Known by millions around the world as ‘the Holy Land', Israel is an exceptional country. The story of this land and its people is truly like nowhere else on earth. 

The first five books of the Bible itself are about the origins and cosmology of the ‘people of Israel', the Jews, from around 2000BC.

Fleeing slavery to conquer and settle in Canaan (broadly the same land as modern Israel), Jewish culture evolved around worship at their Temple in Jerusalem, built around 1000BC. Several attempts by foreign powers to eradicate Israel ended in failure, until in AD135, after some 70 years of war with Jewish rebels, the Romans destroyed Jerusalem, expelled the Jews, and renamed Israel as ‘Palestine'. 

The subsequent Jewish diaspora continues to the present day. Nineteenth-century pogroms in Eastern Europe sparked the Zionist movement that aimed to re-establish the Jewish nation in Palestine, which had become part of the Ottoman Empire. From 1882 onwards, waves of Jewish immigration began. After WW1, the Ottoman Empire was broken up and the British Mandate took control. In 1947 the League of Nations voted to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab areas, a plan accepted by the Zionists but rejected by the Arab League.

The Jewish leaders inaugurated the State of Israel in May 1948, bringing an immediate full-scale war by the Arab states. Much of the history of the region since that time has been one of this continuing conflict. Following the ‘Six Day War' of 1967, Jerusalem came under Jewish rule for the first time since the Roman expulsion. The West Bank was occupied, and its Arab residents, adopting the name Palestinians and represented by the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) became the forefront of the struggle against Israel. 

Israel has since made peace with former foes including Egypt and Jordan. A peace process began with the Palestinians in the early 1990s after years of uprising or intifada. The Palestinian National Authority was set up in 1993 to take over the Palestinian areas. However, the election in January 2006 of militant Islamist organisation Hamas, which claimed responsibility for numerous suicide bombings in Israel, made peace less likely. Lebanon's militant Islamist group Hezbollah launched a war on Israel in August 2006.

Despite these problems, Israel remains buoyant and positive, with a ‘can-do' attitude. It is a world-class destination with outstanding cultural, archaeological and religious attractions, spas and beach resorts, as well as a unique ancient-and-modern atmosphere.