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The Middle Eastern territory of Gaza is struggling to rebuild.It's been almost a year since the Palestinian-controlled area was torn again by war.
The most recent conflict begun with the murder of three Israel teenagers last June.Israel blamed Hamas,the Palestinian militant group that controls Gaza.
In early July,a Palestinian teenager was murdered.
Rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel increased and Israel launched an operation targeting Hamas forces in Gaza.
In the six-week war,2,100 Palestinians,most of them civilians,were killed. Sixty-eight Israelis,most of them soldiers,were killed.
It was the latest cycle of violence.
Gaza is only about 25 miles long and seven miles wide,but this small ship of land is one of the most fought over in history.
It was an Egyptian base,a rural city of the Palestine and the place where the Hebrew hero Samson betrayed by Delilah met his death.
Since then,much blood has been spilled.
The most recent contest for Gaza began at the end of World War II,when persecuted Jews traveled to Israel from Europe looking for a new start,after the horrors of the Holocaust.
In 1947,the U.N. created a plan to split Israel into two countries,one for Jews and one for the Arab people.
Backed by the U.S. President Harry S. Truman,David Ben Gurion,Israel's founder,proclaimed the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948.
Egypt then attacked Israel through the Gaza Strip.
Israel was victorious but Gaza remained under the control of Egypt,and an influx of Palestinian refugees begun.
In 1967,war broke out between Israel,Egypt,Jordan and Syria,in what became known as the Six Day War. Israel seized the Gaza Strip and held it for about 40 years.
In 2006,Hamas,a group that wants to destroy Israel,and listed by the United States and European Union and others as a terrorist group,won a landslide victory in Palestinian
legislative elections,and Israel unilaterally pulled its forces out of Gaza that year. Hamas was now in control of the territory.
However,Israel still controls much of the areas access to and from the Gaza Strip.
Since then,Israel and Hamas have been exchanging blows.
Israel maintains Hamas is a violent terror organization.
While Hamas says they represent an oppressed people being victimized by the Jewish state.
The international community continues to press for a cease in violence.
But for now,the Strip's population of 1.8 million people are trapped in the crossfire.
