Palestine Resources: Primary Sources, Books and Glossary

• UN General Assembly Resolution 181 (II)

  29 November 1947

  The Partition Plan. Recommended ending the British Mandate and dividing Palestine into an Arab state and a Jewish state, with Jerusalem placed under an international regime.

• UN General Assembly Resolution 194 (III)

  11 December 1948

  Paragraph 11 resolves that refugees "wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date", with compensation for those choosing not to return.

• UN Security Council Resolution 242

  22 November 1967

  Adopted after the June 1967 war. Calls for "withdrawal of Israel armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict" and for every state in the area to live in peace within secure and recognised boundaries.

• UN Security Council Resolution 338

  22 October 1973

  Called for a ceasefire in the October 1973 war and for the parties to start implementing Resolution 242 "in all of its parts" immediately.

• UN Security Council Resolution 2334

  23 December 2016

  States that Israeli settlements in the territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, have "no legal validity" and are a "flagrant violation under international law". Passed 14-0, with the United States abstaining.

• UN General Assembly Resolution ES-10/24

  18 September 2024

  Welcomes the ICJ's 2024 advisory opinion and demands that Israel end its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory within 12 months. Adopted 124 in favour, 14 against, 43 abstentions.

• New York Declaration on Palestine

  12 September 2025

  General Assembly endorsement of the outcome of the July 2025 high-level conference, setting out a roadmap to a two-state solution and calling on Hamas to end its rule in Gaza and hand over its weapons to the Palestinian Authority. Adopted 142 in favour, 10 against, 12 abstentions.

• UN General Assembly Resolution 80/72

  2 December 2025

  Demands that Israel comply strictly with international law, end its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and cease all new settlement activity, and rejects any demographic or territorial change in Gaza. Adopted 151 in favour, 11 against, 11 abstentions.

• UN General Assembly Resolution 80/116

  12 December 2025

  Welcomes the ICJ's October 2025 advisory opinion and demands Israel comply with its obligations as occupying power, including immediately allowing and facilitating humanitarian relief by UNRWA and other UN agencies into Gaza. Adopted 139 in favour, 12 against, 19 abstentions.

• ICJ Advisory Opinion on the Wall

  9 July 2004

  Found that the wall Israel was building in the West Bank and around East Jerusalem is contrary to international law. Israel must stop construction, dismantle the sections already built and make reparation.

• ICJ Advisory Opinion on the Occupied Palestinian Territory

  19 July 2024

  Found Israel's continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory unlawful and said it must end "as rapidly as possible". Israel must stop all new settlement activity, evacuate all settlers and make reparation. Other states must not recognise the situation as lawful.

• ICJ Advisory Opinion on Israel's Obligations toward the UN in the OPT

  22 October 2025

  Requested by the General Assembly in December 2024. Finds Israel, as occupying power, must agree to and facilitate impartial relief operations, including by UNRWA, and rejects Israel's unsubstantiated allegations against the agency as a basis for restricting its work.

• South Africa v. Israel: Provisional Measures

  26 January, 28 March and 24 May 2024

  Case under the Genocide Convention. January: Israel must take all measures in its power to prevent acts covered by the Convention and enable humanitarian aid. March: Israel must ensure unhindered delivery of food, water, fuel and medical care. May: Israel must immediately halt its military offensive in Rafah. These orders are interim; the Court has not yet ruled on the merits.

• B'Tselem: A Regime of Jewish Supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea: This Is Apartheid

  12 January 2021

  Israel's largest human rights organisation concludes that a single regime governs the whole area between the river and the sea and works to keep Jews in a position of supremacy over Palestinians.

• Human Rights Watch: A Threshold Crossed

  27 April 2021

  Finds that Israeli authorities are committing the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution against Palestinians.

• Amnesty International: Israel's Apartheid against Palestinians

  1 February 2022

  Concludes that Israel maintains a system of oppression and domination over Palestinians in Israel and the occupied territories, and over Palestinian refugees, that amounts to apartheid under international law.

• UN Commission of Inquiry: Israel has committed genocide in the Gaza Strip

  16 September 2025

  The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel concludes that Israeli authorities and security forces committed four of the five genocidal acts under the 1948 Genocide Convention, and finds genocidal intent in statements by senior Israeli officials.

Arabic for 'catastrophe'. The expulsion and flight of around 750,000 Palestinians in 1947-49 and the destruction of hundreds of their villages. Marked each year on 15 May.

The territory Britain governed under a League of Nations mandate, approved in 1922 and ended on 14-15 May 1948, when Israel declared independence.

The 1949 armistice lines between Israel and its neighbours. It separates Israel from the West Bank and Gaza, which Israel has occupied since June 1967.

Under Article 42 of the 1907 Hague Regulations, territory is occupied when placed under the authority of a hostile army. The Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) sets the occupier's duties; Article 49 bars it from transferring its own civilians into the territory.

Agreements between Israel and the PLO: the 1993 Declaration of Principles and the 1995 Interim Agreement (Oslo II). They created the Palestinian Authority and deferred Jerusalem, refugees, settlements and borders to final-status talks that never concluded.

Oslo II's division of the West Bank. Area A: Palestinian civil and security control. Area B: Palestinian civil control, Israeli security control. Area C, about 60% of the West Bank: full Israeli control.

UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. Created by General Assembly Resolution 302 (IV) in December 1949; runs schools, clinics and aid for registered refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.

Arabic for 'shaking off', usually translated 'uprising'. The First Intifada began in December 1987; the Second began in September 2000.

A crime under international law. The 1973 Apartheid Convention and Article 7(2)(h) of the Rome Statute define it as inhumane acts committed within an institutionalised regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over another, with the intent of maintaining that regime.

Palestinian refugees' claim to return to the homes they fled or were expelled from, based on paragraph 11 of UN General Assembly Resolution 194 and Article 13(2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions. A non-violent campaign launched by Palestinian civil society groups in 2005 to pressure Israel to comply with international law.

A scholarly framework for colonial projects in which settlers come to stay and seek to replace the indigenous population, rather than rule over it. Used by historians such as Rashid Khalidi to describe Zionism in Palestine.