The commander of the IDF’s 98th Division said he would work on evacuation plans “if and when” he is told to launch an invasion.
A Hamas police vehicle was struck in Gaza’s southern city of Rafah on Wednesday evening in what Palestinian media reported as a targeted assassination by the IDF.
According to the reports, Hamas police’s special forces head, Majdi Abd al-Aal, was killed in the suspected attack.
Oh I have looked towards the New Historians for clear black and white answers to what otherwise seems like unabated mutual extremism. Unfortunately, Pappe’s absolute mockery of an attempted chronicling only served to add to the obfuscation of what can be accepted as truth.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ethnic_Cleansing_of_Palestine
Even one of Pappe’s close colleagues completely discredited him:
The siege of Jerusalem preceded Plan D according to New Historians.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_Dalet
Citation [25][26]&[27] are all New Historian documentation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_for_Jerusalem
Avi Shlaim, a New Historian, substantiates the Arab League’s genocidal threats:
https://users.ox.ac.uk/~ssfc0005/The Debate About 1948.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calls_for_the_destruction_of_Israel
New Historian Benny Morris has described the Arabs as making calls with a “expulsionist or eliminationist mindset”:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/41858205?seq=2
I’ve used enough time disputing and this point about Nazi Germany and the Arab League is a really dense subject that Bernard Lewis. who is admittedly alleged to be anti-Arab/Muslim, has revisited many times after Basheer. It’s not really that important to my overall point other than its role in inciting The Great Revolt, which is when it became obvious that war was imminent.
Pappe is biased towards Palestinian emancipation. He explains his position and why in his introductions instead of hiding his bias like some Historians such as Benny Morris.
Here’s Pappe’s response to Benny Morris, where he debunks Morris’ claims:
https://electronicintifada.net/content/response-benny-morris-politics-other-means-new-republic/5040
CAMERA criticisms are easily debunked as seen here:
https://www.palestine-studies.org/en/node/42571
https://mondoweiss.net/2012/03/we-must-expel-arabs-and-take-their-place-institute-for-palestine-studies-publishes-1937-ben-gurion-letter-advocating-the-expulsion-of-palestinians/
“Ben-Gurion’s 5 October 1937 letter thoroughly vindicates Ilan Pappé’s reading; indeed, the Pappé quotes to which CAMERA objects seem almost mild when compared to the actual words Ben-Gurion penned to his son. The more literal translation of the Ben-Gurion direct quote (“We must expel Arabs and take their place”) is actually stronger than Pappé’s freer rendering (“The Arabs must go”), although the meaning is basically the same. As for Pappé’s paraphrase, it is as accurate and comprehensive as any so succinct a sentence could possibly be.”
There’s plenty of reputable historians praising Pappe’s work and credibility. You can find links to them in his wiki page too. The criticisms don’t really hold water.
I think you may be unfamiliar with the phrase “official policy” if you’re asserting the Prime Minister’s letter to his son as such. You’re also squinting really hard to avert your gaze from the numerous times Arabs made it abundantly clear they were going to respond to Jewish independence with indiscriminate obliteration no matter how the chain of events transpired. In fact, you responded to a total of 0 points involving genocidal threats made by Arabs before Israel’s existence in all three of your comments. 🤔
And yes, I’m sure you’re as critical of Pappe as you are of the undoubtedly anti-Semitic views of the Al Jazeera Media Network.
Openly admitting bias does not exonerate you from the ways in which it affects the “truth” you report. You’re also ignoring the criticism that correctly points out that the chronicling of Israel’s history by Pappe can’t be reconciled with interconnected events that happened internationally or with the previously available avenues for Jewish emancipation prior to Plan Dalet being adopted as official policy.
I suggest you read the links I provided for the Concept of Transfer in Zionist thought and the two links on Plan Dalet if you think there is/was no “official policy.”
No, it’s more that a few quotes are no justification for doing ethnic cleansing. Especially when there was no military policy that backed up any genocidal threats.
I can’t find any evidence of that quote in the photo you posted at all, it’s as if they just made it up. The wiki commons for the leaflet say “A leaflet, distributed after the U.N partition resolution, by the Mufti High Command supporters, which calls the Arabs to attack and conquer all of Palestine, to burn all the middle east and cancel the U.N partition resolution.” Was Amin antisemitic? Yes. Is it possible the leaflets influenced some people? Yes. Does that represent the majority of Palestinians? Absolutely not. Most Palestinians were anti-zionist because of fears of being ethnically cleansed from their homes, which ended up happening.
The Azzam Pasha quote, which the wiki link goes into, isn’t as clear cut.
Horowitz quoted Azzam’s gloomy assessment of the situation: “We shall try to defeat you. I am not sure we’ll succeed, but we’ll try. We were able to drive out the Crusaders, but on the other hand we lost Spain and Persia. It may be that we shall lose Palestine. But it’s too late to talk of peaceful solutions.”
Ben-Gurion, who was informed of the meeting, summed up Azzam’s words thus, in a meeting with members of his party: “As we fought against the Crusaders, we will fight against you, and we will erase you from the earth.”
Israeli military officials were quite confident that there was no threat according to New Historians, it’s even within the paragraphs you quoted from the wiki. It’s even more clear if you read the books and get the full context as to why from the minutes of their meetings and their diary entries.
Plus you ignore the decades of Palestinians officials advocating for a unitary state or what life was and the dispossession of Palestinians like under British occupation.
The real question is why Ben-Gurion wanted partition instead of a unitary binational state that was advocated by the Arab side since 1928 and other Jewish participants within the talks. And the point is Transfer / Settler Colonialism
Anti-zionism is not remotely antisemitism. Although, the intentional conflation of them is. As your saying the criticisms of the state of Israel (which doesn’t represent all Israeli and not remotely all Jewish people) is the same as genuine antisemitism.
That’s just wrong, it definitely does. In fact he has multiple books on it that go into immense detail. There are more historians that agree with Pappe than Morris’ criticisms. It basically goes into whether you only believe official Israeli sources or you also cross reference them with additional sources such as the diaries of Israeli officials, Arab sources, and oral history. I highly suggest you try reading the book assuming Pappe is wrong about everything and verifying everything he discusses on your own.
It’s funny you should mention your sources for the Concept of Transfer. This is what originally clued me in on your propagandistic presentation. Nur Masalha obviously failed to conduct credible research, evidenced by his use of works by known fraud, Israel Shahak. Shahak is infamous for taking a personal diary of one Yosef Weitz, who never so much as stepped foot into Jewish government, and deploying it out of context to prove some deep-rooted Zionist conspiracy. Far from being official policy, Weitz later even repudiated the idea.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Shahak
The main contention among historians is whether or not “Transfer” had remained a contingency in the case of unavoidable war for Jewish independence or a secret plot. What I’m here to address is that you’ve only presented one interpretation of the events that defined this conflict. There can be a sincere case made for the origins of Zionism disillusionment with a lack of independence being embedded by centuries of persecution, the inhumane practices of Sharia law, and the burgeoning of such practices being galvanized by Islamic revivalists present in the remnants of the collapsed Ottoman Empire. I find it concerning that there is so much one-dimensional rhetoric about Israel’s practices of apartheid (to be clear this is not a justification for anything, but rather presenting the unrelenting nature of both sides of the coin) and yet the second-class citizenship associated with that of a Dhimmi is absent.
https://nysba.org/NYSBA/Sections/International/Awards/2016 Pergam Writing Competition/submissions/Hellmann Ashlea.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_revival
Next point:
Let’s take a step back. If I gave the impression that I am attempting to justify anything, then I’ve made an error. I’ve already implied that I condemn both parties that this conflict derived from, I.E. my use of “…unabated mutual extremism”. The point here is to remember that I’m presenting what you’ve failed to include in your campaign, the contested interpretation and the context in totality. War had become unavoidable by 1947, and you can imagine what those Jew’s reactions would’ve been to facing another perceived existential threat.
I’ll admit, it’s difficult for me to measure the validity of the original claim because I don’t speak Hebrew or Arabic. However, I do know that al-Husseini had already issued several declarations using this exact same Nazi-emulating rhetoric.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relations_between_Nazi_Germany_and_the_Arab_world
I don’t blame you for accusing me of this. I’m not some omniscient scholar that can decipher exactly what version of events had occurred or who had the onus of making concessions in order to salvage some kind of unity out of what is otherwise over a century of suffering caused to the innocent bystanders of Palestine. However, I do know that there was enormous unrest in the region both before and after the birth of Zionism, and that I am acutely unqualified to suggest the perfect resolution.
Remember that friction was extremely high between these groups. It’s completely possible, had the events occurred differently, that Jews would currently be on the disproportionate receiving end of suffering. I just have absolutely no way of knowing.
https://www.axios.com/2023/10/25/tony-blinken-qatar-israel-hamas | https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/may/20/al-jazeera-suspends-two-journalists-over-offensive-holocaust-report | https://www.arabnews.com/node/1499786/media | https://www.israelhayom.com/2019/05/24/al-jazeeras-anti-semitism-runs-deep/ | https://www.france24.com/en/20170712-uae-slams-al-jazeera-anti-semitism-inciting-hate
Bud, I would not go there. I could not care less what you choose to label it. Openly supporting systematic annihilation of an entire people is beyond redeemable. It’s heinous. And most importantly, it’s evil.
Not everything. Definitely all the times he insinuates that Jews had complete and total control over everything and could commit ethnic cleansing whenever the hell they so chose, though.
Nur Masalha referenced A History of the Concept of “Transfer” in Zionism by Israel Shahek, which I haven’t found criticisms of fabrications of. Looking into his controversy which is about a different book than Nur referenced, it looks like some criticisms are valid. Of course, I’m no religious scholar. I don’t get your point about Yosef Weitz, he did play a major role with the unofficial Transfer Committee and the JNF. Which has dispossessed Palestinians to present day. 972mag, MEE, Haaretz
I don’t support Sharia, human rights abuses are present in practically every religious fundamentalism. I don’t think Christian or Jewish fundamentalism are compatible with democracy either. I don’t like the concept of Dhimmi either, that goes for any laws that create 2nd class citizens. However, looking into the history, it looks like many Jewish people experienced more rights as Dhimmi than they would’ve under Christian nations for example, more so when there were other minority religions groups such as Christians in Muslim countries since it was general to any non-muslim. Especially during the Ottoman empire, it looks like Jewish people had comparatively more rights and was generally considered a ‘safe haven.’ especially in the region of Palestine from what I understand. They deserved equal rights of course, but it’s important to note how it differs from western antisemitism historically.
Antisemitism in Islam
Antisemitism in the Arab World
I focused on the unrest, such as the 1929 riots, within Palestine with multiple sources since not all Arabs/Muslims are Palestinian and not all Palestinians are Arab/Muslim. And that once Zionism chose Palestine as a location, it was deliberately a settler colonialist movement. However I see your point and I’ll add those wikis about historic antisemitism to the list for more context. Amin Husseini became antisemitic largely after his Exodus to Germany. I’m certain he fell for Nazi propaganda and even tried to promote it in Palestine. However his influence continued to dwindle after his Exodus and in Palestine his western antisemitism didn’t really catch on, which I think is most apparent by the magnitude more Palestinians willing to fight Nazi Germany than side with Husseini in his personal army.
I only engage with English AJ, so I can’t speak for Arabic AJ. From what I understand posts with antisemitism are removed and the journalists responsible are fired or suspended. Which they should be. Antisemitism like Holocaust revisionism or ‘kill all jews’ Should never be tolerated and always denounced. This is the AJ obituary on Yusef al Qaradawj which does talk about some of his controversies but doesn’t mention his Hitler related antisemitism which it definitely should. I totally get talking about other aspects of his life but that kind of thing should not be ignored. I was also surprised it wasn’t even talked about on the dude’s wiki. those are genuine antisemitic remarks. Criticisms of the state of Israel are not.
I don’t think Pappe ever insinuates ‘jews’ had ‘complete control.’ Zionists were dependent on British occupation for quite a while. He discusses in detail the military intelligence gathered during plans A,B, and C which were used for Plan Dalet, how the Yishuv military internal intel differed from the rhetoric they gave to politicians not involved in the military operations for Public Relations, and why Ben-Gurion chose the 1947 partition plan as the right precedent to start putting plan dalet into action and obtain the most Palestinian land with the least Palestinians. Also the off-the-record discussions with King Abdullah about the takeover of the West Bank. I don’t know how you got the impression they could’ve done it ‘whenever,’ I certainly disagree with that notion. It took a lot of planning and cooperation with western forces by Ben-Gurion. There is no way they could’ve gotten away with the ethnic cleansing before the 47 partition plan and the status of Israel in the UN as an observer-state. The partition plan wasn’t even official as it would’ve required Palestinian officials to accept it. And it was declined for completely valid reasons.
I don’t agree with the notion that the civil war was inevitable. For one, that argument depends on the notion that Palestinians had no desire for peace and wanted to genocide all the Jews, making it a war for survival. Which doesn’t hold true when looking at the details of the peace process. It is also an after-the-fact justification of partition. Ignoring both the reasons Ben-Gurion insisted on partition, the ongoing dispossession of Palestinians under British occupation, and how the Palestinians officials repeatedly advocated for a unitary/binational state instead of partition. This kind of argument, that the war and ethnic cleansing were a form of preemptive self defense, is used to blame the ethnic cleansing of Palestine to be the fault of the Palestinians. That it was the Palestinians fault they had to be violently forced from their homes. It also justifies the ongoing occupation as a form of security, as it implies the notion that Palestinians are simply inherently violent and don’t want peace.
I advocate for a one-state solution with equal rights for all, like it should’ve been in the first place. Pappe’s book A History of Modern Palestine has a lot more info prior to 1947
First and foremost, I owe you an apology for all of my unfounded accusations. The mere fact that you are willing to hear me out is clear indication that I was mistaken. Upon reflection, it appears that your passion about the topic is entrenched by empathy for the Palestinians that lack any form of agency over their own suffering. That is, of course, the most important thing here. I would do better to remember that.
Note: In an attempt to cut down on the enormous amount of text on screen, I’ve added a lot of links to selected text. I’m not sure whether or not they’re going to work correctly in your browser of choice.
My point is that extremism had pervaded both parties perpetuating this conflict, not to mention there was a tidal wave of Nationalism surging through many countries of the time period. The presence of radical ideology is self-evident and gets us no closer to conclusively proving that the Jewish government had always been plotting to expel Palestinians by force. There needs to be a very clear distinction here. This controversy is embroiled in an abyss of disputed information.
The JNF is actually a prominent example of an organization that took measures not to expel Palestinians by force. There were plenty of Palestinians that were more than happy to sell their land in Palestine, presumably because they wanted to live elsewhere.
Yes, they made mention of this often. Presently the terms “settler” and “colonialist” are used to retroactively transpose modern narratives onto a period in history where conquest/colonialism had not yet been demonized. The Ottoman Empire had not even completely dissolved by the turn of the 20th century. Hell, Egypt, Jordan - Syria and Iraq all swooped in to occupy territory in Palestine, even though the only country that Britain had sanctioned in the territory was Israel. And sure, the ideologies of Zionism were certainly distorted by individual extremism, but I would argue that the underlying goal of an independent Jewish state is not inherently evil when considering they had long established territories in the region. As you brought up, the alternative was to submit themselves to the inhumane segregation of Christian fundamentalism or the inhumane segregation of Islamic fundamentalism.
I think we can agree that they’re both demeaning, and they’re both inhumane. Here are some examples of rights stripped away from you under the Ahl ad-Dhimma System:
https://medium.com/@Jaime.Morris/does-dhimmi-status-still-exist-in-some-islamic-countries-4389b485a134
The Ottomans sometimes made concessions to appease Europe, but Islamic revivalists were still prevalent. Sharia law still being rampant in the middle-east to this very day should be more than sufficient evidence that it was not just paranoia.
I’m almost in complete agreement with you here, but I would still be very careful that we’re not conflating that contemporary Palestine and Arab League. I only ever claimed it had ties to the latter, and the former was not the only Jewish adversary. I’d just really rather not get into the minutia of this topic, its only relevance is the cooperation of some Arab leaders and the fear it would invoke in Jews. It’s not isolated to just Husseini:
https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna29058048
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ba'athism
Hopefully I at least raised enough alarm about Al Jazeera to compel you to be more skeptical about them. The English branch does placate to public opinion, but has still been caught pushing the limits of antisemitism until the outrage starts to boil. I do strongly agree with you though, criticism of Israel is indeed not antisemitism. And extremism still present in Israel continues to disproportionately cause much more suffering than any extremism permeating the Palestinian population.
Pappe’s entire rhetoric about an overarching “master plan” is beyond silly to me. The Arab League’s biggest weakness was not having a united front, but for the overwhelming majority of this time period, even up to the very month the war of independence began, the Jewish military could not even begin to compete. If not for the exact set of events that lead up to this moment in time, such as the Holocaust and emancipation in North Africa both causing massive surges in Jewish emigration and conscription, conquest in Palestine would’ve never been feasible for them as they would’ve been easily obliterated as soon as they occupied territory in Palestine. However, I won’t discredit his assertions that there were radical individuals.
We have a complete misunderstanding here. I’m not suggesting that Palestinians, or Arabs in general, had no desire for peace. They had no desire to recognize Israel’s independence, under any circumstance. And Israel had no desire for anything but independence, under any circumstance. These two diametrically opposed beliefs were on a collision course from the very beginning.