At the beginning of the founding of Israel, the land area was only 14,000 square kilometers, and the living space was small, and then Israel encroached on the territory of Palestine, Syria and other countries, so that its actual control area reached 25,000 square kilometers. Israel is very greedy for its territory, and after encroaching on the territory of countries such as Palestine, it would rather suffer endless reprisals from the Palestinian armed forces than return the territory to Palestine. At the same time, Israel has always coveted Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, so why did it return it to Egypt after occupying it by force?
First, the source of contradictions between Israel and Egypt
The Hebrews, the ancestors of the Jews, lived in Canaanite (Palestine) for a long time. The Jews also saw the land of Canaan as the Promised Land, a territory that God had given them. Later, the Romans occupied Palestine, and their persecution of Jews caused large numbers of Jews to leave their homes and wander around the world. After the decline of the Roman Empire, it was defeated by the Arabs, and Palestine became Arab territory. After the rise of the Ottoman Empire, Palestine became Ottoman territory. During World War I, the Ottoman Empire suffered a crushing defeat to Britain, France, Russia and other countries, disintegrated, and Palestine fell into the hands of the British Empire.
At the end of World War II, Palestine was a British trusteeship.
After the Jews wandered to Europe and other places, they have been discriminated against and ostracized by Europeans, especially during World War II, Nazi Germany brazenly killed Jews, resulting in the tragic death of 6 million Jews. To escape persecution by Nazi Germany, many Jews were forced to flee Europe, and many of them returned to their promised land, Palestine, where they wanted to establish their own state.
During World War II, the unfortunate experience of the Jews won the sympathy of the people of the world, so the United States, the Soviet Union and other countries decided to help the Jews build a country of their own. In 1947, under the leadership of the United States, Britain and other countries, the United Nations adopted the Palestinian-Israeli partition plan, dividing Palestine into two and establishing a predominantly Jewish state and a predominantly Arab state. The Palestinian-Israeli partition plan is extremely unfair under the manipulation of the United States and Britain, and the Arabs, who make up the majority of the population, have only obtained 45% of the land in Palestine, while the Jews, who have a minority population, have obtained 55% of the land in Palestine, which has triggered collective dissatisfaction among Arab countries.
On May 14, 1948, after the establishment of the State of Israel, Egypt, the boss of the Arab world, united with Syria, Lebanon, Transjordan, Iraq and other fraternal Arab countries to launch a war against Israel, wanting to eliminate Israel from Palestinian land. At the beginning of the war, the Arab countries had the upper hand and almost let Israel perish, but with the assistance of the United States, Britain and other countries, the Israelis miraculously turned defeat into victory, defeated Egypt, Syria and other countries, and won the first Middle East war.
Second, the fight for the Sinai Peninsula
Although Egypt and other countries lost the first Middle East war, the hatred of Arab countries against Israel has not been eliminated by the end of the war.
The Suez Canal, which connects the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea, is an important shipping route from Asia to Europe. In 1869, it was jointly funded by France and Egypt. After the completion of the construction of the Suez Canal, due to the small number of ships passing through, the perennial income could not make ends meet, and the loss was serious, the Egyptian government owed a huge debt when building the Suez Canal, in order to solve the financial problem, it sold 44% of its shares in the Suez Canal to the United Kingdom, and Britain and France controlled the Suez Canal. After the end of World War II, the Suez Canal became the busiest shipping lane in the world, and Britain and France made a lot of money. At this time, Egypt wanted to take Suez for itself.
The Suez Canal, in addition to bringing great economic value to Britain and France, it also connects the two continents of Europe and Asia, and its strategic value is extremely important, which makes Britain and France reluctant to return the Suez Canal to Egypt. The Egyptian government directly used administrative means to forcibly recover the Suez Canal. For this, it offended Britain and France. In order to recapture the Suez Canal, Britain and France united Israel to launch the Suez Canal War, also known as the Second Middle East War, against Egypt. The combined forces of Britain, France and Israel quickly defeated the Egyptian army, the British and French troops controlled the Suez Canal, and Israel had always coveted Egypt's Sinai Peninsula and sent troops to occupy the Sinai Peninsula.
The Sinai Peninsula, located at the northeastern tip of Egypt, covers an area of 61,000 square kilometers and borders Egypt and the Palestinian Gaza Strip. Israel has always coveted Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, if the Sinai Peninsula can be taken for itself, Israel's land area can be increased by 5 times, which can solve the problem of Israel's lack of land, but the invasion of Egypt by Britain, France and Israel not only affected the shipping of the Suez Canal, but also challenged the new world order dominated by the United States and the Soviet Union after World War II, causing dissatisfaction among the United States, the Soviet Union and Arab countries.
In order to support Egypt and the Arab countries, the Soviet Union threatened to bomb Britain nuclear. The United States was worried that if this matter was not handled well, it would make all Arab countries fall to the Soviet Union, which was not conducive to its own competition for world hegemony, so it put pressure on Britain and France, used economic means to suppress Britain, and finally forced Britain and France to make concessions, abandon the Suez Canal, withdraw from Egypt, and Israel also withdrew from the Sinai Peninsula.
In 1958, Egypt and Syria merged to form the United Arab Republic, or Arab League for short, which exposed Israel to both the north and the south of the Arab League threat. At the same time, Egypt signed a five-year mutual defense treaty with Jordan. In 1964, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon reached an agreement on the use of the Jordan River, mainly because they wanted to cut off the Jordan River's water flow into Israel.
In 1967, Egypt blocked the Strait of Tiran, Israel's southern outlet to the sea. The unprecedented solidarity of the Arab States and the siege of Israel have made Israel feel a crisis. On June 5, 1967, the Israeli Air Force poured out and attacked 25 air bases in Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Jordan, causing heavy damage to the air forces of the four countries, of which Egypt lost 95% of its 336 fighters and paralyzed the entire air force. Subsequently, the Israeli ground army began to attack, under the cover of the air force, quickly defeated the Arab army, occupied Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, Syria's Golan Heights, Palestine's Old City of Jerusalem and other places.
In the third Middle East war, the Arab countries were defeated and lost a lot of territory, and finally under the mediation of the United States and the Soviet Union, Arab-Israeli war ended.
On 6 October 1973, Egypt and Syria launched the fourth Middle East war against Israel in order to retake the Israeli-occupied Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights. In this war, Egypt and Syria received help from Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan, Algeria, Palestine, Tunisia and other countries. Early in the war, the Arab coalition gained the upper hand, and Egypt defeated the Israeli army and recaptured the Sinai Peninsula. After the strategic objective was achieved, Egypt stopped the offensive, which gave Israel a respite, organized a counteroffensive by its soldiers, and finally defeated Egypt and recaptured the Sinai Peninsula. The Syrian army also lost to Israel in the Golan Heights.
Thirdly, Israel returns the Sinai Peninsula
In the fourth Middle East war, although Israel defeated Egypt and Syria, inflicting 8,500 casualties on the Arab coalition, it also paid the price of 2,800 casualties itself. Egypt, with more than 1 million square kilometers of land, tens of millions of people, now the population is as high as 104 million, Israel's population, only millions, can not consume Egypt, which makes Israel quite afraid of Egypt.
The Sinai Peninsula is very important to Egypt, Egypt's Suez Canal, and the most densely populated Nile Delta, located next to the Sinai Peninsula, if Israel is allowed to control the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt will not sleep well, so Egypt will not cede the Sinai Peninsula to Israel.
Egypt will continue to wage war against Israel in order to recover the Sinai Peninsula, which will keep Israel under the threat of Egypt for a long time. And Israel? Every year, Egypt spends a lot of resources to guard against it, making it insecure. In order to eliminate the Egyptian threat, in 1978, under the mediation of US President Jimmy Carter, Israel and Egypt signed the famous "Camp David Agreement", Israel agreed to return the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt, Egypt and Israel signed a peace agreement, and allowed Israeli ships to pass through the Suez Canal.
After the reconciliation between Egypt and Israel, although it was dissatisfied by Arab countries and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat was assassinated by extremists, the Arab League survived in name only, and there was no more military action to jointly besiege Israel, and Israel's security improved.