Ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, or, democratic Israel at work
While we are still desperately concealing, denying and repressing our major ethnic cleansing of 1948 - over 600,000 refugees, some who fled for fear of the Israel Defense Forces and its predecessors, some who were expelled by force - it turns out that 1948 never ended, that its spirit is still with us.
By Gideon LevyIt happened on the day after Independence Day, when Israel was immersed in praise of itself and its democracy almost ad nauseam, and on the eve of (virtually outlawed ) Nakba Day, when the Palestinian people mark the "catastrophe" - the anniversary of the creation of Israel. My colleague Akiva Eldar published what we have always known but for which we lacked the shocking figures he revealed: By the time of the Oslo Accords, Israel had revoked the residency of 140,000 Palestinians from the West Bank. In other words, 14 percent of West Bank residents who dared to go abroad had their right to return to Israel and live here denied forever. In other words, they were expelled from their land and their homes. In other words: ethnic cleansing.
While we are still desperately concealing, denying and repressing our major ethnic cleansing of 1948 - over 600,000 refugees, some who fled for fear of the Israel Defense Forces and its predecessors, some who were expelled by force - it turns out that 1948 never ended, that its spirit is still with us. Also with us is the goal of trying to cleanse this land of its Arab inhabitants as much as possible, and even a bit more. After all, that's the most covert and desired solution: the Land of Israel for the Jews, for them alone. A few people dared to say it outright - Rabbi Meir Kahane, Minister Rehavam Ze'evi and their disciples, who deserve a certain amount of praise for their integrity. Many aspire to do the same thing without admitting it.
The revelation of the policy of denying residency has proved that this secret dream is in effect the establishment's secret dream. There one doesn't talk about transfer, heaven forfend; nobody would think of calling it cleansing. They don't load Arabs onto trucks as they once did, including after the Six-Day War, and they don't shoot at them to chase them away - all politically incorrect methods in the new world. But in effect that's the goal.
Some people think it's enough if we make the lives of the Palestinians in the territories miserable to get them to leave, and many have in fact left. An Israeli success: According to the Civil Administration, about a quarter of a million Palestinians voluntarily left the West Bank in the bloody years 2000-2007. But that's not enough, so various and sundry administrative means were added to make the dream come true.
Anyone who says "it's not apartheid" is invited to reply: Why is an Israeli allowed to leave his country for the rest of his life, and nobody suggests that his citizenship be revoked, while a Palestinian, a native son, is not allowed to do so? Why is an Israeli allowed to marry a foreigner and receive a residency permit for her, while a Palestinian is not allowed to marry his former neighbor who lives in Jordan? Isn't that apartheid? Over the years I have documented endless pitiful tragedies of families that were torn apart, whose sons and daughters were not permitted to live in the West Bank or Gaza due to draconian rules - for Palestinians only.
Take Dalal Rasras, for example, a toddler with cerebral palsy from Beit Omar, who was recently separated from her mother for months only because her mother was born in Rafah. Only after her case was publicized did Israel let the mother return to her daughter "beyond the letter of the law" - the cruel letter of the law that does not permit residents of Gaza to live in the West Bank, even if they have made their homes there.
The cry of the dispossessed has now been translated into numbers: 140,000, only until the Oslo Accords. Students who went to study at foreign universities, businessmen who tried their luck abroad, scientists who went abroad for professional training, native Jerusalemites who dared to move to the West Bank temporarily - they all met the same fate. All of them were taken by the wind and expelled by Israel. They couldn't return.
Most amazing of all is the reaction of those responsible for the policy of ethnic cleansing. They didn't know. Maj. Gen. (res. ) Danny Rothschild, formerly the chief military governor with the euphemistic title "coordinator of government activities in the territories," said he heard about the procedure for the first time from Haaretz. It turns out that not only is the cleansing continuing, so is the denial. Every Palestinian child knows, and only the general doesn't. Even today there are still 130,000 Palestinians registered as "NLR," a heartwarming IDF acronym for "no longer a resident," as though voluntarily, another euphemism for "expelled." And the general who is considered relatively enlightened was unaware.
This is an absolute refusal to allow the return of the refugees - something that would "destroy the State of Israel." It's also an absolute refusal to allow the return of the people recently expelled. By next Independence Day we'll probably invent more expulsion regulations, and on the next holiday we'll talk about "the only democracy."
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"it" being "the territories".small difference,you agree.so far so good,as israel has achieved all its territorial ambitions,by 1967.now,since the "right" rules the land (always did) and knows it cannot integrate the current land with its current population,the rest surely follows.time will tell if this ambitious project (whatever precisely)will "succeed".time waits by no one.(allowed 1 cliche)."mission impossible" i would hazard,good luck israel.
what if americans did that to american jews who left the states.
except by using economic means. As a reminder, the collapse of modern rule has ever been due to homeostatic imbalance triggered by depriving people from individual rights. When people are deprived of any protection the collective suffers, because no system can tolerate indefinitely pressure arising from a massive, deprived, and congested center; such systems sooner or later explode, forming new structures. Since WWII, the international community has increasingly consolidated (with greater and lesser success) to function as a lever against the narrow self-interest of states; the international community (barring the USA which supports israel unconditionally) must use economic means to interest the Israeli public in its treatment of the "strangers among them".
Hundreds were murdered like what happened in Deer Yassin, Kufer Kassim and others. Many were shot dead in cold blood. Zionist propaganda is engaged in misinformation and a campaign of lies since then. Time to acknowledge the rights of a nation murdered, expelled and beaten by force of arms..
Arab refugees were a direct consequence of the Arab rejection of peace and attacks on the Jews, the responsibility for these refugees lies with the Arab states and their leaders. And you want to talk about massacres in cold blood? Look up what happened at Kfar Etzion, or the Hadassah Hospital convoy massacre, or the Ben Yehuda Street bombing..... Learn some history of this conflict before you spread your big lies.
I urge you to be more aggressive, unjust and atrocious so that you destroy yourself by yourself! The goodness and justice will dominate at the end!
...you will be there, before HIM...by that day I would not want to be in your shoes. VERGOGNATI!!! Shame on you!!!
because justice requires resposibilities for deeds and punishment for crimes
such cruelty, such oppression. And then - on top of everything - a general who says he didn't know. What a mess!
We don't like each other and when you don't like somebody you don't want to be making any goodwill gestures your going to be wanting life hard for them. Thats how we think in Israel and its how the palestinians think. Israel and the arabs are going through a bitter divorce rather than a happy marrige thats Thats how things are in the REAL world not the left wing IDEOLOGICAL ones based on justice and being fair. This conflict has also never been about palestinians, land Israel has captured in wars the root of this conflict is the arab belief that in a part of the world thats dominted by islam there is no place for a jewish state especially in the Holy Land of all places. Creating a palestinian state won't change that. As long as there is a jewish state in an islamic region there will never be peace not matter how many palestinian states we create or peace treaties we sign.
Get a divorce ! who cares ? israeli jews want to live amongst themselves, fine ! you want to stay in your own ignorance, fine ! they want to build walls, fine ! you want to focus on Islam, fine ! you feel in danger, get a doctor ! Israel should not get away with only a divorce. Justice is calling. Israel must pay for its crimes. In any case it's not a palestinian issue.
Just dealing with comparative facts regarding actual ethnic cleansing any journalist who can truly say that what went on and what goes on in Israel is ethnic cleansing is an idiot and should have his credentials revoked
Most abhorrent to me is when Israelis and Jews accept the propaganda of the enemy as fact. If the Israelis had ever intended ethnic cleansing Israel would not be in the situation it is in today. There were no Palestinians in 1948, Arab refugees who came from other countries to find work or food, Arabs who were expelled from their home countries Syria, Iraq, Bosnia.
'Land without a people for a people without a Land' was and apparently with your comment still is THE LIE. You have believed The Lie. What Gideon Levy has written is the truth. You might also reflect on the fact that 10% these Palestinians are Christian.
You've swallowed Joan Peters's hoax hook, line and rod. Palestinians are the descendants of the people who have inhabited that land West of the Jordan for millennia: Canaanites, Philistines, Samaritans, Christians... and Jews. Read a real history book next time.
Mr. Levy, the Beirut Institute for Palestinian studies condcluded long ago that fully 68% of the Palestinians who left Mandate Palestine did so without ever seeing a Jewish soldier or hearing a shot fired in anger. Even Mahmoud Abbas himself admitted on PATV that his family fled from Zefat from fear of reprisals for their actions during the 1936-39 riots--reprisals that never materialized. He also admitted that his family fled in December 1947, a full six months before the British pulled out. Hundreds of families, making up the top half or more of the Palestinian Arab economic scale did the same. While I have sympathy for the Palestinian Arabs who were, and still are, mistreated by their own Arab brethren far worse than Israel ever treated them, I also remember the almost 1,000,000 Jews expelled from Arab countries whose assets, collective and private, were stolen by those Arab governments. This includes a total of about 100,000 square kilometers of land owned by Jews--more than four times the total area of Israel, the Gaza Strip, West Bank and Golan Heights together. How come we never hear a word from you about THOSE refugees? In my opinion, those Palestinian Arabs who left their homes expecting to return after the Arab armies completed their declared aim of pushing the Jews into the sea took a gamble--be refugees for a few weeks or months, then come back and claim Jewish assets. When a gambler loses his bet, what right does he have to demand his money or collateral back after he loses it? Ha'Aretz: While I know this opinion doesn't fit yours, I object to my posts being systematically censored by your moderators. Are you afraid of free speech?
You really think that the Jews who fled from Arab countries owned 100,000 sqaure kilometres of land? On which planet?
Anybody has the right to leave his homeland and return as he pleases. This is never a gamble, it's an inalienable right. Besides, by December 1947 numerous massacres like that of Deir Yassin had already been perpetrated by the Jewish militias (with the clear intention of terrorizing Arabs out of their land). It is only reasonable that people wanted to put their families out of that kind of danger.
It was 1972, in Uruguay. He was a young man, a Christian Arab from Bet Jallah, near Bet Lehem, in the West Bank, who stayed some years in Uruguay studying Medicine. He was denied a permit to go back home to his family. He did nothing wrong. I still remember him crying like a small child.
and begin letting some come back. Some things are a no brainer.
somehow our liberal humanist fail to look at the big picture- the tremendous inequity of what the Arabs have done to the jews and to each other as compared to those we have perpetrated- how we are still- despite our prosperity- in a struggle for survival- and arab murders of their brethren are daily fare- we we are not angels and need to live up to our ethical creed- but do our liberal bretheren excercise tolerance to their fellow jews those not of their religious perspective -I think not
Revoking residence to Jordan citizens dwelling in the West bank is a wrong policy, a damaging policy. It is a policy unacceptable for human rights loving people. Still it has nothing to be with apartheid. The The best thing to do is to criticize Israel policies to the point, an leaving away concepts which are not necessary. The problem for the "concepts users" is that they will get a backlash and turn the agents of the "new" discourse into highly irrelevant. Israel will never be in the position of South Africa unless it decides to annex Judea and Samaria. And that is highly unlikely.
Jordan citizens? No - Palestinian West Bankers and Jerusalemites.
Arik, what ridiculous nonsense! Israel is already 'annexing' Judea & Samaria, and has been doing so since 1967. 20% of the West Bank is covered by Israeli Jewish colonies, another 40% by Israeli military zones. How can you be unaware of this. In effect, what Israel is doing, is to herd those Palestinians it cannot force out into little 'bantustans' where they will constitute readily available, cheap labour reserves for the Jews who are colonising the rest of the land. THAT is what Apartheid was all about in South Africa, and just like under Apartheid my black compatriots were denied the right to participate in national politics, just so the Palestinians are being denied the right to determine their own destiny. Of course, no one expects Israel to actually come right out in the open and acknowledge the truth of the matter. After all, yours is a 'democratic' country, isn't it? HA!
but commits a lot of crimes. Apartheid was a different system: Palestinians with Israeli citizenship do not suffer from this barbarian policy. Black South Africans could not vote. There were no "black" fractions in Parliament. Sex between blacks and whites was forbidden. There were ambulances for whites only. It is stupid to weaken the protest by using wrong historical comparisons.
Enough already with the revisionist memories. Killing Jews by arab leaders and civilians was a sporting event for centuries prior to 1948 and still is. Difference is that after 1948 there are severe consequences to killing Jews just for being Jews. Had this not been the policy, I suggest there may never have been a displacement of populations. Respectfully
On which planet are you living?
So you admit that there was a 'displacement of populations'. That's Ethnic Cleansing!
a Palestinian claim is rendered invalid. Israel is completely out of touch with reality thanks to our Congress, which funds this criminal hypocrisy and illegal annexation.
If only many ordinary Israelis could read this article. They just don't know ! A young Israeli cab driver once drove a Palestinian friend of mine, originally from Jaffa, to the Gaza border to see her dying mother. On their return trip, he invited her to his home in Jaffa for a cup of coffee. She had to tell him that this was forbidden. How to interest and inform the Israeli public about the impossible situation of Palestinian refugees?!
As formal Israeli with family and connections i must inform you that they know and approve.
Most abhorrent to me is when Israelis and Jews accept the propaganda of the enemy as fact. If the Israelis had ever intended ethnic cleansing Israel would not be in the situation it is in today. There were no Palestinians in 1948, Arab refugees who came from other countries to find work or food, Arabs who were expelled from their home countries Syria, Iraq, Bosnia.
Do you really expect the world to believe the crap you are writing? Arabs expelled from Bosnia.....you are a funny dude...
when the hil this hapend.palestinians where kiked out of there homes and land in 1948 and that didnt stop tel 1994.so get your storey righet first
During the 2,000 or so years that the Jews were in exile, Palestinian culture thrived here; we cannot and should not erase it, It was not supported by the billions that have since been invested here by diaspora Jews and friendly allies, but that's no reason we cannot live in peace with it.
You seem to leave out a major part of the refugee problem created in 1948 - Arab fleeing due to their own propaganda. You should at least acknowledge it before you expose your homeland, which is consistently subjected to lies and misconceptions from its enemy, to further damaging criticism.
Israeli propagandists often claim that Arabs left "due to their own propaganda", but they never produce any evidence of this propaganda. In any case, it's irrelevant: people always flee from war zones. The Israeli crime was not letting them back, and then confoscating any property they had left.
Any person is allowed to flee violence. there is no crime in that. Just like any person is free to go on vacation. The crime of Israel in 1948 and 1967 wasn't so big, they created and supported the refugees to stay away during the violence. 'haval-al-ha-zman' The biggest crime in and after 1948 and 1967 was to refuse the return of the legal refugees to their homes! Not only was it an outride crime, it was also the best guarantee for the middle east war to continue until today, the most certain way of creating Palestinian terrorism and an easy way of giving Israel pariah status in the international community. And the current news report only confirms the fact that this was not an incident but this was an is a standing executive order, a state policy. So as long as this continues, Israel will see more uprisings, Intifadas, terror and its pariah status will even grow more. Until there WILL be an international boycott and Israel will have to accept the will of the international community that WILL be fed-up with the crimes, the arrogance and the lies.
Unlike thousands of palestinians, my family fled the house in Jerusalem (Katamon) which was 90% arab. A few months later this became israeli territory and my family could never ever return. Everything became israeli. Even the names of cities and villages were changed. War, propaganda or whatever, what's your point ? does a population have the right to return to its house after a conflict ? the answer is yes. Once you understand that, you'll understand this conflict from a palestinian perspective which is something most israelis deny or simply do not even know because they've been told this land was empty. The problem is that despite the huge efforts of israeli propaganda to erase any sort of palestinian trace, the palestinians still remain. They're everywhere : in the WB, in Gaza, in refugee camps in Lebanon, in Jordan, in Syria....theye are here to remind the israelis of their history. One day israelis will have to face that reality instead of avoiding it. Thanks God there are many good souls in Israel who know. Not surprising they are enemis of the right and extreme right.......
Not to mention the palestinians of the diaspora from around the world who are longing to come back to the land of their ancestors, get a double nationality or simply spend some precious time there. That, israelis will never ever be able to erase it. The army can kill, racist laws can be passed, history can be rewritten, palestinians will remain. If Israel wants peace, there will be peace. Occupation, arrogance and brutality are not peace.
": Why is an Israeli allowed to leave his country for the rest of his life, and nobody suggests that his citizenship be revoked, while a Palestinian, a native son, is not allowed to do so? " Do you know what pendulum is? When a Palie returns back and does a terror act and your people or may be you get hurt, who cares the Palies return. Before 2000, before the second intifada the situation was exactly like that. Arafat and his coleageas reject the Clinton plan and started to kill innocent people. And then every preacaution has been taken to defend our people. It seems you are your near doesn't get hurt. But ask to a mother, what happened when she returned back to get coffie , that her baby is no more alive. She gets her scull. I can give you noumerous examples like this acts. Now if you have the gut to answer, answer these question. Who will bring back this baby to her mother back? Perhaps You. But is ISRAEL is saving you from this actions. This is the priece, you pay it or not. If you want to blame someone, blame Arafat for his past actions, and blame HAMAS which they don't want to get reconciliate with ISRAEL now.
It's almost as if they refuse to look at themselves in the mirror. What's the matter? Do you fear that if you looked you'd see.... nothing?
The revoking of Palestinian residency rights is highly unacceptable, as is its shocking denial by oficials. But according to Gideon, any form of ethnic discrimination can be called Apartheid, which firstly is inaccurate, and secondly dilutes the term Apartheid. Gideon's clear journalistic opportunism needs the emotional response of a hackneyed buzzword like "Apartheid" in order to attempt to shock and mobilize the complacent Israeli public. Grow up, Gideon - you're almost as brain-washed (your term) as your reading public!
Read the history of Apartheid. You will find that many of the policies of the white south African government have direct parallels with Israeli practices and Mr. Levy is perfectly entitled to make the comparison. This response of yours is a clear demonstration of Mr.Levy's point that Israelis deny, conceal, and repress (even to themselves) the truth about the manner in which your country was created and the way it continues to behave. Israel was born out of ethnic cleansing and murder (not forgetting a significant element of terrorism) and its creation was a catastrophe for the original inhabitants of the land. Until Israelis acknowledge that fact and try in some way to make ammends for the injustices that have happened and continue to happen they will not stop their rapid march to the same fate as apartheid South Africa. I think it is time that you grew up Mr. TrueBlue and faced your demons.
What is being denied is a return to the occupied territories. And that is a clear and unequivocal violation of Geneva IV. Israel never even pretended to annex the land from which the people are denied. Why can't an Israeli government adhere to a treaty is signed and ratified?
What is being denied is a return to the occupied territories. And that is a clear and unequivocal violation of Geneva IV. Israel never even pretended to annex the land from which the people are denied.
Mr. Levy courageously speaks truth to power. Every word, comma and period is correct. Israel deserves all the opprobrium and marginalization it receives. And more. For shame.
Many nations have permanent resident laws that state if a person leaves for a certain amount of time they lose their residency. These people in questions were Jordanians in a land not part of Jordan. They are citizens of Jordan, not Israel and not Palestine (since no nation exists). To call this "ethnic cleansing" is a libel and a blatant lie. What is ethnic cleansing is the cleansing of Jews of Arab nations and the moving of Jews out of Gaza and possibly Judea and Samaria. That is ethnic cleansing.
you are right that other nations have permanent resident laws governing a person's absence from the nation. But how many of those nations have DIFFERENT laws for people based on their race or religion? As Mr. Levy pointed out, a Jew can go off to the States or Australia or wherever to make his/her fortune and return anytime he/she desires with no negative consequences. Not so for the Arab. THAT is an Apartheid-like law.
you are right that other nations have permanent resident laws governing a person's absence from the nation. But how many of those nations have DIFFERENT laws for people based on their race or religion? As Mr. Levy pointed out, a Jew can go off to the States or Australia or wherever to make his/her fortune and return anytime he/she desires with no negative consequences. Not so for the Arab. THAT is an Apartheid-like law.
You should learn a little more about the law of the land. The same refusal can be given to any foreign citizen who is a permanent resident in Israel--and this includes some of the extreme ultra-Orthodox who refuse Israeli citizenship. When one is a citizen, it's a different matter. Then, one can be absent for as long as they want, but non-citizen permanent residents can't. This is true in most western countries, as well. The law is not based on race or religion, as you claim, but on the status of the person: citizen, permanent resident, temorary resident or tourist. There's nothing "Apartheid-like" about it.
When did Israel annex what you call Judea and Samaria, the West Bank? Israel has no right to legislate the laws of residency in the USA or Russia or Jordan. What gives the Israeli Knesset and bureaucracy the right to do so in anyplace that not even the Israeli government pretends to have annexed?
If it's not an Apartheid, so tell me why are Jews always citizens as they wish and Palestinians are residents, even though their families have lived on this land for generations? There's no such policy in any western country
The simple fact, which you know well, is that Israel's actions were illegal under about 6 different provisions of international law. But never let truth or international law get in the way of persecuting the Arabs!
I am well aware of the law. You seem to be conveniently ignoring two salient point. First, Jews can always return by simply making aliyah, a right, of course, denied to the Arabs and others. Second and far more significantly, the Arabs were residents BEFORE they became "non-citizen residents." They did not elect to become "foreign citizens with permanent residency." The purported "nation" in which they are "foreign citizens with permanent residency" came up around them. They did not visit, re-locate, enter, obtain any type of visa or move anywhere. All they did was wake up one day and, lo and behold, they are "foreign citizens with permanent residency" who cannot leave their home for an extended period. And THAT is what makes for an Apartheid-like law.
Jews of arab nations suddenly have some importance ! they were treated like animals when they arrived in Israel because they were 'arabs' and not 'pure', most of them encouraged or forced by the zionist propaganda in order to populate the 'empty land'....stop YOUR lies. Palestinians have nothing to do with arab jewish immigration after 48. You know it, the world knows it. Read Seguev for example and educate yourself. Rather you deny and lie. As far as the 500 000 settlers of the WB and Jerusalem are concerned, they have moved to those territories illegally and they were encouraged to do so by Israeli polic using military force against palestinian populations. A palestinian born in the WB is expulsed while some guy from Brooklyn who barely speaks a word of hebrew is welcome and gets citizenship. You should learn about palestinian constitution : 'every palestinian on this planet has the right to come and establish in Palestine and get citizenship'...Israel does not decide. The WB and Gaza are not israeli land. Israel must pay the conequences of its settlement policy. That's the way it goes Chaim. Palestinians will not give up.
in front of his eyes because that will expose him as a supporter of Nazi-like laws. Everything is good for a Jew but not for a Palestinian. Racism and fascism at its best Chaim. Recognize that you support the subjugation of another people, even when is the same type of subjugation that was inflicted on Jews for centuries, that is just sick and wrong. The victim becomes the torturer, and always finds a way to justify himself.
And there's absolutely no doubt that Israel will continue telling it's favorite joke about a "light unto nations"
and nobody except Jews believes such a propaganda. Do you in Israel do not realize that you wtrite hasbara for your own peace of mind because non-Jews do not believe a word ? So much "work" in vain.
They were robbed of their resident status in their West Bank homeland by the administrators of an illegal occupation...who as such, have absolutely no 'legal jurisdiction' to even be there, much less deprive its people of their residency!
Once Palestine is recognized by the UN as independent (this September/October), it will be able to allow in any person they wish. If Israel interferes, this will mean trouble from the rest of the world. Just a tip of the iceberg of problems the Netanyahu-Lieberman government is cooking for us. I hope Israel does not sink like the Titanic, despite the blindness of the captain.
Israel has already announced measures it will take should there be a UDI from the Arabs (What is a "Palestinian"?) This will include de facto annexation of the areas Israel regards as vital for its security. It will just be the Arabs shooting themselves in the foot once again!