FW: Palestine time

[Olson, Arthur David]

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From: 	amos at nsof.co.il[SMTP:amos at nsof.co.il]
Sent: 	Sunday, February 15, 1998 7:48 AM
To: 	tz at elsie.nci.nih.gov
Subject: 	Palestine time

In the asia file you include:

> # Zone  NAME            GMTOFF  RULES   FORMAT  [UNTIL]
> Zone    Asia/Gaza       2:17:52 -       LMT     1900 Oct
>                         2:00    -       EET     1957 May 10
>                         2:00 EgyptAsia  EE%sT   1967 Jun 30
>                         2:00    Zion    I%sT

 From 1917 until 1948/5/15, all of Palestine, including the parts now
known as the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, was under British rule. 
Therefore the rules given for Israel for that period, apply there too. 
(Though I find the name "Zion" rather inappropriate -- why not just call
it "Israel" or "Palestine"?)

The Gaza Strip was under Egyptian rule between 1948/5/15 until 1967/6/5
(except a short occupation by Israel from 1956/11 till 1957/3, but no
time zone was affected then).  It was never formally annexed to Egypt,
though. 

The rest of Palestine was under Jordanian rule at that time, formally
annexed in 1950 as the West Bank (and the word "Trans" was dropped from
the country's previous name of "the Hashemite Kingdom of the
Trans-Jordan").  So the rules for Jordan for that time apply.  Major
towns in that area are Nablus (Shchem), El-Halil (Hebron), Ramallah, and
East Jerusalem. 

Both areas were occupied by Israel in June 1967, but not annexed (except
for East Jerusalem).  They were on Israel time since then; there might
have been a Military Governor's order about time zones, but I'm not aware
of any (such orders may have been issued semi-annually whenever summer
time was in effect, but maybe the legal aspect of time was just
neglected). 

The Palestinian Authority was established in 1993, and got hold of most
towns in the West Bank and Gaza by 1995.  I know that in order to
demonstrate some manner of independence, they have been switching to
summer time and back on a different schedule than Israel's, but I don't
know when this was started, or what algorithm is used (most likely the
Jordanian one). 

To summarize, the table should probably look something like that:

Area \ when | 1918-1947 | 1948-1967 | 1967-1995 | 1996-
------------+-----------+-----------+-----------+-----------
Israel      | Zion      | Zion      | Zion      | Zion      
West bank   | Zion      | Jordan    | Zion      | Jordan     
Gaza        | Zion      | Egypt     | Zion      | Jordan     

I guess more info may be available from the PA's web page (if/when they
have one).


-- 
	Amos Shapir
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