Israel conquered the West Bank and Gaza in 1949

Teejay

Gone Fishin'
Essentially the POD is that Israel conquerors both the West Bank and Gaza in 1949. The result would be that would be even more Arab refugees going into neighboring countries (700,000 refugees out of a total Arab population of 1.3 million refugees in OTL), likely exceeding 1 million. It could be possible that the Arabs left behind are going to be either Druze, Bedouin and maybe Christian. Although it could be possible that the Israeli government decides to expel the Arabs left behind, leaving a Israel which is almost entirely Jewish.

How does a bigger Israel with a large Jewish majority is going to effect it's relationship with the neighboring Arabs. Do the wars which occurred in OTL happen in this TL?
 
In order to make this non-ASB one has to ask: how does Israel conquer the WB/Gaza? It's not so simple as just deciding to do it. Historically the chance to conquer WB/Gaza came in the autumn of 1948, but it was a choice between trying to do that (with success not guaranteed; the Jordanians were feisty) or striking against the substantial and arguably more dangerous Egyptian position in the south. Benny Morris' book 1948 discusses the situation in chapter 7. Ben-Gurion wanted the WB but his Cabinet voted 7-5 against it. (Ben-Gurion called this a 'bechiya ledorot', 'cause of lamentation', which would actually make a good TL title.) Two significant considerations were:
1. the WB was not allocated to Israel under the UN Partition Plan, whereas the Negev was, and in the aftermath of the Bernadotte assassination there was a risk of diplomatic isolation;
2. there were besieged kibbutzim in the Negev.
It would not be too hard to butterfly both of those - i.e. evacuate the Negev kibbutzim before the Egyptian invasion, and save Bernadotte by some chance (e.g. suppose that the plane on which he flew on 17th September couldn't make it and returned to Rhodes with engine trouble). In those circumstances, the narrow Cabinet vote might go the other way. But before going on to think about long-term effects there are major short-term ones. If operation Yoav goes east instead of south, that leaves the Egyptian army in the south unmolested, and maybe means that Israel does not get Beersheva or Eilat. A costly victory over the Jordanians makes major problems for Israel diplomatically - one can't even rule out British intervention to help the Jordanians, if London felt there was a risk that defeat meant Abdullah being overthrown. If British intervention and/ or Abdullah losing power did happen then you've got a major butterfly to deal with. Finally, one can't necessarily assume that the WB Arabs will all become refugees, that wasn't the case, for example, for the Arabs of the central Galilee which Israel conquered at about this time (operation Hiram, end of October 1948).
 
All of the WB/Gaza probably not possible, but MORE including all of Jerusalem and part of Gaza maybe a little more Sinai esp along the area south of Eilat is possible. Giving Israel more depth east/west, some further depth to protect Eilat, and reducing the size of Gaza is important geographically and won't bring anyone else in. Expect that any parts of Gaza and the WB added OTL will see most of the Arabs leaving. The big thing would be to have all of Jerusalem and a bit of a collar. This allows the Israelis to allow the grant of a small bit to the Vatican (around the Holy Sepulchre) and the UN responsibility for the Moslem holy places on the Temple Mount (not directly any Moslem religious authority). These grants are made with a bunch of provisions concerning security, access for Israelis etc. This buys the Israelis goodwill at almost no price.
 
If the war lasted a few days longer, Zionist forces would have captured Gaza and El-Arish.

The issue with the West Bank is the low-key agreement with Jordan that the Zionists had. The Jordanians were the strongest Arab military (really the only well trained one too) and they agreed not to press against the Zionists so long as they were allowed to have the lands right across the Jordan River. Abdullah did't want to bolster his neighbors and was pretty okay with the Zionists. The only place they really fought with Jordan was around Jerusalem.

The Northern West Bank has to go to Jordan (although you could fiddle with the lines regarding Latrun, Musrara, the Walls of Jerusalem, etc). Kfar Etzion could be held on to as well.

Israel traded territory in the south of the West Bank (hills around Hebron) for more territory in the north (the area in israel referred to today as the triangle). Grabbing more lands in the Judean Hills is a possibility if the Zionists took the triangle on their own.
 
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