Middle East milestones

Israel's declaration of statehood 60 years ago this month led to decades of conflict with the Palestinians over the land. It was only in the 1990s that the goal of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel became the basis for peace negotiations.

Here is how the conflict over statehood evolved:

November 1947: The United Nations approves a British plan to partition Palestine into separate Arab and Jewish states. The Arabs reject it.

May 1948: Israel declares its independence as a Jewish state. An estimated 700,000 Palestinians are displaced.

June 1967: The 1967 Middle East War ends with Israel's capture of the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan, the Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip from Egypt, and the Golan Heights from Syria.

July 1968: The Palestinian leadership declares the area of Palestine under the British mandate, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean, "an indivisible territorial unit" and endorses armed struggle to recover it.

December 1988: Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat accepts the goal of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip alongside Israel.

September 1993: As part of the Oslo peace accords, Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization formally recognizes Israel's right to exist, laying the groundwork for talks on a separate Palestinian state.

July 2000: Prime Minister Ehud Barak makes Israel's first offer of statehood to the Palestinians in talks brokered by President Clinton. Arafat rejects the terms.

November 2007: Pressed by President Bush, Israel and the Palestinians launch new talks on Palestinian statehood.

Los Angeles Times