The Nakba of 1948

[Watermelonpower]

Hello everyone
I’m creating this thread because I feel there is not enough awareness about the Nakba of 1948 and the impact this had on the Palestinian people, community and the diaspora that was created as a result. Anyone seeking to understand current events in the Middle East needs to understand The Nakba, what it meant to Palestinians and how the consequences and generational trauma impacts Palestinians to this day. For those who are unaware, 70% of Gaza’s population are Nakba refugees/their descendants.

At the outset I would like to say this thread is about understanding and awareness. Above all, it is about the Palestinian experience and perspective. I would therefore appreciate it if people would keep this in mind and be respectful in their posting, ensuring MN Talk Guidelines are adhered to. I will be also be sharing some personal stories and
suggesting some additional resources and media for those who wish to learn more.

https://www.un.org/unispal/about-the-nakba/

It’s a list of the massacres linked to the UN partition vote by date and who was responsible. This is the historical record, it isn’t a narrative. Anyone can look them up and see they all happened as I have posted. I didn’t skip or exclude any.

You can see that there were 7 massacres over several months, all instigated by Jewish insurgents against Arab civilians following the UN Partition vote before the first Arab retaliatory massacre.

The claim that “Arabs started a civil war because of the UN partition vote” is what doesn’t stand up to basic fact checking. Your attempt to use an example of what has been documented as “inter communal violence” that had nothing to do the UN partition vote as some sort of start of a civil war over the UN partition vote is disingenuous.

@MercanDede from that example looks like proportionality is not a recent issue?

Hiya, can you elaborate? Which example are you referring to? What do you mean by proportionality? (The concept applies to collateral civilian casualties that are at risk of happening when a state military targets a military objective which none of the examples were about)

@MercanDede - the point is that there was violence and retaliatory violence going on in both directions already. Lots of it. And to say that it was primarily Jewish on Arab Palestinian is nonsense.

Can you not see your bias, saying that a mob of Arab Palestinians killing 39 of their co-workers - just for being Jewish - following an attack by a terrorist group doesn't count as Arab on Jewish violence?!

The surviving Arab workers then went on to kill 39 Jewish workers suspecting them of being responsible.

@MercanDede I am on about the word proportionality. As in was this a proportional response? Not really.

I don't think that's what proportionality is, @stomachameleon

If the workers had only killed 6 of their innocent Jewish colleagues to match the number of bomb victims - rather than 39 - it would still have been a mob massacre.

We can understand the context of retaliation killings like that (fear and anger following the terrorist bomb attack). But it is a retaliation, not for a reason. And so should still be condemned.

A reason would be if there was risk of further harm, eg if the Jewish colleagues had guns and were threatening to shoot. Or even if they were standing next to the terrorist about to detonate another bomb, and destroying them both prevented that from happening.

The proportionality is between the harm caused by your action versus the harm prevented by your action.

I didn’t say it did not count as Arab on Jewish violence.

I said it did not count as Arab instigated violence against Jews.

Your logic appears to be whoever suffered the greatest loss of life, by body count, is the victim. Haifa oil refinery, to you is Arab on Jewish violence simply because more Jewish people died.

Apply your logic to 7/10, then, Hamas instigated violence by attacking Israeli civilians and other civilians who happened to be working/visiting Israel. They killed 1,139, including Israeli-Palestinians who were Muslim like themselves. It was an indiscriminate terrorist massacre.

On 7/10, close to 2,000 Hamas & other attackers were also killed along with hundreds of Gazan civilians as air strikes commenced at 9:45am local time and did not pause. At least twice as many Arabs ended up dead than Jewish on 7/10.

If we use your logic to say the side that lost the fewest people is the one responsible for a massacre, and the side that lost the most people is not responsible for a massacre; then 7/10 perversely becomes Jewish on Arab violence.

Your logic is clearly biased. The usual, moral way to asses who is responsible for a massacre is by looking at which party instigated the violence. Hamas attacked and killed first on 7/10 just like a Jewish terrorist group attacked and killed first at the Al Haifa refinery massacre.

If your logic is truly that the party responsible for a massacre- worded by you as responsible party name on target party name violence- is the one that had the lower death toll, then I challenge you to apply it consistently.

You won’t though because you have bias and a double standard.

I was replying to ER2 who claimed that the Arabs had started a civil war due to the UN partition vote. My post was focussed solely on the months immediately after the vote on recorded massacres that were linked to the UN partition vote to show that this claim is without any factual basis whatsoever.

Please do not extrapolate my post to be some sort of sweeping generalisation on all violence in the region prior to the UN partition vote.

I agree it wasn’t a proportional reaction to the instigation.
6 dead vs 39 dead is clearly disproportionate .

Do you think that 1,139 dead vs 23,400 dead is also disproportionate?

It would be retaliation if the workers knew the other workers had not instigated the attack. As it was, the Arab workers thought they were defending themselves after having had two bombs thrown amongst them while at work.

It was a reaction.

Proportionality as in the international warfare concept doesn’t apply here, so the use of the term is more general.

“The proportionality is between the harm caused by your action versus the harm prevented by your action.”
Here you are describing the concept of proportionality when justifying a pre-emptive attack not an immediate reaction to an attack.

@MercanDede sorry I thought you wanted to talk about the nakba. Can't be derailing...

@MercanDede : Your logic appears to be whoever suffered the greatest loss of life, by body count, is the victim. Haifa oil refinery, to you is Arab on Jewish violence simply because more Jewish people died.

Not at all. My logic is that in that single event there was both Jewish on Arab violence (the bomb which killed 6 innocent workers) and also Arab on Jewish violence (the mob who killed 39 innocent Jewish co-workers)

I'm rejecting your assertion that "At the time of the UN partition vote on 29 November 1947 all the way through to 22 February 1948, there was zero “Arab” instigated attacks either by indigenous Palestinians or the neighbouring “Arab” countries towards the Jewish population."

I don't think you can condone the 2nd attack at the refinery simply because it was a retaliation for the first, despite the workers undoubtedly being scared and angry. Especially when the attacks on both sides were basically all retaliations for a whole sequence of other attacks.

Re-read the section on "the beginning of the civil war"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1947%E2%80%931948_civil_war_in_Mandatory_Palestine

The bit that starts "A "wind of violence" rapidly took hold of the country, foreboding civil war between the two communities.Murders, reprisals, and counter-reprisals came fast on each other's heels, resulting in dozens of victims killed on both sides in the process"

You’re right it would be a derailment from the OP. My curiosity got the better of me.

As it was, the Arab workers thought they were defending themselves after having had two bombs thrown amongst them while at work.

Nope sorry, don't believe that. It was a mob lynching.

I condemn it just as I would have utterly condemned any attack on a Muslim passerby following the London terrorist bus bombing in London. But thankfully, no-one behaved in such a despicable way.

Yes, if you like, we can say 6 massacres that were Jewish on Arab plus 1 massacre that was instigated by a Jewish terror group but was a massacre of both due to a reaction of the bombing survivors over several months before the first Arab on Jewish massacre.

Please refer back to my post where I state it is specifically in response to ER2 claiming that “Arabs started a civil war due to the UN partition vote”

I agree the violence went both ways, but was looking at massacres linked to the UN vote (not low level criminal violence like murders linked to other reasons) because massacres is how you start a war, and at who instigated the massacre.

As you can see there is no evidence that “Arabs started a civil war due to the UN partition vote.”

I’m not condoning it. I’m explaining the events of the day based on the historical record. Mistaken identity in the immediate aftermath of a terror attack is not as morally repugnant or condemnable as a retaliatory killing against a known innocent bystander.

@MercanDede massacres is how you start a war

That's an interesting assumption.

Further down in that page they say "by 18 January 1948, 333 Jews and 345 Arabs had been killed while 643 Jews and 877 Arabs had been injured"

My reason for bringing up the numbers (again!) is to show that it wasn't one side massacring the other, which might justify a friendly country riding in to the rescue.

Why do you think the foreign armies invaded?

Speaking of “mob lynching” in retaliation for Al Haifa, that was the Balad al-Shaykh massacre I listed which occurred mere hours after Al Haifa. Al Haifa occurred on 31 Dec 1947, and Balad Al-Shayk massacre started that same night and continued into the next morning.

Despite it being known that Jewish group Irgun had instigated the massacre, the Jewish committee of Haifa directed Haganah to carry out a retaliatory attack on an innocent village anyway:

Israeli historian Benny Morris wrote:
“The Haganah massively retaliated on the night of 31 December 1947 - 1 January 1948 raiding the villages of Balad al Sheikh and Hawassa, in which many of the refinery's workers lived. The raiding unit's orders were to 'kill maximum adult males'. The raiders penetrated to the center of Balad al Sheikh, fired into and blew up houses, and pulled out adult males, and shot them. According to the HGS, 'the penetrating units... were forced to deviate from the line agreed upon and in a few cases hit women and children' after being fired upon from inside houses. The Haganah suffered two dead and two injured. Haganah reports put Arab casualties variously at 'about 70 killed', and 21 killed ('including two women and five children') and 41 injured. (Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Crisis Revisited, 2004, p. 101)”

Like I say, almost exactly equal numbers killed by 18 January 1948. Why do you think the foreign armies invaded?

The Arab League stated why they invaded- to protect Palestinians until they could stand up their own state per the UN partition as by then the Nakba was well underway historians estimate half of it had already occurred. Note, the reference to over 250,000 Palestinians had already become refugees, the number of IDPs isn’t listed but would be many more.

The end of the Mandate had a Jewish state legally constituted, but not a Palestinian state. Both should have been stood up together:

“Now that the Mandate over Palestine has come to an end, leaving no legally constituted authority behind in order to administer law and order in the country and afford the necessary and adequate protection to life and property, the Arab States declare as follows:
(a) The right to set up a Government in Palestine pertains to its inhabitants under the principles of self-determination recognized by the Covenant of the League of Nations as well as the United Nations Charter;
(b) Peace and order have been completely upset in Palestine, and, in consequence of Jewish aggression, approximately over a quarter of a million of the Arab population have been compelled to leave their homes and emigrate to neighbouring Arab countries. The prevailing events in Palestine exposed the concealed aggressive intentions of the Zionists and their imperialistic motives, as clearly shown in their acts committed upon those peaceful Arabs and villagers of Deer Yasheen, Tiberias, and other places, as well as by their encroachment upon the building and bodies of the inviolable consular codes, manifested by their attack upon the Consulate in Jerusalem.
(c) The Mandatory has already announced that on the termination of the Mandate it will no longer be responsible for the maintenance of law and order in Palestine except in the camps and areas actually occupied by its forces, and only to the extent necessary for the security of those forces and their withdrawal. This leaves Palestine absolutely without any administrative authority entitled to maintain, and capable of maintaining, a machinery of administration of the country adequate for the purpose of ensuring due protection of life and property. There is further the threat that this lawlessness may spread to the neighbouring Arab States where feeling is already very tense on account of the prevailing conditions in Palestine. The respective members of the Arab League, and as Members of the United Nations at the same time, feel gravely perturbed and deeply concerned over this situation.
(d) It was the sincere wish of the Arab States that the United Nations might succeed in arriving at a fair and just solution of the Palestine problem, thus establishing a lasting peace for the country under the precepts of the democratic principles and in conformity with the Covenant of the League of Nations and the United Nations Charter.
(e) They are responsible in any ... by virtue of their responsibility as members of the Arab League which is a regional organization within the meaning of Chapter VIII of the Charter of the United Nations. The recent disturbances in Palestine further constitute a serious and direct threat to peace and security within the territories of the Arab States themselves. For these reasons, and considering that the security of Palestine is a sacred trust for them, and out of anxiousness to check the further deterioration of the prevailing conditions and to prevent the spread of disorder and lawlessness into the neighbouring Arab lands, and in order to fill the vacuum created by the termination of the Mandate and the failure to replace it by any legally constituted authority, the Arab Governments find themselves compelled to intervene for the sole purpose of restoring peace and security and establishing law and order in Palestine.
The Arab States recognize that the independence and sovereignty of Palestine which was so far subject to the British Mandate has now, with the termination of the Mandate, become established in fact, and maintain that the lawful inhabitants of Palestine are alone competent and entitled to set up an administration in Palestine for the discharge of all governmental functions without any external interference. As soon as that stage is reached the intervention of the Arab States, which is confined to the restoration of peace and establishment of law and order, shall be put an end to, and the sovereign State of Palestine will be competent in co-operation with the other States members of the Arab League, to take every step for the promotion of the welfare and security of its peoples and territory.
The Governments of the Arab States hereby confirm at this stage the view that had been repeatedly declared by them on previous occasions, such as the London Conference and before the United Nations mainly, the only fair and just solution to the problem of Palestine is the creation of United State of Palestine based upon the democratic principles which will enable all its inhabitants to enjoy equality before the law, and which would guarantee to all minorities the safeguards provided for in all democratic constitutional States affording at the same time full protection and free access to Holy Places. The Arab States emphatically and repeatedly declare that their intervention in Palestine has been prompted solely by the considerations and for the aims set out above and that they are not inspired by any other motive whatsoever. They are, therefore, confident that their action will receive the support of the United Nations as tending to further the aims and ideals of the United Nations as set out in its Charter.
Abdul Razek Azzam Pasha, Secretary-General of the League of Arab States, 16 May 1948”

And why did they besiege Jerusalem, destroying supply convoys taking food to the 100,000 Jewish civilians living there?

The death toll is an estimate by Kirkbride. The same page also has a different estimate by Pappe that 400 Jews and 1,500 Arabs were killed by January 1948. Indicating we don’t really know the exact numbers.

Same reason Israel had a blockade on Gaza, for security to prevent the indiscriminate attacks of Irgun and Lehi of bombs and throwing grenades into crowded places such as bus stops, shopping centres and markets.

In addition, thousands of Palestinians had been expelled from their share of Jerusalem and fled as refugees. It was to keep the Jewish residents and terrorists in their part of Jerusalem. They did let food through though, no one starved.

And they were proven right because when the blockade was broken, East Jerusalem was attacked on 14 May 1948 with the stated intent of annexing it to the Jewish State.

It’s important to note it was Palestinian Arabs that did this, not the Arab League foreign powers. The Arab League weren’t even in the region yet and when they did come, they restricted themselves to the Arab allocated lands per the UN partition.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C0_bQp2sjPC/?igsh=dW9zZnVibXZtc3Fw

That guy is misinformed.

The Jewish people base their claim to the land of Israel on at least four premises: 1) God promised the land to the patriarch Abraham; 2) the Jewish people settled and developed the land; 3) the international community granted political sovereignty in Palestine to the Jewish people and 4) the territory was captured in defensive wars.

When Jews began to immigrate to Palestine in large numbers in 1882, fewer than 250,000 Arabs lived there, and the majority of them had arrived in recent decades. Palestine was never an exclusively Arab country, although Arabic gradually became the language of most the population after the Muslim invasions of the seventh century. No independent Arab or Palestinian state ever existed in Palestine. When the distinguished Arab-American historian, Princeton University Professor Philip Hitti, testified against partition before the Anglo American Committee in 1946, he said: "There is no such thing as 'Palestine' in history, absolutely not." In fact, Palestine is never explicitly mentioned in the Koran, rather it is called "the holy land" (al-Arad al-Mugadesh.)
Prior to partition, Palestinian Arabs did not view themselves as having a separate identity. When the First Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations met in Jerusalem in February 1919 to choose Palestinian representatives for the Paris Peace Conference, the following resolution was adopted:We consider Palestine as part of Arab Syria, as it has never been separated from it at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, natural, economic and geographical bonds.In 1937, a local Arab leader, Auni Bey Abdul-Hadi, told the Peel Commission which ultimately suggested the partition of Palestine: "There is no such country (as Palestine) 'Palestine' is a term the Zionists invented! There is no Palestine in the Bible. Our country was for centuries part of Syria."The representative of the Arab Higher Committee to the United Nations submitted a statement to the General Assembly in May 1947 that said "Palestine was part of the Province of Syria" and that, "politically, the Arabs of Palestine were not independent in the sense of forming a separate political entity." A few years later, Ahmed Shuqeiri, later the chairman of the PLO, told the Security Council: "It is common knowledge that Palestine is nothing but southern Syria."Palestinian Arab nationalism is largely a post-World War I phenomenon that did not become a significant political movement until after the The 1967 Six-Day War and Israel's capture of the West Bank.