By 1948, a tremendous amount of tension had built up in the Middle East. This tension had in fact originated 19 centuries earlier, and began due to differences in both religion and nationalism between Jews and Arabs. After the Romans took control of Judea, this caused the diaspora of Jews to all parts of the world. Eventually, most Jews returned to the region, after the official founding of the state of Israel, and this led to the Arab-Israeli War of Liberation, in which surrounding Arab states, such as Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Jordan attacked Israel for reconquer this land, which originally belonged to Palestine. The Arabs were defeated, and this increased nationalism among them to take revenge, which eventually led them to 3 future wars: the 1956 Suez Canal Crisis, the 1967 Six-Day War, and the 1973 Yom Kippur War. These 3 wars were of significant importance as this was the first time major Superpower involvement was seen. These superpowers, USA and USSR, were interested in the Middle East, mainly because of its strategic location and its natural oil resource. These factors forced the superpowers to become involved in the region, and this involvement eventually led to a proxy war, within the region. Although the wars were fueled by superpower interests, great Arab nationalism also led to wars against Israel from 1948 to 1978. The 1948 War of Liberation was the first war that sparked conflicts in the Middle East and created a basis for numerous other wars that followed. This Middle Eastern conflict eventually became part of the global Cold War, but it was very different, a... means of paper... also due to the recurring sense of Arab nationalism that actually fueled the conflicts in the Middle East. Thus, it could be shown that the conflict in the Middle East was actually fueled by both the interests and concerns of the superpowers in the region. The United States and the Soviet Union were both interested in expanding their spheres of influence in the region, in order to gain a larger foothold in the Middle East and, in turn, possibly gain the major resource, oil. This is also due to their mutual concerns about each other's actions in the region, which led them to support each other's allies, which in turn led to the direct influence of the Cold War in the Middle East. Therefore, it was the extensive involvement of the superpowers in the region that led to the prolongation of the conflict in the Middle East from 1948 to 1948. 1978.