Bokhari, who teaches a UD course entitled “Arab-Israeli Politics and Middle Eastern Geopolitics,” began his talk by reflecting on the acrimonious debate that often stifles conversation and, more insidiously, education.

“There’s an intelligence problem — we have too much. The amount and volume have caused a decline in our ability to analyze,” he said. “Everyone is shouting in the ether, and there’s no sense of how we got here.” 

Speaking to an audience of primarily students, he offered a crash-course into the complexities of the region’s geopolitical landscape. Although the history spans thousands of years, the makings of the modern-day conflict can be partially understood in a three-year timespan from the early 1900s: 

In 1915, in the middle of World War I, the British and the Hashemite tribal leaders in Arabia embarked on an agreement in which the Arabs helped the British defeat the Ottomans in return for an independent Arab kingdom. In 1916, under the Sykes-Picot Treaty between Britain and France, the two countries agreed to split Ottoman Empire holdings, with Syria and Lebanon falling to the French, and [modern-day] Israel, the Palestinian territories, Jordan and Iraq to the Brits. In 1917, the British government issued the Balfour Declaration, which announced their support for a Jewish homeland in Palestine.

“In three successive years, you have three different promises by the colonial powers,” Bokhari explained. “Promising the same territory to different entities sowed the seeds of the conflict that has been unfolding since. It sets the stage for the conflict we see to this day.” 

It is a conflict that has simmered and sometimes boiled over, and Bokhari provided a broader overview.  

In 1947, an organized movement by Jewish Holocaust survivors inside Palestine sought to create a homeland just as Palestinians sought the same. “The Jewish community was far more organized,” he said. They declared a state in 1948. 

The first Arab-Israeli war began soon after. Armies from Egypt, Syria, Jordan and Iraq invaded Israel, “not asking for Palestine,” but rejecting a Jewish state. 

This was taking place in the context of the age of Arab Nationalism, and, according to Bokhari, “a moment of intellectual confusion,” as Arab people across borders felt deserving of an Arab nation and country while existing simultaneously as Syrians, Egyptians, Jordanians and more.

After the war, Israel gained more territory than initially agreed upon in the 1947 UN Partition Plan. Egypt now controlled Gaza, Jordan controlled the West Bank, and that remained unchanged from 1949 to 1967. 

In 1967, Arab states again attacked Israel, but Israeli intelligence learned of the plan and launched a preemptive strike. The ensuing Six-Day War ended in Arab defeat, with Gaza and the West Bank falling under Israeli control.

The territorial struggle would evolve from an Arab-Israeli conflict to an Israeli-Palestinian one, as the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), formed in 1964, sought to establish a Palestinian state. The long, tumultuous battle would include talks of a “two-state solution,” with Israel withdrawing to its 1967 lines (rejected by the PLO); an Israeli push that would move the PLO from Israel to Jordan to Lebanon to Tunisia, “further away from Palestinian territories and unable to play a direct role,” according to Bokhari; and the rise of Hamas, whose increasing violence would sabotage an already-fragile and weak peace process during the late 1980s and ’90s. 

After Israel’s 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, Hamas gained even greater power, winning elections against the PLO in 2006 and shifting the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to what would become — and remain — an intra-Palestinian conflict, in which there are effectively two Palestinian entities: Hamas in Gaza, and the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. This set the stage for Gaza wars in 2008-09, 2012, 2014, 2021 — and the unprecedented attack on Oct. 7.  

“Hopefully, this conversation helps you process and make sense of the things you hear,” Bokhari said of the condensed history he shared. 

Speaking before a rapt audience, he then fielded numerous insightful questions, from more than 50 submitted: 

Does the history of conflict impact how we view the multi-faceted set of current tragedies? 

“Understanding history allows us to understand: What were the mistakes made? What can we learn from it? What can we do differently moving forward? History is crucial.”

How have antisemitism and Islamophobia played a part in this conflict? 

“Antisemitism is real. It shapes conflict. And it shapes the public view of what the Arab-Israeli, Arab-Palestinian conflict should look like. Antisemitism and Islamophobia together are exacerbating what is otherwise a geopolitical conflict over real estate.

“I am an alumnus of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. As a North American Muslim, I’ve engaged in interfaith dialogue to understand Israeli and Jewish concerns. It’s a very fruitful conversation. 

“Until Oct. 7, there was a meeting of minds between Jewish and Arab communities in the United States, given the political climate and rise of antisemitism and Islamophobia from the Far Right. Unfortunately, that has been torpedoed. Nobody is talking about interfaith right now.” 

What’s the feasibility of a two-state, or even three-state solution? 

“That’s probably the most difficult question. I don’t think it’s possible from a purely analytical, forecasting perspective. For it to work, you need two sides willing to negotiate.”

Why is the United States so invested in this conflict? 

“The U.S. began to inherit this area as the Great Power from Britain after 1945, and it wasn’t until 1967 that the U.S. became the biggest global supporter of Israel. It hasn’t existed from the start. In fact, the Eisenhower administration pressured Britain, France and Israel to end their invasion of Egypt in the 1956 war. In 1991, when Israel’s government didn’t want to negotiate with the PLO, George H.W. Bush’s administration threatened to withhold nearly $10 million in loan guarantees. There’s a lot of nuance, which is why history is so important. Otherwise, we come up with absolute notions.” 

About the speaker

Kamran Bokhari is senior director of the Eurasian Security and Prosperity Portfolio at the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy in Washington, D.C. He is currently teaching a course at UD titled “Arab Israeli Politics: Middle Eastern Geopolitics.”

Bokhari is also a national security and foreign policy specialist at the University of Ottawa's Professional Development Institute. Bokhari has served as the Central Asia studies course coordinator at the U.S. Department of State's Foreign Service Institute.

He was a fellow with the Program on Extremism at George Washington University. Bokhari has also been a senior consultant with the World Bank. He has 15 years of experience in the private sector intelligence space, during which he provided intellectual leadership in the publishing of cutting-edge geopolitical analysis and forecasts.