Gaza

a city on the east coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Population, 30,300 (1958).

Gaza was founded in remote antiquity. From the seventh to the ninth century A.D. it formed part of the Arab Caliphate (under the Omayyad and then the Abbasid dynasty). From the ninth to the 11th century it was ruled by the Egyptian Tulunid, Ikhshidid, and Fatimid dynasties. At the end of the 11th century it was captured by the Crusaders, but, after their defeat by the Egyptian ruler Salah al-Din (Saladin) in 1187, it again formed part of the Egyptian states of first the Ayyubite Kingdom and then of the Egyptian Mamelukes. In 1516 it was conquered, together with Palestine, by the Osmanli Turks, and until 1917 it was part of the Ottoman Empire (from 1831 to 1840 under the rule of the Egyptian pasha Muhammad Ali).

In November 1917, Gaza was occupied by British forces and after the mandate for Palestine was conferred upon Great Britain, it became an administrative center of the mandated territory of Palestine. In accordance with a United Nations General Assembly resolution of Nov. 29, 1947, terminating the British mandate over Palestine, Gaza and the surrounding territory were included in the territory of the Arab state. After the Arab-Israeli War of 1948-49 and the conclusion of a truce between Egypt and Israel on Feb. 24, 1949, Gaza and the so-called Gaza Strip (258 sq km) were placed under the administration of Egypt. In June 1967, at the time of the Israeli aggression against the Arab states, Israeli troops occupied Gaza.