Israel's new historians now refute myths of the founding of the state

"Since the 1980's, from the heart of the Israeli intellectual elite came a position adopting many of the political and ideological claims made by movements that represented the victims of official Zionism... Israeli scholars concurred with their Palestinian counterparts that Zionism was...carried out as a pure colonialist act against the local population: a mixture of exploitation and expropriation...

...They were motivated to present a revisionist point of view to a large extent by the declassification of relevant archival material in Israel, Britain and the United States. For example, challenging the Myth of Annihilation - The new historiographical picture is a fundamental challenge to the official history that says the Jewish community faced possible annihilation on the eve of the 1948 war. Archival documents expose a fragmented Arab world wrought by dismay and confusion and a Palestinian community that possessed no military ability with which to frighten the Jews...

...Israel's responsibility for Refugees - The Jewish military advantage was translated into an act of mass expulsion of more than half of the Palestinian population. The Israeli forces, apart from rare exceptions, expelled the Palestinians from every village and town they occupied. In some cases, this expulsion was accompanied by massacres of civilians as was the case in Lydda, Ramleh, Dawimiyya, Sa'sa, Ein Zietun and other places. Expulsion also was accompanied by rape, looting and confiscation of Palestinian land and property...

...The Myth of Arab Intransigence - The U.N. convened a peace conference in Lausanne, Switzerland in the spring of 1949. Before the conference, the U.N. General Assembly adopted a resolution that in effect replaced the November 1947 partition resolution. This new resolution, Resolution 194 of December 11, 1948, accepted (U.N. Mediator) Bernadotte's triangular basis for a comprehensive peace: an unconditional return of all the refugees to their homes, the internationalization of Jerusalem, and the partitioning of Palestine into two states. This time, several Arab states and various representatives of the Palestinians accepted this as a basis for negotiations, as did the United States, which was running the show at Lausanne... Prime Minister David Ben Gurion strongly opposed any peace negotiations along these lines... The only reason he was willing to allow Israel to participate in the peace conference was his fear of an angry American reaction... The road to peace was not taken due to Israeli, not Arab, intransigence...

...Conclusions - The new Israeli historians wish to rectify what their research reveals as past evils... There was a high price exacted in creating a Jewish state in Palestine. And there were victims, the plight of whom still fuels the fire of conflict in Palestine."  Israeli historian, Ilan Pappe in "The Link, January 1998"

Zionism's 'historical right' to Palestine

"Zionism's 'historical right' to Palestine was neither historical nor a right. It was not historical inasmuch as it voided the two millennia of non-Jewish settlement in Palestine and the two millennia of Jewish settlement outside it. It was not a right, except in the Romantic 'mysticism' of 'blood and soil' and the Romantic 'cult' of 'death, heroes and graves'... The claim of Jewish homelessness is founded on a cluster of assumptions that both negates the liberal idea of citizenship and duplicates the anti-Semitic one that the state belongs to the majority ethnic nation. In a word, the Zionist case for a Jewish state is as valid as the anti-Semitic case for an ethnic state that marginalizes Jews."  Professor Norman Finkelstein  "Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict"

The answer ? A sovereign Palestinian state 

"The final destination of a Palestinian-Israeli peace settlement has begun to emerge from the political haze. Such a settlement must give the Palestinian people a sovereign, uncontested, independent state of their own. This is a matter of justice and practicality. If a truly lasting and stable peace is the goal, there is no other option. The mere trappings of statehood will not suffice. The state has to be real and workable. The following are its essential conditions...

...Territorial integrity and contiguity. Any further dissection of Palestinian territory would make it politically and economically impossible to maintain a state. There can be no civilian pockets under Israeli rule on Palestinian land...

...A sovereign capital in Jerusalem. East Jerusalem is Palestine's historical, spiritual and commercial heart. To exclude it from a Palestinian state is unthinkable...

...Justice and fairness for refugees. As a matter of principle, the Palestinians right to return or be compensated for their lost homes and land is nonnegotiable. Israel must acknowledge the suffering and hardship Palestinian refugees have faced as a result of their eviction from their homeland, and must assist in their rehabilitation and reabsorption."  A.S. Khalidi  "Op-Ed piece in the New York Times, February 11, 1997"

For Jewish Readers

As we have seen, the root cause of the Palestine-Israel conflict is clear. During the 1948 war, 750,000 Palestinians fled in terror or were actively expelled from their ancestral homeland and turned into refugees. The state of Israel then refused to allow them to return and either destroyed their villages entirely or expropriated their land, orchards, houses, businesses and personal possessions for the use of the Jewish population. This was the birth of the state of Israel.

We know it is hard to accept emotionally, but in this case the Jewish people are in the wrong. We took most of Palestine by force from the Arabs and blamed the victims for resisting their dispossession. If you run into someone's car, for whatever reason, simple justice demands that you repair it. Our moral obligation to the Palestinian people is no less clear. It is time for all Jewish people of good conscience to apologize and to make whatever amends are possible to the Palestinians in order to live up to the best part of the Jewish tradition - its ethical and moral basis.

Any criticism of Israel is traditionally seen by American Jews as harmful to the Jewish people, even if the criticism is true. But "my people, right or wrong, my people" is no different than "my country, right or wrong, my country". Once we start down the slippery slope where the ends justify the means we have left behind any claim to morality. Besides the tremendous suffering of the Palestinian people, the other tragedy of Zionism is that it has so corroded our commitment to our ethical principles. Along with millions of other American Jews unaffiliated with the major U.S. Jewish organizations, we feel that the Israeli government's habitual belligerence is an embarrassment and that their inhuman oppression of the Palestinians has been the ruination of the moral standing of the Jewish people.

The Israeli government could solve the Palestine/Israel crisis tomorrow. It actually would be in the best interests of its citizens to do so because random acts of terrorism against Israelis would cease if Palestinian demands for a viable, independent state were accepted and compensation for Arab losses made.

The position of the Jewish community in America would also be enhanced, not threatened, if the above program were adopted. We have been thoroughly assimilated into the mainstream of society and hold positions of power and influence in every field of endeavor. We do not need to be in a defensive mode anymore - we can afford to change. At the very least, the American Jewish community needs to let the Israeli government know that we will not support them (literally or figuratively) if they continue to jeopardize the chance for a just peace by further encroachments on Arab territory. And that all human rights abuses must cease at once.

Conclusion

We hope that this look at the historical record concerning the root cause of the Middle East conflict will give second thoughts to all who have previously supported Israel's actions.

The persecution of the Jews for centuries in Europe was the worst of many stains on the European record, and the Zionists' desire for a place of sanctuary is certainly understandable. Like all other colonial enterprises, however, Zionism was based on the total disregard of the rights of indigenous inhabitants. As such, it is morally indefensible. And, as previously stated, all subsequent crimes - and there have been many on both sides - inevitably follow from this original injustice to the Palestinians.

Given the damage that has been done to the Palestinian people, Israel's obligation is to make whatever amends possible. Among these should be assisting the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state in the entire West Bank and Gaza with its capital in East Jerusalem. Israel should not object to this state and, in addition, should help with its foundation via generous reparations. Besides being the right thing to do, this would stop the sporadic acts of violence against Israel, as the Palestinians' legitimate desire for their own state would be realized. Moreover, all laws that discriminate against non-Jews living in Israel should be repealed. All citizens should enjoy full and equal rights, as should any Palestinians who wish to return to their ancestral homeland. These refugees should, as a matter of principle, be compensated for their lost homes and land.

As U.S. citizens, we have a special obligation to see that justice is done in this matter. U.S. financial aid to Israel has been, and continues to be, enormous; and our diplomatic support allows Israel's continued occupation of Arab territories. We strongly recommend that you contact your elected representatives in Washington and urge them to pressure Israel to abide by the consensus of world opinion, as shown by numerous UN votes, as a precondition of continued support.

American Jews in particular have a special responsibility to acknowledge the Palestinian point of view in order to help move the debate forward. As Chomsky writes in his Peace in the Middle East?, "In the American Jewish community, there is little willingness to face the fact that the Palestinian Arabs have suffered a monstrous historical injustice, whatever one may think of the competing claims. Until this is recognized, discussion of the Middle East crisis cannot even begin."

In the long run, only by admitting their culpability and making amends can Israelis live with their neighbours in peace. Only then can the centuries-old Jewish tradition of being a people of high moral character be restored. And only in this way can real security, peace and justice come to this ancient land.