NO CONSPIRACY POUCE CONSPIRACY NO CONSPIRACY fight back. But suppose you lost?
So imagine Palestinians felt like when became Darruly cical Lu them that the Zionist Yishuv i community.
Palestine, pre-1948, was working towards creating an exclusive Zionist state where there would be place Ior them They fought back against this colonisation and rule the Palestinian Rebellion and General Strike of 1936-39. Suppose someone came along and asked you or Belgium — to become homeless, unemployed and suffer all the misery that goes with be. ing a refugee. Your first reaction would probably be what the hell are they talking about and what a stupid question. On realising they weren't joking, your disbelief would turn to anger, fear and panic and you would probably few miles away from their old homes, now bulldozed or inhabited by an Israeli family. 19/0 a play was shown on Israeli TV called Khirbet Hiza. It was based on a fictitious village in 1948. It showed vlare bene allacked by the Haganah army and the villagers being loaded onto trucks, later to be thrown across the border The play caused a scandal!
Generations of Israelis and we In the West had been told inal tne raiesl nians left of their own "Tree will that the Arat liberation army had evacuation According to Chaim Weizmann, president of Israel, the flight of the was 'miraculous simplificaFew questioned the fact that it takes more than 'suade nearly one million 'encouragement people to give up everything for the squalor of refugee camps. did SO many Palestinians flee? FOI similar reasons to those of the thousands in Lebanor trying to seek refuge in Beirut todav - they were attacked!
The casualties suffered by the Palestinians in the 1936-39 Rebellion was decisive factor in their 1948 defeat. Their strength was greatly weakened and they were up against superior military force The Zionists steadily built up their arms.
Haganah army, the Jewish sentencl several Zionist paramilitary or callio were trained by the British and bi UHIC Brit. ticular, Orde Wingate In November 1947 the United Nations proposed the Partition Plan which divided Jewish state and an Arab Palestine into The Zionists prepared Plan Dalet which consisted of 13 military operations aimed capturing the land allocated to the Arabs and to empty the Jewish area of Arab inhabitants Not all the operations succeeded But the Zionists gained control of 3 major Arab coastal cities (Haifa, Jaffa and Acre and the two main ciles il Eastern Galilee (Safed and Tiberias) thus cutting off supply centres to the coun tryside Terror was used deliberately mass killings and rape were com mon. In the massacre of Deir Yassin around people were brutally murdered - this was the tactic to persuade male heads of families to Wal no harm children and the wullicil old no longer applied)
Fighters The majority villagers were poorly arm ed and lacked leadership The only organised Palestinian military force the Jaysh al-Jihad with no more than 5,000 fighters.
The other force was the Arab liberation army sent in by the Arab states to de fend the Palestinians. Badly trained and with no intention of arming and organising the villagers (in some cases they actually took arms away from the Palestinians!) their so called defence was a fiasco.
no leadership antiquated arms, attack: and a campaign of terror against them the Palesti • fled or were dumped in truckloads into the neighbouring Arab states This the Palestinians the 'Disaster' '. This is why they are in Lebanon today. The majority believed they would be able lo go Daci to their homes but they are sulli walling and st suffering from Zionist ag gression the worst assault the Palestinians have faced in recent years the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.
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to voluntarily leave your home, job and which- ever part of Britain you lived in to go to France
family and honour before RIALISM