Transcript Arab-Israeli Conflict

Arab-Israeli Conflict
Shoah
The Nazis
• In 1933 the Nazis came
to power in Germany.
• Immigration exploded
as Jews sought to
escape Europe.
Between 1933 and
1936 140,000 new
immigrants arrived.
• The Palestinians
believed they were
being swamped.
The Holocaust.
• Nazi Germany, and Hitler, perpetrated the worst
‘Pogrom’ in living memory by systematically
trying to eliminate all Jewish people.
• The factory-like process by which Jewish men,
women and children were identified, labelled,
moved, stored, abused and finally killed became
called the ‘Holocaust’.
• Over 6 million Jewish people died.
• The Germans did not succeed in eliminating the
Jews however.
Nazi Concentration
& Extermination Camps
A German death camp at the end
of World War II.
German people are
brought, by the
Americans, to see
the horror of Nazi
brutality against the
Jews in a
concentration camp.
The Nazi Holocaust
 6,000,00 Jews killed
by the Nazis [1/2 in
the concentration
camps.]
World War II
• The discovery of Hitler’s death camps profoundly
shocked the world and highlighted the case of
the Jewish people who had survived.
• Many Jewish people began seeking refuge in
Palestine.
• The Arab states near Palestine were,
meanwhile, throwing off colonial rule and getting
together to preserve Palestine for the Arabs.
World war II 1939-1945
The British Empire was severely shocked by the
war and needed men fast.
It was proposed that Palestine could be a
recruiting base for Jewish soldiers.
The government agreed and a Jewish Brigade was
established. It was even allowed the Zionist
emblem as its flag.
By the end of the war the British sought to break
up the Brigade. They confiscated equipment- but
military knowledge they couldn’t erase.
Redemption---Post WWII
• After World War Two Holocaust
survivors desperate to get out
off Europe and with the gates of
the world closed to them
headed for Palestine.
• Most arrived as illegal
immigrants and had to be
smuggled into the country.
• The fate of the refugee ship The
Exodus became an international
scandal after the British beat its
passengers on to prison ships
and then returned them to
camps in Germany. A US
newspaper ran the headline,
“Back to the Reich.”
The refugee ship ‘Exodus’.
Meanwhile Jewish
refugees continued to
arrive from war-torn
Europe.
Many arrived with, or
without, British
permission to land.
This was like adding
petrol (gas) to a
smouldering fire. It would
make it burst into flame.
British “Detention” Camps
in Cyprus : 1946-1948
Jewish refugees being stopped from entering Palestine by a
British soldier.
British soldiers arresting refugees as
they land illegally in Palestine.
Jews & Arabs in Palestine,
1920
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In 1920, there
was 1 Jew to
every 10 Arabs in
Palestine.

By 1947, the ratio
was 2 Arabs for
every Jew.
The Arabs felt
that they were
loosing control of
their “country!”
Jewish refugees arriving in
Palestine.
A Jewish refugee centre. 1947
Terrorism---1947 UN Issue
• In Palestine Jewish
paramilitaries waged a war
to drive the British out.
• Notorious incidents were
the blowing up of the King
David Hotel and the
hanging of two British
soldiers.
• Britain unable to crush the
revolt chose to hand over
the problem of Palestine to
the UN.
Jewish “Freedom Fighters”
(or “Terrorists”?)
Irgun Zvai Leumi
[Natl. Military Org.]
Avraham Stern &
The Stern Gang
The United Nations Plan of 1947
• The world was sick of war by 1945 and the prospect of another
starting in the Middle East cheered no-one up.
• The United nations decided to partition Palestine as a way to
separate the warring Arabic and Jewish peoples.
• Neither the British, nor the United Nations implemented this plan,
and the cavalier way in which it was seen to be an outside
imposition did not appeal to Jew or Arab.
• British limits on immigration also further angered Zionist groups.
• The idea of an ‘international’ city (Jerusalem) was also found to be
unworkable. Neither side could recognise others’ control of their
most special places.
• The rejection of the plan laid the path clear for the Arab-Israeli war
of 1948
The UN Partition Plan
• In November 1947 the UN voted to
partition Palestine.
• The Jewish State was to have 54% of
the land, including the best land, even
though:
• the Jewish Agency only owned
between 6 -8% of the land;
• the Jewish population of Palestine was
only just a third of the total population;
• the proposed Jewish State would only
just have a bare majority of 15,000 over
its non-Jewish inhabitants.
• The Zionist Agency again accepted the
principle of partition, though not its
borders. The Palestinians rejected it
outright. Violence between the
communities began the next day.
Orange marks
Jewish settlers’
land.
Yellow marks Arab
Palestinian land.
UN Plan for Palestine (1947)
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Partition (separate) the area into 2 countries
Israel (Jewish State) and Palestine (Arab State)
55% of land goes to the Jews
45% of land goes to the Arabs
Total Population: 1.8 million
• 1.2 million Arabs living in area
• 600,00 Jews living in area
Jerusalem:“international city” controlled by UN
Accepted by Jews
Rejected by Arabs
No Arab on committee
Arab Claim the Partition Plan is Unfair
•
The Jewish
representative
addressing the
UN in 1947:
Area
“17,000,000 Arabs now
occupy an area of 1,290,000
square miles, including all the
principal Arab and Moslem
centers.
600,000 Jews now occupy an
area of 10,000 square miles in
Palestine.
Jews
Arabs
Population
Jews
Arabs
Yet the UN proposed to reduce it by one half and to
eliminate Western Galilee from the Jewish State.
That was an injustice and a grievous handicap to the
development of the Jewish State.”
Dr. Abba Hillel Silver, October 2, 1947
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The Arab League 1947
• The Arab states now combined together to
form the “Arab league”
• The Arab league consisted of Syria,
Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi
Arabia and Yemen, and it became a
formidable Arab force arranged against
the Jewish settlers.
The Arab league today (in green) and Israel in blue.
This huge imbalance between the Jewish settlers in 1947 and their
Arab adversaries has changed little.
The UN Plan
for partition
1947.
Post World War Two
• WWII – large portion of Jewish population flees
Nazism for Palestine, many join Zionist
movement, seek new life
– Wounded Britain pulls out of Palestine completely by
1948
– Organized fighting with armies and weapons begins,
bombings, massacres, spontaneous fighting from
both sides
– State of Israel declares independence May 14, 1948
• Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia all
declare war on Israel
• United States immediately recognizes new state, followed by
USSR
• Israeli War of Independence 1948 - 1949
Deir Yassin and Plan Dalet--1948
• In April 1948 Zionist/Israeli
forces unleashed Plan Dalet
to remove ‘hostile’
populations from around
their communication routes.
• On the 9 April the peaceful
village of Deir Yassin was
overrun and its population
massacred. News of the
massacre led to panic and
widespread flight amongst
the Palestinian community.
• In other areas where the
community refused to flee
they were forced out; in
Jaffa, Haifa and Acre literally
pushed into the sea.
Israel Becomes a Nation:
May 14, 1948
Chaim Weizmann,
1st President
David Ben-Gurion,
1st Prime Minister
May 14, 1948-Israeli Independence
Day.
• The Arabic Palestinians, led by the Arab Higher
Committee, moved first. There was a wave of
anti-Jewish protests, Jewish shops were looted,
and Jewish people attacked.
• The Jewish provisional government decided that
they had to act independently. They felt that they
had to act for themselves- and not wait for the
British to leave.
• May 14, 1948 The Prime Minister Ben Gurion
declared the Independence of Israel,only one
day before the end of the mandate, and in a
climate of fear and violence.
David Ben-Gurion declares Israel’s
Independence May 14, 1948
Israel was quickly recognised by the USA and Russia.
They were powerful, and rich, friends.
War Begins!: May 15, 1948
1948-9 Israeli War of
Independence.
• Arab League countries declared war on
the new Israel immediately. Egypt, Iraq,
Syria, Jordan and Lebanon all planned
invasions.
• The idea was to crush Israel before it
could become established.
1948 Arab Invasion plans of Israel ( in red.)
From Lebanon and Syria
From
Transjordan
and Iraq
From Egypt
Israeli Defence Force. (IDF)
•Ben Gurion realised immediately that Israel needed to concentrate all
her soldiers. All armed units- Zionist, or otherwise -were
amalgamated into one force, the IDF. Arab forces were,
conversely, dispersed and under separate control.
•To begin with the Israelis relied on what they had learned in WWII and
from helping the British army. Equipment was scarce and
usually old. In time, however, more supplies arrived and Israel’s
military technology by 1949 was superior to the Arabs’.
•But before this happened the Israelis relied on sheer enthusiasm and
superior military intelligence. Israel won the air war, for
example, by better strategy, rather than better technology.
The war itself.
• It was a disaster for the Arabic nations.
The Israeli forces were far stronger than
any of them expected.
• Many Jews had fought in World War II and
they had reasonable weaponry-mostly
also from World war II.
• The Jewish army also greatly increased in
size, whereas the Arab forces grew only
slowly..
Results of the war.
• Only the Jordanians and the Egyptians made
any real gains. The Jordanians grabbed East
Jerusalem and the ‘West Bank’ land. The
Egyptians gained a strip of coast-line called
the ‘Gaza strip’.
• Elsewhere the Arabic forces were all pushed
back.
• 1949 the United Nations declared a cease-fire
on the ‘Green Line’.
• Israel signed armistice agreements with all the
Arab states.
• Israel had expanded by another 25%!
Israel
Gaza Strip-Egyptian
‘West Bank’-Jordanian
Nakba ‘disaster’
• Up to ¾ of a million Arab Palestinians lost
their homes in the war and fled South or
East.
• Massive refugee camps sprang up and
conditions were horrific.
• These camps proved ideal places for Arab
resistance movements to begin recruiting
members.
Nakba (The Catastrophe)
• As Plan Dalet continued
more and more of
Palestine was ethnically
cleansed.
• Over half of the
Palestinian refugees had
already been forced out
before Israel declared its
independence.
• Even after this, despite
promises of equal
citizenship, Palestinians
continued to be expelled.
Nakba
• “We walked outside, Ben Gurion
accompanying us. Allon repeated his
question: ‘What is to be done with the
population?’ Ben Gurion waved his
hand in a gesture which said, ‘Drive
them out.’ The population of Lod
(Lydda) did not leave willingly. There
was no way of avoiding the use of force
and warning shots in order to make the
inhabitants march the ten or fifteen miles
to the point where they met up with the
Legion.” Yitzhak Rabin.
• Nakba statistics:
• Approximately 750,000 Palestinians
expelled;
• 400 villages completely destroyed;
• All the major cities in what became Israel
ethnically cleansed;
• 78% of Palestine incorporated into Israel
Divergent Narratives: Nakba and
Redemption
• For Israelis the creation of the
Jewish State and the
successful conclusion of the
first Arab-Israeli War meant
redemption and a country
free of persecution for Jews
world wide.
• Chaim Weizmann called the
Palestinian expulsion: “A
miraculous clearing of the
land.”
• David Ben Gurion said of the
refugees: “The old will die the
young will forget.”
• For Palestinians it meant
dispersion, dispossession
and homelessness.
Nakba
• As Palestinians began life in
refugee camps UN General
Assembly Resolution 194
affirmed their right of return. A
right also affirmed in Article 13
of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights: “Everyone has
the right to leave any country,
including his own, and to return
to his own country.”
• Today there are 7.2 million
Palestinian refugees, 4.7
million of them still living as
registered refugees in camps.
The Right of Return
• The Right of Return remains the central
demand of the Palestinian people. A right
Israel absolutely refuses to acknowledge.
• Speaking before the UN General Assembly,
PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat put the Nakba
and the refugees at the heart of the conflict.
In 1948, he explained, the Israelis “occupied
524 Arab towns and villages, of which they
destroyed 385, completely obliterating them
in the process. Having done so, they built
their own settlements and colonies on the
ruins of our farms and our groves. The roots
of the Palestine question lie here. Its causes
do not stem from any conflict between two
religions or two nationalisms. Neither is it a
border conflict between neighbouring States.
It is the cause of people deprived of its
homeland, dispersed and uprooted, and
living mostly in exile and in refugee camps.”
Palestinian
Arab
refugees.
The seeds of years of
future discontent ?
More refugees…..
• Meanwhile Jewish people fled in the
opposite directions- into Israel or back to
Europe, or even to the USA.
• Israel’s population doubled as Arabic
states all expelled their Jewish population.
Point of principal.
• For now, Israel had won her right to exist.
• The Arab league had to think again before
challenging this right.
• Palestinians who had lost homes were a
strong voice of protest against the new
state.
• Ben Gurion was a national hero.
Perspectives on Partition and
1948 War
Israeli
Palestinian
 Creates state of Israel
 War of Independence
 Holocaust and other
periods of violence
against Jews throughout
the past centuries might
not have happened if
there was a Jewish
Homeland
• They had no input
• Nabka: “Catastrophe”
• Land set aside for
Palestinians now under
control of Arab countries
or Israel
Reflection
• Write for three minutes about BOTH of the
following questions.
– If you were Israeli, how might you feel about the
creation of the state of Israel and the war that
began the next day?
– If you were Palestinian, how might you feel
about the creation of the state of Israel and the
war that began the next day?