Israel Kills 34 Kids in Qana

How Can We Stand By and Allow This to Go On?

By ROBERT FISK

They wrote the names of the dead children on their plastic shrouds. " Mehdi Hashem, aged seven Qana," was written in felt pen on the bag in which the little boy's body lay. "Hussein al-Mohamed, aged 12 Qana", "Abbas al-Shalhoub, aged one Qana.'' And when the Lebanese soldier went to pick up Abbas's little body, it bounced on his shoulder as the boy might have done on his father's shoulder on Saturday. In all, there were 56 corpses brought to the Tyre government hospital and other surgeries, and 34 of them were children. When they ran out of plastic bags, they wrapped the small corpses in carpets. Their hair was matted with dust, most had blood running from their noses.

You must have a heart of stone not to feel the outrage that those of us watching this experienced yesterday. This slaughter was an obscenity, an atrocity yes, if the Israeli air force truly bombs with the "pinpoint accuracy" it claims, this was also a war crime. Israel claimed that missiles had been fired by Hizbollah gunmen from the south Lebanese town of Qana as if that justified this massacre. Israel's Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert, talked about "Muslim terror" threatening " western civilisation" as if the Hizbollah had killed all these poor people.

And in Qana, of all places. For only 10 years ago, this was the scene of another Israeli massacre, the slaughter of 106 Lebanese refugees by an Israeli artillery battery as they sheltered in a UN base in the town. More than half of those 106 were children. Israel later said it had no live-time pilotless photo-reconnaissance aircraft over the scene of that killing -- a statement that turned out to be untrue when The Independent discovered videotape showing just such an aircraft over the burning camp. It is as if Qana, whose inhabitants claim that this was the village in which Jesus turned water into wine, has been damned by the world, doomed forever to receive tragedy.

And there was no doubt of the missile which killed all those children yesterday. It came from the United States, and upon a fragment of it was written: "For use on MK-84 Guided Bomb BSU-37-B". No doubt the manufacturers can call it "combat-proven" because it destroyed the entire three-storey house in which the Shalhoub and Hashim families lived. They had taken refuge in the basement from an enormous Israeli bombardment, and that is where most of them died.

I found Nejwah Shalhoub lying in the government hospital in Tyre, her jaw and face bandaged. She did not weep, nor did she scream, although the pain was written on her face. Her brother Taisir, who was 46, had been killed. So had her sister Najla. So had her little niece Zeinab, who was just six. "We were in the basement hiding when the bomb exploded at one o'clock in the morning,'' she said. "What in the name of God have we done to deserve this? So many of the dead are children, the old, women. Some of the children were still awake and playing. Why does the world do this to us?"

Yesterday's deaths brought to more than 500 the total civilian dead in Lebanon since Israel's air, sea and land bombardment of the country began on July 12 after Hizbollah members crossed the frontier wire, killed three Israeli soldiers and captured two others. But yesterday's slaughter ended more than a year of mutual antagonism within the Lebanese government as pro-American and pro-Syrian politicians denounced what they described as " an ugly crime".

Thousands of protesters attacked the largest United Nations building in Beirut, screaming: "Destroy Tel Aviv, destroy Tel Aviv," and Lebanon's Prime Minister, the normally unflappable Fouad Siniora, called US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and ordered her to cancel her imminent peace-making trip to Beirut.

No one in this country can forget how President George Bush, Ms Rice, and Tony Blair have repeatedly refused to call for an immediate ceasefire, a truce that would have saved all those lives yesterday. Ms Rice would say only: "We want a ceasefire as soon as possible,'' a remark followed by an Israeli announcement that it intended to maintain its bombardment of Lebanon for at least another two weeks.

Throughout the day, Qana villagers and civil defence workers dug through the ruins of the building with spades and with their hands, tearing at the muck until they found one body after another still dressed in colorful clothes. In one section of the rubble, they found what was left of a single room with 18 bodies inside. Twelve of the dead were women. All across southern Lebanon now, you find scenes like this, not so grotesque in scale, perhaps, but just as terrible, for the people of these villages are terrified to leave and terrified to stay. The Israelis had dropped leaflets over Qana, ordering its people to leave their homes. Yet twice now since Israel's onslaught began, the Israelis have ordered villagers to leave their houses and then attacked them with aircraft as they obeyed the Israeli instructions and fled. There are at least 3,000 Shia Muslims trapped in villages between Qlaya and Aiteroun close to the scene of Israel's last military incursion at Bint Jbeil and yet none of them can leave without fear of dying on the roads.

And Mr Olmert's reaction? After expressing his "great sorrow", he announced that: "We will not stop this battle, despite the difficult incidents [sic] this morning. We will continue the activity, and if necessary it will be broadened without hesitation." But how much further can it be broadened? Lebanon's infrastructure is being steadily torn to pieces, its villages razed, its people more and more terrorized and terror is the word they used by Israel's American-made fighter bombers. Israel's savagery against the civilian population has deeply shocked not only the Western diplomats who have remained in Beirut, but hundreds of humanitarian workers from the Red Cross and major aid agencies.

Incredibly, Israel yesterday denied safe passage to a UN World Food Program aid convoy en route to the south, a six-truck mission that should have taken relief supplies to the south-eastern town of Marjayoun. More than three quarters of a million Lebanese have now fled their homes, but there is still no accurate figure for the total number still trapped in the south. Khalil Shalhoub, who survived amid the wreckage in Qana yesterday, said that his family and the Hashims were just too "terrified" to take the road out of the village, which has been attacked by aircraft for more than two weeks. The seven-mile highway between Qana and Tyre is littered with civilian homes in ruins and burnt-out family cars. On Thursday, the Israeli Army's Al-Mashriq radio, which broadcasts into southern Lebanon, told residents that their villages would be "totally destroyed" if missiles were fired from them. But anyone who has watched Israel's bombing these past two weeks knows that, in many cases, the Israelis do not know the location in which the Hizbollah are firing missiles, and when they do they frequently miss their targets. How can a villager prevent the Hizbollah from firing rockets from his street? The Hizbollah do take cover beside civilian houses just as Israeli troops entering Bint Jbeil last week also used civilian homes for cover. But can this be the excuse for slaughter on such a scale?

Mr Siniora addressed foreign diplomats in Beirut yesterday, telling them that the government in Beirut was now only demanding an immediate ceasefire and was not interested any longer in a political package to go with it. Needless to say, Mr Jeffrey Feltman, whose country made the bomb which killed the innocents of Qana yesterday, chose not to attend.

Robert Fisk is a reporter for The Independent and author of Pity the Nation. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's collection, The Politics of Anti-Semitism. Fisk's new book is The Conquest of the Middle East.

www.counterpunch.org

CONDOLEEZZA THE BUSH OIL WITCH: "Sorry to Oil the Baby Killings by IDF IAF Nazis / Likud Terrorist / Irgun Zvai Leumi Thugs in Lebanon and the next Shipment of WMD's, Planes, Tanks, and Bombs to IsraOil but Oil comes First. Fill her Up ????????"

his story reports on the tremendous response generated by a campaign to raise money to place an ad in the New York Times and other media calling for an end to the violence in the Middle East and a fair and equitable settlement of the ongoing conflict.

On July 31, the New York Times ran a full-page ad calling for an end to violence in the Middle East and a just and equitable settlement to the ongoing crisis. The ad was sponsored by Tikkun, an interfaith organization chaired by Rabbi Michael Lerner, and was paid for by more than 1500 individual donors, many of them American Jews seeking a peaceful solution. More than 2500 individuals have signed onto the ad--prominent rabbis, Muslim imams, and Christian ministers, including evangelical Rev. Tony Campolo, among them.

The advertisement calls for Hezbollah and Hamas to stop shelling Israel, and for Israel to halt its attacks on Lebanon and to supply food, electricity, water, and funds to repair the humanitarian crisis created by its invasion of Gaza. It also outlines steps necessary to bring about lasting peace in the region.

Two Muslim newspapers have offered to print the ad at no cost.

The full text of the ad appears below.

STOP THE SLAUGHTER IN LEBANON, ISRAEL AND THE OCCUPIED TERRITORIES!

Convene an International Middle East Peace Conference to Impose a Just, Equitable and Lasting Settlement on All Parties.

In the name of our sisters and brothers suffering and dying in Lebanon, Israel and the Occupied

Palestinian Territories, we, the undersigned, call upon the Israeli government, the leaderships of

Hezbollah and Hamas, the U.S. Government, the international community and the United Nations

immediately take the following steps to stop the war in these countries:

1. We call upon Hezbollah and Hamas to immediately stop shelling or otherwise engaging in violence

against Israel. These actions, which have killed numerous Israeli civilians, terrorized the people of

Israel and damaged many towns and cities, played a central role in provoking the current crisis, and

do nothing but harm the cause of Palestinian and Lebanese independence and democracy. It is this

kind of violence which has over the years pushed many decent Israelis into the hands of its most

militaristic insensitive political leaders.

2. We demand that the Israeli government immediately halt its attacks on Lebanon. We join with

the Israeli peace movement and the thousands of Israelis who demonstrated against this war in

Tel Aviv on July 22, 2006 in their insistence that these attacks are utterly disproportionate to the

initial provocation by Hezbollah, have killed innumerable innocent civilians, displaced half a million

people, destroyed billions of dollars of Lebanon’s infrastructure, and will not, in the long run, secure

peace or security for Israel. We also call on the Israeli government to supply food, electricity, water

and funds to repair the humanitarian crisis caused by its invasion of Gaza.

3. We call upon the U.S. and government around the world to insist that Israel, Hezbollah and Hamas

implement a lasting ceasefire, place an immediate embargo on all shipments of weapons to all parties

in the war (including Syria and Iran), and join an international conference to provide security on the

border between Israel and Lebanon. By endorsing Israel’s attacks, sending it new supplies weapons,

and explicitly giving it time to do more damage to the people of Lebanon, the U.S. government ahs

become a party to this violence, which, together with American military action in Iraq, is sure to

create enmity toward the U.S. and Israel in the Muslim world for generations to come.

These are the minimum steps necessary to stop the violence and the humanitarian disaster in southern

Lebanon and the Gaza Strip. But these steps alone will not ensure that the region doesn’t return to an

untenable status quo which will again eventually break into violence and new rounds of warfare.

We therefore also issue:

A Call for Lasting Peace

We call for an International Peace Conference to impose a fair and lasting solution to all aspects of the

Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to the conflict between Israel and other states in the region. Why do we

say “impose”? There are too many forces in each country in the region who are committed to continuing

this struggle forever. Their provocations will continue until the international community stops the

violence once and for all and imposes conditions of peace that will allow the peace and reconciliation

forces in each country to flourish.

Such a solution would be based on the following conditions:

a. The creation of an economically and politically viable Palestinian state (roughly on the pre-1967

borders with minor border modifications mutually agreed upon between Israel and Palestine); and

simultaneously the full and unequivocal recognition by Palestinians and the State of Palestine and all

surrounding Arab states of the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state offering full and equal rights

to all of its non-Jewish citizens;

b. An international consortium to provide reparations for Palestinians who have lost homes or property

from 1947 to the present, and reparations for Jewish refugees from Arab states from 1947–1967;

c. A long-term international peacekeeping force to separate Hezbollah and Israel in southern Lebanon

and to protect Israel and Palestine from each other and from other forces in the region who might

seek to control or destroy either state; and

d. The quick imposition of robust sanctions against any party that refuses to sign or violates

these agreements.

A New Spirit of Open-Heartedness and Reconciliation

We know that no political solution can work without a change of consciousness that minimally

includes an open-heartedness and willingness to recognize the humanity of the Other, and

repentance and atonement for the long history of insensitivity and cruelty to the other side.

Both sides must take immediate steps to stop the discourse of violence and demeaning of the other

in their media, their religious institutions, and their school text books and educational systems. They

should implement this by creating a joint authority with each other and with moral leaders in the

international community who can supervise, and if necessary, replace those in positions of power in

both societies who continue to use the public institutions of the society to spread hatred or nurture

anger at the other.

Once the other parts of a lasting peace have been set in place, we call upon the parties to this struggle

to launch a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, following the model used in South Africa.

Use This Moment to Challenge The Cynical “Political Realism” That Generates Endless Wars

The sef-described “realistic” version of global politics asserts that we live in a world in which our safety

can only be achieved through domination, or others will seek to dominate us first. Of course, when we

act on this assumption, it becomes self-fulfilling.

We propose, instead, a strategy of generosity—to act on the assumption that people have an

enormous capacity for goodness and generosity (without negating the truth that certain conditions

promote fear, anger and hatred which sometimes are expressed in horribly destructive ways). For the

U.S. and other G8 countries, we call for a Global Marshall Plan: for each of the next twenty years,

the U.S. and other G8 countries should dedicate 5% of their Gross Domestic Product to eliminating

global (and domestic) hunger, homelessness, poverty, inadequate health care and inadequate education

for the peoples of the world. This would have to be carefully monitored and apportioned in ways

that ensure the care reaches the people for whom it was intended. But what is critical is the spirit

in which it is done.

Similarly, we urge Israel not only to return to its 1967 borders (with minor border modifications

mutually agreed upon including a sharing of Jerusalem and of its holy sites) but to do so in a spirit of

generosity and caring for the other before it is forced to return to those borders by the international

community and before thousands more young Israelis and Palestinians die in these senseless wars that

will otherwise continue in the coming years.

The only protection that we in the advanced industrial countries of the world can ever really have for

our lives is to spread a spirit of love so powerful and genuine that it becomes capable of reducing the

anger that has justifiably developed against the powerful and the wealthy of the world.

The “cynical realists” claim that others are entrenched in their hatefulness, and that war and domination

is the only way to battle them. This kind of thinking has led to five thousand years of people

fighting wars in order to “end all wars”—and it has not worked. It’s time now to try a new strategy

of generosity, both economic generosity and generosity of spirit. As stated above, there will first have

to be a transitional period in which real military protections are available to people on all sides of the

struggle. But by beginning now to simultaneously commit our economic resources and change the way

that we talk about those whom we previously designated as “enemies,” we can begin the long process

of thawing out angers that have existed for many generations.

Nothing can redeem the deaths and suffering that all sides have faced in this struggle for the past

120 years. But this very moment could also be the time in which the human race realizes the futility of

violence and comes together not only to impose a lasting solution for the Middle East, but to begin a

new era and to recognize that our own well-being depends on the well-being of everyone else on the

planet. The International Middle East Peace Conference should be structured to achieve this end—

which means it should have an explicit psychological and spiritual dimension and a visionary agenda.

We Affirm the Sacredness of All Human Beings.

The creation of the U.N. 61 years ago raised the possibility that we could build a world based on the

equal sanctity of all human beings. But the U.N. too quickly became a body passing resolutions that

most people in the world never heard about. The U.N. represented the elites of the countries around

the world but often failed to represent the will or interests of their own people. It largely ignored the

need to build ethical and spiritual solidarity among the people of the world—the necessary foundations

for an effective global political institution. We need to strengthen international institutions that

move in a new direction, but we also need a commitment of the heart from everyone on the planet to

put our joint attention to building global peace, social and economic justice and ecological sanity.

This may well be the last chance we in the advanced industrial societies have to avoid international

catastrophe (either environmental or nuclear) by modeling something else besides brute power,

military might and indifference to the well-being of others. In not now, when?

Unrealistic? Nope. What has proved unrealistic time and again—whether we are talking about U.S.

policy in Vietnam and Iraq or Israeli and Arab policies in the Middle East—is the fantasy that one

more war will put an end to wars. The path to peace must be a path of peace.

Religious and spiriiutal leaders are also making a global call for days of paryer and fatsting toward the

aim of peace, reconciliation and ending violence, starting with the evening of Wednesday, August 2nd

and through the day of August 3rd.

Signed by:

Rabbi Michael Lerner, Sr. Joan Chittister and Prof. Cornell West,

Co-chairs, The Network of Spiritual Progressives (NSP) info [at] spiritualprogressives.org

This Ad sponsored by TIKKUN:

A Bimonthly Jewish Critique of Politics, Culture and Society (http://www.tikkun.org), the Network of Spiritual Progressives

(http://www.spiritualprogressives.org), The Shalom Center (http://www.shalomctr.org)

And 1850 other religious leaders, scholars, academics, cultural leaders, poets, writers, philanthropists,

social change activists, and citizens of the world. You can find the entire list at http://www.tikkun.org/PeaceAd

JOIN US:

We want to reprint this ad in Israeli, Lebanese and Palestinian media—we need you to donate generously

by filling out the form on the left and mailing it in OR donating on line at http://www.tikkun.org/ PeaceAd AND please work with us to get this message to Congress and the media.

Join our interfaith organization: The Network of Spiritual Progressives (NSP) at http://www.spiritualprogressives.org—because

actualizing the vision in this ad is going to take lots of energy from all of us who want a world of peace.

Ad developed by RabbiLerner [at] tikkun.org,, editor of Tikkun Magazine and author of The Left Hand of

God: Taking Back our Country from the Religious Right. (HarperSanFrancisco, 2006). and rabbi of Beyt

Tikkun synagogue in San Francisco. http://www.beyttikkun.org

Rabbi Michael Feinberg

Rabbi Mordechai Liebling

Rabbi David Schneyer

Rabbi Arthur Waskow

Rep. Byron Rushing

Rev. Tony Campolo

Rev. Donna Schaper

Rev. Don Wagner

Very Rev. Canon Peter Haynes

Karen Armstrong

Salam Al-Marayati

Michael Bader

Nicoli Bailey

Catherine Bock

Trude Bock

Grace Lee Boggs

Fritjof Capra

Kim Chernin

Natalie Z. Davis

Katie Day

Sidra DeKoven Ezrahi

Carolyn Forche

James Foreman

Peter Gabel

Erich Gruen

Dr. Maher Hathout

Kathy Hearn

Kabir Helminski

Norbert Hornstein

Robert Inchausti

Susan Ireland

Michael Johnson

Van Jones

Jeffrey & Eva Kittay

David & Frances Korten

Annie Lamott

Mark Levine

Peter and Frances Marcuse

Ralph Metzner

Shanta Premawardhama

Matthew Rothschild

Waheed Saddiqee

Buffy Sainte-Marie

Andrew Samuels

Richard Schwartz

Shimon Schwarzschild

Peter Dale Scott

Richard Sennett

Milton Viorst

Andrew Weaver

http://www.tikkun.org

Zionism And Its Impact

By Ann M. Lesch

The Zionist movement has maintained a striking continuity in its aims and methods over the past century. From the start, the movement sought to achieve a Jewish majority in Palestine and to establish a Jewish state on as much of the LAND as possible. The methods included promoting mass Jewish immigration and acquiring tracts of land that would become the inalienable property of the Jewish people. This policy inevitably prevented the indigenous Arab residents from attaining their national goals and establishing a Palestinian state. It also necessitated displacing Palestinians from their lands and jobs when their presence conflicted with Zionist interests.

The Zionist movement—and subsequently the state of ISRAEL—failed to develop a positive approach to the Palestinian presence and aspirations. Although many Israelis recognized the moral dilemma posed by the Palestinians, the majority either tried to ignore the issue or to resolve it by force majeure. Thus, the Palestine problem festered and grew, instead of being resolved.

Historical Background

The British Mandate

The Zionist Movement

Practical Zionism

Policies Toward the Palestinians

Conclusion

Historical Background

The Zionist movement arose in late nineteenth-century Europe, influenced by the nationalist ferment sweeping that continent. Zionism acquired its particular focus from the ancient Jewish longing for the return to Zion and received a strong impetus from the increasingly intolerable conditions facing the large Jewish community in tsarist Russia. The movement also developed at the time of major European territorial acquisitions in Asia and Africa and benefited from the European powers' competition for influence in the shrinking Ottoman Empire.

One result of this involvement with European expansionism, however, was that the leaders of the nascent nationalist movements in the Middle East viewed Zionism as an adjunct of European colonialism. Moreover, Zionist assertions of the contemporary relevance of the Jews' historical ties to Palestine, coupled with their land purchases and immigration, alarmed the indigenous population of the Ottoman districts that Palestine comprised. The Jewish community (yishuv) rose from 6 percent of Palestine's population in 1880 to 10 percent by 1914. Although the numbers were insignificant, the settlers were outspoken enough to arouse the opposition of Arab leaders and induce them to exert counter pressure on the Ottoman regime to prohibit Jewish immigration and land buying.

As early as 1891, a group of Muslim and Christian notables cabled Istanbul, urging the government to prohibit Jewish immigration and land purchase. The resulting edicts radically curtailed land purchases in the sanjak (district) of JERUSALEM for the next decade. When a Zionist Congress resolution in 1905 called for increased colonization, the Ottoman regime suspended all land transfers to Jews in both the sanjak of Jerusalem and the wilayat (province) of Beirut.

After the coup d'etat by the Young Turks in 1908, the Palestinians used their representation in the central parliament and their access to newly opened local newspapers to press their claims and express their concerns. They were particularly vociferous in opposition to discussions that took place between the financially hard-pressed Ottoman regime and Zionist leaders in 1912-13, which would have let the world Zionist Organization purchase crown land (jiftlik) in the Baysan Valley, along the Jordan River.

The Zionists did not try to quell Palestinian fears, since their concern was to encourage colonization from Europe and to minimize the obstacles in their path. The only effort to meet to discuss their aspirations occurred in the spring of 1914. Its difficulties illustrated the incompatibility in their aspirations. The Palestinians wanted the Zionists to present them with a document that would state their precise political ambitions, their willingness to open their schools to Palestinians, and their intentions of learning Arabic and integrating with the local population. The Zionists rejected this proposal.

The British Mandate

The proclamation of the BALFOUR DECLARATION on November 2, 1917, and the arrival of British troops in Palestine soon after, transformed the political situation. The declaration gave the Zionist movement its long-sought legal status. The qualification that: nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine seemed a relatively insignificant obstacle to the Zionists, especially since it referred only to those communities': civil and religious rights, not to political or national rights. The subsequent British occupation gave Britain the ability to carry out that pledge and provide the protection necessary for the Zionists to realize their aims.

In fact, the British had contracted three mutually contradictory promises for the future of Palestine. The Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916 with the French and Russian governments proposed that Palestine be placed under international administration. The HUSAYN-MCMAHON CORRESPONDENCE, 1915-1916, on whose basis the Arab revolt was launched, implied that Palestine would be included in the zone of Arab independence. In contrast, the Balfour Declaration encouraged the colonization of Palestine by Jews, under British protection. British officials recognized the irreconcilability of these pledges but hoped that a modus vivendi could be achieved, both between the competing imperial powers, France and Britain, and between the Palestinians and the Jews. Instead, these contradictions set the stage for the three decades of conflict-ridden British rule in Palestine.

Initially, many British politicians shared the Zionists' assumption that gradual, regulated Jewish immigration and settlement would lead to a Jewish majority in Palestine, whereupon it would become independent, with legal protection for the Arab minority. The assumption that this could be accomplished without serious resistance was shattered at the outset of British rule. Britain thereafter was caught in an increasingly untenable position, unable to persuade either Palestinians or Zionists to alter their demands and forced to station substantial military forces in Palestine to maintain security.

The Palestinians had assumed that they would gain some form of independence when Ottoman rule disintegrated, whether through a separate state or integration with neighboring Arab lands. These hopes were bolstered by the Arab revolt, the entry of Faysal Ibn Husayn into Damascus in 1918, and the proclamation of Syrian independence in 1920. Their hopes were dashed, however, when Britain imposed direct colonial rule and elevated the yishuv to a special status. Moreover, the French ousted Faysal from Damascus in July 1920, and British compensation—in the form of thrones in Transjordan and Iraq for Abdullah and Faysal, respectively—had no positive impact on the Arabs in Palestine. In fact, the action underlined the different treatment accorded Palestine and its disadvantageous political situation. These concerns were exacerbated by Jewish immigration: the yishuv comprised 28 percent of the population by 1936 and reached 32 percent by 1947 (click here for Palestine's population distribution per district in 1946).

The British umbrella was CRITICALLY important to the growth and consolidation of the yishuv, enabling it to root itself firmly despite Palestinian opposition. Although British support diminished in the late 1930s, the yishuv was strong enough by then to withstand the Palestinians on its own. After World War II, the Zionist movement also was able to turn to the emerging superpower, the UNITED STATES, for diplomatic support and legitimization.

The Palestinians' responses to Jewish immigration, land purchases, and political demands were remarkably consistent. They insisted that Palestine remain an Arab country, with the same right of self-determination and independence as Egypt, Transjordan, and Iraq. Britain granted those countries independence without a violent struggle since their claims to self-determination were not contested by European settlers. The Palestinians argued that Palestinian territory COULD NOT AND SHOULD NOT be used to solve the plight of the Jews in Europe, and that Jewish national aspirations should not override their own rights.

Palestinian opposition peaked in the late 1930s: the six-month general strike in 1936 was followed the next year by a widespread rural revolt. This rebellion welled up from the bottom of Palestinian society—unemployed urban workers, displaced peasants crowded into towns, and debt-ridden villagers. It was supported by most merchants and professionals in the towns, who feared competition from the yishuv. Members of the elite families acted as spokesmen before the British administration through the ARAB HIGHER COMMITTEE, which was formed during the 1936 strike. However, the British banned the committee in October 1937 and arrested its members, on the eve of the revolt.

Only one of the Palestinian political parties was willing to limit its aims and accept the principle of territorial partition: The NATIONAL DEFENSE PARTY, led by RAGHIB AL-NASHASHIBI (mayor of JERUSALEM from 1920 to 1934), was willing to accept partition in 1937 so long as the Palestinians obtained sufficient land and could merge with Transjordan to form a larger political entity. However, the British PEEL COMMISSION's plan, announced in July 1937, would have forced the Palestinians to leave the olive- and grain- growing areas of Galilee, the orange groves on the Mediterranean coast, and the urban port cities of HAIFA and ACRE. That was too great a loss for even the National Defense Party to accept, and so it joined in the general denunciations of partition.

During the PALESTINE MANDATE period the Palestinian community was 70 percent rural, 75 to 80 percent illiterate, and divided internally between town and countryside and between elite families and villagers. Despite broad support for the national aims, the Palestinians could not achieve the unity and strength necessary to withstand the combined pressure of the British forces and the Zionist movement. In fact, the political structure was decapitated in the late 1930s when the British banned the Arab Higher Committee and arrested hundreds of local politicians. When efforts were made in the 1940s to rebuild the political structure, the impetus came largely from outside, from Arab rulers who were disturbed by the deteriorating conditions in Palestine and feared their repercussions on their own newly acquired independence.

The Arab rulers gave priority to their own national considerations and provided limited diplomatic and military support to the Palestinians. The Palestinian Arabs continued to demand a state that would reflect the Arab majority's weight—diminished to 68 percent by 1947. They rejected the UNITED NATIONS (U.N.) partition plan of November 1947, which granted the Jews statehood in 55 percent of Palestine, an area that included as many Arab residents as Jews. However, the Palestinian Arabs lacked the political strength and military force to back up their claim. Once Britain withdrew its forces in 1948 and the Jews proclaimed the state of Israel, the Arab rulers used their armed forces to protect those zones that the partition plans had ALLOCATED to the Arab state. By the time armistice agreements were signed in 1949, the Arab areas had shrunk to only 23 percent of Palestine. The Egyptian army held the GAZA STRIP, and Transjordanian forces dominated the hills of central Palestine. At least 726,000 of the 1.3 million Palestinian Arabs fled from the area held by Israel. Emir Abdullah subsequently annexed the zone that his army occupied, renaming it the WEST BANK.

The Zionist Movement

The dispossession and expulsion of a majority of Palestinians were the result of Zionist policies planned over a thirty-year period. Fundamentally, Zionism focused on two needs:

1.

to attain a Jewish majority in Palestine;

2.

to acquire statehood irrespective of the wishes of the indigenous population. Non-recognition of the political and national rights of the Palestinian people was a KEY Zionist policy.

Chaim Weizmann, president of the World Zionist Organization, placed maximalist demands before the Paris Peace Conference in February 1919. He stated that he expected 70,000 to 80,000 Jewish immigrants to arrive each year in Palestine. When they became the majority, they would form an independent government and Palestine and would become: "as Jewish as England is English". Weizmann proposed that the boundaries should be the Mediterranean Sea on the west; Sidon, the Litani River, and Mount Hermon on the north; all of Transjordan west of the Hijaz railway on the east; and a line across Sinai from Aqaba to al-Arish on the south. He argued that: "the boundaries above outlined are what we consider essential for the economic foundation of the country. Palestine must have its natural outlet to the sea and control of its rivers and their headwaters. The boundaries are sketched with the general economic needs and historic traditions of the country in mind." Weizmann offered the Arab countries a free zone in Haifa and a joint port at Aqaba.

Weizmann's policy was basically in accord with that of the leaders of the yishuv, who held a conference in December 1918 in which they formulated their own demands for the peace conference. The yishuv plan stressed that they must control appointments to the administrative services and that the British must actively assist their program to transform Palestine into a democratic Jewish state in which the Arabs would have minority rights. Although the peace conference did not explicitly allocate such extensive territories to the Jewish national home and did not support the goal of transforming all of Palestine into a Jewish state, it opened the door to such a possibility. More important, Weizmann's presentation stated clearly and forcefully the long-term aims of the movement. These aims were based on certain fundamental tenets of Zionism:

1.

The movement was seen not only as inherently righteous, but also as meeting an overwhelming need among European Jews.

2.

European culture was superior to indigenous Arab culture; the Zionists could help civilize the East.

3.

External support was needed from a major power; relations with the Arab world were a secondary matter.

4.

Arab nationalism was a legitimate political movement, but Palestinian nationalism was either illegitimate or nonexistent.

5.

Finally, if the Palestinians would not reconcile themselves to Zionism, force majeure, not compromise, was the only feasible response.

First

Adherents of Zionism believed that the Jewish people had an inherent and inalienable right to Palestine. Religious Zionists stated this in biblical terms, referring to the divine promise of the land to the tribes of Israel. Secular Zionists relied more on the argument that Palestine alone could solve the problem of Jewish dispersion and virulent anti-Semitism. Weizmann stated in 1930 that the needs of 16 million Jews had to be balanced against those of 1 million Palestinian Arabs: "The Balfour Declaration and the Mandate have definitely lifted [Palestine] out of the context of the Middle East and linked it up with the world-wide Jewish problem....The rights which the Jewish people has been adjudged in Palestine do not depend on the consent, and cannot be subjected to the will, of the majority of its present inhabitants."

This perspective took its most extreme form with the Revisionist movement. Its founder, Vladimir Jabotinsky, was so self-righteous about the Zionist cause that he justified any actions taken against the Arabs in order to realize Zionist goals.

Second

Zionists generally felt that European civilization was superior to Arab culture and values. Theodor Herzl, the founder of the World Zionist Organization, wrote in the Jewish State (1886) that the Jewish community could serve as: "part of a wall of defense for Europe in Asia, an outpost of civilization against barbarism."

Weizmann also believed that he was engaged in a fight of civilization against the desert. The Zionists would bring enlightenment and economic development to the backward Arabs. Similarly, David Ben-Gurion, the leading labor Zionist, could not understand why Arabs rejected his offer to use Jewish finance, scientific knowledge, and technical expertise to modernize the Middle East. He attributed this rejection to backwardness rather than to the affront that Zionism posed to the Arabs' pride and to their aspirations for independence.

Third

Zionist leaders recognized that they needed an external patron to legitimize their presence in the international arena and to provide them legal and military protection in Palestine. Great Britain played that role in the 1920s and 1930s, and the United States became the mentor in the mid-1940s. Zionist leaders realized that they needed to make tactical accommodations to that patron—such as downplaying their public statements about their political aspirations or accepting a state on a limited territory—while continuing to work toward their long-term goals. The presence and needs of the Arabs were viewed as secondary. The Zionist leadership never considered allying with the Arab world against the British and Americans. Rather, Weizmann, in particular, felt that the yishuv should bolster the British Empire and guard its strategic interests in the region. Later, the leaders of Israel perceived the Jewish state as a strategic asset to the United States in the Middle East.

Fourth

Zionist politicians accepted the idea of an Arab nation but rejected the concept of a Palestinian nation. They considered the Arab residents of Palestine as comprising a minute fraction of the land and people of the Arab world, and as lacking any separate identity and aspirations (click here, to read our response to this myth). Weizmann and Ben-Gurion were willing to negotiate with Arab rulers in order to gain those rulers' recognition of Jewish statehood in Palestine in return for the Zionists' recognition of Arab independence elsewhere, but they would not negotiate with the Arab politicians in Palestine for a political settlement in their common homeland. As early as 1918, Weizmann wrote to a prominent British politician: "The real Arab movement is developing in Damascus and Mecca...the so-called Arab question in Palestine would therefore assume only a purely local character, and in fact is not considered a serious factor."

In line with that thinking, Weizmann met with Emir Faysal in the same year, in an attempt to win his agreement to Jewish statehood in Palestine in return for Jewish financial support for Faysal as ruler of Syria and Arabia.

Ben-Gurion, Weizmann, and other Zionist leaders met with prominent Arab officials during the 1939 LONDON CONFERENCE, which was convened by Britain to seek a compromise settlement in Palestine. The Arab diplomats from Egypt, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia criticized the exceptional position that the Balfour Declaration had granted the Jewish community and emphasized the estrangement between the Arab and Jewish residents that large scale Jewish immigration had caused. In response, Weizmann insisted that Palestine remain open to all Jews who wanted to immigrate, and Ben-Gurion suggested that all of Palestine should become a Jewish state, federated with the surrounding Arab states. The Arab participants criticized these demands for exacerbating the conflict, rather than contributing to the search for peace. The Zionists' premise that Arab statehood could be recognized while ignoring the Palestinians was thus rejected by the Arab rulers themselves.

Fifth

Finally, Zionist leaders argued that if the Palestinians could not reconcile themselves to Zionism, then force majeure, not a compromise of goals, was the only possible response. By the early 1920s, after violent Arab protests broke out in Jaffa and Jerusalem, leaders of the yishuv recognized that it might be impossible to bridge the gap between the aims of the two peoples. Building the national home would lead to an unavoidable clash, since the Arab majority would not agree to become a minority. In fact, as early as 1919 Ben-Gurion stated bluntly: "Everybody sees a difficulty in the question of relations between Arabs and Jews. But not everybody sees that there is no solution to this question. No solution! There is a gulf, and nothing can fill this gulf....I do not know what Arab will agree that Palestine should belong to the Jews....We, as a nation, want this country to be ours; the Arabs, as a nation, want this country to be theirs."

As tensions increased in the 1920s and the 1930s Zionist leaders realized that they had to coerce the Arabs to acquiesce to a diminished status. Ben-Gurion stated in 1937, during the Arab revolt:

"This is a national war declared upon us by the Arabs....This is an active resistance by the Palestinians to what they regard as a usurpation of their homeland by the Jews....But the fighting is only one aspect of the conflict, which is in its essence a political one. And politically we are the aggressors and they defend themselves."

This sober conclusion did not lead Ben-Gurion to negotiate with the Palestinian Arabs: instead he became more determined to strengthen the Jewish military forces so that they could compel the Arabs to relinquish their claims.

Practical Zionism

In order to realize the aims of Zionism and build the Jewish national home, the Zionist movement undertook the following practical steps in many different realms:

1.

They built political structures that could assume state functions

2.

Created a military force.

3.

Promoted large-scale immigration.

4.

Acquired land as the inalienable property of the Jewish people

5.

Established and monopolistic concessions. The labor federation, Histadrut, tried to force Jewish enterprises to hire only Jewish labor

6.

Setting up an autonomous Hebrew-language educational system.

These measures created a self-contained national entity on Palestinian soil that was ENTIRELY SEPARATE from the Arab community.

The yishuv established an elected community council, executive body, administrative departments, and religious courts soon after the British assumed control over Palestine. When the PALESTINE MANDATE was ratified by the League of Nations in 1922, the World Zionist Organization gained the responsibility to advise and cooperate with the British administration not only on economic and social matters affecting the Jewish national home but also on issues involving the general development of the country. Although the British rejected pressure to give the World Zionist Organization an equal share in administration and control over immigration and land transfers, the yishuv did gain a privileged advisory position.

The Zionists were strongly critical of British efforts to establish a LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL in 1923, 1930, and 1936. They realized that Palestinians' demands for a legislature with a Palestinian majority ran counter to their own need to delay establishing representative bodies until the Jewish community was much larger. In 1923, the Jewish residents did participate in the elections for a Legislative Council, but they were relieved that the Palestinians' boycott compelled the British to cancel the results. In 1930 and 1936 the World Zionist Organization vigorously opposed British proposals for a legislature, fearing that, if the Palestinians received the majority status that proportional representation would require, then they would try to block Jewish immigration and the purchase of land by Zionist companies. Zionist opposition was couched indirectly in the assertion that Palestine was not ripe for self-rule, a code for not until there's a Jewish majority.

To bolster this position, the yishuv formed defense forces (Haganah) in March 1920. They were preceded by the establishment of guards (hashomer) in Jewish rural settlements in the 1900s and the formation of a Jewish Legion in World War I. However, the British disbanded the Jewish Legion and allowed only sealed armories in the settlements and mixed Jewish-British area defense committees.

Despite its illegal status, the Haganah expanded to number 10,000 trained and mobilized men, and 40,000 reservists by 1936. During the 1937-38 Arab revolt, the Haganah engaged in active defense against Arab insurgents and cooperated with the British to guard railway lines, the oil pipeline to Haifa, and border fences. This cooperation deepened during World War II, when 18,800 Jewish volunteers joined the British forces. Haganah's special Palmach units served as scouts and sappers for the British army in Lebanon in 1941-42. This wartime experience helped to transform the Haganah into a regular fighting force. When Ben-Gurion became the World Zionist Organization's secretary of defense in June 1947, he accelerated mobilization as well as arms buying in the United States and Europe. As a result, mobilization leaped to 30,000 by May 1948, when statehood was proclaimed, and then doubled to 60,000 by mid-July—twice the number serving in the Arab forces arrayed against Israel.

A principal means for building up the national home was the promotion of large-scale immigration from Europe. Estimates of the Palestinian population demonstrate the dramatic impact of immigration. The first British census (December 31, 1922) counted 757,182 residents, of whom 83,794 were Jewish. The second census (December 31, 1931) enumerated 1,035,821, including 174,006 Jews. Thus, the absolute number of Jews had doubled and the relative number had increased from 11 percent to 17 percent. Two-thirds of this growth could be attributed to net immigration, and one third to natural increase. Two-thirds of the yishuv was concentrated in Jerusalem and Jaffa and Tel Aviv, with most of the remainder in the north, including the towns of HAIFA, SAFAD, and Tiberias.

The Mandate specified that the rate of immigration should accord with the economic capacity of the country to absorb the immigrants. In 1931, the British government reinterpreted this to take into account only the Jewish sector of the economy, excluding the Palestinian sector, which was suffering from heavy unemployment. As a result, the pace of immigration accelerated in 1932 and peaked in 1935-36. In other words, the absolute number of Jewish residents doubled in the five years from 1931 to 1936 to 370,000, so that they constituted 28 percent of the total population. Not until 1939 did the British impose a severe quota on Jewish immigrants. That restriction was resisted by the yishuv with a sense of desperation, since it blocked access to a key haven for the Jews whom Hitler was persecuting and exterminating in Germany and the rest of Nazi-occupied Europe. Net immigration was limited during the war years in the 1940s, but the government estimated in 1946 that there were about 583,000 Jews of nearly 1,888,000 residents, or 31 percent of the total Seventy percent of them were urban, and they continued to be overwhelmingly concentrated in Jerusalem (100,000) the Haifa area (119,000), and the JAFFA and RAMLA districts (327,000) (click here for a map illustrating Palestine's population distribution in 1946). The remaining 43,000 were largely in Galilee, with a scattering in the Negev and almost none in the central highlands.

The World Zionist Organization purchasing agencies launched large-scale land purchases in order to found rural settlements and stake territorial claims. In 1920 the Zionists held about 650,000 dunums (one dunum equals approximately one-quarter of an acre). By 1930, the amount had expanded to 1,164,000 dunums and by 1936 to 1,400,000 dunums. The major purchasing agent (the Palestine Land Development Company) estimated that, by 1936, 89 percent had been bought from large landowners (primarily absentee owners from Beirut) and only 11 percent from peasants. By 1947, the yishuv held 1.9 million dunums. Nevertheless, this represented only 7 percent of the total land surface or 10 to 12 percent of the cultivable land (click here for a map illustrating Palestine's land ownership distribution in 1946)

According to Article 3 of the Constitution of the Jewish Agency, the land was held by the Jewish National Fund as the inalienable property of the Jewish people; ONLY Jewish labor could be employed in the settlements, Palestinians protested bitterly against this inalienability clause. The moderate National Defense Party, for example, petitioned the British in 1935 to prevent further land sales, arguing that it was a: life and death [matter] to the Arabs, in that it results in the transfer of their country to other hands and the loss of their nationality.

The placement of Jewish settlements was often based on political considerations. The Palestine Land Development Company had four criteria for land purchase:

1.

The economic suitability of the tract

2.

Its contribution to forming a solid block of Jewish territory.

3.

The prevention of isolation of settlements

4.

The impact of the purchase on the political-territorial claims of the Zionists.

The stockade and watchtower settlements constructed in 1937, for example, were designed to secure control over key parts of Galilee for the yishuv in case the British implemented the PEEL PARTITION PLAN. Similarly, eleven settlements were hastily erected in the Negev in late 1946 in an attempt to stake a political claim in that entirely Palestinian-populated territory.

In addition to making these land purchases, prominent Jewish businessmen won monopolistic concessions from the British government that gave the Zionist movement an important role in the development of Palestine's natural resources. In 1921, Pinhas Rutenberg's Palestine Electric Company acquired the right to electrify all of Palestine except Jerusalem. Moshe Novomeysky received the concession to develop the minerals in the Dead Sea in 1927. And the Palestine Land Development Company gained the concession to drain the Hula marshes, north of the Sea of Galilee, in 1934. In each case, the concession was contested by other serious non-Jewish claimants; Palestinian politicians argued that the government should retain control itself in order to develop the resources for the benefit of the entire country.

The inalienability clause in the Jewish National Fund contracts included provision that ONLY JEWS could work on Jewish agricultural settlements. The concepts of manual labor and the return to the soil were key to the Zionist enterprise. This Jewish labor policy was enforced by the General Foundation of Jewish Labor (Histadrut), founded in 1920 and headed by David Ben-Gurion. Since some Jewish builders and citrus growers hired Arabs, who worked for lower wages than Jews, the Histadrut launched a campaign in 1933 to remove those Arab workers. Histadrut organizers picketed citrus groves and evicted Arab workers from construction sites and factories in the cities. The strident propaganda by the Histradut increased the Arabs' fears for the future. George Mansur, a Palestinian labor leader, wrote angrily in 1937:

"The Histadrut's fundamental aim is 'the conquest of labor'...No matter how many Arab workers are unemployed, they have no right to take any job which a possible immigrant might occupy. No Arab has the right to work in Jewish undertakings."

Finally, the establishment of an all-Jewish, Hebrew-language educational system was an essential component of building the Jewish national home. It helped to create a cohesive national ethos and a lingua franca among the diverse immigrants. However, it also entirely separated Jewish children from Palestinian children, who attended the governmental schools. The policy widened the linguistic and cultural gap between the two peoples. In addition, there was a stark contrast in their literacy levels (in 1931):

*

93 percent of Jewish males (above age seven) were literate

*

71 percent of Christian males

*

but only 25 percent of Muslim males were literate.

Overall, Palestinian literacy increased from 19 percent in 1931 to 27 percent by 1940, but only 30 percent of Palestinian children could be accommodated in government and private schools.

The practical policies of the Zionist movement created a compact and well-rooted community by the late 1940s. The yishuv had its own political, educational, economic, and military institutions, parallel to the governmental system. Jews minimized their contact with the Arab community and outnumbered the Arabs in certain key respects. Jewish urban dwellers, for example, greatly exceeded Arab urbanites, even though Jews constituted but one-third of the population. Many more Jewish children attended school than did Arab children, and Jewish firms employed seven times as many workers as Arab firms.

Thus the relative weight and autonomy of the yishuv were much greater than sheer numbers would suggest. The transition to statehood was facilitated by the existence of the proto state institutions and a mobilized, literate public. But the separation from the Palestinian residents will exacerbated by these autarchic policies.

Policies Toward the Palestinians

The main view point within the Zionist movement was that the Arab problem would be solved by first solving the Jewish problem. In time, the Palestinians would be presented with the fait accompli of a Jewish majority. Settlements, land purchases, industries, and military forces were developed gradually and systematically so that the yishuv would become too strong to uproot. In a letter to his son, Weizmann compared the Arabs to the rocks of Judea, obstacles that had to be cleared to make the path smooth. When the Palestinians mounted violent protests in 1920, 1921, 1929, 1936-39, and the late 1940s, the yishuv sought to curb them by force, rather than seek a political accommodation with the indigenous people. Any concessions made to the Palestinians by the British government concerning immigration, land sales, or labor were strongly contested by the Zionist leaders. In fact, in 1936, Ben-Gurion stated that the Palestinians will only acquiesce in a Jewish Eretz Israel after they are in a state of total despair.

Zionists viewed their acceptance of territorial partition as a temporary measure; they did not give up the idea of the Jewish community's right to all of Palestine. Weizmann commented in 1937: "In the course of time we shall expand to the whole country...this is only an arrangement for the next 15-30 years."

Ben-Gurion stated in 1938, "After we become a strong force, as a result of the creation of a state, we shall abolish partition and expand to the whole of Palestine." A FEW EFFORTS were made to reduce Arab opposition. For example in the 1920s, Zionist organizations provided financial support to Palestinian political parties, newspapers, and individuals. This was most evident in the establishment and support of the National Muslim Societies (1921-23) and Agricultural Parties (1924-26). These parties were expected to be neutral or positive toward the Zionist movement, in return for which they would receive financial subventions and their members would be helped to obtain jobs and loans. This policy was backed by Weizmann, who commented that: "extremists and moderates alike were susceptible to the influence of money and honors."

However, Leonard Stein, a member of the London office of the World Zionist Organization, denounced this practice. He argued that Zionists must seek a permanent modus vivendi with the Palestinians by hiring them in Jewish firms and admitting them to Jewish universities. He maintained that political parties in which Arab moderates are merely Arab gramophones playing Zionist records would collapse as soon as the Zionist financial support ended. In any event, the World Zionist Organization terminated the policy by 1927, as it was in the midst of a financial crisis and as most of the leaders felt that the policy was ineffective.

Some Zionist leaders argued that the Arab community had to be involved in the practical efforts of the Zionist movement. Chaim Kalvarisky, who initiated the policy of buying support, articulated in 1923 the gap between that ideal and the reality: "Some people say...that only by common work in the field of commerce, industry and agriculture mutual understanding between Jews and Arabs will ultimately be attained....This is, however, merely a theory. In practice we have not done and we are doing nothing for any work in common.

*

How many Arab officials have we installed in our banks? Not even one.

*

How many Arabs have we brought into our schools? Not even one.

*

What commercial houses have we established in company with Arabs? Not even one."

Two years later, Kalvarisky lamented: "We all admit the importance of drawing closer to the Arabs, but in fact we are growing more distant like a drawn bow. We have no contact: two separate worlds, each living its own life and fighting the other."

Some members of the yishuv emphasized the need for political relations with the Palestinian Arabs, to achieve either a peacefully negotiated territorial partition (as Nahum Goldmann sought) or a binational state (as Brit Shalom and Hashomer Ha-tzair proposed). But few went as far as Dr. Judah L. Magnes, chancellor of The Hebrew University, who argued that Zionism meant merely the creation of a Jewish cultural center in Palestine rather than an independent state. In any case, the binationalists had little impact politically and were strongly opposed by the leadership of the Zionist movement.

Zionist leaders felt they did not harm the Palestinians by blocking them from working in Jewish settlements and industries or even by undermining their majority status. The Palestinians were considered a small part of the large Arab nation; their economic and political needs could be met in that wider context, Zionists felt, rather than in Palestine. They could move elsewhere if they sought land and could merge with Transjordan if they sought political independence.

This thinking led logically to the concept of population TRANSFER. In 1930 Weizmann suggested that the problems of insufficient land resources within Palestine and of the dispossession of peasants could be solved by moving them to Transjordan and Iraq. He urged the Jewish Agency to provide a loan of £1 million to help move Palestinian farmers to Transjordan. The issue was discussed at length in the Jewish Agency debates of 1936-37 on partition. At first, the majority proposed a voluntary transfer of Palestinians from the Jewish state, but later they realized that the Palestinians would never leave voluntarily. Therefore, key leaders such as Ben-Gurion insisted that compulsory transfer was essential. The Jewish Agency then voted that the British government should pay for the removal of the Palestinian Arabs from the territory allotted to the Jewish state.

The fighting from 1947 to 1949 resulted in a far larger transfer than had been envisioned in 1937. It solved the Arab problem by removing most of the Arabs and was the ultimate expression of the policy of force majeure.

Conclusion

The land and people of Palestine were transformed during the thirty years of British rule. The systematic colonization undertaken by the Zionist movement enabled the Jewish community to establish separate and virtually autonomous political, economic, social, cultural, and military institutions. A state within a state was in place by the time the movement launched its drive for independence. The legal underpinnings for the autonomous Jewish community were provided by the British Mandate. The establishment of a Jewish state was first proposed by the British Royal Commission in July 1937 and then endorsed by the UNITED NATIONS in November 1947.

That drive for statehood IGNORED the presence of a Palestinian majority with its own national aspirations. The right to create a Jewish state—and the overwhelming need for such a state—were perceived as overriding Palestinian counterclaims. Few members of the yishuv supported the idea of binationalism. Rather, territorial partition was seen by most Zionist leaders as the way to gain statehood while according certain national rights to the Palestinians. TRANSFER of Palestinians to neighboring Arab states was also envisaged as a means to ensure the formation of a homogeneous Jewish territory. The implementation of those approaches led to the formation of independent Israel, at the cost of dismembering the Palestinian community and fostering long-term hostility with the Arab world.

—Ann M. Lesch

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Abu Lughod, Janet L. "The Demographic Transformation of Palestine." In The Tansformation of Palestine, ed. by Ibrahim Abu-Lughod. Evanston, Ill.: Northestern University Press, 1971.

Caplan, Neil. Palestine Jew1Y and the Arab Question, 1917-25. London: Frank Cass, 1978.

Farsoun, Samih K., and Christina Zacharia. Palestine and the Palestinians. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1996.

Flapan, Simha. Zionism and the Palestinians. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1979.

Granott (Granovsky), Avraham. The Land System in Palestine. London: Frank CaBs, 1978.

Hadawi, Sami. Bitter Harvest Palestine 1914-1979. Rev. ed. Delmar, N.Y.: Caravan Books, 1979.

Hattis, Susan Lee. The Bi-National Idea in Palestine during Mandato1Y Times. Haifa: Shikmona Publishing Co., 1970.

Hertzberg, Arthur, ed. The Zionist Idea. New York: Atheneum, 1969.

Hurewitz, J. C. The Struggle for Palestine. Reprint. New York: Schocken Books, 1976.

Lesch, Ann Mosely. Arab Politics in Palestine, 1917-1939. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1979.

Mandel, Neville. "Attempts at an Arab-Zionist Entente, 1913-1914," Middle Eastern Studies 1 (1965).

----."Turks, Arabs, and Jewish Immigration into Palestine, 1882-1914," St. Antony's Papers 17 (1965).

Mansur, George. The Arab Worker under the Palestine Mandate. Jerusalem: Commercial Press, 1937.

Porath, Yehoshua. The Emergence of the Palestinian-Arab National Movement 1918-1929. London: Frank Cass, 1974.

----.Palestinian Arab National Movement, 1929-1939. London: Frank CaBs, 1977.

Ro'i, Yaacov. "The Zionist Attitude to the Arabs, 1908-1914." Middle Eastern Studies 4 (1968).

Ruedy, John. "Dynamics of Land Alienation." In The Transformation of Palestine, ed. by Ibrahim Abu- Lughod. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press 1071

The Above article was quoted from Encyclopedia Of The Palestinians, edited by Philip Mattar

ami Abu Salem, The Electronic Intifada, 31 July 2006

15-year-old Somaia Okal ignored her sister Maria as she asked her to leave the swing for her, while their mother Asma, 30, played with her 8-month-old infant Shahd, in Jabalia, north of Gaza.

This Wednesday, an Israeli shell hit their house and put an end to the laughing and chatter of the innocent Maria and Shahd. The mother was also killed, and Somaia critically wounded in the head; the 5-year-old, Amani, was wounded in the foot.

Samir Okal, 35, a father of seven, did not expect that the Israeli tanks will hit his house as he lives in the "serene" neighbourhood of Abd Rabbu. Even his relatives wanted to leave their homes and stay at his house because it enjoys a reputation for "safety."

Okal could not stop crying while telling how he lost his wife and two of his little daughters. "We had our lunch together, then we realised that Israeli tanks shell our neighbourhood. I closed the window and took my family to the garden in the front of the house."

Okal and his wife tried to calm down their children. The wife played with her baby and Somaia was playing with a swing while Maria was waiting for her turn.

"A shell hit the wall of the garden, I did not see anything because intense dust filled the place. I did not see my children or my wife. One second after, I heard the moaning of the baby and the sighing of my wife."

Read More With Photos:

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article5359.shtml

South Lebanon: I still have no words

Muzna Al-Masri writing from south Lebanon, Live from Lebanon, 2 August 2006

The home of a local resident of Baalbek following an Israeli air strike, 1 August 2006. (Peter Speetjens/IRIN)

I just came from the South of Lebanon. I went to Tyre, to Hannaoui, Qana, Siddiqinne, Srifa, Bint Jbeil, Ainata, and Ein Ebel and many villages on the way. I so want to write, but I still have no words. This was Tyre, after all, the lovely city and its beach that I always wanted to call home. These were the villages at which I made friends, aided in tobacco harvesting and drank the best tea ever. I still haven't cried, I feel I am not entitled to. If I were to cry, what would I leave to the people that have lost loved ones and houses full of memories?

The spaces once full of friendly old men and women inviting any passer by, stranger or friend alike, to coffee, tea and grapes are now empty. The children no longer play football on the edge of the road, or roll wooden self-made toys in the alleys. The late night gatherings under grape trees have gone. Their voices are now replaced by debris, dogs and dying cows. There is nobody in Siddiqinne. I tried to check on Mariam's house but the road is too full of rubble for me to get there. I looked for one familiar face to say hello to, to ask how things have been, but there is no one there.

I went to Ainata to search for a friend's mother. The cease-fire is coming to an end and I am deep in the Bint Jbeil area. I have to return, I don't know the house, there are very few people to help, but I insist on looking further. Zainab, I say, Hussein's mother; I describe his profession, his wife, again and again until I find he who knows the house. I climb the rubble. The house is half destroyed. I know this was the kitchen because of the plates squeezed under the rubble; she might have been there making a cup of tea I think, trying to squeeze normality into my presence in the house I have never visited before. There is no bathroom for me to identify, it is gone. I can't know if she is there but I don't have the heart to leave her son in the agony of ignorance. I approach seeking a different smell. I can't believe that this is the way one look's for a mother's friend. Is it me doing this? But I am doing it; I have been smelling deaths for two days now. I still can't know. I was hoping I would come and she would be in the house, waiting for somebody to help her through the difficult terrain, then I would call her son when in Tyre to say I have your mother with me and I am bringing her to Beirut. I was imagining the relieved smile on his face. This didn't happen.

On the way I get a call; somebody from the Red Cross says they transferred a body of an unidentified woman from Ainata. I find myself wishing it would be her. I want them to at least know. If this cease-fire ends without finding her, they will be spending many hard days. I go around one hospital after another, it is chaotic. We can't see the bodies; we can't find others who know her in the hospital. I have no consoling words for Hussein.

Today, hours before we head back to Beirut from Sidon, we know that the burial of all the bodies - too many to be kept in the ill-equipped hospital - is taking place at noon. There is no way any member of her family can get to Tyre in Time. Maher decides to go. The cease fire has ended, the roads are no longer safe, but the risk is worth going through. I think there is only one loss greater than the death of a loved one -- that of not knowing. He is there now, the burial is delayed and Hussein has arrived. I can't reach them by phone, they have no signal, and I write these words as I wait.

There is a lot to be told, the many stories I have encountered. I have pictures to share, and I will, I promise; but now I need to go, to talk to the families waiting to hear about their homes. The stories have to be told first to those who own them.