All-Palestine Government

At the end of World War I, Great Britain occupied the Ottoman territory of Palestine. The boundaries of the occupied land were not well defined. Britain and France, the main Allied Powers with a long-term interest in the area, made several agreements which set up spheres of interest between them in the area. Britain sought to legitimize the occupation by obtaining the British Mandate of Palestine from the League of Nations. In the mandated territory, Britain set up two separate administrations—Palestine and Transjordan—with the stated objective that they would in the course of time become fully independent.[5][6]

There was opposition from the Arab population of Palestine to the objectives set out in the mandate, and civil unrest persisted throughout the term of the mandate. Various attempts were made to reconcile the Arab community with the growing Jewish population without success. Several partition plans were proposed. The United Nations proposed the Partition Plan of 1947 which proposed that the Gaza area would become part of a new Arab Palestinian state. The Arab states rejected the United Nations plan, which heralded the start of the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine.

Ernest Bevin, the British Foreign Secretary, said that after twenty five years the British had failed to establish the self-governing institutions in Palestine that had been required under the Mandate.[7] Transjordan had been recognized as an independent government throughout most of the mandatory period, but it was officially recognized as an independent state by the United Kingdom in the Treaty of London (1946). Some countries continued to dispute its independent status.[8]

With the announcement by Britain that it would unilaterally withdraw from the Mandate on 15 May 1948, the players in the region commenced maneuvers to secure their positions and objectives in the power vacuum brought on by the departing British.

The objective of the surrounding Arab countries in the take-over of the whole of the British Mandate was set out on April 12, 1948, when the Arab League announced:

The Arab armies shall enter Palestine to rescue it. His Majesty (King Farouk, representing the League) would like to make it clearly understood that such measures should be looked upon as temporary and devoid of any character of the occupation or partition of Palestine, and that after completion of its liberation, that country would be handed over to its owners to rule in the way they like.[9]

Israel declared its independence on 14 May 1948, the day before the expiration of the Mandate (because 15 May was the Jewish Sabbath). On 15 May 1948, the Egyptian army invaded the territory of the former British Mandate from the south, starting the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.[10]

Despite its lofty declarations and goals, the All-Palestine Government proved to be generally ineffectual. The Palestinian Arabs, and the Arab world in general, were shocked by the speed and extent of the Israeli victories, and the poor showing of the Arab armies. This, combined with the expansionist designs of King Abdullah, cast the Palestinian Arab leadership into disarray.

Avi Shlaim writes:

'The decision to form the Government of All-Palestine in Gaza, and the feeble attempt to create armed forces under its control, furnished the members of the Arab League with the means of divesting themselves of direct responsibility for the prosecution of the war and of withdrawing their armies from Palestine with some protection against popular outcry. Whatever the long-term future of the Arab government of Palestine, its immediate purpose, as conceived by its Egyptian sponsors, was to provide a focal point of opposition to Abdullah and serve as an instrument for frustrating his ambition to federate the Arab regions with Transjordan'.[16]

The 1948 Arab-Israeli War came to an end with the Israel-Egypt Armistice Agreement of 24 February 1949, which fixed the boundaries of the Gaza Strip.[17] The All-Palestine Government was not a party to the Agreement nor involved in its negotiation. The Gaza Strip was the only area of the former British Mandate territory that was under the nominal control of the All-Palestine Government. The rest of the British Mandate territory became either part of Israel or the West Bank, annexed by Transjordan (a move that was not recognized internationally). In reality, the Gaza Strip was under Egyptian administration, though Egypt never made any claim to or annexed any Palestinian territory. Egypt did not offer the Palestinians citizenship.

There was an enormous influx into the Gaza Strip of Palestinian refugees from those parts of the former Mandate Palestine that became part of Israel. From the end of 1949 the refugees received aid directly from UNRWA and not from or through the All-Palestine Government. There is no evidence of any All-Palestine Government involvement in the negotiations for the setting up of UNRWA-run refugee camps in the Gaza Strip or anywhere else.

After the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 and the rise to power of Gamal Abdel Nasser, Egyptian support for Pan-Arabism and the Palestinian cause increased. However, the new rule increasingly acted to degrade the Palestinian self-rule. In 1952, All-Palestine being put by the Arab League under the official aegis of Egypt. In 1953, the All-Palestine Government was nominally dissolved, except the Prime Minister Hilmi position, who kept attending the Arab League meetings on behalf of All-Palestine.

During the Suez War of 1956 Israel invaded the Gaza Strip and the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula. Israel eventually withdrew from the territories it had invaded, and the All-Palestine Government continued to have official sovereignty in Gaza.

In 1957, the Basic Law of Gaza established a Legislative Council that could pass laws which were given to the High Administrator-General for approval.[18]

The situation changed again after the 1958 unification of Egypt and Syria in the United Arab Republic. In 1959, Gamal Abdel Nasser officially annulled the All-Palestine Government by decree, reasoning that the All-Palestine Government had failed to advance the Palestinian cause. At that time, Amin al-Husayni moved from Egypt to Lebanon and the Gaza Strip became directly administered by Egypt. In March 1962 a Constitution for the Gaza Strip was issued confirming the role of the Legislative Council.[18] Egyptian administration came to an end in June 1967 when the Gaza Strip was captured by Israel in the Six-Day War.