Endless Conflict: Palestine-Israel Historical Roots

Few conflicts in modern history have generated more commentary and less genuine historical understanding than the struggle over Palestine and Israel. Behind the daily headlines lies a layered, century-long record of competing nationalisms, colonial decisions, broken agreements, and civilian populations repeatedly sacrificed to geopolitical calculation. Endless Conflict begins where understanding must begin—with the late Ottoman period, the Balfour Declaration of 1917, and the competing promises made by European powers to Arab and Jewish communities whose aspirations were never genuinely reconciled. Drawing on British Mandate archives, UN partition records, diplomatic correspondence, and the testimony of displaced communities on both sides, each chapter examines a distinct turning point: the 1948 Nakba and Israeli War of Independence, the 1967 occupation and its territorial consequences, the Oslo Accords and their structural limitations, and the successive cycles of violence that have defined the decades since. The book treats neither population as a monolith and neither leadership as a reliable representative of the people living with the consequences of its decisions. The final section examines the international legal framework that governs—or fails to govern—the conflict: UN resolutions systematically unenforced, ICC proceedings contested, and humanitarian obligations observed selectively by all parties with the power to act. Endless Conflict is not an argument for any political outcome. It is a rigorous historical examination of how this conflict was made, how it has been sustained, and what the documentary record reveals about why every proposed resolution has so far fallen short of peace.