The fight between Jews and Arabs over Israel and Palestine goes back to 1922. The Romans had given Palestine its name when they conquered it from the Jews nearly 2,000 years earlier. After the Romans were thrown out Palestine was part of one Arab or other Moslem empire after another since the 7th century. Finally, in the 400 years before it became available in 1922, Palestine had been a small part of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. But in World War I the British and French defeated Germany and the Ottoman Empire and stripped them of their colonies. Thus the League of Nations had to decide what nations should become sovereign in Palestine and the rest of the vast lands lost by the Turks. The League awarded more than 90% of these lands to Arab states, with Britain and France as temporary trustees.
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