Israeli Military Control of the West Bank: Origins, International Framework, and Post-1967 Realities
The Israeli military’s administration of the West Bank originates in the defensive Six-Day War of June 1967. Before that conflict the territory was under Jordanian control. After the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Jordan occupied the area west of the Jordan River, including East Jerusalem, and formally annexed it in 1950—an annexation recognized by only a few states. Under Jordanian rule, Jewish communities that had lived in the region for centuries were expelled or destroyed, and the Arab population lived under Jordanian sovereignty.
By spring 1967 the strategic situation had become existential for Israel. Egypt expelled United Nations peacekeepers from Sinai, massed large forces on Israel’s border, and closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping—an internationally recognized act of war. Syria intensified artillery attacks from the Golan Heights. Arab leaders openly called for Israel’s destruction. Jordan, linked by a defense pact to Egypt, placed its army under Egyptian command. Facing multi-front threats and the risk of being overwhelmed, Israel launched a preemptive strike against Egyptian air power on 5 June 1967. When Jordanian forces opened fire on Israeli positions in Jerusalem and along the armistice lines, Israel responded and within days captured the West Bank.
Israel could have expelled the Arab (predominantly Muslim) population from the newly captured territory, as many conquering armies in history have done and as Arab states had done to their Jewish populations after 1948. It chose not to. Hundreds of thousands of Arabs remained in their homes and towns. Muslim religious life, mosques, and daily practice continued. This decision stands in sharp contrast to the systematic expulsion or forced departure of approximately 800,000–850,000 Jews from Arab and Muslim countries in the years following Israel’s independence. Those Jewish communities were largely erased; today virtually no Jewish communities are permitted to establish or maintain themselves freely in Arab countries. Israel, by contrast, retained the Arab population under its control after 1967.
United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, adopted in November 1967, formed the main international framework for addressing the territorial outcome of the war. The resolution called for the “withdrawal of Israel armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict” and for the termination of all claims of belligerency, respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of every state in the area, and the right of every state to live in peace within “secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.” Critically, the English text—the authoritative negotiating language—does not say “all the territories” or “the territories.” This deliberate wording has been understood by Israel and several other parties to allow for negotiated adjustments rather than a full return to the vulnerable 1949 armistice lines. Resolution 242 also linked withdrawal to peace and recognition, principles that were not fulfilled by the Arab states at the time (the Khartoum summit’s “three no’s”: no peace, no recognition, no negotiation).
For the next quarter-century the West Bank remained under Israeli military administration. Israel applied security measures necessary in a territory that had been a launching pad for attacks and that bordered its population centers. This included control of strategic high ground, roads, and certain structures when required for military necessity or counter-terrorism. In some cases the military took temporary or longer-term control of individual houses or buildings for observation posts, to neutralize threats, or in connection with enforcement of building regulations in areas under its full authority. Such actions occurred within the framework of military government and, later, under the dual legal systems that developed in the territory. They were driven by security requirements in an unresolved conflict rather than by a policy of wholesale population displacement.
The Oslo Accords of the 1990s marked a major attempt to move from military administration toward a political settlement. The 1993 Declaration of Principles and the subsequent Oslo II Interim Agreement of 1995 created the Palestinian Authority and divided the West Bank into three categories. Area A (major Palestinian population centers) was placed under full Palestinian civil and security control. Area B received Palestinian civil control with joint Israeli-Palestinian security responsibility. Area C—approximately 60 percent of the West Bank, containing Israeli settlements, major roads, the Jordan Valley, and sparsely populated zones—remained under full Israeli civil and security control. Final-status issues including permanent borders, Jerusalem, refugees, and settlements were deferred to later negotiations. The accords were explicitly interim; they did not end the conflict or resolve sovereignty. After the collapse of final-status talks and the outbreak of the Second Intifada, which featured extensive Palestinian terrorism against Israeli civilians, Israel retained and in places intensified security control, particularly in Area C and along routes used for attacks. Military measures affecting specific houses or properties continued to be justified on security grounds—preventing terrorism, enforcing permit regimes in strategically sensitive zones, and protecting both Israeli and Palestinian civilians from violence.
Throughout this period the Arab Muslim population of the West Bank has remained in place. Israel did not implement a policy of expulsion in 1967 and has not done so since. Muslims continue to live, work, worship, and maintain religious institutions across the territory, including under Palestinian Authority administration in Areas A and B. This outcome differs markedly from the near-total disappearance of Jewish communities from the Arab world. Israeli military control of portions of the West Bank therefore reflects the defensive acquisition of the territory in 1967, the incomplete implementation of Resolution 242’s land-for-peace formula, the interim arrangements of Oslo, and ongoing security needs in the absence of a final peace agreement.
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