Israel/Palestine: The Basics


What are “The Basics” when speaking of Israel/Palestine? Most basic of all: some knowledge of recent history – including a little bit of geography – and the current conditions of life in the occupied territories and within Israel.  Without those, nothing else will make sense, so we encourage those who are new to this subject to read one or more of the historical resources on our history page and look over the maps that illustrate the events in that history.

When learning that history, a timeline may be helpful to pull together the sequence of events over the last century and a glossary can help with unfamiliar terms, titles, and names.

International law is at the crux of what justice advocates require of Israel, so we provide some grounding in international laws that apply to this conflict.

The primary focus of Palestine Portal is church-based advocacy in the United States for a just peace in Israel/Palestine. All such Christian advocacy is a response to the Palestinian Christians theological message and urgent call to action for the global Church. To understand what Christians in the U.S. and around the world are striving for – and why – it is important to hear what the Christians of Palestine are saying to us.