PDF Summary:Israel, by Noa Tishby

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one of the most contentious issues in modern geopolitics, but understanding its foundations requires examining historical context that's often overlooked. In Israel, actress and activist Noa Tishby explores the historical and political foundations of the State of Israel, tracing the roots of Zionism, the 1948 War of Independence, and the displacement of Palestinians. She examines how neighboring Arab nations responded to Israel's founding and how ongoing conflicts have evolved through different phases over decades.

Tishby discusses attempts at peace-building, the role of international organizations like UNRWA, and obstacles that continue to complicate resolution—including settlements, the situation in Gaza, and the actions of radical groups. She also addresses how language and framing, such as the term "Nakba," have shaped perceptions of the conflict and influenced international discourse about Israel's legitimacy.

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(Shortform note: In The Iron Cage, Rashid Khalidi explains that the 1948 war created a power vacuum in the region, which the Arab states exploited to advance their own interests. The Arab Higher Committee, which had been the main political body representing Palestinian Arabs, was dissolved by the Arab League in 1948. This left the Palestinians without a unified leadership or political structure, making it easier for Egypt and Jordan to assert control over Gaza and the West Bank.)

Israel emerged victorious and expanded its territory beyond the UN Partition Plan. Tishby argues that the Israelis were able to win the war because they were well-prepared, unified, and highly motivated, while the Arab nations were not as organized. Israel gained control of another third of the land that was previously under British mandate. The Arabs in the region didn't seize this opportunity to return to the UN Partition Plan and request statehood, so an Arab-Palestinian nation wasn't formed. Rather, Egypt obtained Gaza, and Jordan gained control of the West Bank, despite these regions being designated by the Partition Plan to the local Arabs (the Palestinians) for a state of their own.

The Fate of the Palestinian Territories

In The Iron Cage, Rashid Khalidi explains that the armistice agreements concluded at Rhodes in 1949 effectively froze the front lines of the Arab armies in Palestine, and that, in the areas they held, the Egyptian and Transjordanian regimes rapidly established their own military and civil administrations, marginalizing any specifically Palestinian institutions. He explains that the Arab League’s All-Palestine Government, proclaimed in Gaza in late 1948 under Hajj Amin al-Husayni, never exercised real authority, was not recognized by Transjordan, and was soon reduced to a symbolic body under Egyptian patronage. In contrast, Transjordan moved systematically to integrate the territory it controlled: it dissolved or absorbed existing Palestinian political structures, extended Jordanian citizenship to the Arab inhabitants, incorporated local elites into the Jordanian parliament and bureaucracy, and in 1950 formally annexed the area, thereby blocking the emergence of an independent Palestinian political entity there. Egypt, for its part, kept the territory it controlled under a separate military administration, did not grant its inhabitants citizenship, tightly circumscribed political activity, and ultimately allowed the All-Palestine Government to wither away, so that no autonomous Palestinian government was able to develop in that enclave either.

Palestinian Displacement and Arab Minority Populations in Israel

The displacement of Palestinians is a contentious issue in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Tishby explains that the 1948 war left 700,000 to 750,000 Palestinians without homes. Currently, UNRWA registers 5.6 million displaced individuals, reflecting its stance that refugee status is passed down to descendants. She argues that no other refugees worldwide experience this practice and that Palestinians ought to be subject to identical criteria.

Tishby also contends that there was no organized ethnic cleansing, citing that Israeli Arabs make up 21% of Israel’s population and are employed in high-ranking roles in public sector work, the Israel Defense Forces, and governmental positions.

(Shortform note: In many protracted refugee situations, the children of recognized refugees automatically receive and retain refugee status. This is because the UNHCR, which administers most refugee situations, recognizes the principle of family unity. This principle ensures that families remain together and that children born to refugees are not left stateless or without protection. Refugee status is maintained until a durable solution, such as voluntary repatriation, local integration, or resettlement, is found.)

The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict and Contemporary Challenges

According to Tishby, the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians has evolved through different phases over time. She argues that the conflict is not only between Israelis and Palestinians, but also involves Israel and the broader Arab region. It’s usually separated into three eras: Bi-Communal Conflict (1860–1948), which involved fighting between Jewish and Arab communities, resembling a civil war; Interstate Conflicts (1948–1973), which was an organized effort by all neighboring countries to defeat the new Jewish state; and Non-State Actor Conflict (1973–present), which has largely involved non-governmental factions, such as insurgent, guerilla, and terrorist groups funded by other countries to fight as their stand-ins.

The Evolution of Warfare

Tishby’s three-part storyline of the Arab–Israeli struggle is a common way of narrating long-running conflicts. In the field of war studies, scholars often break down conflicts into stages to better understand how they evolve over time. For example, in her influential book New and Old Wars, political scientist Mary Kaldor argues that the nature of warfare has fundamentally changed since the end of the Cold War. She identifies two main stages: “old wars,” which were fought between states using conventional armies, and “new wars,” which are characterized by decentralized, networked groups fighting for identity-based goals.

Peace efforts have occurred, but challenges remain. Tishby points out that the nation has made many attempts at peace, but these have been rejected. Israel's existence has faced political and religious opposition from the Arab world. In fundamentalist Islam, when a territory is governed by Islamic law, it's considered part of Islam and must not be relinquished to those outside the faith. This extremist view has greatly impeded the path to peace. However, sensible leadership from each side can rise above extremist religious views and establish a new reality. In 1977, Anwar Sadat, who was then Egypt's president, visited Israel and pledged to break the cycle of wars between their nations. Israel's leader Menachem Begin also committed to peace.

(Shortform note: In Islam: The Straight Path, John L. Esposito explains that classical Muslim jurists divided the world into two realms: the “abode of Islam,” where Muslims ruled and Islamic law prevailed, and the “abode of war,” inhabited and ruled by non-Muslims. This division shaped Muslim conceptions of territory, authority, and communal identity. In the modern period, the experience of European colonial conquest, the dismantling of the Ottoman Empire, and the abolition of the caliphate gave this older doctrine renewed ideological force. Islamist movements reinterpreted the classical division of the world and the doctrine of jihad in light of foreign domination and secular nationalism.)

However, this was perceived as a betrayal by other Arab nations, and Sadat was killed in 1981 by an Egyptian Islamic Jihad member. In 2002, Saudi Arabia issued the Arab Peace Proposal, detailing conditions that all Arab League member countries put forward to recognize Israel as a nation. Israel rejected the conditions, but the proposal initiated unofficial talks and collaboration with Gulf states, which led to the 2020 Abraham Accord.

(Shortform note: The Palestinian Authority and the PLO Executive Committee have argued that the Abraham Accord contradicts the Arab Peace Proposal. They claim that the Abraham Accord undermines the proposal by normalizing relations between Arab countries and Israel before a Palestinian state is established. They argue that the Abraham Accord rewards Israel without requiring it to make concessions to the Palestinians.)

In 2019, the Trump administration proposed a peace plan regarding Israel and Palestine, though the plan didn't involve Palestinians. The Trump administration asked Palestinian leaders to negotiate, but they refused, perceiving the administration as biased toward Israel. In 2020, a peace agreement was signed by Israel and two other nations: the UAE and Bahrain. Morocco, Sudan, and additional nations began to officially engage with Israel.

(Shortform note: The Trump administration’s proposal and the subsequent normalization of relations between Israel and several Arab nations reflect an “outside-in” diplomatic strategy. This approach prioritizes building alliances based on shared security and economic interests, rather than conditioning normalization on progress in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. This strategy, as described by Wikipedia editors, online encyclopedia contributors, a Wikipedia article, or an online encyclopedia entry, aims to create a regional environment more conducive to eventual Israeli-Palestinian peace by first establishing broader Arab-Israeli cooperation.)

The absence of a peaceful resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is due to several issues. First, there are ongoing assaults by terrorist groups. Each time a peace process begins, extremists on both sides push back, but usually it's just Palestinian radicals who show their opposition by killing Israelis. This instills fear and trauma in Israelis, changing public opinion from supporting peace to favoring military action. Israelis question why they would negotiate with people who continue attempting to murder them and how they can trust a future Palestinian state to manage radicals and keep Israel safe if it can’t manage them now. When Israel dispatches troops to Palestinian territories to confront violent extremists, it leads to the deaths of innocent Palestinians and destruction of property, perpetuating a cycle of violence and revenge.

How Extremists Sabotage Peace

In 2002, political scientists Andrew Kydd and Barbara Walter published an article titled “Sabotaging the Peace: The Politics of Extremist Violence.” In it, they argue that extremists can derail peace negotiations by using violence to convince the other side that their leaders can’t control them. This makes the other side doubt the leaders’ ability to keep promises or maintain order. The authors use the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a key example, showing how attacks by groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad have repeatedly undermined peace efforts. They explain that these groups use violence to make Israelis question whether Palestinian leaders can control their own people, which then leads to Israeli retaliation and a cycle of violence that makes peace even harder to achieve.

Next, we’ll explore the mechanisms of conflict and delegitimization, key events and conditions, obstacles to peace, and ongoing challenges in the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Mechanisms of Conflict and Delegitimization

One mechanism of delegitimization is the phrase "Nakba," which has portrayed Palestinians as victims. Tishby explains that Nakba is an Arabic term for a disastrous catastrophe. It refers to when every Arab nation launched an invasion of Israel, attempting to annihilate it. The term was first applied to Israel in a pamphlet by Syrian professor Constantin Zureiq on August 5, 1948, during the ongoing war. Zureiq viewed the Nakba not as an event inflicted by Israelis on Arabs, but instead as a shameful, self-inflicted injury by Arabs themselves. The term was later rebranded by Yasser Arafat, who founded Fatah, a terrorist organization devoted to Israel's destruction.

(Shortform note: While Tishby is correct that the term “Nakba” was first used to describe the Arab states’ invasion of Israel, it’s more commonly used to describe the unravelling of Palestinian society in 1948. In other words, the term is more often used to describe the mass dispossession and exile of Palestinians, rather than the failed war effort of the Arab states. This is because the Nakba is often seen as a turning point in Palestinian history, marking the end of their traditional way of life and the beginning of a new era of displacement and statelessness.)

In 1998, Arafat established Nakba Day as a national occasion of remembrance, grief, and protest, set for May 15. The term caught on, rewriting its own meaning and the history of the War of Independence along with it. Palestinians and their supporters use the term Nakba to refer to a calamity that befell the Palestinians, portraying it as a natural disaster or premeditated holocaust. The day brought disaster to Arab Palestinians, Syrians, Iraqis, Egyptians, and their allies, but it wasn't an act of God. Poor decisions by ineffective Arab rulers led to defeats both politically and militarily. The term "Nakba" has been branded to cast those who were defeated in the war they began as heroic victims. Had the Arabs accepted the UN's plan to divide the land, the Nakba and the conflict could have been avoided, possibly allowing us to have enjoyed peaceful conditions since then.

The Nakba as a “Technology of Memory”

In Heroes and Martyrs of Palestine, Laleh Khalili explains how the term “Nakba” works to shape people’s understanding of the 1948 war. She argues that Palestinian practices of national commemoration—including anniversaries, monuments, funerals, posters, museums, and school curricula—are not mere reflections of past events but are active “technologies of memory” that weave dispersed and unequal experiences of displacement, loss, and struggle into a single, continuous narrative of collective suffering and resistance. Through the repetition of these rituals over time, they cultivate shared emotions, moral claims, and political subjectivities that organize how Palestinians understand their history and imagine their future. In other words, by constantly reinforcing the Nakba narrative through various forms of commemoration, Palestinians come to interpret the entire War of Independence through the lens of dispossession and moral claim.

Another mechanism that has perpetuated the conflict is UNRWA's policies, which have prolonged the issue of Palestinian refugees. UNRWA is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, created in 1949 to provide temporary relief to Palestinian refugees. Tishby argues that UNRWA has been unsuccessful in resettling refugees and instead has kept them dependent on aid. It has expanded the definition of "refugee" to cover the offspring of the initial refugees, inflating the numbers. Additionally, UNRWA has allowed its educational materials to promote violence and anti-Jewish sentiments. The agency's existence has enabled Arab states to avoid integrating Palestinians uprooted by the conflict, using their plight as a political tool against Israel.

UNRWA’s Role in the Conflict

Tishby’s view of UNRWA is highly contested. In Palestinian Refugees in International Law, international lawyers Francesca Albanese and Lex Takkenberg argue that UNRWA’s existence is a result of the lack of a political solution to the Palestinian refugee crisis, not a cause of it. They explain that UNRWA was created to provide essential services to Palestinian refugees who were left stateless after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. The agency’s mandate has been repeatedly renewed because a political solution to the refugee issue has not been reached. Albanese and Takkenberg argue that UNRWA’s role is to provide a framework for the protection and assistance of Palestinian refugees, not to create a political problem. They contend that the agency’s existence is a reflection of the international community’s failure to resolve the conflict.

Key Events, Conditions, and Obstacles to Peace

Attempts at Resolution and Peace-Building

Israel has made multiple attempts to negotiate peace with Palestinians, according to Tishby. These include the 1990s Oslo Agreement, the Camp David Summit in 2000, and the peace plan proposed by Trump in 2019. However, these efforts have been unsuccessful due to ongoing violence from radical groups, disagreements over whether Palestinian refugees can return, and the refusal of Palestinian leaders to commit to fully resolving the conflict.

Settlements as an Obstacle to Peace

Another reason these peace efforts failed is that Israel continued to expand its settlements during negotiations. In Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, former US President Jimmy Carter argues that the continued occupation of Palestinian territories and the expansion of Israeli settlements on that land are the primary obstacles to a just and lasting peace. He explains that these settlements fragment the land that should form a Palestinian state, seize Palestinian resources, and convince Palestinians that negotiations will not lead to genuine freedom or sovereignty.

Ongoing Conflict, Obstacles, and Central Problems

Despite attempts at peace, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is ongoing, with issues like settlements and Gaza contributing to tensions. Tishby explains that settlements are Jewish communities beyond the boundaries established in 1967, known as the Green Line. The West Bank, which Israel gained control of following the Six Day War, is in a situation that is described internationally as "occupatio bellica," or belligerent occupation: land taken in conflict that's controlled militarily but hasn't been formally annexed by the victor. Settlements are a major source of hostility toward Israel.

(Shortform note: While the international community has described the West Bank as “occupatio bellica,” some authors have argued that this is an inaccurate description. In 2012, a report commissioned by the Israeli government concluded that the West Bank is not occupied territory and that Israeli settlements there are legal. The report argued that the West Bank’s unique legal status, stemming from the British Mandate period, means that classic occupation laws do not apply. The report also argued that Israel’s presence in the West Bank is not an occupation because there was no recognized sovereign power displaced in 1967.)

The earliest settlements to be revived were in sections of the West Bank where Jews had lived before the 1948 war. Labor Minister Yigal Alon formulated an unofficial policy called the "Alon Plan" to create settlements in parts of the occupied regions, aiming to create a protective buffer against potential attacks. Although the plan wasn't officially accepted, some of it was put into action, and settlements began emerging in previously uninhabited areas throughout the West Bank.

(Shortform note: The Alon Plan was never officially adopted, but it was quietly used as a map for troop stations, road building, and public land allocation. As a result, mid-level officials and generals created the very chain of settlements that the plan had outlined. This approach allowed the government to avoid public debate while still achieving its goals.)

The Gaza situation is chaotic. In 2005, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon decided the country should unilaterally withdraw from Gaza. Israeli troops tore down the settlers' houses and displaced them, trying to give Gaza to an eventual Palestinian state. In January 2006, Hamas ran in the initial Palestinian legislative elections, facing off against the PLO. Hamas emerged victorious in the elections. Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas sought to reconcile Hamas with the PA, but these efforts failed, and Hamas began attacking and attempting to assassinate PLO leaders. Internal conflict erupted and lasted almost 12 months, and in mid-2007, Hamas forcefully took control of Gaza, starting an offensive against the Palestinian Liberation Organization.

(Shortform note: The Palestinian Authority is a government body that was created by the PLO to govern parts of Gaza and the West Bank. The PLO is the internationally recognized leadership body of the Palestinian people. The PLO was founded in 1964 and is composed of various Palestinian political and resistance groups. The PLO's primary goal is to achieve Palestinian self-determination and statehood. The Palestinian Authority was established in 1994 as part of the Oslo Accords, a peace agreement between Israel and the PLO. The PA was intended to be a temporary, self-governing body that would administer parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip until a final status agreement could be reached.)

The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades stormed the Palestinian Authority's headquarters and showed no mercy. They ransacked the offices, executed people in the presence of their loved ones, and killed PA members by shooting them or tossing them off roofs, resulting in around 160 deaths by the end of the coup. Egypt, which shares a border with Gaza, soon became aware and, along with Israel, put a blockade in place to cut off ammunition supply to Hamas.

(Shortform note: The Wikipedia article on the Battle of Gaza (2007) provides a detailed account of the conflict, including casualty figures and the political context. It cites various sources, including news reports and human rights organizations, to support its claims. While the exact number of casualties varies depending on the source, the article provides a range of estimates and highlights the political motivations behind the violence. This information supports the claim that the conflict resulted in significant loss of life and targeted killings of political opponents.)

Hamas violently seized Gaza only two years after Israel's withdrawal, realizing Israelis' worst fears and giving the right-wing hawks in Israel a flawless "We told you so." Instead of leading to a developing Palestine, Israel's unilateral withdrawal led to a radical Islamist government taking over, one that was violent and repressive and immediately began firing rockets and mortars at villages and towns in southern Israel, with some reaching Tel Aviv. Israel's withdrawal from Gaza turned into a massive red flag for the potential repercussions in the region when Israel extends a hand in support, signals a desire for peace, dismantles settlements, or exits entirely—you encounter threats from Islamist radicals intent on your death and willing to kill their own citizens, too, from just thirty miles away.

(Shortform note: The warning that Gaza provides about the dangers of dismantling settlements or exiting territory may not apply in all cases. In Thirteen Days in September, Lawrence Wright describes how the border between Egypt and Israel remained relatively quiet for decades after the Camp David Accords, which included Israel’s withdrawal from the Sinai Peninsula. Wright explains that the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel included a phased Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai, the establishment of demilitarized zones, and the presence of international monitors. These measures helped to create a stable border between the two countries, demonstrating that territorial concessions can lead to peace when they are part of a comprehensive agreement between sovereign states.)

Israel's withdrawal from Gaza and Hamas's seizure of power are the biggest deterrents for the Israeli public when it comes to future land concessions.

(Shortform note: Since the publication of this book, the October 7, 2023, attacks by Hamas on Israel have become the main deterrent for many Israelis when it comes to land concessions.)