The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine

by Ilan Pappe

  11. Yehosua Porath, The Emergence of the Palestinian Arab National Movement, 1919–1929.

  12. Eliakim Rubinstein, ‘The Treatment of the Arab Question in Palestine in the post-1929 Period’ in Ilan Pappe (ed.), Arabs and Jews in the Mandatory Period –A Fresh View on the Historical Research (Hebrew).

  13. On Peel see Charles D. Smith, Palestine and the Arab–Israeli Conflict, pp. 135–7.

  14. Barbara Smith, The Roots of Separatism in Palestine: British Economic Policy, 1920–1929.

  15. This connection is made by Uri Ben-Eliezer, The Making of Israeli Militarism.

  16. John Bierman and Colin Smith, Fire in the Night: Wingate of Burma, Ethiopia and Zion.

  17. Hagana Archives, File 0014, 19 June 1938.

  18. Ibid.

  19. The Bulletin of the Hagana Archives, issues 9–10, (prepared by Shimri Salomon) ‘The Intelligence Service and the Village Files, 1940–1948’ (2005).

  20. For a critical survey of the JNF see Uri Davis, Apartheid Israel: Possibilities for the Struggle Within.

  21. Kenneth Stein, The Land Question in Palestine, 1917–1939.

  22. This correspondence is in the Central Zionist Archives and is used in Benny Morris, Correcting A Mistake, p. 62, notes 12–15.

  23. Ibid.

  24. Hagana Archives, File 66.8

  25. Hagana Archives, Village Files, File 24/9, testimony of Yoeli Optikman, 16 January 2003.

  26. Hagana Archives, File 1/080/451, 1 December 1939.

  27. Hagana Archives, File 194/7, pp. 1–3, interview given on 19 December 2002.

  28. See note 15.

  29. Hagana Archives, S25/4131, 105/224 and 105/227 and many others in this series each dealing with a different village.

  30. Hillel Cohen, The Shadow Army: Palestinian Collaborators in the Service of Zionism.

  31. Interview with Palti Sela in the Hagana Archives, File 205.9, 10 January 1988.

  32. See note 27.

  33. Hagana Archives, Village Files, 105/255 files from January 1947.

  34. IDF Archives, 49/5943/114, orders from 13 April 1948.

  35. See note 27.

  36. Ibid., File 105.178.

  37. Quoted in Harry Sacher, Israel: The Establishment of Israel, p. 217.

  38. Smith, Palestine and the Arab–Israeli Conflict, pp. 167–8.

  39. Yossef Weitz, My Diary, vol. 2, p. 181, 20 December 1940.

  40. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 12 July 1937, and in New Judea, August– September 1937, p. 220.

  41. Shabtai Teveth, Ben-Gurion and the Palestinian Arabs: From Peace to War.

  42. Hagana Archives, File 003, 13 December 1938.

  43. On British policy see Ilan Pappe, Britain and the Arab–Israeli Conflict, 1948–1951.

  44. Interview of Moshe Sluzki with Moshe Sneh, in Gershon Rivlin (ed.), Olive-Leaves and Sword: Documents and Studies of the Hagana, and Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 10 October 1948.

  45. See Yoav Gelber, The Emergence of a Jewish Army, pp. 1–73.

  46. Michael Bar-Zohar, Ben-Gurion: A Political Biography, vol. 2, pp. 639–66 (Hebrew).

  47. See Pappe, Britain and the Arab–Israeli Conflict.

  48. Yehuda Sluzki, The Hagana Book, vol. 3, part 3, p. 1942.

  49. See chapter four.

  CHAPTER 3

  1. Palestine was divided into several administrative districts. In 1947 these were the percentages of Jews in them: Safad 12%; Acre 4%; Tiberias 33%; Baysan 30%; Nazareth 16%; Haifa 47%; Jerusalem 40%; Lyyd 72% (this includes Jaffa, Tel-Aviv and Petah Tikva); Ramla 24% and Beersheba 7.5%.

  2. See Ilan Pappe, The Making of the Arab– Israeli Conflict, 1947–1951, pp. 16–46.

  3. See United Nations Archives: The UNSCOP Documents, Box 2.

  4. Walid Khalidi, ‘Revisiting the UNGA Partition Resolution’, Journal of Palestine Studies, 105 (Autumn 1997), p. 15. For more on UNSCOP and how, prompted by the Zionists, it maneuvered the UN towards the pro-Zionist solution of the partition of Palestine, see Pappe, The Making of the Arab–Israeli Conflict, pp. 16–46.

  5. Khalidi, ibid.

  6. Ibid.

  7. Plenary Meetings of the General Assembly, 126th Meeting, 28 November 1947, UN Official Record, vol. 2, pp. 1390–1400.

  8. Flapan, The Birth of Israel, pp. 13–54.

  9. See, for example, David Tal, War in Palestine, 1948: Strategy and Diplomacy, pp. 1–145.

  10. Bar-Zohar, Ben-Gurion, part II, pp. 660–1.

  11. See his speech in the Mapai Centre on 3 December, 1947.

  12. Private Archives, Middle East Centre, St. Antony’s College, Cunningham’s Papers, Box 2, File 3.

  13. Ibid.

  14. For an extensive analysis of the Arab reaction see Eugene L. Rogan and Avi Shlaim (eds.), The War For Palestine: Rewriting the History of 1948; see especially Charles Tripp, ‘Iraq and the 1948 War: Mirror of Iraq’s Disorder’; Fawaz A. Geregs, ‘Egypt and the 1948 War: Internal Conflict and Regional Ambition’ and Joshua Landis, ‘Syria and the Palestine War: Fighting King Abdullah’s “Greater Syria” Plan.

  15. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 7 October, 1947.

  16. Only once did Ben-Gurion refer to it by name. In an entry in his diary (1.1.1948) he called it ‘a party of experts’, Mesibat Mumhim. The editors of the published diary added that a party means a meeting of the experts on Arab Affairs. The document of that meeting shows a larger forum that included, in addition to the experts, certain members of the High Command. Indeed when the two groups met together they became what I have called the Consultancy.

  17. Ben-Gurion’s Diary refers to the following meetings: 18 June 1947, 1–3 December 1947, 11 December 1947, 18 December 1947, 24 December 1947 (which was reported in his diary on the 25th and dealt with fortifications in the Negev), 1 January 1948, 7 January 1948 (discussion on the future of Jaffa), 9 January 1948, 14 January 1948, 28 January 1948, 9–10 February 1948, 19 February 1948, 25 February 1948, 28 February 1948, 10 March 1948 and 31 March 1948. Pre and post correspondence of all the meetings mentioned in the diary are to be found in the Ben-Gurion Archives, the correspondence section and the private correspondence section. They fill many gaps in the sketchy diary references.

  18. Here is a reconstruction of the individuals who were part of the Consultancy: David Ben-Gurion, Yigael Yadin (Head of Operations), Yohanan Ratner (Strategic Adviser to Ben-Gurion), Yigal Allon (Head of the Palmach and Southern Front), Yitzhak Sadeh (Head of Armoured units), Israel Galili (Head of the High Command), Zvi Ayalon (Deputy to Galili and Commander of the Central Front). Others not part of the Matkal, the High Command, were Yossef Weitz (Head of settlement department in the Jewish Agency), Isar Harel (Head of intelligence) and his people: Ezra Danin, Gad Machnes and Yehoshua Palmon. In one or two meetings, Moshe Sharett and Eliahu Sasson were present too, although Ben-Gurion met Sasson almost every Sunday separately with Yaacov Shimoni in Jerusalem, as his diary testifies. Some officers from the field were also alternately called in to join: Dan Even (Commander of the Coastal Front), Moshe Dayan, Shimon Avidan, Moshe Carmel (Commander of the Northern Front), Shlomo Shamir and Yitzhak Rabin.

  19. The meeting is also reported in his book When Israel Fought, pp. 13–18.

  CHAPTER 4

  1. We have testimony from the British High Commissioner in Palestine, Sir Alan Cunningham, about how this protest, initially a strike, turned violent: ‘The initial Arab outbreaks were spontaneous and unorganized and were more demonstrations of displeasure at the UN decision than determined attacks on Jews. The weapons initially employed were sticks and stones and had it not been for Jewish recourse to firearms, it is not impossible that the excitement would have subsided and little loss of life been caused. This is more probably since there is reliable evidence that the Arab Higher Committee as a whole and the Mufti in particular, although pleased at the strong response to the strike call, were not in favour of serious outbreaks’; quoted in Nathan Krystal, ‘The Fall of the New City, 1947–1950,’ in Salim Tamari, Jersualem 1948. The Arab Neighbourhoods and their Fate
in the War, p. 96.

  2. This is discussed in detail in the next chapter.

  3. Bar-Zohar, Ben-Gurion, p. 663.

  4. Meir Pail, ‘External and Internal Features in the Israeli War of Independence’ in Alon Kadish (ed.), Israel’s War of Independence 1948–1949, pp. 485–7.

  5. Smith, Palestine and the Arab–Israeli Conflict, pp. 91–108.

  6. Avi Shlaim, Collusion.

  7. Avi Shlaim, ‘The Debate about 1948’ in Pappe (ed.), The Israel/Palestine Question, pp. 171–92.

  8. Rivlin and Oren, The War of Independence, vol. 1, p. 320, 18 March 1948; p. 397, 7 May 1948; vol. 2, p. 428, 15 May 1948.

  9. Ibid., 28 January 1948, p. 187.

  10. This included an arms deal worth $12,280,000, which the Hagana concluded with Czechoslovakia, purchasing 24,500 rifles, 5,200 machine guns and 54 million rounds of ammunition.

  11. See note 8.

  12. The order to the Intelligence Officers will be mentioned again. It can be found in the IDF Archives, File 2315/50/53, 11 January, 1948.y t

  13. As can be seen from his letters to Ben-Artzi quoted in Bar-Zohar, Ben-Gurion, p. 663 and to Sharett in Ben-Gurion Archives, Correspondence Section, 23.02–1.03.48 document 59, 26 February 1948.

  14. Ben-Gurion’s letters, ibid.

  15. Israeli State Archives Publications, Political and Diplomatic Documents of the Zionist Central Archives and Israeli State Archives, December 1947–May 1948, Jerusalem 1979 (Hebrew), Doc. 45, 14 December 47, p. 60.

  16. Masalha, Expulsion of the Palestinians.

  17. Bar-Zohar, Ben-Gurion, p. 702.

  18. On 12 July, 1937, there is a long entry in Ben-Gurion’s Diary in which he expresses the wish that the Jewish leadership would have the will and the power to transfer the Arabs from Palestine.

  19. The whole speech was published in his book, David Ben-Gurion, In the Battle, pp. 255–72.

  20. Central Zionist Archives, 45/1 Protocol, 2 November 1947.

  21. Flapan, The Birth of Israel, p. 87.

  22. Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited.

  23. That this was disconnected was reported to Ben-Gurion. See Ben-Gurion Archives, Correspondence Section, 1.12.47–15.12.47, Doc. 7, Eizenberg to Kaplan, 2 December 1947.

  24. Ben-Gurion’s Diary reports one such meeting on 2 December 1947 when the Orientalists suggested attacking water supplies and transport centres of the Palestinians.

  25. See Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 11 December 1947; for the assessment that most peasants did not wish to be involved in a war.

  26. Hagana Archives, 205.9.

  27. This meeting was reported in Ben-Gurion’s Diary a day later, on 11 December 1947; it may have taken place in a more limited forum.

  28. IDF Archives, 49/5492/9, 19 January 1948.

  29. See the website www.palestineremembered.com– an interactive site that invites oral history testimonies.

  30. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 11 December 1947, and the letter to Moshe Sharett, are from G. Yogev, Documents, December 1947–May 1948, Jerusalem: Israel State Archives 1980, p. 60.

  31. Reported in The New York Times, 22 December 1947. The Hagana report was sent to Yigael Yadin, on December 14; see the Hagana Archives, 15/80/731.

  32. IDF Archives, 51/957, File 16.

  33. Central Zionist Archives, Report S25/3569, Danin to Sasson, 23 December 1947.

  34. The New York Times, 20 December 1947, and speech by Ben-Gurion in the Zionist Executive, 6 April 1948.

  35. Ben-Gurion summarized the wednesday meeting in his Diary, 18 December 1947.

  36. Yaacov Markiviski, ‘The Campaign on Haifa in the Independence War’ in Yossi Ben-Artzi (ed.), The Development of Haifa, 1918–1948.

  37. Filastin, 31 December 1947.

  38. Milstein, The History of the Independence War, vol. 2, p. 78.

  39. Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, p. 156 and Uri Milstein, The History of the Independence War, vol. 2, p. 156.

  40. National committees were bodies of local notables that were established in various localities throughout Palestine in 1937, to act as a form of emergency leadership for the Palestinian community in each city.

  41. Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, p. 50 and Milstein, The History of the Independence War, vol. 3, pp. 74–5.

  42. Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, p. 55, note 11.

  43. Political and Diplomatic Documents, Document 274, p. 460.

  44. Ibid., Document 245, p. 410.

  45. Rivlin and Oren, The War of Independence, editorial remark, p. 9.

  46. The text of the Protocol for the Long Seminar is in Ha-Kibbutz Ha-Meuchad Archives, Aharon Zisling’s private collection.

  47. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 31 December 1947.

  48. Weitz, My Diary, vol. 2, p. 181.

  49. Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, p. 62.

  50. Ben-Gurion Archives, The Galili papers, Protocol of the meeting.

  51. Danin testimony for Bar-Zohar, p. 680, note 60.

  52. Ben-Gurion Archives, Correspondence Section, 16.1.48–22.1.48, Document 42, 26 January 1948.

  53. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 7 January 1948.

  54. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 25 January 1948.

  55. Rivlin and Oren, The War of Independence, p. 229, 10 February 1948.

  56. Ben-Gurion Archives, Correspondence Section, 1.1.48–31.1.48, Doc. 101, 26 January 1948.

  57. These were Yohanan Ratner, Yaacov Dori, Israeli Galili, Yigael Yadin, Zvi Leschiner (Ayalon) and Yitzhak Sadeh.

  58. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 9 January 1948.

  59. This appeared in their publication Mivrak.

  60. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 31 January 1948.

  61. Rivlin and Oren, The War of Independence, pp. 210–11.

  62. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 1 January 1948.

  63. See note 52.

  64. Bar-Zohar, Ben-Gurion, p. 681.

  65. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 30 January 1948.

  66. Ibid., 14 January 1948, 2 February 1948, and 1 June 1948.

  67. Information on the meetings in February is drawn from Ben-Gurion’s Diary.

  68. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 9 and 10 February 1948 and Haganah Book, pp. 1416–18.

  69. Hashomer Ha-Tza‘ir Archives, Files 66.10, meeting with Galili 5 February 1948 (reporting a day after the Matkal meeting on 4 February Wed.).

  70. Zvi Sinai and Gershon Rivlin (eds), The Alexandroni Brigade in the War of Independence, p. 220 (Hebrew).

  71. Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, pp. 53–4.

  72. Weitz, My Diary, vol. 3, p. 223, 11 January 1948.

  73. The figures listed in the official report were more modest, detailing the blowing up of forty houses, the killing of eleven villagers, and the wounding of another eighty.

  74. Israel Even Nur (ed.), The Yiftach-Palmach Story.

  75. Ben-Gurion’s Diary, 19 February 1948.

  76. Ibid.

  77. Khalidi (ed.), All That Remains, pp. 181–2.

  78. Weitz, My Diary, vol. 3, p. 223, 11 January 1947.

  79. Ibid, 239–40.

  80. Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, pp. 84–86.

  81. Pail, From the Hagana to the IDF, p. 307. See discussion of State D, next chapter.

  82. The English translation is in Walid Khalidi, ‘Plan Dalet: Master Plan for the Conquest of Palestine’, Journal of Palestine Studies, 18/69 (Autumn 1988), pp. 4–20.

  83. See chapter five.

  84. The Plan distributed to the soldiers and the first direct commands are in IDF Archives, 1950/2315 File 47, 11 May 1948.

  85. Yadin to Sasson IDF Archives, 16/69/261 The Nachshon Operations Files.