Subject Knowledge Notes Middle East Lesson Five: Why did and Arab nations fight wars, and how did it change who controlled the region

The 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory was the first phase of the 1948 Palestine war. It broke out after the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a resolution on 29 November 1947 recommending the adoption of the Partition Plan for Palestine.

During the civil war, the Jewish and Arab communities of Palestine clashed (the latter supported by the Arab Liberation Army) while the British, who had the obligation to maintain order, organized their withdrawal and intervened only on an occasional basis.

When the British Mandate of Palestine expired on 14 May 1948, and with the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel, the surrounding Arab states—, Transjordan, and —invaded what had just ceased to be , and immediately attacked Israeli forces and several Jewish settlements. The conflict then turned into the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.

As a result of the war, the State of Israel controlled both the area that the UN General Assembly Resolution 181 had recommended for the proposed Jewish state as well as almost 60% of the area of Arab state proposed by the 1948 Partition Plan, including the , Lydda and Ramle area, , some parts of the Negev, a wide strip along the Tel Aviv– road, West Jerusalem and some territories in the . Transjordan took control of the remainder of the former British mandate, which it annexed, and the Egyptian military took control of the Gaza Strip. At the Conference on 1 December 1948, 2,000 Palestinian delegates called for unification of Palestine and Transjordan as a step toward full Arab unity. No state was created for the Palestinian . The conflict triggered significant demographic change throughout the Middle East. Around 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled from their homes in the area that became Israel, and they became in what they refer to as Al-Nakba ("the catastrophe"). In the three years following the war, about 700,000 Jews immigrated to Israel, with many of them having been expelled from their previous countries of residence in the Middle East.

The Six-Day War was fought between 5 and 10 June 1967 by Israel and the neighboring states of Egypt (known at the time as the ), , and Syria.

The Egyptians were caught by surprise, and nearly the entire Egyptian air force was destroyed with few Israeli losses, giving the Israelis air supremacy. Simultaneously, the Israelis launched a ground offensive into the Gaza Strip and the Sinai, which again caught the Egyptians by surprise. After some initial resistance, Egyptian leader ordered the evacuation of the Sinai. Israeli forces rushed westward in pursuit of the Egyptians, inflicted heavy losses, and conquered the Sinai.

Further Reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli%E2%80%93Palestinian_conflict https://www.vox.com/2018/11/20/18079996/israel-palestine-conflict-guide-explainer https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/20436092

Videos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHqJ6pgdE-c https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLGaoVunH8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRYZjOuUnlU

Lesson Five: Why did Israel and Arab nations fight wars, and how did it change who controlled the region?

• Introduce the question for this lesson, explaining that we will look at some of the major wars between Israel and the surrounding nations, and how this changed who controlled different regions (slide 2). • Children independently complete the retrieval practice (slide 4) 5 minutes • Pupils should complete from memory, leaving answers if they are stuck • Circulate to spot common misconceptions. • Display answers for pupils to self-/peer-mark (slide 5) • Remind pupils, again, that this is a contentious and ongoing subject. There is still fighting happening in this region. There are different ‘narratives’ presented by each side. • Everybody reads 1948 Arab-Israeli War. 5 minutes • Partners to complete table for Task 1, revisiting text from previous lesson one if necessary (King David). • Continue reading, and explain that both sides (Jews and ) felt aggrieved at this point. • Ask pupils to work in partners to revisit the text from the previous lessons to jot notes of reasons that each side might feel aggrieved (slide 6) 10 minutes • Share these notes so that all pupils can improve their own lists. • Read about the 1947 Partition plan (slide 7) • Ask pupils to list choose one of the countries which became involved in the establishment of Israel, and what their motivations might have been. • Share these thoughts to challenge misconceptions and model disciplinary 10 minutes thought. • Continue reading about the establishment of Israel following the 1948 war. • Pupils should look at the map and ask pupils to complete task 3, filling in the gaps. • Display the map on slide 8 to make clear the changing control. 5 minutes • Explain that we will now zoom forward in time to one of the next major conflicts, the Six Day War. • Pupils to analyse the maps (slide 8) to complete Task 4 independently. • Pupils should mention the different sections which were under Israeli control after the Six Day War. 5 minutes • Everybody reads the text on the Six Day War. • Pupils to answer Task 5 and feedback answers to the class. • Ensure pupils are clear about how Israel was fighting Syria, Egypt and Jordan, 5 minutes the surrounding Arab nations in this war. • Read the remaining text, and ask pupils to study the map showing the Israeli offensive in Sinai. • Ask pupils to return to the text and note two reasons that Israel were able to defeat the Arab nations in the Six Day War. 10 minutes • Display the map on slide 9 to show how much land Israel now controlled in the area. • Pupils record 3 key things they have learnt.

5 minutes