At the heart of the conflict lies the fact that most leaders of the Arab world have consistently refused to accept the state of Israel and a Jewish population in the area. The Arab world with its 422 million inhabitants and almost 600 times the land area of Israel has fought several wars against Israel, with the stated goal of destroying the State of Israel and throwing the Jews into the sea. The UN partition plan in 1948 was rejected by the Arab countries, and when Jordan then conquered East Jerusalem, all Jewish residents were immediately expelled.
About 700,000 Jews were forced to flee the Arab world after the 1948 War of Independence, when the invading Arab armies failed to destroy Israel.
The majority of Muslim and Arab countries still refuse entry permits to people with Israeli passports.
The Arabs who left their homes in connection with the Arab countries' war of aggression against Israel in 1948 have received the full support of the international community, unlike the Jewish refugees after the genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Jews in Europe and the Jewish refugees from Iran and the Arab world.
While all other refugee efforts from the UN via the refugee agency UNHCR are about integrating and including refugees in their new environment, the UN agency UNRWA instead aims to make the Palestinian refugee situation permanent. No other refugee in the world can similarly inherit their refugee status for generations.
After losing several wars of aggression against Israel, during a summit in Sudan's capital Khartoum shortly after the Six Day War in 1967, the Arab League said: No to peace with Israel, no to negotiations with Israel, and no to a normalization of relations with Israel.
At the same time, the Arab world changed tactics. After Egypt and Jordan lost control of what is now defined as the Palestinian territories in 1967, the Muslim world, with the help of the communist dictatorships of the Warsaw Pact and the Socialist International, highlighted the Muslim population's demand for independence as a means of pressure against Israel. Before 1967, there was no strong national Palestinian movement in Gaza or the West Bank.
Never before in history has there been an independent country named Palestine, and Jerusalem has never been the capital of any country other than Israel.