Dr. Salman Abu Sitta: Palestinians' Sacred Right of Return

In 1948, the villagers of Kfar Bir'im in Galilee were evicted from their homes.  Some lived in caves thinking that they could return in two weeks.  Seven children died. In 1953 they watched from a hill, called today the "Wailing Hill," as Israel bombed their houses from the air.  The third generation of internally displaced villagers continue their struggle to return to their land.

Kfar Bir'im is a microcosm of Palestine's tragedy.  What follows is Dr. Salman Abu Sitta's story in today's Guardian.  Dr. Abu Sitta is a scholar and a refugee from Ain Al Sitta in Beersheeba.  He is author of the monumental Atlas of Palestine.Kfar Bir'imAtlas of Palestine

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/...

Dr. Abu Sitta addresses how to reverse ethnic cleansing.

"In a civilised society, if a crime is committed, its consequences must be reversed. The criminal should not be rewarded, and his crime should not be forgiven or even legitimised. The stolen property must be returned. Rights must be reinstated and reparation paid for material losses.
This is what the international community insisted upon, sometimes using military force, in implementing the return of refugees to Bosnia, Kosovo, Burundi, Cambodia, East Timor, Georgia, Guatemala, Mozambique, Ruwanda, South Africa, Tajikistan, Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan."

He also touches upon the 'feasibility of return,'with which he has dealt extensively.

"The pretext that return is not possible because of the influx of Jewish immigrants to Palestine to replace the expelled Palestinians is not a valid one, morally, legally or politically. But we are spared the argument on this point. Here we have yet another one of the misconceptions designed to mislead and misinform the western public. It is not true that it is physically impossible to implement the right of return."

I'd encourage anyone who would like more information about refugees and right of return to go to Dr. Abu Sitta's website, Palestine Land Society.  Yesterday in Doha a debate sponsored by BBC World, "This House Believes the Palestinians Should Give Up Their Right to Return," resulted in an overwhelming victory for those debating for the Palestinians' inalienable right to return to their homes and villages.  

The right to return is still strong among the third generation of Palestine's refugees. Article 13:Section 2, of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states "Everyone has the right to leave his country and return to his country."  The UN has reaffirmed Resolution 194 which calls for the return of the refugees to their homes and villages one hundred and thirty-five times.  The simple desire to return to the home to which one holds the key, or to the village of one's parents or grandparents is not in the least an extreme notion.  

Palestine Land Society.victory

•  Thank you for posting this diary.

  A lot of people don't really know about this tragedy and what went on back then. No wonder this right of return is a big issue. Understandable.

  by smerfish on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 01:43:53 PM PDT

•  The failure of Israeli governments

  to honor the right of the people of Ikrit and Birim to return to their villages is shameful.

  But it much of this diary is plainly wrong, which substantially undermines the diarists credibility on matters of fact that are not so easily checkable and on matters of judgment. For example,

  • The diary claims that "their land," referring to the Palestinian Arabs, "represents 93% of Israel's area." But Negev desert alone comprises 66%, over 6,700 square miles, of Israel.

  • The diary claims: "We have complete UN-documented ownership records of every acre of land. Not a single Israeli Jew has an equivalent title deed after al-Nakba." First, the only pre-1948 ownership records are those maintained by the Turkish and British authorities. Second, many Israeli Jews and Jewish organizations, such as the Jewish National Fund, hold title to property going back to the Turkish and British Mandatory periods.

  by another American on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 01:47:05 PM PDT

  •  Two points

    first the points made in the diary are by the Guardian's columnist, Salman Abu Sitta, not by the diarist.

    Second, the documentary evidence does indeed confirm that 7% of the land in Palestine was owned by Jews at the time of GAR 181.

    That figure is the one used by Ilan Pappe in his Ethnic Cleansing, and if I remember correctly it is also used by Kimmerling and Migdal in their Palestinian People.

    It would include the holdings of the JNF and other organizations, as well as the private holdings of individual Jews.

    by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:07:09 PM PDT

    •  But 93% was NOT owned by Arabs.

      IIRC, and I don't have time just now to check, a majority of the land was state-owned.

      by another American on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:10:56 PM PDT

      •  Ah, there's your capacity

        for nuance!

        I knew you could do it!

        by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:16:37 PM PDT

•  I saw newsreels of this ethnic cleansing. n/t

  by Silverbird on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 01:52:53 PM PDT

  •  where n/t

    by redcardphreek on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:12:13 PM PDT

    •  Movie theaters in the late 40s

      in Louisville, Kentucky.  Double features with a series of newsreels in between.  I saw atomic bomb test explosions in the newsreels, Ghandi leading the Indians protesting for independence, the Exodus ship full of Jewish refugees -- vivid images.  (And Esther Williams doing synchronized swimming!)  I may have been young but this was quite memorable.  News then was not as self-censored as it is today.

      by Silverbird on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 07:18:23 AM PDT

•  Should western Poland go back to Germany or,

  at a minimum, should German refugees from (what is now) western Poland be entitled to return and reclaim their former holdings?

  What about the ethnic Germans from the Sudetenland?

  Shall we insist that the population exchange between Turkey and Greece be undone?

  What about the millions of people who left their homes in connection with the partition of the Indian subcontinent?
  
  

  According to my understanding, roughly half the Palestinian refugees were expelled by Israeli forces and half left without being forced to do so. The fact acceptance of the UN partition resolution by Palestinian Arabs and neighboring Arab states would have avoided the bitter fighting that led to flight and expulsion does not diminish the human suffering of both subsets of refugees.

  But it does help make the point that, in the context of that bitter, Arab-initiated conflict, it became impossible for the two communities to go on as they had before. The Palestinians are entitled to their own state, and so Israelis must agree, among other things, to limit realization of their law of return to within Israel proper. So, too, are the Israelis entitled to their state, and so Palestinians must agree, among other things, to limit realization of their claimed right of return to the State of Palestine.

  If you want, you can allow your conception of the best to become the enemy of the good. If enough people take that position, you probably can prevent an end-of-conflict settlement between Israel and the Palestinians. IMHO, that would be a tragedy, and the principal victims would be the Palestinians.

  No justice without peace.

  Two states for two peoples.

  by another American on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 01:56:47 PM PDT

  •  Two states

    as you know is a recipe for Palestinian impoverishment and dependence on Israel.

    Which is exactly why you endorse it so heartily...

    by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:08:17 PM PDT

    •  A one state solution

      would destroy the only Jewish state in the world.

      Which is why you endorse it so heartily....

      by redcardphreek on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:11:27 PM PDT

      •  Actually

        I want to see the children of my sabra cousins grow up in peace, without fear of suicide bombs, and free of the racism that divides Palestinian from Jew in their country.

        A one-state solution, if you ask me, provides the best opportunity for a stable, long-term peace in the region.

        by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:23:30 PM PDT

        •  Worked out well

          in Yugoslavia

          by redcardphreek on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:04:41 PM PDT

          •  I'd think Czechosovakia would be

            a better example.

            by Red Sox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:14:38 PM PDT

            •  Right

              because the Czechs and the Slovaks have been trying to kill each other for the past sixty years...

              by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:50:14 PM PDT

              •  Clearly not, but

                is prior conflict the sole reason you believe the one-state solution to be the only viable option?

                by Red Sox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:53:48 PM PDT

                •  Originally was to be one partioned state.

                  Writing in the early years on the establishment of Israel expressed more concern for the fate of the Palestineans.  Now the hard right tends to prevail in Israel's government as it does in our own.  Similarly, it is now mostly the radical Israel citizens and troops who speak of the injustice done to Palestineans, and not usually Americans.

                  by Silverbird on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 08:30:09 AM PDT

    •  As you well know,

      I am a strong supporter of, among other things, the Geneva Initiative, which is the joint product of senior Palestinian and Israeli figures. I also strongly support the Clinton Peace Parameters, which Arafat belatedly claimed to accept.

      Unless you mean to claim, and can document, that the people involved in those efforts intend(ed) "Palestinian impoverishment and dependence on Israel," I suggest that you withdraw your false charge against me. Or, do you need to dehumanize those with whom you disagree?

      by another American on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:14:20 PM PDT

      •  That's a good one

        The Palestinians after fifty years of assault, ethnic cleansing, and military occupation, finally accede to the best terms their oppressors offer them -- not without serious misgivings, mind you -- and in your hands that becomes a joint Israeli-Palestinian initiative.

        Worthy of ...

        Well, you did defend someone's right to call Israel's critics "proterrorist" the other day.  But I'll lay off the hyperbole for the moment.

        by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:19:44 PM PDT

        •  So do you doubt

          the sincerity of Sari Nusseibeh?

          by Red Sox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:55:06 PM PDT

    •  A two-state solution is the only one which

      recognizes the right of self-determination of both peoples.

      by Geekesque on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:37:30 PM PDT

      •  If you believe that

        how do you explain Hamas's victory in the Palestinian elections?

        by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:49:45 PM PDT

        •  What does that have to do

          with the right of self-determination of both peoples?

          The Palestinians have the right to self-determination.  They don't have the right to take it away from the Israelis.

          The same goes in reverse, of course, but sadly that hasn't prevented the Israelis from doing it anyways.

          Moreover, Hamas won because Fatah makes Nigerian politicos seem honest and trustworthy.

          by Geekesque on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:33:01 PM PDT

          •  Hamas won

            in part it represents the position that the UN had no right to divide Palestine in 1948.  A majority of Palestinians agree with that, even if they accept the political necessity to reach an accommodation with Israel.

            If the Palestinians self-determine, they would determine a state that stretches from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean, one that would be secular and democratic.

            by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:49:19 PM PDT

            •  You don't get to self-determine

              other people's rights.

              They don't get to self-determine Israel out of existence any more than Israel has a right to self-determine Lebanon out of existence.

              by Geekesque on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:50:46 PM PDT

              •  Israel has been self-determining

                Palestinian rights since 1948...

                by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:51:54 PM PDT

                •  Apparently we have radically

                  different ideas of what self-determination means.

                  by Geekesque on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:56:26 PM PDT

                  •  I don't think so

                    I just think you're not thinking through seriously what Israel did to the Palestinians, and how that historical crime impacts Israel's contemporary rights to self-determination.

                    by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:58:20 PM PDT

                    •  Israel has no right to self-determination.

                      Israelis do.

                      by Geekesque on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 05:28:17 AM PDT

                      •  Distinction

                        without a difference.

                        by litho on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 01:14:06 PM PDT

                •  Which has what to do

                  with the Palestinian "right" to eliminate Israel because they believe it to be part of their determinative right?

                  by Red Sox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:58:03 PM PDT

                  •  I think you missed

                    my diary on the one-state solution.  Read that before you start attributing opinions to me I do not hold.

                    by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:59:40 PM PDT

                    •  What have I mistakenly attributed to you?

                      The elimination of Israel? That's an eventual certainty, given the demographics. The idea that "Israel retains its flag, currency, official language, and name" is quaint...and will last for maybe twenty years. I'm not quite sure why you would decide who they could and could not allow to immigrate.

                      That "modest proposal" might was well have been called "Israel's Unconditional Surrender."

                      by Red Sox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:08:46 PM PDT

                      •  In a few days I'll have another one explaining

                        why I disagree with the idea that a binational state needs necessarily to the elimination of Israel, or to ongoing hostile confrontation between Palestinians and Jews.

                        I'm still working out the ideas, though.  I'll try to let you know when it goes up.  Shoot me an email with your addy and I'll drop you a line...

                        by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:15:55 PM PDT

                        •  Sorry, but

                          job is both sensitive and generally hostile to progressivism. Have to maintain anonymity, but I will try to check your page from time-to-time. I doubt I'll agree with much, but I'm sure I won't find it dull...

                          by Red Sox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:24:38 PM PDT

                          •  Dunno about that last part

                            I'll be engaging some political theory, some of which goes back to Arendt and to Nietzsche.

                            Understand the anonymity, of course.  You'll notice, though, that my email here is under my pseudonym.  It's not hard to set up a hotmail, gmail, or yahoo account.

                            by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 05:06:35 PM PDT

  •  Agree

    They lost a war.

    As people have lost wars since history began.

    I have recent ancestry from East Prussia, cousins and such that were driven out and worse by the Russians.

    Arguments could be made that they have been 'refugees' at least three years longer then the Palestinians.

    by redcardphreek on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:10:24 PM PDT

    •  Might makes right.

      Bravo.

      by upstate NY on Sat Mar 31, 2007 at 06:33:25 PM PDT

  •  And the ironic aspect is this

    If all these refugees return to their ancestral home, they will be living in Israel...they will be Israelis. So the question is, do they want to be Palestinians in Palestine, or Israelis in Israel?  What if a Palestinian state were set up in the West Bank and Gaza -- where would these refugees choose to live? And if they choose Israel, what does that say about the confidence in a Palestinian state among Palestinians?

    by Paul in Berkeley on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:27:34 PM PDT

•  Fait accompli

  It does nobody any good to insist on returning to a village that ceased to exist 59 years ago.

  Injustices happen.  They should be righted.  But, trying to make them right "in kind" by undoing two generations of history, is a prescription for frustration that leads to violence.

  At some point, you have to grieve, accept that you've been screwed, and look for a new future.

  Reparations are probably appropriate.  Honoring historical claims to land is not.

  by ohwilleke on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:02:51 PM PDT

  •  injustice happens?

    nice.

    what is this, "shit happens" legal theory? (I am sorry, we kill and steal , but shit happens, grey poupon anybody? )

    by fugue on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:07:09 PM PDT

    •  I robbed the bank, but I've already spent...

      the money! Can't we just move on?

      by Diaries on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:19:56 PM PDT

    •  no poupon for you!

      ....you make the sandwich with the condiments you have, not the ones you wish you had!

      condiments happen... or, in your case, they don't.  :)

      by james risser on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 06:13:12 PM PDT

•  Hi Umkahlil

  You know me as "Elizabeth" from my blog.

  Thanks for posting this here. There are unfortunately a number of Israel-apologist trolls who show up occasionally on Dailykos.

  I think this post might be a bit esoteric for the average reader of this site. But it's still good information.

  by Taketheredpill on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:12:51 PM PDT

  •  Please name names.

    "There are unfortunately a number of Israel-apologist trolls who show up occasionally on Dailykos."

    by another American on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:15:15 PM PDT

    •  Oh, that's another good one

      because if we start naming the people who clearly behave as pro-Israel trolls, uprating offensive comments on their side and trollrating comments that criticize Israel, why then we'd be engaged in calling out other kossacks, and that -- as you well know -- is a bannable offense.

      Now, why would you be asking people to name names, another American?  You wouldn't want to see anyone banned, would you?

      by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:21:55 PM PDT

      •  Perhaps I'm mistaken, but if some truly is

        a troll, then I do not understand naming him or her to be any kind of offense. But if you think I'm mistaken, I hope you and your friends will report these trolls to the management. Whatever their stripe, trolls do not belong here.

        by another American on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:28:53 PM PDT

        •  Some have been reported

          and some have even temporarily changed their behavior after being reported and warned.

          by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:35:08 PM PDT

•  I don't see why

    Either admitting a "right" to dispossess current landholders, or an absolute blanket prohibition on the return of refugees, have to be the only options.  Why can't there be a fair procedure by which Palestinian Arabs who want to take up Israeli citizenship (obviously recognizing and pledging loyalty to the state of Israel as part of that) can do so?

  by WIds on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:28:42 PM PDT

•  The Palestinians...

  ...and their "leaders" tried to wage war on the Jews of Palestine and lost.  Many of them lost their homes because they chose to do so.  

  It was Arab leaders that declared and waged an ethnic war.  Israel is not to be blamed for the fact that the Jews of Palestine successfully fought that off.

  The rest of Dr. Sitta's essay is the typical recycled crap.  Another American has pointed out the "Jews only owned 7%" fallacy.  The "80% of Jews live in 15% of Israel" is also a funny line.  It's kind of like saying "50 % of New York State Residents live on less than 1% of the land."  Sounds interesting, until you realize that I'm talking about urban NYC compared with the rest of the state.  Israel is in fact one of the most densely populated countries in the middle east.  If Dr. Sitta is looking for his home, he should talk to his Arab neighbors who a) screwed him out of it and b) have plenty of empty space and underpopulated regions for him to live in.

  by JPhurst on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:35:53 PM PDT

  •  There is certainly

    a fair amount of recycled "Israel sucks" crap in the piece, but I have a problem with your final sentence. The presence of Arab land mass and the insincerity of Arab League advocacy for the Palestinians don't dictate that if he wants a viable home he should have to move.

    by Red Sox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:16:32 PM PDT

    •  twice in one day... :)

      by james risser on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 06:09:38 PM PDT

  •  in other words....

    Dr. Sitta can go sit in a Jordanian or Egyptian desert and pound sand up his ass.

    How exactly did his Arab neighbours screw him out of land now part of Israel?

    It is true that some historical wrongs can not be righted, and that an unfettered right of return is not likely to come about under any circumstances most of us would accept.

    All the same, JPhurst, the state of Israel is going to have to better than your "nanna nanna fuck you."

    Whether you likes it or not.

    by Boreal Ecologist on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:50:29 PM PDT

  •  There is no

    "seven percent" fallacy.  What another American pointed out is that even if Jews only owned seven percent of Palestinian land (an established historical fact) that does not mean that Palestinians owned 93%.

    No historian, actually, argues that.  Much of the land in Palestine was absentee owned, especially by Turks.

    What cannot be denied, however, is that all that land was taken over by the State of Israel after 1948, and much of it was eventually given to the Jewish National Fund.

    Those are historical facts.

    by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:54:31 PM PDT

•  When Ethnic Cleansing Occurred

  Fully one half of Palestine's refugees were ethnically cleansed before any Arab army entered Palestine and before the end of the British Mandate.  This is information that is acknowledged by Israel's historians.

  It is feasible for those Palestinians wishing to return to their villages and towns to do so with minimal disruption to people already living in Israel.  

  It is not incumbant upon the dispossessed to assure that the oppressor maintains demographic superiority, neither is it moral.  

  Hello, Elizabeth.  Thank you for the information; I'll try to keep my posts simple and clear.

  by umkahlil on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 02:57:37 PM PDT

  •  Several points to consider

    1.  If Jews had lost the 1948 war, what would the arabs have done with them?  Probably kill and/or expel them.  And nobody would have cared.

    2.  The Romans in 70 AD cleansed the Palestinian Jews from their land.  After more than a millenium of diapora, persecution, and genocide, their descendants returned.

    3.  Many of the Palestinian Arabs who resided in pre-1948 Israel were themselves newcomers, having migrated into the area from Egypt and elsewhere due to the increased employment opportunities created by the Jews.  See:  "From Time Immemorial" by Joan Peters.

    by sandbox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:11:14 PM PDT

    •  The old Peters hoax...

      That has been rebutted so many times now, by researchers from various countries (including Israel). It's embarrasing to see someone cite it in all seriousness.

      Regarding #1, we don't know what would have happened. Why don't we stick to actual history - that is, the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians?

      As for #2, I don't see the necessary connection between that and the forced expulsion of the Palestinian Arabs. Care to explain?

      by pinhead on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:32:46 PM PDT

      •  Regarding #1

        At the time in 1948 we do know what would have happened to the Jews as radio broadcasts and newspaper reports in neighboring Arab countries that tried to invade the new State of Israel called for killing and expelling the Jews.  So why wouldn't the Palestinian arabs and neighboring countries have done so if they had the chance?

        I do not accept your "forced expulsion" version of history.  There were radio broadcasts at the time over Arab media telling the Palestinian Arabs to leave many areas, that when the war was over, and the Jews beaten (which was widely anticipated in the Arab world), then those who left could then return.  While there are some examples of forced expulsion, I do not think it was as widspread as asserted by the zionist revisionists and others.

        I do not accept your characterization of the Peters book as a hoax.  

         

         

        by sandbox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:50:43 PM PDT

        •  Regarding #1

          You will not find any serious historian who would engage in the kind of wild counter-factual analysis you do here.

          We know what happened in 1948.  What "might have happened" is outside the realm of our knowledge.

          by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 03:57:24 PM PDT

          •  You are seriously saying that if the

            newly formed country of Israel had lost the 1948 war that the Jews residing there would not have been killed and expelled?  After being threatened by Arab media that this is just what will happen.  

            by sandbox on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:02:35 PM PDT

            •  I am seriously saying that neither you nor I

              nor anyone else can honestly say what would have happened had Israel lost the 1948 war.

              Doesn't the answer to that question depend on who WON the war?  Wouldn't the outcome have been substantially different if King Abdullah's Arab Legion emerged victorious, as opposed to, say, Fawzi al-Qawuqji's Arab Liberation Army?  Would it have made a difference if the winner had been the Mufti, Hitler's erstwhile ally, over, say, Egypt's King Farouq -- he who defended Egyptian Jews from a populist pogrom three years earlier?

              I'm saying that neither you nor I have sufficient information about the past to be able to state with certainty what would have happened with a different outcome to the war.

              It's like asking "What if Superman had been a Nazi?"

              by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:21:10 PM PDT

              •  He almost was

                There was a Bizarro episode where Lois is teleported to an alternate universe where Superman is a vaguely fascist policeman (the S on his suit is a stylised Nazi-SS lightning bolt) in Lex Luthor's dictatorship of Metropolis.

                by 1918 on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 05:21:27 PM PDT

                •  The reference actually

                  is to classic SNL episode from 1978.  Transcript here.

                  Hitler was played by Michael Palin, and Klaus Kent/Superman was played by Dan Ackroyd.

                  The weird thing is I actually remember watching it live...

                  by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 05:24:40 PM PDT

        •  Excellent rebuttal...

          sandbox wrote:

          I do not accept your characterization of the Peters book as a hoax.

          That's a terrific rebuttal - really, wonderful argumentation. Why don't you just say "uh-uh" and put your hands over your ears?

          However, you don't need to take my word for it. Try Yehoshua Porath's instead - if you dare to have your happy little myth shattered:

          Much of Mrs. Peters's book argues that at the same time that Jewish immigration to Palestine was rising, Arab immigration to the parts of Palestine where Jews had settled also increased. Therefore, in her view, the Arab claim that an indigenous Arab population was displaced by Jewish immigrants must be false, since many Arabs only arrived with the Jews. The precise demographic history of modern Palestine cannot be summed up briefly, but its main features are clear enough and they are very different from the fanciful description Mrs. Peters gives.

          But, of course, this probably won't matter to you - seeing as how you've now resurrected the "Arab broadcasts" bullshit. Christopher Hitchens took care of that one, in hilarious form, over 20 years ago, before he went insane.

          by pinhead on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:28:29 PM PDT

          •  I recently came across

            this excellent literature review on the Palestinian refugee issue, which should be read by everyone interested in the topic.

            It includes this passage:

            Another study by the Anglo-Irish writer Erskine Childers drew similar conclusions. Childers examined the BBC monitoring files and discovered repeated Arab appeals to the Palestinians to stay in Palestine. He discovered no evidence of any orders to evacuate Palestine. Childers concluded that "official Zionist forces were responsible for the expulsion of thousands upon thousands of Arabs and for deliberate incitement to panic"....

            In my opinion, ... Childers successfully destroyed the credibility of the "Arab orders" thesis.

            by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 05:21:50 PM PDT

      •  According to Benny Morris

        From Righteous Victims, p. 13:

        As part of the reaction to growing European influence, the Ottoman authorities--in an effort at "Islamization"--transferred tens of thousands of Muslims from the empire's northern and Balkan peripheries (Bukhara, the Caucasus, Albania, and Bosnia) to its Levantine core, including Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine. This increased the Muslim proportion of the population . . .

        He seems to mean in the late 1800s judging from the context, but I wish he would have provided dates in these sentences. Anyway, interesting . . .

        by Yitzchak on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 06:52:59 PM PDT

  •  It isn't at all obvious that it is feasible with

    minimal disruption.

    Indeed, the main reason that there has been almost no budging on the point is that it is widely believed that trying to put things back the way they were would be catastrophically disruptive, if it was even feasible at all.

    by ohwilleke on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:26:26 PM PDT

•  Where do you draw the line?

  Only 750,000 Palestinians were displaced in 1948.  Some of them are now dead, from illness, old age, etc. Is the "right of return" limited to those 750,000, or does it extend to children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren who weren't even born in 1948, and have never seen nor lived in Israel?

  And if we are willing to extend the right of return to a generation that wasn't even born in 1948 -- for example, a Palestinian born yesterday -- doesn't that simultaneously legitimize the Jews' claim to return to land from which they were expelled centuries ago?  

  Finally, if the return of Palestinian refugees results in the displacement of Israelis, doesn't that redress of one injustice simply create another one? We have one big endless game of musical chairs, only the lyrics are "you fucked me over, now it's my turn to fuck you over."

  by Paul in Berkeley on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:32:03 PM PDT

  •  I wouldn't call the situation

    of a third generation Palestinian refugee, who might very well be living in their grandparents' home or at least knows their first and last names and has a good idea of not only the village they lived in but may also have the legal papers giving her title to their land, comparable in any way to my own rather tenuous relationship to my distant ancestors expulsion from Roman Palestine.  I accept that such ancestors exist, of course, but I have no idea who they were, where they lived, or even when they left.  I'm not even sure how many of my ancestors from the first century even lived in Roman Palestine, as I undoubtedly have forebears from Russia, Poland, and -- if one unreliable genealogist is to be believed -- the Iberian peninsula.

    The question of displacing Israelis is a real one, and however this situation reaches final resolution those competing claims over property have to be addressed in a way that is fair to all parties.

    by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 05:17:36 PM PDT

    •  It's a slippery slope

      Why a third generation and not a fourth generation? What if another 30 years elapses -- will the great-great-grandchildren be entitled to return, or do we cut them off at great grandchildren?  The line gets drawn somewhere, and someone gets cut off.

      I can trace my family back to eastern Europe, on one side, more than 60 years before the creation of Israel.  Can I get my village back?  If I went back there, would it even be recognizable?

      Somewhere in Lebanon, there's a 16 year old kid obsessing over a key to a house he's never even seen, that his mother and father never saw either.  Is there an Israeli family living in his house today?  What if it's an Arab family living in it by now? Should the Arab family be kicked out, or is that only for the Jews?  Is the house even there?? Maybe its a supermarket now, or a playground, or a road.  

      The painful truth of the matter is this -- only a small portion of those 750,000 will be permitted to return to what is now Israel.  The rest, and their children and grandchildren and so on, are going to have to live somewhere else, maybe Palestine, maybe another country.  And they will get some form of compensation.  It may not be fair, it may not be just, and it certainly isn't perfect, but that's what will happen. The sooner that teenager accepts that reality, the sooner there will be peace.

      by Paul in Berkeley on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 05:51:50 PM PDT

      •  They should all be permitted to return to Israel

        even though not all will be able to return to their former homes.

        Everyone descended from a 1948 refugee, not to mention the refugees themselves, should be entitled to fair compensation for the property the State of Israel expropriated from them in 1948.

        Do it now, and we won't have to worry what to do about future generations.

        by litho on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 06:32:33 PM PDT

•  False premise

  This is what the international community insisted upon, sometimes using military force, in implementing the return of refugees to Bosnia, Kosovo, Burundi, Cambodia, East Timor, Georgia, Guatemala, Mozambique, Ruwanda, South Africa, Tajikistan, Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan.

  While I can't speak to each of these situations, certainly in the case of Bosnia and Kosovo there has been no meaningful or widespread return of refugees.

  In Bosnia, the country is still split into an ethnically cleansed Republic Serbska, and a Muslim-Croat Federation.  The only place any significant numbers of people have return is in Dayton Accord Daydreams.

  In Kosovo, most Serbs have left, under coersive pressure, and aren't coming back.

  In Iraq, there are at least two million refugees and we're way too busy looking for IEDs and trying to train government troops to try to restore any of them to their former residences.

  In Kuwait and Afghanistan we see people who were refugees when their side lost respective struggles who come back when their side won again.  That isn't the same as internationally sanctioned repatriation.

  I don't recall large numbers of refugees in the case of South Africa, but would be happy to be informed otherwise.

  There is often talk of repatriation, but it doesn't seem to happen very often.

  by ohwilleke on Thu Mar 29, 2007 at 04:33:06 PM PDT

•  My main question

  for the diarist, and the original author, is:  Why did the villagers think they could return in two weeks, and isn't that really the heart of the problem.?

  And by the way, those are both rhetorical questions, I know the answers.

  by dfb1968 on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 04:23:29 AM PDT

  •  I think in the case...

    ...of Birim, there was a legitimate reason for expecting to return.

    The villagers of Ikrit and Birim left their villages based on an understanding with the Haganah that the evacuation was temporary and that they could return.

    Ikrit and Birim are not, as Dr. Sitta says, microcosms of the conflict.  In those cases there was an understanding, even if not an outright agreement.  The villages were not belligerent or used by belligerents, and the residents cooperated based on an understanding that they could return as part of the new state.

    by JPhurst on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 06:07:01 AM PDT

•  Al Nakba

  is in your tags but not in your story. What is it?

  (It showed up in tag cloud infor this morning as a singleton. In the course of tag-cloud clean up duty, I came by and read your story. For which I thank you.)

  by CalifSherry on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 07:28:32 AM PDT

  •  Al-Nakba

    Is what the Palestinians call their failed war against Israel.  It means "the catastrophe."  It treats the war as if it was something that happened TO them, rather than something they partook in.

    They have a similar word for the failed Arab war in 1967, which translates to "the setback."

    by JPhurst on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 08:31:14 AM PDT

  •  Al-Nakba

    You're quite welcome.  Al-Nakba means "catastrophe" in Arabic.  For Palestinians it marks their dispossesion when the state of Israel was created in 1948 although the seeds for the catastrophe were planted before its actual creation when Zionists started their colonisation in Palestine in the late 1880's with the express purpose of creating a Jewish state.  Problem was there were already people there and according to one of the early Zionists, who began to have doubts about Zionist colonisation, Ahad Haim, the land was already cultivated.

    Al-Nakba resulted in the depopulation of 675 villages of their Palestinian Arab inhabitants and at least 418 villages were completely destroyed to ensure that their people did not return.  All of this is meticulously detailed in Walid Khalidi's All That Remains.  In addition, David Ben Gurion, aka David Gruen, formed a committee to replace all of the Arabic names of Palestinian towns and villages with Hebrew names in an attempt to Judaise Palestine.  Many of the Arabic place names were commemorations of important events, etc.  His committee was not able to come up with enough Hebrew for all of the Arabic names and Dr. Salman Abu Sitta's Atlas of Palestine's is filled with maps with the original names restored.  

    This is a video from the fifties, Sands of Sorrow, which shows the immediate result of Al-Nakba.

    Sands of Sorrow

    by umkahlil on Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 11:25:26 AM PDT