1948 Arab–Israeli War

The 1948 Arab-Israeli War , called the " War of Independence " ( Hebrew : מלחמת העצמאות) by Israelis and " al Nakba " ( Arabic : النكبة, "the catastrophe") by Arabs, was the first in a series of wars in the Arab-Israeli conflict . It established the state of Israel as an independent state, dividing the remaining areas of the British Mandate of Palestine into areas controlled by Egypt and Transjordan .

This includes the entire military personnel count—both combat units and logistical units. Note that the entire Jewish population in Israel in May 1948 was 806,000. Egypt : 10,000 initially, rising to 20,000 Iraq : 3,000 initially, rising to 15,000 – 18,000 Syria : 2,500 – 5,000 Jordan : 8,000 – 12,000 Lebanon : 1,000 Saudi Arabia : 800–1,200 Arab Liberation Army : 3,500 - 6,000 These numbers include only the combat units sent to the former British Mandate of Palestine, not the entire military strength. The 1948 Arab–Israeli War , known by Israelis as the War of Independence ( , Milhemet HaAtzma'ut ) or War of Liberation ( , Milhemet HaShihrur ) and by the Arabs as the Catastrophe ( , al-Nakba ), was the first in a series of wars fought between the newly declared State of Israel and its Arab neighbours in the long-running Arab-Israeli conflict . The war commenced upon the termination of the British Mandate of Palestine in mid-May 1948 following a previous phase of civil war in 1947–1948 . After the Arab rejection of the 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine (UN General Assembly Resolution 181) that would have created an Arab state and a Jewish state side by side, five Arab states invaded the territory of the former British Mandate of Palestine. The war concluded with the 1949 Armistice Agreements , but it did not mark the end of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Benny Morris (2008), 1948: A history of the first Arab-Israeli war . pg. 332 "The formation of Israel by The Ovi Team" . Arab states against israel, 1948 - A map from New York Times including Mutawakkilite Yemen John Pike. Pollack, 2004; Sadeh, 1997 Casualties in Arab-Israeli Wars "What was the course of the War of Independence?" . The War for Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948 . 2nd ed.

Total: 13,000 (initial) 51,100 (minimal) 63,500 (maximum) Casualties and losses 6,373 killed (about 4,000 troops and 2,400 civilians) Arab armies: 3,700-7,000 killed Palestinian Arabs: 3,000-13,000 killed (both fighters and civilians) The 1948 Arab–Israeli War or the First Arab–Israeli War was fought between the State of Israel and a military coalition of Arab states. In Hebrew it is known as The War of Independence ( , Milkhemet Ha'Atzma'ut ) or the War of Liberation ( , Milkhemet HaShikhrur ). This war formed the second stage of the 1948 Palestine war , known in Arabic as The Nakba or Catastrophe ( , al-Nakba ). There had been tension and conflict between the Arabs and the Jews , and between each of them and the British forces, ever since the 1917 Balfour Declaration and the 1920 creation of the British Mandate of Palestine . British policies dissatisfied both Arabs and Jews. The Arabs' opposition developed into the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine , while the Jewish resistance developed into the Jewish insurgency in Palestine (1944–1947). In 1947 these ongoing tensions erupted into civil war , following the 29 November 1947 adoption of the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine which planned to divide Palestine into three areas: an Arab state, a Jewish state and the Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem. On 15 May 1948 the ongoing civil war transformed into an inter-state conflict between Israel and the Arab states, following the Israeli Declaration of Independence the previous day. A combined invasion by Egypt, Jordan and Syria, together with expeditionary forces from Iraq, entered Palestine - Jordan having declared privately to Yishuv emissaries on 2 May it would abide by a decision not to attack the Jewish state. The invading forces took control of the Arab areas and immediately attacked Israeli forces and several Jewish settlements. The 10 months of fighting, interrupted by several truce periods, took place mostly on the former territory of the British Mandate and for a short time also in the Sinai Peninsula and southern Lebanon . As a result of the war the State of Israel retained 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 Jaffa , Lydda and Ramle area, Galilee , some parts of the Negev , a wide strip along the Tel-Aviv - Jerusalem road, West Jerusalem, and some territories in the West Bank . Transjordan took control of the remainder of the former British mandate, which it annexed, and the Egyptian military took control of the Gaza Strip . No state was created for the Palestinian Arabs. The conflict triggered significant demographic change throughout the Middle East. Around 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled from the area that became Israel and they became Palestinian refugees . 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. There are <ref group=Note> tags on this page, but the references will not show without a template (see the help page ).

Total: 13,000 (initial) 51,100 (minimum) 63,500 (maximum) Casualties and losses 6,373 killed (about 4,000 fighters and 2,400 civilians) Arab armies: 3,700–7,000 killed Palestinian Arabs: 3,000–13,000 killed (both fighters and civilians) The 1948 (or First) Arab–Israeli War was the second and final stage of the 1947–49 Palestine war . It formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight on 14 May 1948; the Israeli Declaration of Independence had been issued earlier that day, and a military coalition of Arab states entered the territory of British Palestine in the morning of 15 May. The first deaths of the 1947–49 Palestine war occurred on 30 November 1947 during an ambush of two buses carrying Jews. There had been tension and conflict between the Arabs and the Jews , and between each of them and the British forces since the 1917 Balfour Declaration and the 1920 creation of the British Mandate of Palestine . British policies dissatisfied both Arabs and Jews. Arab opposition developed into the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine , while the Jewish resistance developed into the Jewish insurgency in Palestine (1944–1947). In 1947, these on-going tensions erupted into civil war following the 29 November 1947 adoption of the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine , which planned to divide Palestine into an Arab state, a Jewish state, and the Special International Regime encompassing the cities of Jerusalem and Bethlehem . On 15 May 1948, the civil war transformed into a conflict between Israel and the Arab states following the Israeli Declaration of Independence the previous day. The invading forces took control of the Arab areas and immediately attacked Israeli forces and several Jewish settlements. The 10 months of fighting took place mostly on the territory of the British Mandate and in the Sinai Peninsula and southern Lebanon , interrupted by several truce periods. As a result of the war, the State of Israel controlled the area that UN General Assembly Resolution 181 had recommended for the proposed Jewish state, as well as almost 60-percent of the area of Arab state proposed by the 1947 Partition Plan, including the Jaffa , Lydda , and Ramle area, Galilee , some parts of the Negev , a wide strip along the Tel Aviv – Jerusalem road, West Jerusalem, and some territories in the West Bank . 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 Jericho Conference on 1 December 1948, 2,000 Palestinian delegates called for unification of Palestine and Transjordan as a step toward full Arab unity. 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 Palestinian refugees in what they refer to as Al-Nakba ("the catastrophe"). In the three years following the war, about 700,000 Jews emigrated to Israel. Around 260,000 Jews came to Israel from the Arab world during and immediately after the war. Anita Shapira, L'imaginaire d'Israël : histoire d'une culture politique (2005), Latroun : la mémoire de la bataille , Chap. A Statistical Encyclopedia of Casualty and Other Figures, 1492–2015, 4th ed . A History of the First Arab-Israeli War . There are <ref group=Note> tags on this page, but the references will not show without a template (see the help page ).

Second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war This article is about the international phase of the 1948 Palestine war . The 1948 Arab–Israeli War , also known as the First Arab–Israeli War , followed the civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war . The civil war became a war of separate states with the Israeli Declaration of Independence on 14 May 1948, the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight, and the entry of a military coalition of Arab states into the territory of Mandatory Palestine the following morning. The war formally ended with the 1949 Armistice Agreements which established the Green Line . Since the 1917 Balfour Declaration and the 1920 creation of the British Mandate of Palestine, and in the context of Zionism and the mass migration of European Jews to Palestine , there had been tension and conflict between Arabs, Jews, and the British in Palestine. The conflict escalated into a civil war 30 November 1947, the day after the United Nations adopted the Partition Plan for Palestine proposing to divide the territory into an Arab state, a Jewish state, and an internationally administered corpus separatum for the cities of Jerusalem and Bethlehem . At the end of a campaign beginning April 1948 called Plan Dalet , in which Zionist forces attacked, conquered, and depopulated cities, villages, and territories in Mandatory Palestine in preparation for the establishment of a Jewish state, and just before the expiration of the British Mandate for Palestine , Zionist leaders announced the Israeli Declaration of Independence on 14 May 1948. The following morning, Egypt , Transjordan , Syria , and expeditionary forces from Iraq entered Palestine, taking control of the Arab areas and attacking Israeli forces and settlements. The 10 months of fighting took place mostly on the territory of the British Mandate and in the Sinai Peninsula and southern Lebanon , interrupted by several truce periods. By the end of the war, the State of Israel controlled all of the area that the UN had proposed for a Jewish state, as well as almost 60% of the area proposed for an Arab state, including Jaffa , Lydda and Ramle area, Upper Galilee , some parts of the Negev , the west coast as far as Gaza City , and a wide strip along the Tel Aviv – Jerusalem road. Israel also took control of West Jerusalem , which was meant to be part of an international zone for Jerusalem and its environs. Transjordan took control of East Jerusalem and what became known as the West Bank , annexing it the following year . The territory known today as the Gaza Strip was occupied by Egypt . Expulsions of Palestinians , which had begun during the civil war, continued during the Arab-Israeli war. Hundreds of Palestinians were killed in multiple massacres , such as occurred in the expulsions from Lydda and Ramle . These events are known today as the Nakba ( Arabic for "the catastrophe") and were the beginning of the Palestinian refugee problem . A similar number of Jews moved to Israel during the three years following the war, including 260,000 who migrated, fled, or were expelled from the surrounding Arab states . Anita Shapira, L'imaginaire d'Israël : histoire d'une culture politique (2005), Latroun : la mémoire de la bataille , Chap. A Statistical Encyclopedia of Casualty and Other Figures, 1492–2015 (4th ed.). JSTOR 2537591 . 'Plan Dalet' or 'Plan D' was the name given by the Zionist High Command to the general plan for military operations within the framework of which the Zionists launched successive offensives in April and early May 1948 in various parts of Palestine. After initial Arab gains, Israel counter-attacked successfully, enlarging its national territory... The invasion of Palestine by the Arab Armies started on 15 May, when the Iraqi, Syrian, Jordanian and Egyptian forces crossed the international border.