Global Information1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight information
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In the 1948 Palestine war more than 700000 Palestinian Arabs – about half of Mandatory Palestine's Arab population – fled from their homes or were expelled, at first by Zionist paramilitaries,[a] and after the establishment of the Israel, by its military.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9] The expulsion and flight was a central component of the fracturing, dispossession, and displacement of Palestinian society, known as the Nakba.[10][11][12] Dozens of massacres targeting Arabs were conducted by Israeli military forces and between 400 and 600 Palestinian villages were destroyed. Village wells were poisoned in a biological warfare programme and properties were looted to prevent Palestinian refugees from returning.[13][14] Other sites were subject to Hebraization of Palestinian place names.[15]
The precise number of Palestinian refugees, many of whom settled in Palestinian refugee camps in neighboring states, is a matter of dispute.[16] Around 80 percent of the Arab inhabitants of what became Israel (half of the Arab total population of Mandatory Palestine) left or were expelled from their homes.[17][18] About 250000–300000 Palestinians fled or were expelled during the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, before the termination of the British Mandate on May 14 1948. The desire to prevent the collapse of the Palestinians and to avoid more refugees were some of the reasons for the entry of the Arab League into the country, which began the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.[19][20]
The causes of the 1948 Palestinian exodus are also a subject of fundamental disagreement among historians. Factors involved in the exodus include Jewish military advances, destruction of Arab villages, psychological warfare, fears of another massacre by Zionist militias after the Deir Yassin massacre,[21]: 239–240 which caused many to leave out of panic, direct expulsion orders by Israeli authorities, the demoralizing impact of wealthier classes fleeing,[22] the typhoid epidemic in some areas caused by Israeli well-poisoning,[23] collapse in Palestinian leadership and Arab evacuation orders,[24][25] and a disinclination to live under Jewish control.[26][27]
Later, a series of land and property laws passed by the first Israeli government prevented Arabs who had left from returning to their homes or claiming their property. They and many of their descendants remain refugees.[28][29] The expulsion of the Palestinians has since been described by some historians as ethnic cleansing,[30][14][31] while others dispute this charge.[32][33][34] Nevertheless, the existence of the so-called Law of Return allowing for immigration and naturalization of any Jewish person and their family to Israel, while a Palestinian right of return has been denied, has been cited as an evidence for the charge that Israel practices apartheid.[35][36]
The status of the refugees, and in particular whether Israel will allow them the right to return to their homes, or compensate them, are key issues in the ongoing Israeli–Palestinian conflict. The events of the Palestinian expulsion are commemorated 15 May, a date known as Nakba Day.
Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).
- ^ Hazkani, Shay (2019). Dear Palestine A Social History of the 1948 War. Stanford University Press. ISBN 978-1-5036-2766-6.
It is noteworthy that the aforementioned silk gloves were not invoked when discussing the Palestinian "exodus," i.e., the expulsion and flight of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, which became a pressing concern in the months following the adoption of Plan D (tokhnit dalet) by the Haganah's general staff in March 1948.
- ^ Warf, C.; Charles, G. (2020). Clinical Care for Homeless, Runaway and Refugee Youth: Intervention Approaches, Education and Research Directions. Springer International Publishing. ISBN 978-3-030-40675-2.
By 1948, the majority of Palestinians, about 700000 to 800000 people from 500 to 600 villages, were displaced. They were either expelled or fled from their homes for fear of being killed, as had actually taken place in a number of villages.
- ^ Gerber, H. (2008). Remembering and Imagining Palestine: Identity and Nationalism from the Crusades to the Present. Palgrave Macmillan UK. ISBN 978-0-230-58391-7.
One of the more important consequences of the 1948 war was the expulsion and/or flight of some 750000 Palestinians from their homes inside Israel, and the refusal of Israel to allow them to return, despite an express UN decision calling on it to do so. ... About 750000 of the 900000 strong Palestinian population were expelled, or fled, all completely terrorized and fearing for their lives
- ^ Petersen-Overton, Kristofer J.; Schmidt, Johannes D.; Hersh, Jacques (27 September 2010). "3. Retooling Peace Philosophy: A Critical Look at Israel's Separation Strategy". In Carter, Candice C.; Kumar, Ravindra (eds.). Peace Philosophy in Action. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 49. doi:10.1057/9780230112995. ISBN 978-0-230-11299-5.
as scores of historical documentation has since revealed, the Yishuv encouraged the flight or directly forced 750000 Palestinians (more than 80 percent of the population at the time) from their homeland in 1948 and destroyed 531 Palestinian villages
- ^ Natour, Ghaleb (2015). "The Nakba—Flight and Expulsion of the Palestinians in 1948". In Hoppe, Andreas (ed.). Catastrophes Views from Natural and Human Sciences. Springer. p. 81.
The Nakba is a catastrophe describing "the expulsion and flight of the Palestinians which reached its peak in 1948"
- ^ Slater, Jerome (2020). Mythologies Without End: The US, Israel, and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1917-2020. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-045908-6.
There is no serious dispute among Israeli, Palestinian, or other historians about the central facts of the Nakba. All of the leading Israeli New Historians—particularly Morris, Shlaim, Pappé, and Flapan—extensively examined the issue and revealed the facts. Other accounts have reached the same conclusions. For example, see Ben-Ami, "A War to Start All Wars"; Rashid Khalidi, "The Palestinians and 1948"; Walid Khalidi, "Why Did the Palestinians Leave, Revisited"; Masalha, Expulsion of the Palestinians; Raz, Bride and the Dowry. Reviewing the evidence marshaled by Morris and others, Tom Segev concluded that "most of the Arabs in the country, approximately 400000, were chased out and expelled during the first stage of the war. In other words, before the Arab armies invaded the country" (Haaretz, July 18, 2010). Other estimates have varied concerning the number of Palestinians who fled or were expelled before the May 1948 Arab state attack; Morris estimated the number to be 250000–300000 (The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, 262); Tessler puts it at 300000 (A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, 279); Pappé's estimate is 380000 (The Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 96). In another recent review of the evidence, the Israeli historian Daniel Blatman estimates the number to be about 500000 (Blatman, "Netanyahu, This Is What Ethnic Cleansing Really Looks Like"). Whatever the exact number, even Israeli "Old Historians" now admit that during the 1948 war, the Israeli armed forces drove out many of the Palestinians, though they emphasized the action as a military "necessity." For example, see Anita Shapira, Israel: A History, 167–68. In July 2019, the Israeli government sought to cover up the extensive documentary evidence in its state archives that revealed detailed evidence about the extent of the Nakba—even the evidence that had already been published by newspapers and Israeli historians. A Haaretz investigation of the attempted cover-up concluded: "Since early last decade, Defense Ministry teams have scoured local archives and removed troves of historic documents to conceal proof of the Nakba, including Israeli eyewitness reports at the time" (Shezaf, "Burying the Nakba: How Israel Systematically Hides Evidence of 1948 Expulsion of Arabs").
- ^ "Why Nakba is the Palestinians' most sombre day, in 100 and 300 words". BBC News. 15 May 2018.
up to 750000 Palestinians who had lived on that land fled or were expelled from their homes.
- ^ Ibish, Hussein (14 May 2018). "A 'Catastrophe' That Defines Palestinian Identity". The Atlantic.
the overwhelming majority of Palestinian Arabs, perhaps 700000 to 800000 people, had either fled or been expelled
- ^ McDowall, David; Palley, Claire (1987). The Palestinians. Minority Rights Group Report no 24. p. 10. ISBN 978-0-946690-42-8.
- ^ Honaida Ghanim, Poetics of Disaster: Nationalism, Gender, and Social Change Among Palestinian Poets in Israel After Nakba, International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society March 2009 Vol. 22, No. 1 pp.23-39 p.37
- ^ Stern, Yoav (13 May 2008). "Palestinian refugees, Israeli left-wingers mark Nakba". Haaretz. Nakba 60 Archived 12 June 2008 at the Wayback Machine, BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights; Cleveland, William L. A History of the Modern Middle East, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2004, p. 270. ISBN 978-0-8133-4047-0
- ^ Ghanim, Honaida (March 2009). "Poetics of Disaster: Nationalism, Gender, and Social Change Among Palestinian Poets in Israel After Nakba". International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society. 22 (1): 23–39 [25–26]. doi:10.1007/s10767-009-9049-9. JSTOR 40608203. S2CID 144148068.
- ^ Morris, Benny; Kedar, Benjamin Z. (19 September 2022). "'Cast thy bread': Israeli biological warfare during the 1948 War". Middle Eastern Studies. 59 (5): 1–25 [2–3]. doi:10.1080/00263206.2022.2122448. S2CID 252389726.
- ^ a b Cite error: The named reference
Pappe2006was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Bardi, Ariel Sophia (March 2016). "The "Architectural Cleansing" of Palestine". American Anthropologist. 118 (1): 165–171. doi:10.1111/aman.12520.
- ^ Pedahzur, Ami; Perliger, Arie (2010). "The Consequences of Counterterrorist Policies in Israel". In Crenshaw, Martha (ed.). The Consequences of Counterterrorism. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. p. 356. ISBN 978-0-87154-073-7.
- ^ Masalha, Nur (1992). Expulsion of the Palestinians. Institute for Palestine Studies, this edition 2001, p. 175.
- ^ Khalidi, Rashid (September 1998). Palestinian identity: the construction of modern national consciousness. Columbia University Press. pp. 21–. ISBN 978-0-231-10515-6.
In 1948 half of Palestine's ... Arabs were uprooted from their homes and became refugees
- ^ Gelber 2006, p. 137: "Drawn into the war by the collapse of the Palestinians and the ALA, the Arab governments' primary goal was preventing the Palestinians’ total ruin and the flooding of their own countries by more refugees."
- ^ Matthew Hogan (2001). The 1948 Massacre at Deir Yassin Revisited: "Meanwhile, the subsequent May 1948 outbreak of regional war between the newly declared state of Israel and the Arab states, beginning the prolonged Arab-Israeli conflict, was contemporaneously explained by Arab League chief Azzam Pasha in terms of the Deir Yassin incident: "The massacre of Deir Yassin was to a great extent the cause of the wrath of the Arab nations and the most important factor for sending [in] the Arab armies."
- ^ Morris, Benny (2004). The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-81120-0.
- ^ J.P.D. Dunbabin, The Post-Imperial Age: The Great Powers and the Wider World, Routledge 2014 ISBN 978-1-317-89293-9 pp.256-258.
- ^ Benny Morris, Benjamin Z. Kedar, 'Cast thy bread': Israeli biological warfare during the 1948 War Middle Eastern Studies 19 September 2022, pages =1-25 p.8:'The SHAI, in its report from the end of June 1948 on the causes of the Arab flight from Palestine, mentioned ‘the typhus epidemic’ as ‘an exacerbating factor in the evacuation’ in certain areas. ‘More than the disease itself, it was the panic induced by the rumours of the spread of the disease in the area that was a factor in the evacuation’, stated the report. In its site-by-site breakdown of the Arab flight, the report mentioned ‘harassment [by the Haganah] and the typhus epidemic’ as the causes of the partial exodus of the population from Acre on 6 May.'
- ^ Pittsburgh Press (May 1948). "British Halt Jerusalem Battle". UP. Retrieved 17 December 2010.
The British spokesman said that all 12 members of the Arab Higher Committee have left Palestine for neighboring Arab states… Walter Eyelan, the Jewish Agency spokesman, said the Arab leaders were victims of a "flight psychosis" which he said was sweeping Arabs throughout Palestine.
- ^ Blomeley, Kristen (March 2005). "The 'new historians' and the origins of the Arab/Israeli conflict". Australian Journal of Political Science. 40 (1): 125–139. doi:10.1080/10361140500049487. S2CID 143673606.
- ^ McGhee, George Crews (1997). On the frontline in the Cold War: an ambassador reports. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 42. ISBN 978-0-275-95649-3.
- ^ Stein, Leslie (2003). The Hope Fulfilled: The Rise of Modern Israel. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-275-97141-0.
- ^ Kodmani-Darwish, p. 126; Féron, Féron, p. 94.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
UNRWAwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Cite error: The named reference
IANBLACKwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Shavit, Ari. "Survival of the Fittest? An Interview with Benny Morris" Archived 5 September 2021 at the Wayback Machine. Logos. Winter 2004
- ^ Matas, David (2005). Aftershock: anti-zionism and anti-semitism. Dundurn Press Ltd. pp. 555–558. ISBN 978-1-55002-553-8.
- ^ Benvenis'tî, Mêrôn (2002). Sacred landscape: the buried history of the Holy Land since 1948. University of California Press. pp. 124–127. ISBN 978-0-520-23422-2.
- ^ Benny Morris (21 February 2008). "Benny Morris on fact, fiction, & propaganda about 1948". The Irish Times, reported by Jeff Weintraub Archived 7 December 2008 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Human Rights Watch. "A Threshold Crossed," April 27, 2021. A Threshold Crossed.
- ^ Amnesty International. "Israel's Apartheid against Palestinians: A Cruel System of Domination and a Crime against Humanity," February 1, 2022. Israel's Apartheid against Palestinians.