Oslo II and the Division of the West Bank
The Interim Agreement signed on 28 September 1995 cut the occupied West Bank into Areas A, B and C for a five-year transition. Thirty years later the transition has not ended, and Area C — about sixty percent of the territory — remains under full Israeli control.
The Declaration of Principles of September 1993 had deferred almost everything. The Israeli–Palestinian Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, signed in Washington on 28 September 1995 and known as Oslo II, was where the deferral acquired a map. It extended Palestinian self-government beyond Gaza and Jericho to the rest of the West Bank, established the Palestinian Legislative Council, provided for elections and for further Israeli redeployments — and divided the territory into three zones.
What the three zones are — Palestinian civil and security control in Area A, Palestinian civil administration under Israeli security control in Area B, full Israeli control in Area C — is set out in this archive’s entry on Area A, Area B and Area C. Worth adding here is that the familiar proportions are not the proportions of 1995. At signing, Area A was only the main Palestinian cities, a small fraction of the West Bank; it grew through the staged redeployments the agreement provided for. The last of them, agreed at Wye River on 23 October 1998, transferred thirteen percent of Area C (one percent to Area A, twelve to Area B) and turned a further 14.2 percent of Area B into Area A. Only after that did Area A reach roughly the eighteen percent usually quoted. The arrangement was explicitly transitional: permanent-status negotiations on Jerusalem, refugees, settlements, borders and security were to begin no later than May 1996 and conclude by May 1999.
They did not conclude. Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated five weeks after signing, on 4 November 1995; the negotiations that followed at Camp David in 2000 and Taba in 2001 ended without agreement; the second intifada, the reoccupation of the Area A cities in 2002 and the construction of the separation barrier followed. Meanwhile the settler population of the West Bank has multiplied several times over since the agreement was signed.
The three areas were meant to dissolve. Instead they hardened into the architecture of the occupation, and the arithmetic of Area C is the measure of it. UN monitors recorded that less than one percent of Area C is covered by an Israeli-approved planning scheme for Palestinian communities; that between 2009 and 2016 fewer than three percent of Palestinian building-permit applications there were approved; that Israel demolished more than four thousand Palestinian-owned structures in Area C over the same period, with over twelve thousand demolition orders outstanding; and that Palestinians are barred from nearly thirty percent of Area C as designated firing zones. Some 300,000 Palestinians live in 532 residential areas lying partly or wholly in Area C, alongside 400,000 settlers in roughly 230 settlements. What was drawn as a five-year expedient has lasted longer than the Mandate.
Sources
Cited works
3- un.org — auto insert 185434(opens in a new tab)https://www.un.org/unispal/document/auto-insert-185434/
- peacemaker.un.org — il20ps981023the20wye20river20memorandumPDF(opens in a new tab)https://peacemaker.un.org/sites/default/files/document/files/2024/05/il20ps981023the20wye20river20memorandum.pdf
- ochaopt.org — area c key humanitarian concernsPDF(opens in a new tab)https://www.ochaopt.org/sites/default/files/area_c_key_humanitarian_concerns.pdf
Connected in the archive
7 connected records7 records elsewhere in the archive are linked to this one, each by a piece of evidence you can read below.
names this record — 6 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- al-Birehالبيرة
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Under Oslo II al-Bireh was divided: 8,157 dunums, 39.8 per cent of the city, classified Area A where the Palestinian Authority holds responsibility for internal security, and where most of the population lives; 1,033 dunums Area B; the remainder Area C.
- ar-Ramالرام
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Under Oslo II the town was split into Area B — 2,226 dunums, a third of its land, holding most of its population — and Area C, 4,482 dunums where Israel retains full control and Palestinian building requires a permit from the Civil Administration.
- Kufr 'Aqabكفر عقب
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Its whole territory — 6,665 dunums — was placed inside the municipal boundary Israel declared unilaterally in 1967, and for that reason it was never assigned to Area A, B or C when Oslo II divided the West Bank in 1995.
- Oslo Accords
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The follow-up Interim Agreement of 28 September 1995 ('Oslo II') created the Palestinian Authority, provided for Palestinian elections, and divided the West Bank into Areas A and B under Palestinian civil administration and Area C — about 60 percent of the territory — under full Israeli control.
- Qalandiyaقلنديا
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Under Oslo II, 3,207 of Qalandiya's 3,273 dunums — 98 per cent — were classified Area C, where Palestinian building requires a permit from the Israeli Civil Administration; 66 dunums, 2 per cent, were Area B, and that fragment holds most of the village's people.
- The Oslo Accords
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The 1995 Oslo II agreement divided the West Bank into Areas A, B, and C, leaving most of the territory under full Israeli control.
named in this record — 1 record
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Area A, Area B, and Area C
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: What the three zones are — Palestinian civil and security control in Area A, Palestinian civil administration under Israeli security control in Area B, full Israeli control in Area C — is set out in this archive's entry on Area A, Area B and Area C.
Cite this page
Every claim above carries its sources — citation is the point.
- Chicago
“Oslo II and the Division of the West Bank.” Timeline, FALASTEEN.AI. Accessed 22 August 2026. https://falasteen.ai/timeline/oslo-ii-interim-agreement.- MLA
“Oslo II and the Division of the West Bank.” Timeline, FALASTEEN.AI, 2026, https://falasteen.ai/timeline/oslo-ii-interim-agreement. Accessed 22 August 2026.- BibTeX
@misc{falasteen-oslo-ii-interim-agreement, title = {Oslo II and the Division of the West Bank}, howpublished = {\url{https://falasteen.ai/timeline/oslo-ii-interim-agreement}}, organization = {FALASTEEN.AI — A Living Archive for Palestine}, year = {2026}, note = {Accessed 2026-08-22} }