In November of 1947, the UN adopted a plan to partition the part of the British Palestine Mandate that had not already be given to the Kingdom of Transjordan (later called Jordan). The plan called for 2 states, one Jewish and one Arab, and included detailed recommendations for the boundaries of the two.
So, we already HAVE a UN resolution for a Palestinian state! Why doesn't one exist? The first answer is that, while the Jews accepted the partition plan, the Arabs did NOT. Instead, when the British withdrew in 1948 and the Jews announced the establishment of the State of Israel, ALL the surrounding Arab countries immediately attacked the new State the very next day. There was no mystery about what they planned to do -- they loudly and very publicly proclaimed that their goal was to kill the Jews or to push them into the sea and to completely eliminate the State of Israel. So this was very clearly a war of survival for the Jews. Not surprisingly, it was a bloody war, with many casualties on both sides. The new Jewish state lost about 1% of its entire population, more than a third of them civilians. Entire villages were destroyed or depopulated on both sides, and many people became refugees (more, MUCH more, on that issue later).
To nearly everyone's surprise, the Arabs did NOT succeed in their goal. When an armistice was finally signed in 1949, Palestine was, in fact, divided betweens Jews and Arabs, although not very close to the UN-recommended borders. This armistice line, commonly called "the Green line", is the one we have been hearing so much about recently, misleadingly referred to as "the 1967 lines".
The Jewish part of Palestine continued to be the State of Israel, of course. What happened to the proposed Arab state? Here's the 2nd reason there is no Palestinian state: all the Arab parts of Palestine were occupied by neighboring Arab states. The so-called "West Bank" was occupied by the Kingdom of Transjordan (which explains the later name-change to "Jordan" -- they were no longer only "trans-", i.e. on the other side, of the Jordan River!), and the Gaza Strip was occupied by Egypt. These occupations continued for nearly 2 decades, but NONE of the Palestinians objected to either of them during that entire time! In other words, what the Arabs wanted was NOT a Palestinian state, but the end of the JEWISH state. The "Palestine Liberation Organization", established during this period (in 1964), was NOT opposed to Jordan or Egypt. It was opposed to ISRAEL, which did not occupy one square inch of the currently proposed Palestinian state.
So, what was the Nakba, the catastrophe?
As I mentioned before, many people were displaced from their homes and became refugees. The exact numbers are HIGHLY disputed, and there are no really reliable records. The best guess is probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 400,000 to 750,000 Arabs. There are at least three main explanations for these displacements. The most easily documented reason is quite simple. Arab radio from surrounding countries that were invading told Arabs to leave temporarily so that the Arab armies would not be impeded in killing the Jews. Of course, it's hard to tell how many of the refugees actually were motivated by these broadcast, but at least SOME must have been.
The second reason, though, is probably the most important. As the Jewish forces began to have successes, the Arabs panicked. Remember that the Arab threat was not only to destroy the Jewish state but also to massacre the Jews. Remember, too, that in 1929 and on many other occasions as well, Arabs HAD, in fact, massacred Jews. There is almost NO doubt that the Arabs feared that the Jews would do to them exactly what they had promised to do to the Jews, had the war gone the other way!
The third reason for the Arab refugees is that some were definitely deliberately driven from their homes by the Jews. Although some of these evictions may have been unjustified and unnecessary, at least in retrospect, many of them were also strategically required by the conditions of the war. Remember, this war was NOT started by the Jews, and they were fighting for their very survival! This was most definitely NOT ethnic cleansing, as most of the Arabs in territory that was to become part of the State of Israel were encouraged to stay and did stay and become citizens of Israel with full civil rights, including the right to vote and to hold elected office (the Knesset has ALWAYS had some Arab members!).
In the third post of this series, I'll talk much more about the "refugee" issue.
No comments:
Post a Comment