
  - World War II
  - The early postwar period
  - Civil war in Palestine
- Palestine and the Palestinians (1948–67)
  - The partition of Palestine and its aftermath
  - The term “Palestinian”
  - Diverging histories for Palestinian Arabs
    - Palestinian citizens of Israel
    - West Bank (and Jordanian) Palestinians
    - Palestinians in the Gaza Strip
    - The UNRWA camps
    - Palestinians outside mandated Palestine
  - Resurgence of Palestinian identity
    - The role of camps
    - The role of Palestinians outside formerly mandated Palestine
    - The Palestine Liberation Organization
    - Fatah and other guerrilla organizations
- The Arab-Israeli war of 1967 and its consequences
  - Palestinian citizens of Israel
  - The PLO’s rise as a revolutionary force
  - The PLO’s struggle for Palestinian autonomy
    - Palestinians and the PLO in Jordan
    - Palestinians and the PLO in Lebanon
    - International recognition
    - Palestinians and the civil war in Lebanon
    - The PLO in the occupied territories
- Negotiations, violence, and incipient self-rule
  - The Camp David Accords and the PLO
  - The dispersal of the PLO from Lebanon
  - Years of mounting violence
  - The first intifadah
    - Tactics and tolls
    - PLO declaration of independence
  - The move toward self-rule
    - The Oslo Accords
    - The birth of the Palestinian Authority
  - The second intifadah
  - Split administration of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip
    - Blockade and 2008 conflict in the Gaza Strip
    - Palestinian Authority bid for statehood recognition
    - 2014 Gaza conflict
    - Political and financial uncertainty

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Palestine

Also known as: Eretz Yisraʾel, Philistia, Syria Palaestina

Written by Walid Ahmed Khalidi, William Charles Brice, Rashid Ismail KhalidiSee All

Fact-checked by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

Last Updated: Jul 27, 2023 • Article History

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Palestine, area of the eastern Mediterranean region, comprising parts of modern Israel and the Palestinian territories of the Gaza Strip (along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea) and the West Bank (west of the Jordan River). The term Palestine has been associated variously and sometimes controversially with this small region, which some have asserted also includes Jordan. Both the geographic area designated by the name and the political status of it have changed over the course of some three millennia. The region (or at least a part of it) is also known as the Holy Land and is held sacred ...(100 of 27844 words)

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