The Israeli Declaration of Independence, formally the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel (Hebrew: הכרזה על הקמת מדינת ישראל), was proclaimed at the Tel Aviv Museum on 14 May 1948 (5 Iyar 5708), at the end of the civil war phase and beginning of the Arab–Israeli War of the 1948 Palestine war, by the Va'ad Leumi led 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. While celebrated in Israel as Independence Day, a national holiday on 5 Iyar of every year according to the Hebrew calendar, Palestinians view the day as the start of Nakba, or "catastrophe", marking the mass displacements of Palestinians and the loss of homes and lands, and commemorate it annually on 15 May as Nakba Day.
Zionist aspirations and the Balfour Declaration
The idea of a Jewish homeland in Palestine had been a goal of Zionist organisations since the late 19th century. In 1917 British foreign secretary Arthur Balfour expressed support for this goal in a letter to British Jewish community leader Walter, Lord Rothschild:
His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.
Through this letter, which became known as the Balfour Declaration, British government policy officially endorsed Zionism. After World War I, the United Kingdom was given a mandate for Palestine, which it had conquered from the Ottomans during the war.
International efforts and the UN Partition Plan
In 1937 the Peel Commission suggested partitioning Mandate Palestine into an Arab state and a Jewish state, though the proposal was rejected as unworkable by the government and was at least partially to blame for the renewal of the 1936–39 Arab revolt.
In the face of increasing violence after World War II, the British handed the issue over to the recently established United Nations. The result was Resolution 181(II), a plan to partition Palestine into Independent Arab and Jewish States and the Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem. The Jewish state was to receive around 56% of the land area of Mandate Palestine, encompassing 82% of the Jewish population. At the time, however, Jews were a minority of the total population of Mandate Palestine, while Arabs constituted the majority. Although they were given more than half of the land area of Mandate Palestine, Jews had only owned approximately 7% of the land in 1947.
The plan was accepted by most of the Jewish population, but rejected by much of the Arab populace. On 29 November 1947, the resolution to recommend to the United Kingdom, as the mandatory Power for Palestine, and to all other Members of the United Nations the adoption and implementation, with regard to the future government of Palestine, of the Plan of Partition with Economic Union was put to a vote in the United Nations General Assembly.
The result was 33 to 13 in favour of the resolution, with 10 abstentions. Resolution 181(II): PART I: Future constitution and government of Palestine: A. TERMINATION OF MANDATE, PARTITION AND INDEPENDENCE: Clause 3 provides:Independent Arab and Jewish States and the Special International Regime for the City of Jerusalem, ... shall come into existence in Palestine two months after the evacuation of the armed forces of the mandatory Power has been completed but in any case not later than 1 October 1948.
The Arab countries (all of which had opposed the plan) proposed to query the International Court of Justice on the competence of the General Assembly to partition a country, but the resolution was rejected.
The first draft of the declaration was made by Zvi Berenson, the legal advisor of the Histadrut trade union and later a Justice of the Supreme Court, at the request of Pinchas Rosen. A revised second draft was made by three lawyers, Mordechai Baham, Uri Yadin and Zvi Eli Baker, and was framed by a committee including David Remez, Pinchas Rosen, Haim-Moshe Shapira, Moshe Sharett and Aharon Zisling. A second committee meeting, which included David Ben-Gurion, Yehuda Leib Maimon, Sharett and Zisling produced the final text.
Palestinian Arab perspectives and ongoing conflict
Palestinian Arabs were largely excluded from the drafting process and viewed the declaration as a unilateral decision over the sovereignty of the territory they inhabited. They considered the UN Partition Plan unfair, both because it denied their right to self-determination, and because it gave a significant portion of the land to a Jewish state despite the Arab population being the majority. Consequently, Arab leaders and communities opposed the plan, stating they would not support any scheme that "provided for the dissection, segregation or partition of their country". This exclusion and denial of political rights contributed to rising tensions, and ultimately, conflict and the 1948 war.
On 12 May 1948, the Minhelet HaAm (Hebrew: מנהלת העם, lit. People's Administration) was convened to vote on declaring independence. Three of the thirteen members were absent, with Yehuda Leib Maimon and Yitzhak Gruenbaum being blocked in besieged Jerusalem, while Yitzhak-Meir Levin was in the United States.
The meeting started at 13:45 and ended after midnight. The decision was between accepting the American proposal for a truce, or declaring independence. The latter option was put to a vote, with six of the ten members present supporting it:
For: David Ben-Gurion, Moshe Sharett (Mapai); Peretz Bernstein (General Zionists); Haim-Moshe Shapira (Hapoel HaMizrachi); Mordechai Bentov, Aharon Zisling (Mapam).