1. The problem with Palestine after the First World War was that the British had expressed promises both to the Arab people in the land and to Jewish Zionists who wanted to settle the land. The British were given governing control of the region under a mandate from the newly formed League of Nations.
2. As World War II came to an end, in 1947 the United Nations (which replaced the League of Nations) proposed the division of Palestine into two independent states. The UN plan called for a separate Jewish state and Arab state, and for Jerusalem to be governed as an international city under UN administration.
