Waubonsee Community College

The Gaza Strip, its history and politics : from the pharaohs to the Israeli invasion of 2009, Nathan Shachar

eng

Includes bibliographical references and index

illustrationsplatesmaps

index present

non fiction

The Gaza Strip

bibliography

303097580

Nathan Shachar

its history and politics : from the pharaohs to the Israeli invasion of 2009

In antiquity Gaza was a horn of plenty, hub of fabulous networks of desert and maritime trade. Egyptian, Persian and Assyrian emperors fought over it, and so did Alexander the Great, Richard the Lionheart, Saladdin and Napoleon. More recently Gaza's fame has been a place of crisis, anguish and misery. Since 170,000 Palestinian refugees arrived there in 1948, and the Strip became another piece in the intractable Middle Eastern puzzle, it has gone through a succession of bloody upheavals: passing from Egyptian to Israeli to PLO to Hamas' rule, all the while remaining a volatile geopolitical flashpoint. Apart from separating between Israel and the refugees in the southwestern corner of Palestine, the Strip's borders coincide with other momentous fault-lines: between Islamism and secularism, tradition and modernity, East and West - and between the first and third world. Nathan Shachar, veteran correspondent, has covered Gazan affairs for more than three decades. He has personally witnessed much turmoil which has made the Gaza Strip a permanent item of news bulletins for sixty years. This book relates the Gaza Strip's rich and tumultuous history in a highly readable text, which includes time-lines for all major events and personalities (from the Egyptian Pharaoh Thutmose III to Hamas' leader Ismai̕l Haniye). It brings perspective to the recent Israeli invasion of the Strip and its political and social aftermath

The setting : geography, climate, wildlife, and ecology -- Egyptians, Hebrew and Philistines -- Persians, Greeks and Romans -- Freedom of religion and the rise of Christianity -- Arabs and Crusaders, 634-1193 -- Tartars, Mongols, and Mamluks -- Ottoman conquest and rule, 1517-1918 -- The British conquest and mandate, 1917-1948 -- The Nakba and the first Arab-Israeli War : the all-Palestine government of Gaza, 1947-1950 -- Egyptian military rule, 1948-1967 -- Israeli conquest and occupation, 1967-1971 -- Ariel Sharon's "dirty war" : the beginning of Jewish settlement, 1971-1972 -- The quiet years, 1972-1986 -- The outbreak of the first Palestinian uprising, December 1987 -- Economic warfare and the rise of Islamism, 1987-1991 -- Hardship, delusion, and desperation : the First Gulf War, 1990-1991 -- Failure at Madrid and success at Oslo, 1991-1993 -- High hopes and new dangers, 1994-1995 -- Exit Rabin, enter Likud, 1995-1999 -- Barak's gamble and the second Palestinian uprising, 1999-2001 -- The return of Sharon : the destruction of Palestinian self-rule, 2001-2003 -- The death of Yasser Arafat : the evacuation of the strip, 2003-2005 -- Sharon's departure : the Hamas election triumph, 2005-2006 -- Civil War and the Hamas takeover, 2007 -- Operation "Cast Lead", 2008-2009 -- Epilogue: An ideological war of nerves and prestige