Arab–Israeli conflict Arabs emerged in the early 20th century, peaking into a full-scale civil war in 1947 and transforming into the First Arab–Israeli War in May 1948, following the Israeli Declaration of Independence. Large-scale hostilities mostly ended with the cease-fire agreements after the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Peace agreements were signed between Israel and Egypt in 1979, resulting in Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai Peninsula and abolishment of the military governance system in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, in favor of Israeli Civil Administration and consequent unilateral annexation of the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem. The nature of the conflict has
Views on the Arab–Israeli conflict Palestinian residential areas in the name of Israeli security add to the poor conditions and lack of opportunities for the Palestinians. This is a frequently-used point of indignation against Israel by Palestinian sympathizers. Arab publications and others have compared Zionism to German Nazism and other historical examples of oppression and ethnic cleansing. Many Arabs, and others, believe Israel practices a form of Israeli apartheid against the Palestinian people, as bad as, or worse than, that practiced by South Africa, and that Zionism is a form of colonialism and has been carried out through extensive ethnic cleansing against the "indigenous people