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Introduction; Land and Resources; People and Society; Arts; Economy; Government; History

Barak’s Tenure

Barak took office in July 1999 and created a broad center-left coalition government. He pledged to take “bold steps” to help forge a comprehensive peace in the Middle East. He focused his attention on negotiations with the Palestinians, but he also expressed eagerness to reach a peace agreement with Syria. In addition, he promised to withdraw Israeli troops from southern Lebanon within one year.

These steps led to increased optimism regarding the peace process. Barak transferred some West Bank territory to the authority of the PNA and also hinted that he might return virtually all of the Golan Heights to Syria in exchange for peace. Barak met with U.S. president Bill Clinton in July 1999 and set a 15-month deadline for a final peace settlement with the Palestinians. Negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians began in November 1999 but soon bogged down over further transfers of land in the West Bank to Palestinian control.

In December 1999 Israel and Syria agreed to resume peace negotiations. Talks held in January 2000 were inconclusive, however, and a summit meeting between Assad and Clinton in April of that year failed to end the stalemate.

Exasperated by the failure of the Syrian talks and concurring with growing Israeli dismay with further casualties in southern Lebanon, Barak unilaterally ordered the withdrawal of all Israeli forces from Lebanon to the countries’ international border as confirmed by the United Nations. The withdrawal was completed by June 2000.

Sharon Becomes Prime Minister

In the February 2001 election, voters were presented with a choice between Barak and Ariel Sharon of Likud for the post of prime minister. Leading up to the election, Sharon’s campaign stressed two factors: first, that the security of Israelis would be his administration’s paramount concern; and second, that the peace process initiated in Oslo in 1993 was “dead.” Sharon stated unequivocally that the violence must stop before the negotiations could continue, and that negotiations should then not be restricted by the agreements reached in Oslo. Sharon won the election by an overwhelming margin, reflecting the growing pessimism among Israelis regarding the peace process and Arafat’s power to curtail violence.

Sharon assembled a broad-based government that included people with differing views on the peace process. Several noted Labor figures were appointed to cabinet positions, including Shimon Peres as foreign minister. The government’s clear first objective was to stop the violence and restore security to the average Israeli. However, violence continued across the country.

Israeli-Palestinian relations were further soured in January 2002 when Israeli forces seized a large shipment of weaponry allegedly purchased by a high-ranking Palestinian official. The peace process seemed to be moving in reverse as Palestinian terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians, and Israeli military responses to these attacks, continued to grow in severity and lethality.

In response to mounting Israeli death tolls from Palestinian suicide bombings, in 2002 Israeli forces swept into the West Bank and occupied key urban centers. During the operation, which was vehemently denounced by Palestinian leaders, Israeli forces arrested hundreds of alleged terrorists and seized or destroyed large quantities of weapons. Violence escalated in late 2002. In October the Labor Party withdrew from the government when funds were allocated to Jewish settlements in the West Bank in the government’s 2003 budget.

After the 2001 election the Knesset voted to revert to Israel’s pre-1996 system of having the leader of the party with the most parliamentary seats named prime minister. In January 2003 parliamentary elections, Likud emerged as the dominant party, and Sharon retained the post of prime minister.

In the spring of 2003 U.S. president George W. Bush unveiled what was referred to as a “road map” toward the goal of independent Israeli and Palestinian states living side by side in peace and security. The PNA and, eventually, Israel accepted the road map, and Hamas agreed to a cease-fire. Summit meetings followed. However, violence surged in August with a bloody Palestinian suicide bombing in Jerusalem followed by Israeli missile strikes against top Hamas leaders.

In late 2003 Sharon announced that Israel would take unilateral steps to ensure the country’s security in the perceived absence of a Palestinian partner for peace. These steps included a unilateral Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the dismantling of Gaza Strip settlements. Israel continued to build a fence, sometimes referred to as a security barrier, to separate Israel from the West Bank. Israel has been criticized by Palestinians and international organizations for building the barrier within West Bank territory in some stretches. Palestinian terrorist attacks against Israel continued and Israeli forces also continued to target Hamas leadership. An Israeli missile strike in March 2004 killed Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin, and another strike killed the new Hamas leader the following month.

In early 2005 the Labor Party formed a coalition with Likud after Likud lost support from coalition members who opposed the planned withdrawal from Gaza. Labor Party leader Peres assumed the position of deputy premier under Sharon.

Formation of Kadima and 2006 Elections

In August 2005 Israel evacuated about 9,000 settlers from all 21 Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip and some others from 4 settlements in the northern West Bank. The evacuation met with opposition from a minority of Israelis. Some settlers from Gaza and the northern West Bank had to be forcibly removed. Former prime minister Netanyahu opposed the pullout. He resigned from his position as finance minister and announced that he would challenge Sharon for leadership of the Likud Party. The Israeli troop withdrawal from Gaza was largely completed by October. In November Peres lost the leadership of the Labor Party to Amir Peretz, the head of Israel’s trade union federation. Peretz pledged to withdraw Labor from the Likud coalition. The same month Sharon, frustrated by opposition from within Likud to the Gaza withdrawal, resigned from the party and formed a new centrist party, known as the Kadima party. Netanyahu became the leader of Likud, and Peres joined Kadima. The Knesset dissolved itself, paving the way for parliamentary elections in the spring of 2006.

In January 2006 Sharon suffered an extensive stroke. His powers as prime minister were transferred to Deputy Premier Ehud Olmert, who also became the leader of Kadima.

In the March 2006 parliamentary elections, the newly established Kadima party, under Olmert’s leadership, won the single largest number of seats, 29, but fell short of a majority in the Knesset, as have all parties throughout Israel’s history. Labor, led by the Moroccan-born Peretz, won 19 seats to come in second. Likud suffered a significant setback, securing only 12 seats. Israel’s right-wing parties did not do well enough to form an opposition coalition that could block Olmert’s plan for continued Israeli withdrawal from the Occupied Territories. In May Olmert formed a coalition with Labor, the ultra-Orthodox Shas Party, and the newly formed Pensioners Party to control 67 of the 120 seats in the Knesset. As part of the coalition agreement, Olmert became the prime minister, and Labor secured a number of Cabinet positions, including the defense ministry to be headed by Peretz.

Olmert reportedly regarded the elections as a referendum on his plans to establish permanent borders for Israel, either through negotiations with the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) or by withdrawing unilaterally from parts of the West Bank. Several factors complicated a withdrawal, however. The Labor Party favored a negotiated settlement, but Olmert refused to negotiate with Hamas, the militant Islamic group. Hamas does not recognize Israel’s right to exist, calls for Israel's replacement by an Islamic Palestinian state, and refuses to renounce terrorism. Although Mahmoud Abbas remained president of the PNA, Hamas won the Palestinian legislative elections in the West Bank and Gaza in January 2006 and established the PNA’s Cabinet in March 2006.

Conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon

The lack of movement in the Arab-Israeli peace process and continued tensions along Israel’s borders with Lebanon and the Gaza Strip was replaced in the summer of 2006 by conflict. On June 26, Palestinians tunneled under the international border between Israel and Gaza, attacked an Israeli patrol, killed two soldiers, and kidnapped a third one. Israel responded by attacking a series of terrorist and infrastructure targets in the Gaza Strip, but the kidnapped Israeli soldier remained in captivity somewhere in Palestinian territory.

In July 2006 Hezbollah militia fighters crossed the internationally recognized border from Lebanon into Israel, attacked and killed eight Israeli soldiers, and kidnapped two others. Prime Minister Olmert called this an “act of war,” and Israeli forces launched an attack on targets in Lebanon. Israel bombed Hezbollah strongholds in southern Lebanon, destroying the organization’s headquarters. To prevent any supply of arms from Syria and Iran from reaching Hezbollah, Israel launched air attacks against Beirut’s airport and major land routes, while a naval blockade prevented shipping from entering or leaving the ports. Thousands of foreign nationals eventually were evacuated from the war zone.

Israeli attacked Hezbollah targets, including weapons storehouses and missile launching points, across the country. Meanwhile, Hezbollah responded with rocket attacks on northern Israeli cities, including attacks on Haifa. Israel called up reservists, and a military incursion led to the taking of villages and towns south of the Līţānī River, but Israeli forces met fierce resistance from Hezbollah fighters entrenched in underground tunnels and caves and armed with sophisticated antitank weapons that appeared to have been supplied by Iran and Syria.

The fighting lasted for 34 days until a UN Security Council resolution achieved a cease-fire on August 14, 2006, and an agreement was reached for a “robust” version of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) to be installed in southern Lebanon to prevent Hezbollah from reestablishing itself there and using the area to attack Israel.

Estimates of the number of Lebanese killed varied from about 850 to 1,200. The number of Israelis killed was put at 43 civilians and 117 soldiers between July 12 and August 14, with more than 4,000 wounded. UN officials estimated that a million Lebanese and 300,000 Israelis had been displaced by the fighting. More than a million Israelis were forced to live in shelters as some 4,000 rockets landed on Israel. Israel’s army completed its withdrawal from Lebanon on October 1, 2006.

As with previous wars that ended without overwhelming success for Israel, there developed a series of problems within Israel concerning performance and outcomes. When the war ended, the captured Israeli soldiers remained in their captors’ hands, and the image of Israel as an overwhelmingly successful military power seemed diminished. This led to protests and demonstrations, calls for commissions to evaluate the handling of the conflict, and for a reevaluation of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israel’s political leadership. Some called for change in the government, while others demanded changes at the top of the IDF leadership.

Internationally, Israel came under criticism for its use of cluster bombs in populated areas of Lebanon. Although cluster bombs are not an outlawed weapon, critics of their use in populated areas note that children can easily mistake them for harmless objects. The United Nations emergency relief coordinator, Jan Egeland, condemned Israel’s use of cluster bombs as “completely immoral.” In January 2007 Israeli deputy prime minister Shimon Peres said the use of cluster bombs was a regrettable mistake and apparently occurred without the prior knowledge of the IDF’s chief-of-staff.

Within Israel the Olmert government came under harsh criticism for its handling of the conflict and the related diplomacy. Many Israelis believed the government responded ineptly to the Hezbollah attacks by relying almost solely on air power at the beginning of the fighting, rather than launching a full-scale invasion into southern Lebanon. Critics of the government cited the lack of military experience of both Olmert and the newly appointed defense minister, Amir Peretz, the leader of the Labor Party. The Olmert government called for an investigation into the military response, but the inquiry itself, known as the Winograd Commission, came under challenge because it was not an official state inquiry. Discontent and concern lingered into the winter.

On October 30, 2006, Prime Minister Olmert won approval of Israel’s cabinet for the parliamentary faction Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel Our Home) to join the government. Led by Avigdor Lieberman, Israel Our Home is a right-wing party that advocates annexation of parts of the West Bank and the transfer of some Arab towns in Israel to a future Palestinian state. By inviting Israel Our Home into the government, Olmert increased to 78 (out of 120) the number of legislators supporting the coalition, giving it a substantial majority. The move also suggested a more rightward and hardline shift for Israel in the wake of the Hamas and Hezbollah attacks. With Hezbollah being supported by Syria and Iran, many Israelis were reminded of statements by Iran’s president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has organized conferences within Iran denying the existence of the Holocaust and opposing Zionism.

In January 2007 the head of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Lieutenant General Dan Halutz, resigned just weeks before the Winograd Commission was due to issue an interim report. Halutz became the third Israeli general to resign in the wake of the war against Hezbollah. He had been criticized in particular for taking the time to sell stock during the first hours of the war. Peretz, too, took the brunt of much of the criticism and resigned as defense minister. He was replaced by former prime minister and Labor Party leader Ehud Barak. When the Winograd Commission issued its final report in January 2008, it placed most of the blame for Israel’s losses in the fighting with Hezbollah on the IDF and largely exonerated Olmert.

Clashes with Hamas over Gaza

Meanwhile, Israel continued to struggle with Hamas and the smaller Islamic Jihad Party, which continued to launch rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip on the Israeli southern border town of Sederot. Hamas had won the Palestinian Legislative Council elections in 2006 and ever since Israel had attempted to undercut its growing popularity among Palestinians, especially in Gaza. Soon after the elections, Israel withheld tax revenues that it continued to collect for the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), apparently in the hope of undermining Hamas. Instead, Hamas appeared to secure its hold on Gaza, even staging a coup and ousting Fatah from Gaza in June 2007.

An informal cease-fire that had existed between Hamas and Israel broke down. Israel resumed its policy of targeted assassinations against Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants after Hamas reportedly failed to control rocket attacks by Islamic Jihad on southern Israel and then began to initiate its own attacks. The relatively small and inaccurate Qassam rockets were responsible for only two Israeli deaths in 2007 but they made life miserable for the residents of Sederot who bore the brunt of thousands of rocket attacks.

In September 2007 Israel declared Gaza a “hostile territory.” Israel began to impose sanctions such as cutting off fuel and electricity and making it more difficult for Gazans to cross the borders into Israel or Egypt. In June 2008, as a result of talks brokered in Egypt, Hamas announced another informal cease-fire. Israeli officials said that they would hold Hamas responsible for any attacks by Islamic Jihad or the Al Aksa Martyrs Brigade, an offshoot of Fatah.

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Israel (country)

Barak’s Tenure

Sharon Becomes Prime Minister

Formation of Kadima and 2006 Elections

Conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon

Clashes with Hamas over Gaza