Arab-Israeli Conflict

Since the United Nations resolution that partitioned the British Mandate of Palestine into the State of Israel and Transjordan, there have been active wars and continuing military confrontations between Israel, the Arab nations that surround it, and nonadjacent Arab nations supporting the neighboring states. Israel has won each of the wars, at varying cost, through superior organization and technology, not numbers.

Beginning with migration after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, but principally after Israel took the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and Golan Heights in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, the situation has led to the continuing Israel-Palestine Conflict. In other words, the military balance for Israel involves both insurgency and conventional war.

Adding to the complexity of the situation are actions of non-national radical Islamist groups, and strategic tension, potentially involving weapons of mass destruction, with Muslim but non-Arab Iran. While Israel maintains a policy of "strategic ambiguity", it is accepted that the country has a significant number of deliverable nuclear weapons.