The creation of Israel

On 14 May 1948, David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the independence of the new State of Israel. The country met with a great deal of international opposition as well as a great deal of support as a potential haven for the many victims of the German persecution of Jews in Europe.

The land is sacred to religious Jews. Their ties with the land are described in the Torah, the holy book of the Jewish faith. And so, many Jews viewed the country as a safe place. They no longer wanted to suffer the hatred of Jews that they had suffered in Europe for centuries. For decades, Jews had been emigrating from Europe to Palestine. This was not a peaceful process. There had been fighting between Jews, the Arabs living in the country, and the troops of Great Britain, which had ruled the country since 1917.

After the Second World War, many Jews wanted to leave Europe for Palestine. Great Britain did not allow them to and sent the Jewish immigrants back or locked them up in camps.

In 1947, the United Nations agreed to divide the Palestinian territory between the Jews and the Arabs. Many Arabs and Jewish organisations did not agree and the fight that followed was won by the Jews.

One day after the establishment of the Israeli state had been proclaimed, its Arab neighbours attacked Israel. The war lasted almost a year and was won by Israel.

Many Arab inhabitants were driven out of what had been Palestine and fled. They, and the Arabs who stayed behind, were called Palestinians from then on.

In the first three years after the establishment of the new state, approximately 600,000 Jews left Europe for Israel.