In 1948, there were approximately 860,000 Palestinians inside today’s Israel. About 700,000 were driven out or fled during the fighting that followed the declaration of Israeli statehood. The Palestinian population of Jerusalem went from 75,000 to 3,500; of Jaffa from 70,000 to 3,600; of Haifa from 71,000 to 2,900; of Lydda-Ramle from 35,000 to 2,000; of Tiberias from 5,300 to zero. All refugees lost their property (about 800,000 acres were taken for Israeli use.). The 160,000 Palestinians still in Israel in 1949 when the fighting stopped lost another 250,000 acres. The Palestinians in Israel were left without resources or strong leaders.

When the Likud Party took power in 1977, it intensified colonization, pouring some $1 billion into settlement building over the next seven years. Today, land taken from the Palestinians and earmarked for military purposes or Jewish settlements amounts to more than 52% of the most fertile areas of the West Bank and 40% of the Gaza Strip. Only a very small percentage of this land was sold willingly by Palestinians. Most of it was confiscated, and is held to be for Jews only-not just Jews from Israel, but Jews from anywhere in the world. Many newly-arrived immigrants from the United States and Russia are given heavily financed housing in the settlements built on seized Palestinian land. By 1990, according to Israeli estimates, 83% of the water from the West Bank will be diverted to Jewish settlements and Israel. The indigenous Palestinians will get only 17% of their own water. This taking of natural resources from the Palestinians, are the reasons for the rise in conflict.

To a large extent Jews and Palestinians are geographically concentrated. Most Jews live in Israel and most Palestinians live in the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem. There are exceptions of course. Many Jews live in the new ring of suburbs around East Jerusalem and in the new settlements in the West Ban