In the last of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict, presenter Jonny Dymond is joined by journalist Jane Corbin, who has covered the region for three decades, and the BBC’s International Editor Jeremy Bowen.

They start by discussing Israel’s economic success in the 2010s, and the situation in that period for Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. This episode also covers Gaza’s “tunnel economy”, continuing Hamas attacks on Israel, the wars in Gaza in 2008, 2012 and 2014, the expansion of Israeli settlements on the West Bank, the stalling of Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts in the 2010s, and the Abraham Accords of 2020 between Israel and several Arab nations.

Jonny and his guests conclude the series by looking at the impact and significance of Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7th, 2023. How has that event and the war in Gaza that followed affected the long-term prospects for an end to the conflict?

'How Did We Get Here? Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.

In the ninth of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict, presenter Jonny Dymond is joined by journalist and film-maker Jane Corbin, who has been reporting from the region for more than 30 years, and by the BBC’s International Editor Jeremy Bowen.

They begin by examining the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising – bloodier than the first – which began on the West Bank and in Gaza in 2000 and lasted till 2005.

They go on to discuss Israel’s construction, from 2002 onwards, of the West Bank separation barrier, the last years and legacy of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, who died in 2004, the Israeli disengagement from Gaza in 2005, the rise of Hamas, its victory in the Palestinian elections of 2006, and its violent takeover of Gaza in 2007.

Jonny and his guests examine reactions in Israel and in the international community to Hamas rule in Gaza and discuss the blockade of the territory. They finish this episode by looking at how the Middle East conflict was affected by the election of Barack Obama as US president in 2008, and the re-election of Benjamin Netanyahu for a second term as Israeli prime minister in 2009.

'Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.

The eighth of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict begins five years after Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, with the outbreak in 1987 of a Palestinian uprising or intifada, in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Presenter Jonny Dymond, the BBC’s International Editor Jeremy Bowen, and Mark Tessler, Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan, USA, discuss what caused it – and the consequences for Israel and the Palestinians.

They then trace the beginnings of a peace process that led eventually to the Oslo Accords of 1993 and the establishment of a Palestinian Authority in the occupied territories. Why did the “Oslo process” gradually unravel?

Jonny and his guests look at the pressures on the agreement, and examine the assassination in 1995 of one of its architects, Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin. The Camp David summit of 2000 was a final attempt to get the Oslo accords back on track. Why did it fail? And how did that failure contribute to the outbreak of a second intifada in 2000?

'How Did We Get Here? Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.

The seventh of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict takes the story from the aftermath of the Six Day War in 1967 to its invasion of Lebanon in 1982.

Presenter Jonny Dymond, the BBC’s International Editor Jeremy Bowen, and Mark Tessler, Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan, USA, begin by discussing the impact of Israel’s victory on both Israel itself and on Palestinians, many of whom now found themselves under Israeli occupation. They go on to look at the Palestinian struggle for nationhood in this period – and at terror attacks by some Palestinian groups, including the killing of Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics in 1972.

They examine the beginning of Israeli settlement on the occupied West Bank, the electoral earthquake of 1977 in Israel which brought the right wing to power for the first time – and Egyptian president Anwar Sadat’s historic visit to Jerusalem, which led in 1979 to the signing of an Israeli-Egyptian peace agreement, the first between the Jewish state and an Arab country. The episode finishes by asking why Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 – and what the consequences were for Palestinian refugees there, and for Israel itself.

'How Did We Get Here? Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.

The sixth of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict examines the years from the end of the first Arab-Israeli war to the Six Day War of 1967.

Presenter Jonny Dymond is joined by Mark Tessler, Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan, USA, and author of ‘A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict’ and by the BBC’s International Editor Jeremy Bowen.

They discuss the early years of the new state of Israel, the influx into Israel of Jews from Arab countries, the Suez campaign by Britain, France and Israel against Egypt in 1956, the origins of the Palestinian national movement and the founding of the Palestine Liberation Organisation. They trace the origins of the Six Day War between Israel and its Arab neighbours, and look at how it ended in a dramatic Israeli victory.

'How Did We Get Here? Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.

In the fifth of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict, we reach the key years of 1945-49, when the United Nations voted for two states in Palestine, the State of Israel was established, and Israel and its Arab neighbours fought their first war – by the end of which 700,000 Palestinians had lost their homes.

Presenter Jonny Dymond is joined by Gudrun Kraemer, Professor of Islamic Studies at the Free University of Berlin, Eugene Rogan, Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History at Oxford University and the BBC’s International Editor Jeremy Bowen, author of ‘The Making of the Modern Middle East’.

They discuss the impact of the Second World War on British-ruled Palestine, British attempts to prevent Jewish immigration into the country after the Holocaust, Jewish paramilitary attacks on British targets, the UN decision in 1947 to partition Palestine, the outbreak of civil war between Jews and Arabs, the British withdrawal in 1948, the declaration of Israeli statehood, and the invasion of what had been British Palestine by neighbouring Arab states. They conclude by discussing how the 1948-9 war ended, and the origins of the Palestinian refugee problem.

'How Did We Get Here? Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.

In the fourth of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict, presenter Jonny Dymond is joined by Gudrun Kraemer, Professor of Islamic Studies at the Free University of Berlin, author and historian James Barr and Eugene Rogan, Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History at Oxford University.

They begin by discussing the origins, significance and consequences of the Balfour Declaration, Britain’s expression of support for a Jewish “national home” in Palestine. They go on to look at the establishment of the British mandate in Palestine, the changing demography of the country as Jewish immigration increased in the inter-war years, the causes and consequences of the Arab Revolt against British rule which broke out in 1936, and the Peel Commission report of 1937 – an early proposal for a “two-state solution”

'How Did We Get Here? Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.

In the third of ten programmes exploring the origins and tracing the history of the Middle East conflict, presenter Jonny Dymond is joined by Hugh Kennedy, Professor of Arabic at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Eugene Rogan, Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History at Oxford University, and historian Simon Sebag Montefiore. What kind of people lived in Ottoman-ruled Palestine in the early Nineteenth Century? What were the origins of Zionism? How did Arabs react to Jewish immigration into Palestine in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries – and what was the nature of Palestinian Arab identity in this period? Why were the Great Powers so interested in the region at this time? And what was the significance of the Sykes-Picot Agreement – a plan by Britain, France and Russia to divide the Middle East between them?

'How Did We Get Here? Israel and the Palestinians' is a BBC News Long Form Audio production. The presenter is Jonny Dymond and the editor is Penny Murphy. The Radio 4 commissioners are Hugh Levinson and Dan Clarke. The studio engineers are Neil Churchill, James Beard, Rod Farquhar, Mike Regaard and David Crackles.