23.3: India, Israel, and Palestine

Despite the enormous pressure exerted by the superpowers, some independence movements did manage to avoid becoming a proxy conflict during the Cold War. From Asia to Latin America, independence movements and rebel groups that adopted communist ideology were targeted by the US. In other global regions, some countries could fight for independence and stay in the good grace of the USSR (as with Egypt) without openly embracing communism. Meanwhile, the Truman Doctrine committed the United States to armed intervention in the case of a communist-backed uprising.

After quickly growing in the 19th Century, colonial empires collapsed following World War II, in a phenomena known as decolonization. By the 1960s, the entire continent of Africa was independent of European power. Likewise, European possessions in Asia all but vanished in the postwar era.

Decolonization was often as bloody and inhumane as had been the establishment of empire in the first place. In some cases, such as Dutch control of Indonesia and French sovereignty in Indochina, European powers clung desperately to colonies in the name of retaining their geopolitical relevance. In others, such as the British in Kenya and the French in Algeria, large numbers of white settlers refused to be “abandoned” by the European metropole, leading to sometimes staggering levels of violence. That being noted, there were also major (soon to be former) colonies that achieved independence without the need for violent insurrection against their imperial masters.

(Note: Given the large number of countries that achieved independence during the period of decolonization, this chapter concentrates on some of the particularly consequential cases in terms of their geopolitical impact over time).

India

Long the "jewel in the crown of the British empire", India was both an economic powerhouse and a massive symbol of British prestige. By World War II, the Indian National Congress had agitated for independence for almost sixty years Despite the growth in nationalist sentiment, 2.5 million Indian troops served the British Empire. These troops returned to find a social and political system still designed to keep Indians from positions of importance in the Indian administration. Peaceful protests grew in intensity. In the aftermath, and in part because of the financial devastation of the war, a critical mass of British politicians finally conceded that India would have be granted independence in the near future. The British state established the date of independence as July 18, 1947.

The British government made it clear that the actual logistics of independence and of organizing a new government were to be left to the Indians. A conflict exploded between the Indian Muslim League and the Hindu-dominated Congress Party, with the former demanding an independent Muslim state. With the British support of the idea, the Congress Party conceded despite the vociferous resistance of the independence leader Mahatma Gandhi. As a result, India was divided between a non-contiguous Muslim state, Pakistan, and a majority-Hindu state, India.

This event is referred to as "The Partition" of India. Millions of Muslims were driven from India and millions of Hindus and Sikhs were forced from Pakistan. Countless acts of violence accompanied the expulsion of both Muslims and Hindus from what had been their homes. Historians estimate that between 200,000 and 2 million people died in the process. Gandhi, who bitterly opposed the Partition, was murdered by a Hindu extremist in 1948. Relations between Pakistan and India are still tense today.

Figure 23.2.1: The partitioning involved two of India's biggest provinces, Punjab and Bengal. The details of where the new international boundary would lie were made public only two days after independence. Source: BBC

Israel and Palestine

Religious and ethnic divides within former colonies were not unique to India. Indeed, the “national” borders of states like Iraq, Ghana, and Rwanda had been arbitrarily created by the imperial powers decades earlier with complete disregard for the religious and ethnic differences of the people who lived there. For example, in Iraq, both Sunni and Shia Muslims, Christian Arabs (the Assyrians, many of whom claim a direct line of descent from ancient Assyria), different Arab ethnicities, and Kurds all lived side-by-side. That diversity did not guarantee violent conflict, but when circumstances arose that inspired conflict, violence could, and often did, result.

The current ongoing crisis of Israel – Palestine is a result of arbitrary borders drawn up by former imperial powers as well as a unique case of a nationalist movement achieving its goals for an ethnic-religious homeland. The British had held the “mandate” (political governorship) of the territory of Palestine before WWII, having seized it after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. Thousands of European Jews had already immigrated to Palestine, fleeing anti-Semitism in Europe, and hoping to create a Jewish state as part of the Zionist movement founded during the Dreyfus Affair in France.

During World War I, the British had promised to support the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. In addition, Britain's Balfour Declaration of 1917 specifically included language that promised the Arabs of Palestine (both Muslim and Christian) support in ensuring their own “civil and religious rights.” In other words, the dominant European power that was to directly rule the area from 1920 – 1947, tried to appease both sides with sometimes vague assurances.

After World War I, the British established control over a large swath of territory that included the future state of Israel, frustrating Arab hopes for their own independence. Between 1918 and 1939, the Jewish population of Palestine went from roughly 60,000 to 650,000 as Jews attracted to Zionism moved to the area. The entire period was replete with riots and growing hostility between the Arab and Jewish populations, with the British trying (and generally failing) to keep the peace.

In April 1947, unable and unwilling to try to manage the volatile region, the British turned the territory over to the newly-created United Nations. The UN’s plan to divide the territory into two states – one for Arabs and one for Jews – was rejected by all of the countries in the region. The creation of Israel as a formal state occurred in May of 1948. Nine months of war followed between the state of Israel and a coalition of the surrounding Arab states: Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon, along with small numbers of volunteers from other Arab countries. Israel consistently fielded larger, better-trained, and better-equipped armies in the ensuing war. Arab states were in their infancy, and Jewish settlers in Palestine had spent years organizing their own militias. When the dust settled, there were nearly a million Palestinian refugees and a state that promised to be the center of conflict for decades to come.

Since the creation of Israel, there have been three more full-scale regional wars:

• the 1956 Suez War, which had no lasting consequences besides adding fuel to future conflicts
• the Six-Day War of 1967, which resulted in great territorial gains for Israel
• the Yom Kippur War of 1973, which undid some of the previous gains.

In addition to the actual wars, there have been ongoing explosions of violence between Palestinians and Israelis that continue to the present.

Source: The Sun

In 2005, Israel left Gaza and Hamas took control after winning the elections. However, Israel still controls most of Gaza's borders and coastal territory, deciding who can get in and out of region, including goods. Hamas, the largest militant Islamist group in Palestine, refuses to recognize Israel as a country, and wants Palestinians to be able to return to their own home. Their resistance to occupation has led to rocket attacks from Gaza, which causes Israel to retaliate with further force. As of 2021, Israel is dominated by right-wing parties opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state.