Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
(Fig. 3.15). Jewish immigrants from the Eurasian region
continue to migrate to Israel. Following the collapse of
the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, thousands of Jews
who had been unable to practice their religion in the
Soviet Union migrated to Israel. Today Israel's popu-
lation of 7.4 million, including about 1 million Arab
Israelis, continues to grow through immigration as well
as substantial natural increase.
Before the East German government built the Berlin
Wall and the Iron Curtain divided Western and Eastern
Europe, several million Germans fl ed Soviet-controlled
East Germany into what was then West Germany. And
millions of migrants left Europe altogether to go to the
United States (1.8 million), Canada (1.1 million), Australia
(1 million), Israel (750,000), Argentina (750,000), Brazil
(500,000), Venezuela (500,000), and other countries. As
many as 8 million Europeans emigrated from Europe in
the postwar stream.
Even before Cuba became a communist state, thou-
sands of Cuban citizens applied annually for residency in
the United States. Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba
in 1959. During the 1960s, while the Cuban government
was establishing the Communist Party of Cuba and for-
malizing a communist state, the number of Cuban immi-
grants in the United States swelled. The U.S. government
formalized the fl ow as the Cuban Airlift, an authorized
movement of persons desiring to escape from a commu-
nist government. The vast majority of Cuban immigrants
arrived and remained in the greater Miami area. In south-
ern Florida Cubans developed a core of Hispanic culture,
and in 1973, Dade County, Florida declared itself bicul-
tural and bilingual.
In 1980 another massive, organized exodus of Cubans
occurred, which brought more than 125,000 Cubans to
U.S. shores. Special legislation allowed the large group to
become naturalized citizens over time. The Cuban infl ux
persisted throughout the 1980s, and then in 1994, over
30,000 Cubans fl ed for the United States. By that point, the
Soviet Union had collapsed, and the Soviet Union's fi nan-
cial support for the Cuban government had dwindled. The
1994 exodus pushed diplomats in both the United States
and Cuba to come to an agreement on Cuban migration.
In 1995, the U.S. government established the wet foot-dry
foot policy, which stemmed the fl ow of Cuban migrants to
the United States.
Confl ict and War
At the end of World War II, as many as 15 million Germans
migrated westward from their homes in Eastern Europe,
either voluntarily or because they were forced to leave.
35°
LEBANON
Me
d
ite
rr
a
n
ea
n
Sea
Nahariya
Safed
33°
SYRIA
Acre
Sea o
f
Haifa
G
alilee
Nazareth
Tiberias
Jenin
Beit Shean
Nefanya
Tulkarm
Nablus
Tel Aviv
Jaffa
Ramla
Lod
32°
Jericho
Amman
Jerusalem
Ashdod
Nitzanim
Gat
Dea
d
Yad Mordechai
Bethlehem
Sea
Gaza
Ein Gedi
Hebron
Khan Yunis
Rafah
JORDAN
Beersheba
Nirim
Gevulot
Revivim
National Migration Flows
National migration fl ows can also be thought of as
internal migration fl ows. Historically, two of the major
migration fl ows before 1950 occurred internally, that
is, within a single country rather than across interna-
tional borders. In the United States, a massive migra-
tion stream carried the center of population west and
more recently also south, as Figure 3.16 shows. As the
American populace migrates westward, it is also shift-
ing from north to south, to refl ect migration fl ows from
south to north and back again. After the American Civil
War, and gaining momentum during World War I, mil-
lions of African Americans migrated north to work in the
industrial Northeast and Midwest. This internal migra-
tion fl ow continued during the 1920s, declined during
0
25
50
75 Kilometers
0
25
50 Miles
State of Israel as proposed
by the United Nations, Nov. 1947
Jerusalem and its suburbs, originally
designated as an international zone
Territory gained by Israel,
1948-49
Territory occupied by Israel
since 1967
Gaza Strip
Sinai
Peninsula
(returned to
Egypt 1982)
EGYPT
Elat
Figure 3.14
Changing Boundaries of Israel
.
Updated and adapted with
permission from:
M. Gilbert,
Atlas of the Arab-Israeli Confl ict,
New York: Macmillan, 1974, p. 38.
