State of Israel in the context of Government of Israel

The Israeli coastal plain (Hebrew: מישור החוף, romanized: Mishor HaḤof, lit. 'coastal plain') is the Israeli segment of the Levantine coastal plain of the Mediterranean Sea, extending 187 kilometres (116 mi) north to south. It is a geographical region defined morphologically by the sea, in terms of topography and soil, and also in its climate, flora and fauna. It is narrow in the north and broadens considerably towards the south, and is continuous, except the short section where Mount Carmel reaches almost all the way to the sea. The Coastal Plain is bordered to the east by – north to south – the topographically higher regions of the Galilee, the low and flat Jezreel Valley, the Carmel range, the mountains of Samaria, the hill country of Judea known as the Shephelah, and the Negev Mountains in the south. To the north it is separated from the coastal plain of Lebanon by the cliffs of Rosh HaNikra, which jut out into the sea from the Galilee mountains, but to the south it continues into the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula.

The plain can be conventionally divided into a number of areas: the Northern Coastal Plain borders the Galilee in its northern part, and the Jezreel Valley in its southern part between Akko and Haifa, where it is also called the Plain of Zebulon; Hof HaCarmel, or the Carmel Coastal Plain, runs along the Mount Carmel range; the Sharon Plain continues down to northern Tel Aviv; the Central Coastal Plain stretches from Tel Aviv to the northern limit of the Gaza Strip, with the Nahal Shikma [he] stream as its limit – there Israel's access to the Mediterranean ends and the Israeli Southern Coastal Plain, also known as the Western Negev, actually consists of the hinterland of the Strip. For almost its entire length, the plain has sandy beaches, and a Mediterranean climate, except at its southern end where the climate is semi-arid.

Aliyah (US: /ˌæliˈɑː/, UK: /ˌɑː-/; Hebrew: עֲלִיָּה, romanized: ălīyyā, lit. 'ascent') is the immigration of Jews from the diaspora to, historically, the geographical Land of Israel or the Palestine region, where in the 20th century the State of Israel was established. Traditionally described as "the act of going up" (towards the Jewish holy city of Jerusalem), moving to the Land of Israel or "making aliyah" is one of the most basic tenets of Zionism. The opposite action – emigration by Jews from the Land of Israel – is referred to in the Hebrew language as yerida (lit. 'descent'). The Law of Return that was passed by the Israeli parliament in 1950 gives all diaspora Jews, as well as their children and grandchildren, the right to relocate to Israel and acquire Israeli citizenship on the basis of connecting to their Jewish identity.

For much of their history, most Jews have lived in the diaspora outside of the Land of Israel due to various historical conflicts that led to their persecution alongside multiple instances of expulsions and exoduses. In the late 19th century, 99.7% of the world's Jews lived outside the region, with Jews representing 2–5% of the population of the Palestine region. Despite its historical value as a national aspiration for the Jewish people, aliyah was acted upon by few prior to the rise of a national awakening among Jews worldwide and the subsequent development of the Zionist movement in the late 19th century; the large-scale immigration of Jews to Palestine had consequently begun by 1882. Since the Israeli Declaration of Independence in 1948, more than 3 million Jews have made aliyah. As of 2014, Israel and the Israeli-occupied territories contain approximately 42.9 percent of the world's Jewish population.

The 1948 Palestine war was fought in the territory of what had been, at the start of the war, British-ruled Mandatory Palestine. During the war, Zionist forces conquered territory and established the State of Israel, over 700,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled from Palestine, the British withdrew from their Mandate of Palestine, and four neighbouring Arab nations entered the territory and joined the war. By the end of the war, the State of Israel had held or captured about 78% of former territory of the mandate, the Kingdom of Jordan had captured and later annexed the area that became the West Bank, and Egypt had captured the Gaza Strip. The war formally ended with the 1949 Armistice Agreements, which established the State of Israel and laid out the Green Line demarcating these territories. It was the first war of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the broader Arab–Israeli conflict.

The war had two main phases, the first being the 1947–1948 civil war, which began on 30 November 1947, a day after the United Nations voted to adopt the Partition Plan for Palestine, which planned for the division of the territory into Jewish and Arab sovereign states. During this period, the British still maintained a declining rule over Palestine and occasionally intervened in the violence. Initially on the defensive, the Zionist forces switched to the offensive in April 1948. In anticipation of an invasion by Arab armies, they enacted Plan Dalet, an operation aimed at securing territory for the establishment of a Jewish state.

Modern Hebrew (endonym: עִבְרִית חֲדָשָׁה, romanized: 'Ivrit ḥadasha, IPA: [ivˈʁit χadaˈʃa] or [ʕivˈrit ħadaˈʃa]), also known as Israeli Hebrew or simply Hebrew, is the standard form of the Hebrew language spoken today. It is the only extant Canaanite language, as well as one of the oldest languages to be spoken as a native language in the modern day, on account of Hebrew being attested since the 2nd millennium BC. It uses the Hebrew Alphabet, an abjad script written from right-to-left. The current standard was codified as part of the revival of Hebrew in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and now serves as the sole official and national language of the State of Israel, where it is predominantly spoken by over 10 million people. Thus, Modern Hebrew is nearly universally regarded as the most successful instance of language revitalization in history.

A Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic language family, Hebrew was spoken since antiquity as the vernacular of the Israelites until around the 3rd century BCE, when it was supplanted by a western dialect of the Aramaic language, the local or dominant languages of the regions Jews migrated to, and later Judeo-Arabic, Judaeo-Spanish, Yiddish, and other Jewish languages. Although Hebrew continued to be used for Jewish liturgy, poetry and literature, and written correspondence, it became extinct as a spoken language.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; Hebrew: צבא הגנה לישראל, romanized: Tsva Hagana le-Yisra'el, lit. 'Army for the Defense of Israel'), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym Tzahal (צה״ל), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branches: the Israeli Ground Forces, the Israeli Air Force, and the Israeli Navy. It is the sole military wing of the Israeli security apparatus. The IDF is headed by the chief of the general staff, who is subordinate to the defense minister.

On the orders of first prime minister David Ben-Gurion, the IDF was formed on 26 May 1948 and began to operate as a conscript military, drawing its initial recruits from the already existing paramilitaries of the Yishuv—namely Haganah, the Irgun, and Lehi. It was formed shortly after the Israeli Declaration of Independence and has participated in every armed conflict involving Israel. In the wake of the 1979 Egypt–Israel peace treaty and the 1994 Israel–Jordan peace treaty, the IDF underwent a significant strategic realignment. Previously spread across various fronts—Lebanon and Syria in the north, Jordan and Iraq in the east, and Egypt in the south—the IDF redirected its focus towards southern Lebanon and the Palestinian territories. In 2000, the IDF withdrew from Southern Lebanon and in 2005 from Gaza. Conflict between Israel and Islamist groups based in Gaza, notably Hamas, has continued since then. Moreover, notable Israeli–Syrian border incidents have occurred frequently since 2011, due to regional instability caused by the Syrian civil war.

The Temple menorah (/məˈnɔːrə/; Biblical Hebrew: מְנוֹרָה, romanized: mənorā, Tiberian Hebrew /ˌmənoːˈʀɔː/) is a seven-branched candelabrum that is described in the Hebrew Bible and later ancient sources as having been used in the Tabernacle and the Temple in Jerusalem.

Since ancient times, it has served as a symbol representing the Jews and Judaism in both the Land of Israel and the Jewish diaspora. It became the State of Israel's official emblem when it was founded in 1948.

Israeli law is based mostly on a common law legal system, though it also reflects the diverse history of the territory of the State of Israel throughout the last hundred years (which was at various times prior to independence under Ottoman, then British sovereignty), as well as the legal systems of its major religious communities. The Israeli legal system is based on common law, which also incorporates facets of civil law. The Israeli Declaration of Independence asserted that a formal constitution would be written, though it has been continuously postponed since 1950. Instead, the Basic Laws of Israel (Hebrew: חוקי היסוד, romanized: ḥuqe ha-yesod) function as the country's constitutional laws. Statutes enacted by the Knesset, particularly the Basic Laws, provide a framework which is enriched by political precedent and jurisprudence. Foreign and historical influences on modern-day Israeli law are varied and include the Mecelle (Hebrew: מג'לה; the civil code of the Ottoman Empire) and German civil law, religious law (Jewish Halakha and Muslim Sharia; mostly pertaining in the area of family law), and British common law. The Israeli courts have been influenced in recent years by American Law and Canadian Law and to a lesser extent by Continental Law (mostly from Germany).

Anti-Zionism is opposition to Zionism. Although anti-Zionism is a heterogeneous phenomenon, all its proponents agree that the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, and the movement to create a sovereign Jewish state in the region of Palestine—a region partly coinciding with the biblical Land of Israel—was flawed or unjust in some way.

Before World War II, opposition to Zionism was common among Jewish communities. Secular critics viewed Zionism as a form of nationalism inconsistent with Enlightenment universalism, while some Orthodox groups opposed it on theological grounds, regarding the establishment of a Jewish state as contingent upon the arrival of the Messiah. Support for Zionism increased during the 1930s as conditions for Jews rapidly deteriorated in Europe due to the rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany, and Zionism began to prevail over opposition to it in the Jewish diaspora. With the Second World War, the sheer scale of the Holocaust was felt and support for Zionism increased dramatically. After 1948, anti-Zionism shifted from opposition to the creation of a Jewish state to rejection of the existence of Israel itself, with many postwar movements advocating its replacement by an alternative political entity. Most Jewish anti-Zionist movements subsequently disintegrated or transformed into pro-Zionist organizations, although a minority, including the American Council for Judaism, continued to oppose the ideology. Outside the Jewish community, opposition to Zionism developed primarily among Arab populations, particularly among Palestinians, who associated it with the Nakba.

The Law of Return (Hebrew: חוק השבות, romanized: ḥok ha-shvūt) is an Israeli law, passed on 5 July 1950, which gives Jews, people with one or more Jewish grandparent, and their spouses the right to relocate to Israel and acquire Israeli citizenship. Section 1 of the Law of Return declares that "every Jew has the right to come to this country as an oleh [immigrant]". In the Law of Return, the State of Israel gave effect to the Zionist movement's aim for the establishment of Israel as a Jewish state. In 1970, the right of entry and settlement was extended to people with at least one Jewish grandparent and a person who is married to a Jew, whether or not they are considered Jewish under Orthodox interpretations of Jewish law.

On the day of arrival in Israel, or occasionally at a later date, a person who enters Israel under the Law of Return as an oleh would receive a certificate confirming their oleh status. The person then has three months to decide whether they wish to become a citizen and can renounce their prior citizenship during this time. Since 2005, the right does not apply to residents of the West Bank or the Gaza Strip due to the Citizenship and Entry into Israel Law. The right to an oleh certificate may be denied if the person is engaged in antisemitic activity, is a hazard to the public health or security of the state, or has a criminal past that may endanger public welfare.

The Israeli Declaration of Independence, formally the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel (Hebrew: הכרזה על הקמת מדינת ישראל), was proclaimed on 14 May 1948 (5 Iyar 5708), at the end of the civil war phase and beginning of the international phase of the 1948 Palestine war, by David Ben-Gurion, the executive head of the World Zionist Organization and chairman of the Jewish Agency for Palestine.

It declared the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine (or the Land of Israel in the Jewish tradition), to be known as the State of Israel, which would come into effect on termination of the British Mandate at midnight that day. The event is celebrated annually in Israel as Independence Day, a national holiday on 5 Iyar of every year according to the Hebrew calendar. Palestinians view the declaration of independence as marking the start of the Nakba and commemorate it annually on May 15 as Nakba Day.

The Yishuv (Hebrew: ישוב, lit. 'settlement'), HaYishuv Ha'ivri (Hebrew: הישוב העברי, lit. 'the Hebrew settlement'), or HaYishuv HaYehudi Be'Eretz Yisra'el (lit. 'the Jewish Settlement in the Land of Israel') was the community of Jews residing in Palestine prior to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. The term came into use in the 1880s, when there were about 25,000 Jews living in that region, and continued to be used until 1948, by which time there were some 630,000 Jews there. The term is still in use to denote the pre-1948 Jewish residents in Palestine, corresponding to the southern part of Ottoman Syria until 1918, OETA South in 1917–1920, and Mandatory Palestine in 1920–1948.

A distinction is sometimes drawn between the Old Yishuv and the New Yishuv. The Old Yishuv refers to all the Jews living in Palestine before the first Zionist immigration wave (aliyah) of 1882, and to their descendants until 1948. The Old Yishuv residents were religious Jews, living mainly in Jerusalem, Safed, Tiberias, and Hebron. There were smaller communities in Jaffa, Haifa, Peki'in, Acre, Nablus, Shfaram, and until 1799 in Gaza. In the final centuries before modern Zionism, a large part of the Old Yishuv spent their time studying the Torah and lived off charity (halukka), donated by Jews in the Diaspora.

The legitimacy of the State of Israel has been challenged since before the state was formed. There has been opposition to Zionism, the movement to establish a Jewish state in Palestine, since its emergence in 19th-century Europe. Since the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, a number of individuals, organizations, and states have challenged Israel's political legitimacy and its occupation of territories belonging to Palestine, Syria and Lebanon. Over the course of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and broader Arab–Israeli conflict, the country's authority has also been questioned on a number of fronts.

Criticism of Israel may include opposition to the country's right to exist or, since the 1967 Arab–Israeli War, the established power structure within the Israeli-occupied territories. Israel has also been accused of crimes against humanity and war crimes—such as apartheid, starvation and genocide—including by scholars, legal experts, and human rights organizations. Israel regards such criticism as attempts to delegitimize it. Israel has also been criticized for maintaining "the longest and one of the most deadly military occupations in the world".

Yasser Arafat (4 or 24 August 1929 – 11 November 2004), also popularly known by his kunya Abu Ammar, was a Palestinian political leader. He was chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from 1969 to 2004, President of Palestine from 1989 to 2004 and President of the Palestinian Authority (PNA) from 1994 to 2004. Ideologically an Arab nationalist and a socialist, Arafat was a founding member of the Fatah political party, which he led from 1959 until 2004.

Arafat was born to Palestinian parents in Cairo, Egypt, where he spent most of his youth. He studied at the University of King Fuad I. While a student, he embraced Arab nationalist and anti-Zionist ideas. Opposed to the 1948 creation of the State of Israel, he fought alongside the Muslim Brotherhood during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. Following the defeat of Arab forces, Arafat returned to Cairo and served as president of the General Union of Palestinian Students from 1952 to 1956.

Religious Zionism (Hebrew: צִיּוֹנוּת דָּתִית, romanized: Tziyonut Datit) is a religious denomination that views Zionism as a fundamental component of Orthodox Judaism. Its adherents are also referred to as Dati Leumi (דָּתִי לְאֻמִּי, 'National Religious'), and in Israel, they are most commonly known by the plural form of the first part of that term: Datiim (דתיים, 'Religious'). The community is sometimes called 'Knitted kippah' (כִּפָּה סְרוּגָה, Kippah seruga), the typical head covering worn by male adherents to Religious Zionism.

Before the establishment of the State of Israel, most Religious Zionists were observant Jews who supported Zionist efforts to build a Jewish state in the Land of Israel. Religious Zionism revolves around three pillars: the Land of Israel, the People of Israel, and the Torah of Israel. The Hardal (חרדי לאומי, Ḥaredi Le'umi, 'Nationalist Haredi') are a sub-community, stricter in its observance, and more statist in its politics. Those Religious Zionists who are less strict in their observance – although not necessarily more liberal in their politics – are informally referred to as "dati lite".

The Ministry of Interior (Hebrew: משרד הפנים, Misrad HaPnim; Arabic: وزارة الداخلية) in the State of Israel is one of the government offices that is responsible for local government, citizenship and residency, identity cards, and student and entry visas.

David Ben-Gurion (/bɛn ˈɡʊəriən/ ben GOOR-ee-ən; Hebrew: דָּוִד בֶּן־גּוּרִיּוֹן [daˈvid ben ɡuʁˈjon] ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary national founder and first prime minister of the State of Israel. As head of the Jewish Agency from 1935, and later president of the Jewish Agency Executive, he was the de facto leader of the Jewish community in Palestine, and largely led the movement for an independent Jewish state in Mandatory Palestine.

Born in Płońsk, then part of Congress Poland, to Polish Jewish parents, he immigrated to the Palestine region of the Ottoman Empire in 1906. Adopting the name of Ben-Gurion in 1909, he rose to become the preeminent leader of the Jewish community in British-ruled Mandatory Palestine from 1935 until the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, which he led until 1963 with a short break in 1954–55. Ben-Gurion's interest for Zionism developed early in his life, leading him to become a major Zionist leader, and the executive head of the World Zionist Organization in 1946.