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Palestinians in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza - A Primer

Updated: Apr 5

Israeli forces occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip in June 1967 during a war with Jordan and Egypt. In 1980, Israel annexed East Jerusalem.

 

From 1993 to 1995, the Oslo Peace Accords prompted the Israeli military’s withdrawal from much of Gaza and divided the West Bank into three distinct jurisdictions:

 

● A areas, 18% of the West Bank’s territory - an archipelago of small urban areas in which the Palestinian Authority (PA) has, in theory, both security and civilian control;

 

● B areas, 22% of the West Bank’s landmass - another urban and semi-urban archipelago in which the PA has jurisdiction over civilian affairs, but where the Israeli military is officially responsible for security;

 

● C areas, 60% of the West Bank - territories where the Israeli military and increasingly civilian Israeli agencies exercise security and civilian control.


A, B, and C zones in the West Bank (source: UN, 2022)
A, B, and C zones in the West Bank (source: UN, 2022)

Palestinians under direct or indirect Israeli control now live in six distinct jurisdictions.[1]


Each of these has its own set of arrangements for governance, security, administration, and juridical rules and authority.

 

The population of these six jurisdictions is roughly 14.4 million, divided equally between Jews and Palestinians.


Some 7.2 million Jewish citizens are subject to the laws of the State of Israel and its civilian government no matter where they live, while roughly 7.2 million Palestinians residing in the Israel-Palestinian space are subject to different administrative and legal regimes.[2]




These six geographic/ administrative/legal spaces are as follows:

 

(1) Israel


Roughly 1.6 million Christian and Muslim Palestinians (22% of the total 7.2 million Palestinians in these six jurisdictions and roughly 16% of Israel’s 9.6 million citizens as of 2023) live within Israel’s internationally recognized borders.[3] They hold Israeli citizenship and are subject to Israeli law.

 

Palestinian citizens of Israel, as individuals, enjoy formal legal equality with their Jewish counterparts. They vote in elections, move freely within the country, and are equally represented before the law.


Civil rights organizations have documented various forms of discrimination against Israeli-Palestinian citizens.[4] The problem crops up most notably in the country's political processes, land use planning, and public service budgeting, notably in education and healthcare.  


In 2018, the Israeli parliament (known as the Knesset) passed a Jewish Nation-State Basic Law with constitution-like status, establishing Israel as the “nation-state of the Jewish People.” This law stipulates that only Jews have collective, national, and historical rights in the country, and the ensuing debate made clear how upset many Palestinian-Israeli citizens were by this.[5]

 

The number of Palestinians with Israeli citizenship in the Israeli parliament tends to hover at around the 10% mark, substantially below their 16% share of the country's citizenry.


Arab legislators are typically barred, by convention, from serving as cabinet ministers. In 2021-22, however, Issawi Frej of the Jewish-majority party Meretz did serve as a minister for regional cooperation, and in that same government, a Palestinian-majority party, Ra’am, formally joined the country’s ruling coalition for the first time, albeit without a cabinet minister.  

 

Palestinians vote in Israeli elections at a lower rate than their Jewish co-citizens. Palestinian turnout in the 2022 elections was 53%, compared to 70% for the Israeli population overall. Historically, Palestinian turnout has ranged from 40 to 50%. In 2020, several Palestinian-Israeli political parties joined together in a shared slate, pushing turnout to 63.5%, the highest ever recorded.

 

(2) East Jerusalem


Some 350,000 Palestinians (roughly 5% of the 7.2 million total Palestinian population under Israeli jurisdiction, and roughly 38% of Jerusalem’s population of 900,000) live in East Jerusalem and hold permanent Israeli residence status.[6] Israel formally offered East Jerusalem Palestinians citizenship when it annexed the eastern part of the city in 1980. Most reject Israeli citizenship, however, considering it a threat to their membership in the Palestinian nation and a future Palestinian state.

 

Palestinian permanent residents have many of the same rights and benefits as Israeli citizens, save for the right to participate in national elections. They appear before Israeli courts and access Israeli social services. At the same time, they face some of the same discrimination encountered by Israel’s Palestinian citizens, as well as a unique legal threat: If the Israeli Ministry of Interior determines Jerusalem is no longer a person’s permanent home, they will revoke their permanent resident status.

 

Palestinian permanent residents can move freely in Israel and exit the country through its air and seaports and land crossings. And while the Israeli authorities ban its citizens from entering A areas in the West Bank, security forces do not typically prevent Palestinians with Israeli papers (citizens and permanent residents) from doing so.

 

(3,4) West Bank Areas A and B

Roughly 2.8 million Palestinians - some 40% of the total 7.2 million and 80-85% of Palestinians living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem - live in A and B areas.[7] A and B areas are not contiguous; instead, they are composed of some 200 distinct sub-areas.

 

Palestinians in A and B zones are subject to two legal and administrative regimes: the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the Israeli military. The PA, in theory, controls civilian and security affairs in A zones and civilian issues in B zones. The PA can do little in either area without Israeli military authorization, however, as Israeli-controlled areas surround the A and B zones, allowing Israeli security forces to quickly isolate them at will. The PA’s budget, moreover, enjoys substantial funding from taxes collected and transferred by Israel, and this financial lifeline can be easily disconnected. Israeli troops often enter A areas, typically with the tacit cooperation of the PA, who would, in any case, be unable to prevent these incursions.

 

Palestinians in A and B areas cannot enter East Jerusalem, Israel, or traverse Israeli territory to Gaza without permission. Palestinians cannot reach Israeli or East Jerusalem hospitals without military permission or use the Israeli airport. Their only regular point of exit to the outside world is through the Allenby Bridge into Jordan, the use of which is regulated both by the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli military.

 

Palestinian residents in A and B areas are subject to the PA police, courts, and land planning agencies.

 

Importantly, however, Palestinians in these areas are also subject to Israeli military law and courts for security matters. The Israeli military can arrest, indict, and imprison Palestinians in A and B zones for security offenses, designate entities of one kind or another in those zones as illegal, or impose sanctions of various kinds.

 

Palestinians in the A and B areas do not vote in Israeli elections and have few rights under Israeli domestic law. Although they are subject to Israeli military law, they can appeal military decisions or policies to the civilian Israeli Supreme Court. There, lawyers typically make arguments based both on international law (human rights law and those aspects of the Fourth Geneva Conventions that pertain to occupied territories) and Israeli domestic law.

 

(5) West Bank Area C Some 200,000-300,000 Palestinians live in Area C, comprising roughly 3% of the total 7.2 million Palestinians living under direct or indirect Israeli rule, and 7% of the Palestinian West Bank population of 3.1 million.

 

Area C enjoys greater territorial contiguity than A and B. Palestinians living in Area C typically lead rural or semi-nomadic lives and are subject to Israeli military control for security and civilian issues. In particular, the Israeli Office for the Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) controls land use planning. In recent years, COGAT has turned down most Palestinian requests for residential or infrastructure construction. At the same time, civilian Israeli ministries authorize, fund, and promote Jewish settlement throughout the C zone.[8]

 

There are now roughly 400,000 Jewish settlers in Area C, but are subject to an entirely different legal system than their Palestinian neighbors. The Israeli state governs Jewish settlers through civilian bodies and Israeli law but governs Palestinians in Areas A, B and C through the military courts. Although Palestinians are unequally treated when compared to Jews in all six jurisdictions, this inequality is at its most stark in Area C.

 

Palestinians in Area C cannot access the Palestinian Authority for most services, including legal protection. For many years, their only legal recourse was the Israeli Supreme Court, typically through the offices of private Israeli lawyers or NGOs. In the last few years, however, the Israeli government has begun allowing the Israeli district court in East Jerusalem to deal with some legal matters in Area C, typically concerning land use and freedom of movement.

 

Palestinians in all areas of the West Bank and Gaza face movement restrictions, but Area C farmers face a unique challenge in that some of their lands are on the wrong side of the separation barrier dividing the West Bank from Israel and East Jerusalem. That barrier runs through Area C but does not always track Israel’s internationally recognized border. As a result, some Area C farmers are cut off from their lands.  

 

(6) The Gaza Strip


Some 2.2 million Palestinians (roughly 30% of the 7.2 million Palestinians under some form of Israeli control) live in Gaza. Until 2007, the Palestine Authority was responsible for security and civilian affairs in the Strip, but that year an armed conflict between Hamas and the Palestine Authority left the Strip in Hamas’ hands.

 

Later that year, the Israeli Cabinet declared Gaza “enemy territory” and said Israel reserved the right to restrict supplies of food, fuel, electricity, and other goods when necessary. Israel has no official ties to the Hamas leadership, which does not recognize Israel or Palestinian Authority agreements with Israel. The Palestinian Authority is at peace with Israel, but Hamas and Israel consider themselves to be in a state of war.

 

Israel does not allow anyone from Israel, the West Bank, or East Jerusalem to enter Gaza without express authorization. Theoretically, Gaza residents can exit the Strip through a northern checkpoint into Israel or a southern checkpoint into Egypt, but in practice, Israel and Egypt tightly restrict both crossing points.

 

Notes


[1] Although Palestinians, NGOs working with them, and international actors are acutely aware of these six different jurisdictions, most Jewish Israelis (and many foreign visitors) are not, as their different rules on freedom of movement, legal rights, and political representation do not apply to them. The “Green Line '' between Israel and the West Bank, which demarcates Israel’s internationally recognized borders, does not appear in Israeli maps, and the government does not distinguish between these areas when it comes to Jewish civilians, save for barring their entrance to A areas. As a result, many Jewish Israelis cannot say where the West Bank or East Jerusalem is located, and few use those terms. Instead, most refer to the West Bank either as “the territories'' or as “Judea and Samaria.” The same is not true for Gaza, however, where the border is clearly specified.

[2] The 7.2 million estimate includes Palestinians living in these six jurisdictions. A further 3.4 million are registered with the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Jordan (2.3 million), Lebanon (480,000), and Syria (568,000). 

[3] According to the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics, almost 10 million people lived in Israel in 2023, of whom 9.6 million were citizens. Some 1.6 million of these were Christian and Muslim Palestinian Arabs with Israeli citizenship, while another 150,000 were Israeli citizens from the Druze religious community, whose political identity differs.

[4] Recent efforts to document discrimination against Palestinian citizens of Israel include reports by international NGOs on the broader Israeli system of control, with reference therein to Palestinian citizens. These include Amnesty International (2022), Israel’s Apartheid against Palestinians, available at https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/mde15/5141/2022/en/, and Human Rights Watch (2021) A Threshold Crossed, available at https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/israeli-authorities-and-crimes-apartheid-and-persecution.


For background on Israeli-Palestinian citizens, see the Council on Foreign Relations’ 2023 paper, “What to Know about the Arab Citizens of Israel,” available at https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/what-know-about-arab-citizens-israel; the Israeli Democracy Institute’s webpage, Arab Citizens of Israel, available at https://en.idi.org.il/tags-en/1905; and a primer published by a Palestinian NGO in Israel, Adalah, available at https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/9271, along with their list of allegedly discriminatory Israeli laws, available at https://www.adalah.org/en/content/view/7771.  

[5] Raoul Wootlif (2018). ”Israel Passes Jewish State Law, Enshrining National Home of the Jewish People,’” Times of Israel, available at https://www.timesofisrael.com/knesset-votes-contentious-jewish-nation-state-bill-into-law/.

[6] A recent overview of East Jerusalem issues by a credible international commentator is the International Crisis Group’s 2019 report, Reversing Israel’s Deepening Annexation of Occupied East Jerusalem, available at https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/eastern-mediterranean/israelpalestine/202-reversing-israels-deepening-annexation-occupied-east-jerusalem. A more dated international overview is available in the Norwegian Refugee Council’s 2013 report, The Legal Status of East Jerusalem, available at https://www.nrc.no/globalasets/pdf/reports/the-legal-status-of-east-jerusalem.pdf.

[7] International reviews of the legal system and human rights conditions in the Palestinian West Bank include the above-cited reports by Amnesty International (2022) and Human Rights Watch (2021), as well as the website of the Israeli NGO, B’Tselem: https://www.btselem.org/.  A visual presentation of relevant data is available in the UN Office of the Coordinator of Humanitarian Affairs’ 2019 Occupied Palestinian Territory Humanitarian Atlas, available at https://www.ochaopt.org/atlas2019/images/db/atlas-final.pdf.  

[8] For recent data on Jewish settlements in the West Bank (but not East Jerusalem), see the “Settlements Watch” website of the Israeli NGO, Peace Now: https://peacenow.org.il/en.


About James Ron

Learn more about James on his website and LinkedIn profile. To read his scholarly articles, please visit James' ResearchGate and Academia.edu profiles. To learn how other scholars have used his work in their research, please visit his Google Scholar page. You can read James' social science blog here and his personal blog here. 

 

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