On July 16, 1948, a powerful Israeli offensive in northern Palestine captured Nazareth and the whole region of lower Galilee extending from Haifa in the coastal west to the Sea of Galilee in the east. Further north, the Syrian Army continued to hold Mishmar Hayarden after stopping an Israeli attempt to take the town.
(Taken from 1948 Arab-Israeli War – Wars of the 20th Century: Vol. 1)
In southern Palestine, the Egyptian offensives in Negba (July 12), Gal (July 14), and Be-erot Yitzhak were thrown back by the Israeli Army, with disproportionately high Egyptian casualties. On July 18, the UN imposed a second truce, this time of no specified duration.
The truce lasted nearly three months, when on October 15, fighting broke out once more. During the truce, relative calm prevailed in Palestine despite high tensions and the occasional outbreaks of small-scale fighting. The UN also proposed new changes to the partition plan which, however, were rejected once more by the warring sides.
On September 22, the Israeli government passed a law that made all captured territories an integral part of Israel, including those that would be won in the future. By the autumn of 1948, the Israeli Army totaled 90,000 soldiers, greatly outnumbering the combined Arab expeditionary forces. Large shipments of war materials continued to arrive in Israel.
In mid-October 1948, Israeli forces attacked and captured Egyptian-held Beersheba and Bayt Jibrin. Consequently, the whole Negev came under Israeli control, with 4,000 Egyptian troops trapped in al-Faluja and Iraq al-Manshiyya, two villages near Ashkelon. Israeli warships blocked the Egyptian Navy from rescuing the trapped soldiers.
Later in October, the UN imposed a third truce. Fighting, however, continued in Marmon in northern Palestine. On October 24, another powerful Israeli offensive captured the whole northern Galilee, forcing Syrian and Lebanese Army units, including Arab paramilitary auxiliaries, to withdraw across their respective borders. Tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians fled or were forced to leave to escape the fighting, although many other Arab residents (about 20%) remained. Those who remained eventually were granted Israeli citizenship.
In early November 1948, Israeli forces pursuing Lebanese troops into the border penetrated five miles into Lebanon and captured many Lebanese villages. Israel later withdrew its forces from Lebanon after both countries signed an armistice at the end of the war.
On December 22, Israeli forces attacked Egyptian Army units positioned in the southern Negev, driving them across the Egyptian border after five days of fighting. The Israelis then crossed into the Sinai Peninsula and advanced toward al-Arish to trap the Egyptian Army. Britain and the United States exerted pressure on Israel, forcing the latter to withdraw its forces from the Sinai.
On January 3, 1949, the Israeli Army surrounded the Egyptian forces inside the Gaza Strip in southwestern Palestine. Three days later, Egypt agreed to a ceasefire, which soon came into effect. The 1948 Arab-Israeli War was over. In the following months, Israel signed separate armistices with Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria.
At war’s end, Israel held 78% of Palestine, 22% more than was allotted to the Jews in the original UN partition plan. Israel’s territories comprised the whole Galilee and Jezreel Valley in the north, the whole Negev in the south, the coastal plains, and West Jerusalem. Jordan acquired the West Bank, while Egypt gained the Gaza Strip. No Palestinian Arab state was formed.
During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, and the 1947-1948 Civil War in Palestine (previous article) that preceded it, over 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled from their homes, with most of them eventually settling in the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and southern Lebanon (Map 11). About 10,000 Palestinian Jews also were displaced by the conflict. Furthermore, as a consequence of these wars, tens of thousands of Jews left or were forced to leave from many Arab countries. Most of these Jewish refugees settled in Israel.