(25 March 2024)

In 1971, Ariel Sharon, the Israeli army commander of the southern region who later became prime minister, prepared a plan to divide Gaza and North Sinai into five settlement areas that prevent geographic contiguity between Palestinians in the north, centre, and south.

Israel surrounds this area from the north with settlements and checkpoints and from the south with a settlement bloc in the northern Sinai desert.

Sharon named it the „Five Fingers Plan“, and the government headed by Golda Meir fully adopted it in 1972.