HIST 410N WEEK 5: ISRAEL AND THE MIDDLE EAST DISCUSSION

ISRAEL AND THE MIDDLE EAST – Why has the Arab-Israeli conflict been so persistent? What religious and cultural factors have contributed to the persistent state of unrest in the Middle East and, in particular, in what some people refer to as the Holy Land?

Class, there’s no denying the role of religion in the Arab-Israeli conflict, but let me ask all of you this…we are a nation of many religions, but yet, we don’t have the kind of conflicts that have taken place in the Mid-East. Why?

ISRAEL AND THE MIDDLE EAST

Fighting for land, religion and culture were causes of conflict in the Middle East. Kurds and Christians, were mostly refugees from Turkey. They were established in the North which had a big Jewish population that formed a community in Baghdad. Arabs were divided into Sunni and Shiite, which was established in the South. ” In 1947, the United Nations decided to divide Palestine into two separate zones, one Jewish and one Arab, and to make Jerusalem an international zone open to everyone. The Palestinians did not favor this plan”(Week 5 Lesson).The conflict caused cultural groups to politicalize their region. Also these regions have plenty of resources that people wanted to have access to.

ISRAEL AND THE MIDDLE EAST References

Week 5 Lesson:  Revolutions and Independence: Postwar Asia and Africa.  (2017).  Retrieved from https://devryu.instructure.com/courses/7413/pages/week-5-lesson?module_item_id=918399