From Ancient Roots to a Living Nation
United Kingdom: Reign of David and Solomon.
Division of the kingdom into Israel in the north and Judah in the south.
The Northern Kingdom is conquered by the Assyrian Empire, and much of the population is exiled.
Judah is attacked by the Assyrian king Sennacherib; Jerusalem is spared.
Judah is attacked by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar; King Jehoiachin and the families of the elites in Judah, including the boy Daniel, are taken into exile.
The Temple in Jerusalem is destroyed by the Babylonians, and more Judeans are exiled to Babylon.
Return of many Jews from Babylonia; reconstruction of the Temple.
Conquest of the land by Alexander the Great; Hellenistic rule.
Antiochus IV, king of the Greek Seleucid Empire, intensifies attempts to eradicate Judaism.
Military campaign of Antiochus IV. Conquest of the city and desecration of the Temple.
Maccabean revolt (Hasmoneans) against the restriction of the practice of Judaism and the desecration of the Temple.
Judas Maccabeus captures Jerusalem; the Temple is restored and rededicated (story of Hanukkah).
Jerusalem is conquered by the Roman general Pompey. Israel becomes a Roman protectorate.
Herod the Great, Roman vassal king, rules the land of Israel; the Temple in Jerusalem is completely renovated.
Birth of Yeshua (Jesus) in Judea, Bethlehem.
Archelaus is deposed; Judea is governed directly by Rome.
Pontius Pilate serves as procurator of Judea.
The ministry of Jesus.
Jesus is crucified and resurrected.
Jewish revolt against the Romans. About 2.4 million Jews live in the land.
Jews believing in Jesus flee to Pella east of the Jordan.
Jerusalem is captured by the Romans; the Second Temple is destroyed. Many Jews are massacred, others flee or are taken into exile as slaves. In the revolt, a quarter of the Jewish population dies and a tenth is sold into slavery.
Rabbinic Judaism begins to reorganize around Yavneh in the coastal plain and later in Galilee.
The last resistance of the Jews in Masada is broken.
Diaspora revolt – a Jewish uprising in Cyrenaica, Egypt, Cyprus, Mesopotamia, during the reign of the Roman emperor Trajan.
Emperor Hadrian in Jerusalem; he decides on the construction of a Temple of Jupiter on the Temple Mount.
Bar Kokhba uprising against Rome. In the revolt, a third of the Jewish population of the land dies. The province of Judea is given the new name Syria-Palestina.
The Roman emperor Hadrian rebuilds Jerusalem as Aelia Capitolina and banishes the Jews from the city.
The Roman emperor Constantine renames the city of Aelia Capitolina back to Jerusalem and begins to make it a center of Christianity. The Jews still do not have free access to the city.
Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem built.
Jewish uprising against Constantius Gallus. Chorazin, Beth-Shearim and Tiberias are severely damaged.
As part of his aversion to Christianity, Emperor Julian encourages the Jews to rebuild the Temple. His death after 2 years puts an end to this.
The Jerusalem Talmud completed in Tiberias (a commentary and an expansion of the Mishnah)
The Sanhedrin, the supreme rabbinical court based in Galilee, was ultimately dissolved following the restrictions imposed by the Byzantines.
The Jewish uprising against Byzantine rule begins.
The Sassanid Empire (Persia) conquers Israel and Jerusalem from the Byzantines and installs a Jewish leadership. Almost all churches and monasteries are destroyed. Massacres among the Christians with the help of the Jews.
The Byzantines reconquer the land, annihilate the Jewish population in Jerusalem and Galilee as an act of revenge and end the last major Jewish attempt to rule the land of Israel until modern times.
The Muslim caliph Umar conquers Jerusalem; Jews are allowed to live in Jerusalem again.
Al-Aqsa Mosque is built on the Temple Mount, along the southern city wall.
The Dome of the Rock is built by the caliph Abd al-Malik on the site of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem.
Caliph El-Hakim has the Church of the Holy Sepulchre destroyed.
The Byzantine emperor Constantine IX Monomachos promotes the reconstruction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in cooperation with the caliph.
Under Pope Urban II, the Crusades begin to restore Christian rule over the Holy Land.
The Crusaders conquer Jerusalem and massacre a large part of the Jewish and Muslim population of the city.
Saladin, a Kurdish Muslim, conquers Jerusalem from the Crusaders.
A large group of Rabbinic Scholars from England and France emigrate to the land of Israel.
Destruction of Jerusalem during internal Islamic conflicts.
The Mongols invade the land of Israel and are defeated by the Mamluks at Ein Harod.
Nachmanides, also known as Ramban, revives the Jewish presence in Jerusalem and encourages other Jews to return there.
The Mamluks from Egypt and Syria conquer Acre and destroy the last capital of the Crusaders.
The Franciscan Order establishes its seat in Jerusalem. Its monks take care of holy sites and pilgrims.
The Black Plague strikes Jerusalem.
The Jews are expelled from Spain. Many find refuge in the lands ruled by the Ottoman Muslims.
The Ottomans conquer Jerusalem, opening the way for large-scale Jewish settlement in the Land of Israel.
Suleiman the Magnificent rebuilds the city walls of Jerusalem.
The code of Jewish law (Shulchan Aruch) is published, setting forth Jewish practice for daily life in simplified form
Sabbatai Zevi, who claimed to be the Jewish messiah, visits the land of Israel. He is imprisoned by the Ottoman rulers and converts to Islam.
Hundreds of Jews from Western Europe immigrate to Jerusalem under the leadership of Yehuda he-Hassid.
Napoleon abandons the attempt to conquer Jerusalem after the defeat at Acre.
About 300,000 inhabitants live in the land of Israel, about 7,000 of them Jews.
The first residential neighborhood outside the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem is built.
For the first time after 1,800 years, Jerusalem is a city with a Jewish majority. 21,000 inhabitants, 10,500 Jews, 5,000 Muslims and 5,500 Christians.
Eliezer Ben-Yehuda moves to Jerusalem and begins the revival of Hebrew as a modern language.
First larger immigration (Aliyah), mainly from Russia.
The first Zionist Congress is convened by Theodor Herzl in Basel, Switzerland. Practical steps are set forth to help Jews immigrate to the Land of the Bible with the goal of establishing a state there.
Second Aliyah, mainly from Russia and Poland.
The first kibbutz, Degania, and the first modern purely Jewish city, Tel Aviv, are founded.
70,000 Jews live in the land.
During the First World War, Britain and France attack Ottoman-controlled territories in the Middle East. Many Jews, thought to be sympathetic to the British, are expelled from the land by the Ottoman authorities.
400 years of Ottoman rule are ended by the British conquest. The British Foreign Secretary Balfour declares his support for the establishment of a “Jewish national home in Palestine”. Only about 30,000 Jews remain in the land.
Third Aliyah, mainly from Russia in the aftermath of the Bolshevik revolution there.
The failed Faisal–Weizmann agreement, according to which a Jewish state was to be formed in accordance with the Balfour Declaration, led to part of the Arab revolt.
The Histadrut (General Federation of Labor) and the Haganah (Jewish defense organization), and the Vaad Leumi (National Council) are founded by the Jewish community (Yishuv) to regulate its affairs.
The first moshav (cooperative village), Nahalal, is founded.
Great Britain receives from the League of Nations the mandate to govern Palestine (Land of Israel) until self-rule can be established there; Transjordan is established on three quarters of the territory, one quarter remains for the Jewish homeland. Founding of the Jewish Agency, which represents the Jewish community to the mandate authorities.
The Technion, the first technical university, is founded in Haifa.
Fourth Aliyah, mainly from Poland.
Opening of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem on Mount Scopus.
Jews in Hebron are massacred by Arab terrorists.
The Jewish underground organization Etzel is founded.
Fifth Aliyah, mainly from Germany in parallel with the rise of Naziism there.
The “White Paper” of the British government provides for limiting Jewish immigration to Palestine to 10,000 per year, emergencies excepted.
Second World War; Holocaust in Europe, in which 6 million Jews were murdered.
A Jewish brigade is formed as part of the British armed forces fighting against the Nazis in WW II.
The UN proposes the creation of an Arab and a Jewish state. This Partition Plan is accepted by the Jewish leadership, and rejected by the Arab leadership. Jerusalem is to be an internationalized city.
May 14: End of the British Mandate period. The State of Israel is proclaimed. May 15: Israel is invaded by five Arab states. Establishment of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). War of Independence (May 1948 – July 1949). During the war, about 750,000 Palestinian Arabs flee from territories under Israeli control, out of a total population of about 1,200,000.
Mass Jewish immigration from Europe and from the Arab countries.
Armistice agreements; Israel receives more territory than provided for in the Partition Plan, including West Jerusalem. Jordan annexes Judea and Samaria (which they call the “West Bank”) and East Jerusalem, and Egypt occupies the Gaza Strip.
The first Knesset (parliament) is elected. Israel is admitted to the United Nations as its 59th member.
Israel marches into Egypt during the Suez Crisis together with Great Britain and France in order to reopen the canal for Israeli shipping and to put an end to armed attacks by Palestinians in the Sinai. UN buffer forces are deployed in the Sinai and in the Gaza Strip, Israeli ships are allowed to pass through the Suez Canal.
Completion of the national water carrier, which brings water from the Sea of Galilee in the north to the coastal plain and the semi-arid south.
The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) is founded based in Jordan.
A MiG-21 fighter jet is brought to Israel in a covert operation named “Operation Yahalom”.
June: After months of tensions, including border clashes, UN buffer forces are expelled from the Sinai by Egypt. The Straits of Tiran are closed to Israeli shipping, Israel launches a preemptive strike against Egypt, and Jordan and Syria join the war. The war lasts six days, as a result of which Israel gains control over East Jerusalem, the entire West Bank, Gaza, the Golan Heights and the Sinai. In all these territories, Jewish settlements are established in the following years with government approval.
October: On Yom Kippur, Egypt and Syria launch a coordinated attack against the Israeli armed forces in Sinai and on the Golan Heights. Israel is victorious, but only after significant losses. Public sentiment turns against the ruling Labor Party.
Israel becomes an associate member of the European Economic Community.
In the controversial UN Resolution 3379, Zionism is described as a form of racism and racial discrimination.
Mass protests by Israeli Arabs against the government’s attempts to expropriate land in the Galilee region in northern Israel. Six Arab citizens are killed in clashes with security forces. The memory of these events has since been commemorated annually as Land Day.
Israeli commando forces storm Entebbe Airport in Uganda and free more than 100 predominantly Israeli and Jewish hostages who are held captive by German and Palestinian terrorists.
May: After the Knesset elections, Likud forms the government and ends the 30-year rule of the Labor Party.
November: Egyptian President Anwar Sadat visits Jerusalem and initiates the process that leads to Israel’s withdrawal from the Sinai and to Egypt’s recognition of Israel in the Camp David Accords of 1978. In the agreements, Israel also commits to expanding Palestinian self-government in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
After an inflation rate of 130%, the Israeli lira is replaced by the Israeli shekel.
June: In an attack by the Israeli Air Force, the nuclear reactor in Osirak in Iraq is destroyed.
The three-stage withdrawal of Israel from the Sinai Peninsula is completed.
June: Israel marches into Lebanon to drive out the leadership of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) after a small militant Palestinian group carried out an assassination attempt on the Israeli ambassador in London.
July: After the elections, a national unity government (Likud and Labor) is formed.
November: Operation Moses, a covert airlift for Ethiopian Jews begins. The operation is repeated in 1991 under the name Operation Solomon.
June: Israel withdraws from most of Lebanon, but continues to occupy a narrow security zone along the border.
Jibril deal: Release of 1,150 prisoners in exchange for three Israeli soldiers.
After an inflation rate of over 400% per year, the shekel is replaced by the new shekel, together with reforms that lead the Israeli economy into the modern era.
The First Intifada begins (Palestinian uprising). The Muslim Brotherhood in Gaza founds the Hamas movement, which quickly turns to violence against Israel.
September: With the reconnaissance satellite Ofek, Israel becomes one of only eight countries at that time capable of independently launching satellites.
The Soviet Union allows Jews to emigrate, which leads to about one million former Soviet citizens moving to Israel.
Israel is attacked by Iraqi Scud missiles during the Gulf War.
Resolution 4686 of the United Nations General Assembly revokes Resolution 3379, equating Zionism with Racism.
At a conference in Madrid organized by the United States and the Soviet Union, representatives of Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and the Palestinians meet for the first time since 1949. This sets in motion talks to normalize relations.
Establishment of diplomatic relations with China and India.
The Labor Party returns to power under Yitzhak Rabin. Rabin promises to halt Jewish settlement construction and opens secret talks with the PLO, leading to the Oslo Accords.
Oslo Accords: Declaration of Principles on interim self-government arrangements for the Palestinians, signed by Israel and the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people.
Implementation of Palestinian self-rule in the Gaza Strip and in the Jericho area. Rabin, Peres and Arafat receive the Nobel Peace Prize. Morocco and Tunisia establish representative offices. Signing of the Israeli-Jordanian peace treaty. Israel and the Vatican establish full diplomatic relations.
A Jewish extremist massacres Muslims in the Machpelah mosque in Hebron.
Expansion of Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip; election of the Palestinian Council.
November: A Jewish extremist shoots Yitzhak Rabin in Tel Aviv. Shimon Peres assumes the office of Prime Minister.
May: Likud returns to power under Benjamin Netanyahu and signs the Hebron Protocol and the Wye River Memorandum, giving control of additional territory to the Palestinian Authority. Muslim fundamentalist terrorism against Israel escalates.
Operation “Grapes of Wrath”: retaliation for attacks on northern Israel by Hezbollah terrorists from Lebanon.
Israel withdraws from the security zone in southern Lebanon.
The Second Intifada, a new wave of Palestinian violence, featuring suicide bombers, breaks out.
Minister of Tourism Rehavam Ze’evi is murdered by terrorists.
Israel launches Operation Defensive Shield in response to massive Palestinian terrorist attacks. Israel also begins the construction of the anti-terror barrier to prevent terrorists from the West Bank from killing Israeli citizens.
The Quartet of the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations proposes a roadmap for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which would lead to an independent Palestinian state. Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority accept the plan, which calls for a freeze on Jewish settlements in the West Bank and an end to attacks on Israelis.
Israel implements the disengagement plan and withdraws all Jewish settlers and military forces from the Gaza Strip.
Israel carries out military operations against Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip following the abduction of an Israeli soldier.
The Second Lebanon War breaks out, in which Israel conducts military operations against Hezbollah terrorism in southern Lebanon, following rocket attacks by Hezbollah and the abduction of two Israeli soldiers.
After the violent takeover of the Gaza Strip by Hamas, Israel declares the Gaza Strip a “hostile territory”.
Attack on the Syrian nuclear reactor built by North Korea.
Israel celebrates its 60th anniversary and begins its Gaza operation in response to the firing of more than 10,000 rockets and mortars from the Gaza Strip.
Israel joins the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
May: Nine Turkish pro-Palestinian activists attempting to break the blockade of the Gaza Strip are killed in clashes with Israeli soldiers. Relations with Turkey are on the brink. Israel apologizes for the deaths in 2013.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears before both houses of the US Congress and declares that “Israel will not return to the indefensible lines of 1967.”
Hamas releases the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in exchange for 1,027 prisoners, after Germany and Egypt mediate the deal.
First interception of a rocket by the Israeli Iron Dome anti-missile defense system.
November: Israel launches a week-long military operation against armed groups in the Gaza Strip, as rocket attacks on Israeli cities have been increasing for months.
The UN upgrades Palestine from an “observer” to a “non-member observer state.”
August: Israeli-Palestinian peace talks resume.
July–August: Israel responds to attacks by armed groups in the Gaza Strip with a military operation by air and on the ground in order to destroy rocket launchers and Hamas attack tunnels. The clashes end in August with a ceasefire mediated by Egypt.
May: Prime Minister Netanyahu forms a new coalition government.
October: A wave of shootings, stabbings, and vehicular attacks carried out by Palestinians or Israeli Arabs.
November: The EU decides that goods from Jewish settlements in the West Bank should be labeled as originating from settlements rather than from Israel.
February: The parliament passes a law that retroactively legalizes dozens of Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria. In June, construction begins on the first new Jewish settlement in the West Bank in 25 years.
December: US President Donald Trump recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. The following March, he recognizes Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 war and later annexed. The international community does not recognize Israeli sovereignty.
The US embassy is symbolically opened on May 14, the 70th anniversary of Israel’s declaration of independence, replacing the embassy in Tel Aviv.
In three parliamentary elections, Netanyahu runs against a centrist alliance led by former Chief of Staff Benny Gantz, but no clear majority emerges.
November: The United States declares that it no longer considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank to be illegal.
August: The United Arab Emirates becomes the first Gulf state to establish diplomatic relations with Israel.
September: Peace agreement between Israel and Bahrain.
May: Unrest over the forced evictions of long-term Arab squatters in East Jerusalem leads to conflict between Israel and Hamas and communal violence in Israeli cities.
March 23: Fourth election. After weeks of negotiations and an eleven-day war between Israel and Palestinian terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip.
June: Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett form a government coalition of right-wing, liberal and Arab parties, ending twelve consecutive years of Netanyahu’s rule.
December 29: After less than a year in power, Lapid’s coalition loses its narrow majority due to defections. Instead of waiting for the opposition to vote it out, the government dissolves parliament, triggering Israel’s fifth election since 2019.
October 7, 2023: Hamas massacre: nearly 1,200 Israelis killed, over 250 hostages taken. Oct.–Dec. 2023: Israeli counter-offensive in Gaza to destroy Hamas infrastructure.
Multi-front war: attacks from Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and direct Iranian attacks.
June 13–24: The Twelve-Day War between Israel and Iran. Israel gains air superiority and destroys strategic targets in Iran. Iran fires about 500 ballistic missiles and 1000 explosive drones at Israeli population centers.
October 9: Ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas: prisoner exchange and release of all living hostages. On October 7 Israeli losses stood at 1,163, 766 civilians and 397 IDF Soldiers and Security Forces. In total, the war took the lives of 966 IDF soldiers. One of the highest military losses in decades.
At the beginning of 2026, the population of the State of Israel was 10.25 million. By comparison, at the time of the founding of the state there were about 806,000 inhabitants in Israel. About 76% are recognized as Jewish, 21% are Arab Muslims, Arab Christians or Druze, and a further 3% are non-Arab Christians, members of other religions or had no religious classification in the Interior Ministry. The average life expectancy in Israel in 2025 was almost 84 years, ranking seventh worldwide. Israel has the highest birth rate among developed countries at 2.8 children per woman.
January: The last dead hostage, Ran Gvili, was identified and returned to Israel. There are no longer any hostages in the Gaza Strip. Gvili was killed on October 7, 2023, defending Kibbutz Alumim. His body was subsequently taken to Gaza.
February 28 – April 9: Operation Roaring Lion (in Israel) and “Epic Fury” (in the US): Joint Israel / US strikes on Iran. Iran fires about 650 missiles, as well as explosive drones at Israeli population centers. Hezbollah terrorists based in Lebanon fire more than 1200 missiles at Israeli population centers.
