Ramallah

Ramallah

Ramallah (Arabic: رام الله (help·info) Rām Allāh) (lit: "Height of God") is a Palestinian city in the central West Bank adjacent to al-Bireh with a population nearly 25,500. Ramallah is located 10 kilometers (6 miles) north of Jerusalem and currently serves as the administrative capital of the Palestinian National Authority.

Modern Ramallah was founded in the mid-1500s by the Haddadeens, a tribe of brothers descended from Ghassanid Christian Arabs. The Haddadeens, led by Rashed Haddadeen, arrived from east of the Jordan River near what is now the Jordanian town of Shobak. The Haddadeen migration is attributed to fighting and unrest among clans in that area. According to local legend, Rashed's brother Sabri Haddadeen was hosting Emir Ibn Kaysoom, head of a powerful Muslim clan in the region, when Sabri's wife gave birth to a baby girl. According to custom, the Emir proposed a betrothal to his own infant son when they came of age. Sabri believed the proposal was in jest, as Muslim-Christian marriages were not customary, and gave his word. When the Emir later came to the Haddadeens and demanded that they fulfill their promise, they refused. This set off bloody warfare between the two families. The Haddadeens fled west and settled on the hilltops of Ramallah, where only a few Muslim families lived at the time. Today, a large community of people descended directly from the Haddadeens live in the United States. The town is now predominately Muslim. .

Ramallah grew throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as an agricultural village, thus attracting more (predominantly Christian) inhabitants from around the region. In 1700, Yacoub Elias was the first Ramallah native to be ordained by the Greek Orthodox Church, the dominant Christian denomination in the Holy Land at that time. In the early 1800s, the first Arab Orthodox church was built. The Church of Transfiguration, built to replace it in 1850, is the sole Orthodox Church in Ramallah today. During that same decade, the Latin (Roman Catholic) Church established its presence in Ramallah, constituting the second largest Christian denomination in the city. The Roman Catholic Church established the St. Joseph's Girl's School, as well as the co-educational al-Ahliyyah high school. With the influx of Muslim and Christian refugees and internal migration, new mosques and churches were built. The Jamal Abdel Nasser Mosque is one of the city's largest. The Melkite Catholic Church, Lutheran Church, Arab Episcopal (Anglican) Church, and Ramallah Baptist Church all operate schools in the city.

In the 19th century, the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) established a presence in Ramallah and built several schools for girls to alleviate the dearth of education for women and girls. Eli and Sybil Jones opened an academy for girls in 1869. A medical clinic was established in 1883, with Dr. George Hassenauer serving as the first doctor in Ramallah. In 1889, the girls academy became the Friends Girls School (FGS). As the FGS was also a boarding school, it attracted a number of girls from surrounding communities, including Jerusalem, Lydda, Jaffa, and Beirut. The Friends Boys School (FBS) was founded in 1901. The Quakers opened a Friends Meeting House for worship in the city center in 1910.

These Quaker schools, now known as the Ramallah Friends Schools, still exist today, in a co-ed format. According to the schools' official website, most high school students choose to take the International Baccalaureate exams instead of the traditional "Tawjihi" university exams.

The activity of foreign churches in Palestine in the late nineteenth century increased awareness of prosperity in the West. In Ramallah and Bethlehem, a few miles south, local residents began to seek their fortunes overseas. In 1901, merchants from Ramallah emigrated to the United States and established import-export businesses, selling handmade rugs and other exotic wares across the Atlantic. Increased trade dramatically improved living standards for Ramallah's inhabitants. American cars, mechanized farming equipment,radios, and later televisions became attainable luxuries for upper class families. As residents of Jaffa and Lydda moved to Ramallah, the balance of Muslims and Christians began to change.

By the beginning of the twentieth century Ramallah was an active agricultural town. It was declared a city in 1908 and had an elected municipality as well as partnership projects with the adjacent town of al-Bireh. In World War I, a few locals joined the Turkish army, a number of whom were killed in battle. The Friends Boys School became a temporary hospital during the War. The British Army occupied Ramallah in December 1917. The city remained under British rule until 1948.

The economy improved in the 1920s. The landed aristocracy and merchants who formed the Palestinian upper class built stately multi-storied villas during this period; many of these estates are still standing today. The Jerusalem Electric Company brought electricity to Ramallah in 1936, and most homes were wired shortly thereafter. In 1946, the British authorities inaugurated the "Palestine Broadcasting Service" in Ramallah, the staff of which was trained by the British Broadcasting Corporation to deliver daily broadcasts in Arabic, Hebrew, and English. This station was later renamed "Kol Yerushalaym" (The Voice of Jerusalem).

By 1953, Ramallah's population had doubled, but the economy and infrastructure were not equipped to handle the influx of poor villagers. They also feared the establishment of kibbutzim in Israel might engender a socialist-collectivist ideology among Palestinians and that their personal wealth might be confiscated and redistributed. Natives of Ramallah left, primarily to the United States. By 1946, 1,500 of Ramallah's 6,000 natives (or about a quarter) had emigrated, and Arabs from the surrounding towns and villages particularly Hebron, bought up the property and homes the émigrés left behind.

Ramallah was relatively tranquil during the years of Jordanian rule between 1948 and 1967, with residents enjoying freedom of movement between the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon, and elsewhere. Jordan had annexed the West Bank, applying its law to the territory. However, many Palestinians were jailed for being members of what the Jordanian government regarded as illegal political parties, including the Palestine Communist Party and other socialist and pro-independence groups. Jordanian law also restricted the creativity and freedom desired by many Palestinians at the time. During the Six-Day War in 1967, Israel captured Ramallah, immediately imposing a military closure, and conducted a census a few weeks later. Every person registered in the census was given an Israeli identity card which was the sole document that allowed the bearer to continue to reside there. Those who were abroad during the census lost their residency rights. For residents of Ramallah, the situation had now reversed itself; for the first time in 19 years residents could freely visit Israel and the Gaza Strip and engage in commerce there.

Unlike the Jordanians, Israel did not annex the West Bank. Ramallah residents did not have voting rights in Israel and could only work there by permit. Certain services, like banks, were not allowed in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Ramallah remained under Israeli military rule for three decades. The Civil Administration established in 1981, was in charge of civilian and day-to-day services such as issuing permission to travel, build, export or import, and host relatives from abroad. The CA reprinted Jordanian textbooks for distribution in schools but did not update them. The CA was in charge of tax collection and land expropriation, which sometimes included olive groves that Arab villagers claimed to have tended for generations. According to the Israeli Human Rights activists, Jewish settlements in the Ramallah area, such as Beit-El and Psagot, prevented the expansion of the city and cut it off from the surrounding villages. As resistance increased, Ramallah residents were jailed or deported to neighboring countries for membership in the Palestine Liberation Organization. In December 1987, the popular uprising known as the Intifada erupted.

Ramallah residents were among the early joiners of the First Intifada. The Intifada Unified Leadership, an umbrella organization of various Palestinian factions, distributed weekly bulletins on the streets of Ramallah with a schedule of the daily protests, strikes and action against Israeli patrols in the city. At the demonstrations, tires were burned in the street and the crowds threw stones and Molotov cocktails. The IDF responded with tear gas and rubber bullets. Schools in Ramallah were forcibly shut down, and opened gradually for a few hours a day. House arrests were carried out and curfews were imposed that restricted travel and exports in what Palestinians regarded as collective punishment. In response to the closure of schools, residents organized home schooling sessions to help students make up missed material; this became one of the few symbols of civil disobedience. The Intifada leadership organized "tree plantings" and resorted to the tactics used in pre-1948 Palestine, such as ordering general strikes in which no commercial businesses were allowed to open and no cars were allowed on the streets.

In 1991, the Palestinian delegation to the Madrid International Peace Conference included many notables from Ramallah. As the Intifada wound down and the peace process moved forward, normal life in Ramallah resumed. On September 13, 1993 the famous White House handshake between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian Leader Yasser Arafat took place, and schoolchildren in Ramallah handed out olive branches to Israeli soldiers patrolling the streets. In December 1995, in keeping with the Oslo Accords, the Israeli army abandoned the Mukata'a and withdrew to the city outskirts. The newly established Palestinian Authority assumed civilian and security responsibility for the city, which was designated "Area A" under the accords.

The years between 1993 and 2000 (known locally as the "Oslo Years") brought relative prosperity to Ramallah. Many expatriates returned to establish businesses there and the atmosphere was one of optimism. In 2000, unemployment began to rise and the economy of Ramallah declined. The Israel Defense Force remained in control of the territories, the freedom of movement enjoyed by Ramallah residents prior to the first Intifada was not restored. Travel to Jerusalem required special permits, and expansion of Israeli settlements around Ramallah increased dramatically. A network of bypass roads for use of Jewish citizens only was built around Ramallah, and land was confiscated for settlements. Many official documents previously handled by the Israeli Civil Administration were now handled by the Palestinian Authority but still required Israeli approval. A Palestinian passport issued to Ramallah residents was not valid unless the serial number was registered with the Israeli authorities, who controlled border crossings. The failure of the Camp David summit in July 2000 led to the outbreak of the Al-Aqsa Intifada in September 2000.

Young Ramallah residents demonstrated daily against the Israeli army, with marches to the Israeli checkpoints at the outskirts of the city. Over time, the marches were replaced by sporadic use of live ammunition against Israeli soldiers; and various attacks targetting Jewish settlers, particularly on the Jewish-only bypass roads. Army checkpoints were established to restrict movement in and out of Ramallah.

On October 12, 2000, two Israeli army reservists took a wrong turn near Ramallah and were set upon by an angry mob. According to the Palestinian police chief, attempts were made to shield them from harm at the Ramallah police station, but a frenzied crowd stormed the station, killed the two reservists, mutilated their bodies, and dragged them through the streets. Later that afternoon, Israeli army carried out an air strike on Ramallah, demolishing the police station. In subsequent months, Palestinians resorted to increased use of firearms to target Israeli soldiers and Jewish settlers, and suicide bombers attacked Israeli civilians in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and elsewhere. Some of the bombers came from villages and refugee camps around Ramallah.

In 2002, Ramallah was reoccupied by Israel in an IDF operation codenamed Operation Defensive Shield, which resulted in curfews, electricity cuts, school closures and disruptions of commercial life. Many Ramallah institutions, including government ministries, were vandalized, and equipment was destroyed or stolen. The IDF took over local Ramallah television stations, and social and economic conditions deteriorated. Many expatriates left, as did many other Palestinians who complained that the living conditions had become intolerable. The Israeli West Bank barrier has furthered Ramallah's isolation.

Ramallah had a population of 3,067 in a 1922 British Mandate census, rising to 5,080 in Sami Hadawi's population survey in 1945. Christian formed the majority of the population, however, the demographic makeup of the town changed drastically between 1948 and 1967 with only slightly more than half of the city's 12,134 inhabitants being Christian, the other half Muslim.

Ramallah's population drastically decreased in the late 20th century from 24,722 inhabitants in 1987 to 17,851 in 1997. In the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) census in 1997, Palestinian refugees accounted for 60.3% of the population which was 17,851. There were 8,622 males and 9,229 females. People younger than 20 years of age made up 45.9% of the population, while those aged between 20 and 64 were 45.4%, and residents aged over 64 constituted 4.7%.

Only in 2005 did the population reach over 24,000. In a PCBS projection in 2006, Ramallah had a population of 25,467 inhabitants. Sources vary about the current Christian population in the city, ranging from less than 50% to at least 5%.

Yasser Arafat established his West Bank headquarters, the Mukata'a, in Ramallah. Although considered an interim solution, Ramallah has become the de facto capital of the Palestinian Authority, hosting almost all governmental headquarters. In December 2001, Arafat held meetings at the Mukata'a, but lived with his wife and daughter in Gaza City. After suicide bombings in Haifa, Arafat was confined to the Ramallah compound. In 2002, the compound was partly demolished by the IDF and Arafat's building was cut off from the rest of the compound. Israel showed pictures of illegal weapons allegedly found in the Mukata'a and said it proved Arafat's link to terrorism. The Palestinians claimed the weapons belonged to the Palestinian security services.

On November 11, 2004 Arafat died at the Percy training hospital of the Armies near Paris. He was buried in the courtyard of the Mukata'a on November 12, 2004. The site still serves as the Ramallah headquarters of the Palestinian Authority, as well the official West Bank office of Mahmoud Abbas.

In December 2005, local elections were held in Ramallah in which candidates from three different factions competed for the 15-seat municipal council for a four-year term. The council elected Janet Mikhail as mayor, the first woman to hold the post.

Ramallah is generally considered the most affluent and cultural, as well as the most liberal, of all Palestinian cities, and is home to a number of popular Palestinian activists, poets, artists, and musicians. One hallmark of Ramallah is Rukab's Ice Cream, which is based on the resin of chewing gum and thus has a distinctive taste. Another is the First Ramallah Group, a boy- and girl-scout club that also holds a number of traditional dance (Dabka) performances and is also home to men's and women's basketball teams that compete regionally. During the annual "Saturday of Light" religious festival (which occurs on the Saturday between Good Friday and Easter Sunday to commemorate the light that tradition holds shone from the tomb of Jesus), the scouts hold a parade through the city streets to receive the flame from Jerusalem. (The flame is ignited in Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre and is passed on through candles and lanterns to regional churches.) A variety of mosques and churches of different denominations dot the landscape. International music and dance troupes occasionally make a stop in Ramallah, and renowned Israeli pianist Daniel Barenboim performs there often. The Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center, founded in 1996, is a popular venue for such events. The Al-Kasaba Theatre is a venue for plays and movies. In 2004, the state-of-the art Ramallah Cultural Palace opened in the city. The only cultural center of its kind in the Palestinian territories, it houses a 736-seat auditorium, as well as conference rooms, exhibit halls, and movie-screening rooms. It was a joint venture of the Palestinian Authority, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the Japanese government. Ramallah hosted its first annual international film festival in 2004.

Due to the difficulty of travel in the 19th century, villages in Palestine remained isolated. As a result, clothing and accessories became a statement of region. In Ramallah, the back panels of dresses often incorporated a palm tree motif embroidered in cross-stitch. Ramallah women were famous for their distinctive dress of white linen fabric embroidered with red silk thread. The headdress or smadeh worn in Ramallah was common throughout northern Palestine: a small roundish cap, padded and stiffened, with gold and silver coins set in a fringe with a long veil pinned to the back, sometimes of silk and sometimes embroidered.

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Ramallah Friends Schools

The Ramallah Friends Schools are two Schools started by Quakers in the city of Ramallah, in the West Bank. The Friends Girls' School was founded in 1869; the Friends Boy's School was founded in 1901.

The schools are now co-educational and divided into Senior and Junior sections; a Meeting House was built in 1910.

The Friends Schools are considered one of the best schools in the West Bank and Gaza Strip areas of Palestine., offering various educational curricula. These include Local governmental examinations: ‘Tawjihi’, American SAT examinations, and the IB curriculum. The school was able to provide the IB curriculum after being certified in 2001 by the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO). The Friends School currently serves as the School for the best and the brightest. It is well known to educate the children of Palestinian elites.

Among the distinguished alumni of the schools are Hanan Ashrawi, Serene Husseini Shahid, Hani Masri, Joyce Khalaf, Raja Shehadeh and Rami Kashou.

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Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate

The Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate (Arabic: محافظة رام الله و البيرة‎) is one of 16 Governorates of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. It covers a large part of the central West Bank, on the northern border of the Jerusalem Governorate. Its district capital or muhfaza (seat) is the city of al-Bireh.

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS), the district had a population of 290,401 in mid-year 2006. Its governor is Said Abu Ali.

According to PCBS, the governorate has 78 localities including refugee camps in its jurisdiction. Thirteen localities retain the status of a municipality.

The following localities in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate have populations over 1,000.

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West Bank

The West Bank (Arabic: الضفة الغربية‎, aḍ-Ḍiffä l-Ġarbīyä, Hebrew: הגדה המערבית‎, HaGadah HaMa'aravit) is a landlocked territory on the west bank of the River Jordan in the Middle East. To the west, north, and south the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the country of Jordan. The West Bank also contains a significant coast line along the western bank of the Dead Sea. Since 1967 most of the West Bank has been under Israeli military occupation.

Prior to the First World War, the area now known as the West Bank was under Ottoman rule as part of the province of Syria. In the 1920 San Remo conference, the victorious Allied powers allocated the area to the British Mandate of Palestine. The 1948 Arab-Israeli War saw the establishment of Israel in parts of the former Mandate, while the West Bank was captured and annexed by Jordan. The 1949 Armistice Agreements defined its interim boundary. From 1948 until 1967, the area was under Jordanian rule, and Jordan did not officially relinquish its claim to the area until 1988. Jordan's claim was never recognized by the international community, with the exception of the United Kingdom. The West Bank was captured by Israel during the Six-Day War in June, 1967. With the exception of East Jerusalem, the West Bank was not annexed by Israel. Most of the residents are Arabs, although a large number of Israeli settlements have been built in the region since 1967.

The region did not have a separate existence until 1948–1949, when it was defined by the Armistice Agreement of April 1949 between Israel and Jordan (until then known as Transjordan). The name "West Bank" was apparently first used by Jordanians at the time of their annexation of the region in 1950, and has become the most common name used in English and some of the other Germanic languages. The term was used in order to differentiate 'the West bank of the river Jordan', namely the newly annexed territory; from the "East Bank", namely the 'East bank' of this same River Jordan (Transjordan), which today constitutes the present territory of the Kingdom of Jordan.

The neo-Latin name Cisjordan or Cis-Jordan (literally "on this side of the Jordan") is the usual name in the Romance languages and Hungarian. The analogous Transjordan has historically been used to designate the region now comprising the state of Jordan which lies on the "other side" of the River Jordan. In English, the name Cisjordan is also occasionally used to designate the entire region between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, particularly in the historical context of the British Mandate and earlier times. The use of Cisjordan to refer to the smaller region discussed in this article, while common in scholarly fields including archaeology, is rare in general English usage; the name West Bank is standard usage for this geo-political entity. For the low-lying area immediately west of the Jordan, the name Jordan Valley is used instead.

Israelis refer to the region either as a unit: "The West Bank" (Hebrew: "HaGada HaMa'aravit" "הגדה המערבית"), or as two units: Judea and Samaria (Hebrew: "Yehuda" "יהודה", "Shomron" "שומרון"), after the two biblical kingdoms (the southern Kingdom of Judah and the northern Kingdom of Israel — the capital of which was, for a time, in the town of Samaria). The geographic terms Judea and Samaria have been in continual use by Jews since Biblical times. The combined term "Judea and Samaria" was officially adopted by the Israeli government in 1967 but not used extensively until the Likud assumed office in 1977. Arab geography also refers to the northern part of the West Bank as ‘’as-Samara’’. However, the name has become somewhat obsolete among Arabs due its politicised use by the Israeli settler movement.

The Arab world and especially the Palestinians strongly object to the term Judea and Samaria, the use of which they deem to reflect Israeli expansionist aims. Instead, they refer to the area as "the occupied West Bank".

The territory now known as the West Bank was a part of the British Mandate of Palestine entrusted to the United Kingdom by the League of Nations after World War I. The terms of the Mandate called for the creation in Palestine of a Jewish national home without prejudicing the civil and religious rights of the non-Jewish population of Palestine.

The current border of the West Bank was not a dividing line of any sort during the Mandate period, but rather the armistice line between the forces of the neighboring kingdom of Jordan and those of Israel at the close of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. When the United Nations General Assembly voted in 1947 to partition Palestine into a Jewish State, an Arab State, and an internationally-administered enclave of Jerusalem, a more broad region of the modern-day West Bank was assigned to the Arab State. The West Bank was controlled by Iraqi and Jordanian forces at the end of the 1948 War and the area was annexed by Jordan in 1950 but this annexation was recognized only by the United Kingdom (Pakistan is often, but apparently falsely, assumed to have recognized it also). The idea of an independent Palestinian state was not on the table. King Abdullah of Jordan was crowned King of Jerusalem and granted Palestinian Arabs in the West Bank and East Jerusalem Jordanian citizenship.

During the 1950s, there was a significant influx of Palestinian refugees and violence together with Israeli reprisal raids across the Green Line.

In May 1967 Egypt ordered out U.N. peacekeeping troops and re-militarized the Sinai peninsula, and blockaded the straits of Tiran. Fearing an Egyptian attack, the government of Levi Eshkol attempted to restrict any confrontation to Egypt alone. In particular it did whatever it could to avoid fighting Jordan. However, "carried along by a powerful current of Arab nationalism", on May 30, 1967 King Hussein flew to Egypt and signed a mutual defense treaty in which the two countries agreed to consider "any armed attack on either state or its forces as an attack on both". Fearing an imminent Egyptian attack, on June 5, the Israel Defense Forces launched a pre-emptive attack on Egypt which began what came to be known as the Six Day War.

Jordan soon began shelling targets in west Jerusalem, Netanya, and the outskirts of Tel Aviv. Despite this, Israel sent a message promising not to initiate any action against Jordan if it stayed out of the war. Hussein replied that it was too late, "the die was cast". On the evening of June 5 the Israeli cabinet convened to decide what to do; Yigal Allon and Menahem Begin argued that this was an opportunity to take the Old City of Jerusalem, but Eshkol decided to defer any decision until Moshe Dayan and Yitzhak Rabin could be consulted. Uzi Narkis made a number of proposals for military action, including the capture of Latrun, but the cabinet turned him down. The Israeli military only commenced action after Government House was captured, which was seen as a threat to the security of Jerusalem. On June 6 Dayan encircled the city, but, fearing damage to holy places and having to fight in built-up areas, he ordered his troops not to go in. However, upon hearing that the U.N. was about to declare a ceasefire, he changed his mind, and without cabinet clearance, decided to take the city. After fierce fighting with Jordanian troops in and around the Jerusalem area, Israel captured the Old City on 7 June.

First, the Israeli government had no intention of capturing the West Bank. On the contrary, it was opposed to it. Second, there was not any provocation on the part of the IDF. Third, the rein was only loosened when a real threat to Jerusalem's security emerged. This is truly how things happened on June 5, although it is difficult to believe. The end result was something that no one had planned.

The Arab League's Khartoum conference in September declared continuing belligerency, and stated the league's principles of "no peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with it". In November 1967, UN Security Council Resolution 242 was unanimously adopted, calling for "the establishment of a just and lasting peace in the Middle East" to be achieved by "the application of both the following principles:" "Withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict" (see semantic dispute) and: "Termination of all claims or states of belligerency" and respect for the right of every state in the area to live in peace within secure and recognised boundaries. Egypt, Jordan, Israel and Lebanon entered into consultations with the UN Special representative over the implementation of 242. The text did not refer to the PLO or to any Palestinian representative because none was recognized at that time.

Area A comprises Palestinian towns, and some rural areas away from Israeli population centers in the north (between Jenin, Nablus, Tubas, and Tulkarm), the south (around Hebron), and one in the center south of Salfit. Area B adds other populated rural areas, many closer to the center of the West Bank. Area C contains all the Israeli settlements, roads used to access the settlements, buffer zones (near settlements, roads, strategic areas, and Israel), and almost all of the Jordan Valley and Judean Desert.

Areas A and B are themselves divided among 227 separate areas (199 of which are smaller than 2 square kilometres (1 sq mi)) that are separated from one another by Israeli-controlled Area C. Areas A, B, and C cross the 11 Governorates used as administrative divisions by the Palestinian National Authority and named after major cities.

While the vast majority of the Palestinian population lives in areas A and B, the vacant land available for construction in dozens of villages and towns across the West Bank is situated on the margins of the communities and defined as area C.

In December 2007, an official Census conducted by the Palestinian Authority found that the Palestinian population of the West Bank (including Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem) was 2,345,000.

There are over 275,000 Israeli settlers living in the West Bank, as well as around 200,000 living in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem. There are also small ethnic groups, such as the Samaritans living in and around Nablus, numbering in the hundreds. Interactions between the two societies have generally declined following the Palestinian Intifadas, though an economic relationship often exists between adjacent Israeli and Palestinian Arab villages.

As of October 2007, around 23,000 Palestinians in the West Bank work in Israel every day with another 9,200 working in Israeli settlements. In addition, around 10,000 Palestinian traders from the West Bank are allowed to travel every day into Israel.

Approximately 30% of Palestinians living in the West Bank are refugees or descendants of refugees from villages and towns located in what became Israel during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War (see Palestinian exodus), 754,263 in June 2008 according to UNRWA statistics.

The most densely populated part of the region is a mountainous spine, running north-south, where the Palestinian cities of Nablus, Ramallah, al-Bireh, Abu Dis, Bethlehem, Hebron and Yattah are located as well as the Israeli settlements of Ariel, Ma'ale Adumim and Betar Illit. Ramallah, although relatively small in population compared to other major cities, serves as an economic and political center for the Palestinians. Jenin in the extreme north of the West Bank is on the southern edge of the Jezreel Valley. Modi'in Illit, Qalqilyah and Tulkarm are in the low foothills adjacent to the Israeli Coastal Plain, and Jericho and Tubas are situated in the Jordan Valley, north of the Dead Sea.

The West Bank has 4,500 km (2,796 mi) of roads, of which 2,700 km (1,678 mi) are paved.

In response to shootings by Palestinians, some highways, especially those leading to Israeli settlements, are completely inaccessible to cars with Palestinian license plates, while many other roads are restricted only to public transportation and to Palestinians who have special permits from Israeli authorities. Due to numerous shooting assaults targeting Israeli vehicles, the IDF bars Israelis from using most of the original roads in the West Bank. Israel's longstanding policy of separation-to-prevent-friction dictates the development of alternative highway systems for Israelis and Palestinian traffic.

Israel maintains more than 600 checkpoints or roadblocks in the region. . As such, movement restrictions are also placed on main roads traditionally used by Palestinians to travel between cities, and such restrictions have been blamed for poverty and economic depression in the West Bank. Since the beginning of 2005, there has been some amelioration of these restrictions. According to recent human rights reports, "Israel has made efforts to improve transport contiguity for Palestinians travelling in the West Bank. It has done this by constructing underpasses and bridges (28 of which have been constructed and 16 of which are planned) that link Palestinian areas separated from each other by Israeli settlements and bypass roads" and by removal of checkpoints and physical obstacles, or by not reacting to Palestinian removal or natural erosion of other obstacles. "The impact (of these actions) is most felt by the easing of movement between villages and between villages and the urban centres".

However, the obstacles encircling major Palestinian urban hubs, particularly Nablus and Hebron, have remained. In addition, the IDF prohibits Israeli citizens from entering Palestinian-controlled land (Area A).

As of August 2007, a divided highway is currently under construction that will pass through the West Bank. The highway has a concrete wall dividing the two sides, one designated for Israeli vehicles, the other for Palestinian. The wall is designed to allow Palestinians to freely pass north-south through Israeli-held land.

The West Bank has three paved airports which are currently for military use only. Palestinians were previously able to use Israel's Ben Gurion International Airport with permission; however, Israel has discontinued issuing such permits, and Palestinians wishing to travel must cross the land border to either Jordan (via the Allenby Bridge) or Egypt in order to use airports located in these countries.

As transportation between the Palestinian cities became very difficult, due to hundreds of Israeli military checkpoints on Palestinian roads, telephone and internet play a more important role in the Palestinian daily life for communication.

The Palestinian PalTel Group telecommunication companies provide communication services in the West Bank, such as Landline, Cellular network and Internet.

Dialling code +970 is used in the West Bank and all over Palestinian territories within Palestinian Authority.

The Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation broadcasts from an AM station in Ramallah on 675 kHz; numerous local privately owned stations are also in operation. Most Palestinian households have a radio and TV, and satellite dishes for receiving international coverage are widespread. Recently, PalTel announced and has begun implementing an initiative to provide ADSL broadband internet service to all households and businesses.

Israel's cable television company 'HOT', satellite television provider (DBS) 'Yes', AM & FM radio broadcast stations and public television broadcast stations all operate. Broadband internet service by Bezeq's ADSL and by the cable company are available as well.

The Al-Aqsa Voice broadcasts from Dabas Mall in Tulkarem at 106.7 FM. The Al-Aqsa TV station shares these offices.

Before 1967 there were no universities in the West Bank (except for the Hebrew University in Jerusalem - see below). There were a few lesser institutions of higher education; for example, An-Najah, which started as an elementary school in 1918 and became a community college in 1963. As the Jordanian government did not allow the establishment of such universities in the West Bank, Palestinians could obtain degrees only by travelling abroad to places such as Jordan, Lebanon, or Europe.

Most universities in the West Bank have politically active student bodies, and elections of student council officers are normally along party affiliations. Although the establishment of the universities was initially allowed by the Israeli authorities, some were sporadically ordered closed by the Israeli Civil Administration during the 1970s and 1980s to prevent political activities and violence against the IDF. Some universities remained closed by military order for extended periods during years immediately preceding and following the first Palestinian Intifada, but have largely remained open since the signing of the Oslo Accords despite the advent of the Al-Aqsa Intifada in 2000.

The founding of Palestinian universities has greatly increased education levels among the population in the West Bank. According to a Birzeit University study, the percentage of Palestinians choosing local universities as opposed to foreign institutions has been steadily increasing; as of 1997, 41% of Palestinians with bachelor degrees had obtained them from Palestinian institutions. According to UNESCO, Palestinians are one of the most highly educated groups in the Middle East "despite often difficult circumstances". The literacy rate among Palestinians in the West Bank (and Gaza) (89%) is third highest in the region after Israel (95%) and Jordan (90%).

The Muslim community makes up 75 percent of the population, while 17 percent of the population practice Judaism and the other 8 percent of the population consider themselves Christian.

The United Nations Security Council, the United Nations General Assembly, the International Court of Justice, and the International Committee of the Red Cross refer to it as occupied by Israel.

The future status of the West Bank, together with the Gaza Strip on the Mediterranean shore, has been the subject of negotiation between the Palestinians and Israelis, although the current Road Map for Peace, proposed by the "Quartet" comprising the United States, Russia, the European Union, and the United Nations, envisions an independent Palestinian state in these territories living side by side with Israel (see also proposals for a Palestinian state). However, the "Road Map" states that in the first phase, Palestinians must end all attacks on Israel, whereas Israel must dismantle outposts. Since neither condition has been met since the Road Map was "accepted," by all sides, final negotiations have not yet begun on major political differences.

The Palestinian Authority believes that the West Bank ought to be a part of their sovereign nation, and that the presence of Israeli military control is a violation of their right to Palestinian Authority rule. The United Nations calls the West Bank and Gaza Strip Israeli-occupied (see Israeli-occupied territories). The United States State Department also refers to the territories as occupied. Many Israelis and their supporters prefer the term disputed territories, because they claim part of the territory for themselves, and state the land has not, in 2000 years, been sovereign.

There has been a proposal of the West Bank's accession to Jordan by the people of Jordan, Palestine and even Israel. It is also supported by Pakistan, Turkey and Syria.

Israeli settlements on the West Bank beyond the Green Line border are considered by some legal scholars to be illegal under international law. Other legal scholars including Julius Stone, have argued that the settlements are legal under international law, on a number of different grounds. The Independent reported in March 2006 that immediately after the 1967 war Theodor Meron, legal counsel of Israel's Foreign Ministry advised Israeli ministers in a "top secret" memo that any policy of building settlements across occupied territories violated international law and would "contravene the explicit provisions of the Fourth Geneva Convention". A contrasting opinion was held by Eugene Rostow, a former Dean of the Yale Law School and undersecretary of state for political affairs in the administration of U.S. President Lyndon Johnson, who wrote in 1991 that Israel has a right to have settlements in the West Bank under 1967's UN Security Council Resolution 242. The European Union and the Arab League consider the settlements to be illegal. Israel also recognizes that some small settlements are "illegal" in the sense of being in violation of Israeli law.

Although Israel has formally pledged to stop settlement efforts in the West Bank as part of internationally-backed peace efforts, it has failed to honor the commitment and construction has continued to grow. Israel has also stopped monitoring new construction at the settlements.

In 2005 the United States ambassador to Israel, Dan Kurtzer, expressed U.S. support "for the retention by Israel of major Israeli population centres as an outcome of negotiations", reflecting President Bush's statement a year earlier that a permanent peace treaty would have to reflect "demographic realities" on the West Bank.

The UN Security Council has issued several non-binding resolutions addressing the issue of the settlements. Typical of these is UN Security Council resolution 446 which states practices of Israel in establishing settlements in the Palestinian and other Arab territories occupied since 1967 have no legal validity, and it calls on Israel as the occupying Power, to abide scrupulously by the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention.

On December 30, 2007, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert issued an order requiring approval by both the Israeli Prime Minister and Israeli Defense Minister of all settlement activities (including planning) in the West Bank.

The Israeli West Bank barrier is a physical barrier being constructed by Israel consisting of a network of fences with vehicle-barrier trenches surrounded by an on average 60 metres (197 ft) wide exclusion area (90%) and up to 8 metres (26 ft) high concrete walls (10%) (although in most areas the wall is not nearly that high). It is located mainly within the West Bank, partly along the 1949 Armistice line, or "Green Line" between the West Bank and Israel. As of April 2006 the length of the barrier as approved by the Israeli government is 703 kilometers (436 miles) long. Approximately 58.4% has been constructed, 8.96% is under construction, and construction has not yet begun on 33% of the barrier. The space between the barrier and the green line is a closed military zone known as the Seam Zone, cutting off 8.5% of the West Bank and encompassing tens of villages and tens of thousands of Palestinians..

The barrier generally runs along or near the 1949 Jordanian-Israeli armistice/Green Line, but diverges in many places to include on the Israeli side several of the highly populated areas of Jewish settlements in the West Bank such as East Jerusalem, Ariel, Gush Etzion, Emmanuel, Karnei Shomron, Givat Ze'ev, Oranit, and Maale Adumim.

The barrier is a very controversial project. Supporters claim the barrier is a necessary tool protecting Israeli civilians from the Palestinian attacks that increased significantly during the al-Aqsa Intifada; it has helped reduce incidents of terrorism by 90% from 2002 to 2005; over a 96% reduction in terror attacks in the six years ending in 2007, though Israel's State Comptroller has acknowledged that most of the suicide bombers crossed into Israel through existing checkpoints . Its supporters claim that the onus is now on the Palestinian Authority to fight terrorism.

Opponents claim the barrier is an illegal attempt to annex Palestinian land under the guise of security, violates international law, has the intent or effect to pre-empt final status negotiations, and severely restricts Palestinians who live nearby, particularly their ability to travel freely within the West Bank and to access work in Israel, thereby undermining their economy. According to a 2007 World Bank report, the Israeli occupation of the West Bank has destroyed the Palestinian economy, in violation of the 2005 Agreement on Movement and Access. All major roads (with a total length of 700 km) are basically off-limits to Palestinians, making it impossible to do normal business. Economic recovery would reduce Palestinian dependence on international aid by one billion dollars per year.

Pro-settler opponents claim that the barrier is a sly attempt to artificially create a border that excludes the settlers, creating "facts on the ground" that justify the mass dismantlement of hundreds of settlements and displacement of over 100,000 Jews from the land they claim as their biblical homeland.

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