Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Israel/Palestine
In reply to the discussion: Thank you, Russian immigrant to Israel, for Nakba Day (Bradley Burston) [View all]shira
(30,109 posts)23. Still no context, and yes it matters. Here's Benny Morris...
Neither Ben-Gurion nor the Zionist movement planned the displacement of the 700,000-odd Arabs who moved or were removed from their homes in 1948. There was no such plan or blanket policy. Transfer was never adopted by the Zionist movement as part of its platform; on the contrary, the movement always accepted that the Jewish state that arose would contain a sizeable Arab minority.
But in 1947-48 the Palestinian Arabs, joined by invading Arab states armies from outside, launched a war whose aim which they (and even Pappe, Israels Lord Haw-Haw) have never denied was to destroy the nascent state of Israel (and quite probably its inhabitants as well). But what can you do? the Arabs were beaten. And in the course of beating them, the Israelis drove out the Palestinians, who were not totally innocent ... peasants (a ludicrous phrase). Their villages and towns served as the bases from which their militiamen and armies attacked Jewish communities and convoys.
The innocent Palestinians were the aggressors and dispossession was the price they paid for their aggression. In the circumstances, had the Jews not driven them out, Israel would not have arisen and its (Jewish) population would have been slaughtered or, at the least, the Jewish state would have been established with a considerable Fifth Column in its midst and rendered mortally unstable. (Conversely, had the Arabs accepted the 1947 UN Partition Resolution, refrained from violence, and gone on with their lives as loyal Israeli citizens, nothing would have happened to them.)
Nonetheless, Israel emerged from the 1948 War with a 160,000-strong Arab minority (alongside 700,000 Jews) a fact that tends to undermine the charge that there was a blanket policy of ethnic cleansing.
But in 1947-48 the Palestinian Arabs, joined by invading Arab states armies from outside, launched a war whose aim which they (and even Pappe, Israels Lord Haw-Haw) have never denied was to destroy the nascent state of Israel (and quite probably its inhabitants as well). But what can you do? the Arabs were beaten. And in the course of beating them, the Israelis drove out the Palestinians, who were not totally innocent ... peasants (a ludicrous phrase). Their villages and towns served as the bases from which their militiamen and armies attacked Jewish communities and convoys.
The innocent Palestinians were the aggressors and dispossession was the price they paid for their aggression. In the circumstances, had the Jews not driven them out, Israel would not have arisen and its (Jewish) population would have been slaughtered or, at the least, the Jewish state would have been established with a considerable Fifth Column in its midst and rendered mortally unstable. (Conversely, had the Arabs accepted the 1947 UN Partition Resolution, refrained from violence, and gone on with their lives as loyal Israeli citizens, nothing would have happened to them.)
Nonetheless, Israel emerged from the 1948 War with a 160,000-strong Arab minority (alongside 700,000 Jews) a fact that tends to undermine the charge that there was a blanket policy of ethnic cleansing.
Edit history
Please sign in to view edit histories.
46 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
RecommendedHighlight replies with 5 or more recommendations
Thank you, Russian immigrant to Israel, for Nakba Day (Bradley Burston) [View all]
Violet_Crumble
May 2012
OP
Thanks. I must have been trying to read one that was part of their premium content...
Violet_Crumble
May 2012
#2
As usual, yr wrong. The Nakba was the dispossession of around 700,000 Palestinians...
Violet_Crumble
May 2012
#6
I'll have to rememberthis the n ext time you attempt to delegitimize wiki however
azurnoir
May 2012
#27
Is there something you didn't understand about the information I gave you?
Violet_Crumble
May 2012
#17
If they had been allowed to return, without retribution, after the war was over
Ken Burch
May 2012
#13
Yes, and the first was a civil war. And you cannot understand why Israel was reluctant...
shira
May 2012
#41