Tag: 1948 Palestine

1948 no catastrophe says Israel, as term nakba banned from Arab children’s textbooks

Ian Black | The Guardian

22 July 2009

Israel’s education ministry has ordered the removal of the word nakba – Arabic for the “catastrophe” of the 1948 war – from a school textbook for young Arab children, it has been announced.

The decision – which will alter books aimed at eight- and nine-year-old Arab pupils – will be seen as a blunt assertion by Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud-led government of Israel’s historical narrative over the Palestinian one.

The term nakba has a similar resonance for Palestinians as the Hebrew word shoah – normally used to describe the Nazi Holocaust – does for Israelis and Jews. Its inclusion in a book for the children of Arabs, who make up about a fifth of the Israeli population, drives at the heart of a polarised debate over what Israelis call their “war of independence”: the 1948 conflict which secured the Jewish state after the British left Palestine, and led to the flight of 700,000 Palestinians, most of whom became refugees.

Netanyahu spoke for many Jewish Israelis two years ago when he argued that using the word nakba in Arab schools was tantamount to spreading propaganda against Israel.

Palestinians have always maintained that the 1948 refugees were the victims of Israeli “ethnic cleansing”. But in recent years a new generation of revisionist Israeli historians has rejected the old official narrative that the Palestinians, supported by the neighbouring Arab states, were responsible for their own misfortune.

Reflecting those changing perceptions, Ehud Olmert, Israel’s last prime minister and leader of the centrist Kadima party, referred to Palestinian “suffering” at the Annapolis peace conference in 2007.

Netanyahu’s Likud takes a different view. “There is no reason to present the creation of the Israeli state as a catastrophe in an official teaching programme,” said the education minister, Gideon Saar. “The objective of the education system is not to deny the legitimacy of our state, nor promote extremism among Arab-Israelis.” There was bitter controversy in 2007 when nakba was introduced into a book for use in Arab schools only, by the then education minister, Yuli Tamir of the centre-left Labour party.

“In no country in the world does an educational curriculum refer to the creation of the country as a ‘catastrophe’,” Saar told MPs in the Knesset yesterday. “There is a difference between referring to specific tragedies that take place in a war – either against the Jewish or Arab population – as catastrophes, and referring to the creation of the state as a catastrophe.”

Arab MP Hana Sweid accused the government of “nakba denial”. The follow-up committee for Arab education said: “Palestinian-Arab society in Israel has every right to preserve its collective memory, including in its school curriculums.”

Jafar Farrah, director of Mossawa (Equality), an Israeli-Arab advocacy group, told Reuters the decision to excise the term nakba only “complicated the conflict”. He called it an attempt to distort the truth and seek confrontation with the country’s Arab population.

Yossi Sarid, a dovish former education minister, said the decision showed insecurity. “Zionism has already won in many ways, and can afford to be more confident,” he said. “We need not be afraid of a word.”

Israeli Arab activists have also pledged to carry on marking Nakba Day in the face of planned legislation that would withhold government money from institutions that fund activity deemed detrimental to the state.

These include commemorating the nakba – on the same day as Independence Day – “rejecting Israel’s existence as the state of the Jewish people” and supporting an “armed struggle or terrorist acts” against Israel. An initial version proposed by the far-right foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman would have banned all Nakba commemorations and carried sentences of up to three years in prison.

By the book

Japan has long been criticised for toning down aspects of its wartime atrocities in textbooks, particularly the Nanjing massacre and use of sex slaves. Russia has taken up Soviet techniques of airbrushing history, a book being banned two years ago for positing that Vladimir Putin had established an “authoritarian dictatorship”. A decade after Nelson Mandela’s release from prison, black schoolchildren in South Africa were still studying textbooks that extolled the voortrekkers and offered only minimal explanations of their own history. In Britain it was an exam paper that caused offence when a poem by Carol Ann Duffy containing referencing knife crime was removed from the GCSE syllabus. The Carol Ann Duffy poem began: “Today I am going to kill something. Anything./ I have had enough of being ignored and today/ I am going to play God.”

A harsh reality for Palestinians

Ahmad Tibi | The New York Times

6 April 2009

JERUSALEM — The right-wing coalition of the new Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, does not bode well for Palestinians in Israel. With the appointment of Avigdor Lieberman as foreign minister, the extremists are going after the indigenous population and threatening us with loyalty tests and the possibility of “transfer” into an area nominally controlled by the Palestinian Authority.

Netanyahu’s intransigence vis-à-vis Palestinians in the occupied territories is certainly cause for concern. No less concerning is what the Netanyahu-Lieberman combination may mean to Palestinian citizens of Israel.

This government, particularly with Lieberman as foreign minister, should be boycotted by the international community, just as it once boycotted Jörg Haider, the late Austrian far-right politician who won global notoriety for his anti-immigrant views.

Lieberman, in one of many outrageous comments, declared in May 2004 that 90 percent of Israel’s Palestinian citizens “have no place here. They can take their bundles and get lost.”

But my family and I were on this land centuries before Lieberman arrived here in 1978 from Moldova. We are among the minority who managed to remain when some 700,000 Palestinians were forced out by Israel in 1948.

Today, Lieberman stokes anti-Palestinian sentiment with his threat of “transfer” — a euphemism for renewed ethnic cleansing. Henry Kissinger, too, has called for a territorial swap, and Lieberman cites Kissinger to give his noxious idea a more sophisticated sheen. Lieberman and Kissinger envision exchanging a portion of Israel for a portion of the occupied West Bank seized illegally by Jewish settlers.

But Israel has no legal right to any of the occupied Palestinian territories. And Lieberman has no right to offer the land my home is on in exchange for incorporating Jewish settlers into newly defined Israeli state borders. We are citizens of the state of Israel and do not want to exchange our second-class citizenship in our homeland — subject as we are to numerous laws that discriminate against us — for life in a Palestinian Bantustan.

We take our citizenship seriously and struggle daily to improve our lot and overcome discriminatory laws and practices.

We face discrimination in all fields of life. Arab citizens are 20 percent of the population, but only 6 percent of the employees in the public sector. Not one Arab employee is working in the central bank of Israel. Imagine if there was not one African-American citizen employed in the central bank of the United States.

Israel is simultaneously running three systems of government. The first is full democracy toward its Jewish citizens — ethnocracy. The second is racial discrimination toward the Palestinian minority — creeping Jim Crowism. And the third is occupation of the Palestinian territories with one set of laws for Palestinians and another for Jewish settlers — apartheid.

A few weeks ago, Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu Party led the charge in the Israeli Knesset to ban my party — the Arab Movement for Renewal — from participating in the elections. Netanyahu’s Likud also supported the action. The Supreme Court overturned the maneuvers of the politicians. But their attempt to ban our participation should expose Israel’s democracy to the world as fraudulent.

Lieberman’s inveighing against Palestinian citizens of Israel is not new. Less than three years ago, he called for my death and the death of some of my Palestinian Knesset colleagues for daring to meet with democratically elected Palestinian leaders. Speaking before the Knesset plenum, Lieberman stated: “World War II ended with the Nuremberg trials. The heads of the Nazi regime, along with their collaborators, were executed. I hope this will be the fate of the collaborators in this house.” Lieberman now has the power to put his vile views into practice.

We call for more attention from the Obama administration toward the Palestinian minority in Israel. It is a repressed minority suffering from inadequately shared state resources. The enormous annual American aid package to Israel fails almost entirely to reach our community.

Between Netanyahu and Lieberman, the Obama administration will have its hands full. Make no mistake that Netanyahu and Lieberman will press the new administration hard to accept Israeli actions in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem — as well as discriminatory anti-Palestinian actions in Israel itself. Settlements will grow and discrimination deepen. American backbone will be crucial in the months ahead.

Ahmad Tibi is a Palestinian citizen of Israel and a member of the Knesset, Israel’s Parliament.

Ynet: Police seize boat ahead of Gaza sail

Arab Knesset members, left-wing activists planning to sail south from Jaffa in bid to ‘break the blockade’, transfer humanitarian equipment to Strip stopped by Israel Police; vessel transferred to Tel Aviv marina. ‘This is a coward move; all we wanted was to deliver medicines,’ says MK Tibi

To view original article, published by Ynet on the 7th December, click here

Police prevent Gaza sail: A boat scheduled to leave the Jaffa Port on Sunday morning with several Arab Knesset members and sail to the Gaza Strip was seized by the police early Sunday and transferred to the Tel Aviv marina, Ynet has learned.

The police also seized a truck carrying equipment and medications and detained three suspects for questioning.

Left-wing activists and several Arab MKs were planning to dock in the Strip a day before the Muslim Festival of Sacrifice (Eid al-Adha) in protest of the “Israeli blockade” and transfer humanitarian equipment, including medications, food and toys.

Police officials explained that they acted according to clause 24 in the “disengagement implementation law”, which states that Israelis will not enter Gaza without a permit.

There were no reports of clashes in the area, but the police boosted their forces in Jaffa for fear of riots. Police officials estimated that was the only boat scheduled to sail to Gaza.

Hadash Chairman Mohammad Barakeh was on his way to Jaffa when he heard about the police operation from Ynet.

“If this is the state of things, the strong Israel must be afraid of a humanitarian act,” he said. “We wanted to show the world that there is a different Israel, but it appears that the authorities insist on presenting Israel in its ugliness.”

‘Illegal move’

Zahi Nujaidat of the Committee against the Siege, which initiated the move, claimed that the police operation had no illegal basis. “No one told us, ‘Don’t sail.’ Every person in Israel can pay a boat owner and sail and travel to Gaza’s waters, just like anyone can sail to Akko and Tiberias,” he said.

United Arab List-Ta’al Chairman Ahmad Tibi, who joined the sail initiative at the last moment, said this was “a coward and anti-Democratic move by people and an establishment fearing the supply of medicines to a Gaza hospital.

“This is the same institution which turns a blind eye and silently agrees – recently more intensely – to the riots and pogroms of Jewish fascists from the settlements, and is the one preventing a ship of medications carrying a human message to sail to the Shifa Hospital in Gaza in order to deliver the medicines.”

Tibi stressed that the sail was not a political one and that there were no scheduled meetings with members of movements which do not recognize Israel (i.e. Hamas).

“This was a symbolic sail aimed at breaking the siege. We support the lull and we succeed in the humanitarian test, while the occupation fails once and again.”

MKs Wasal Taha and Jamal Zahalka (Balad) said in a statement, “We will continue our efforts to send aid boats to Gaza from Israel and abroad and won’t give up. “Gaza is hungry on the eve of the Festival of Sacrifice and this is humanitarian aid.”

3 sails despite truce

Last week, Libya demanded that the United Nations Security Council hold an emergency session to discuss Israel’s refusal to allow a Libyan vessel carrying humanitarian supplies to dock on Gaza’s shore.

During the discussion, Israeli Ambassador to the UN Gabriela Shalev responded to the claims on damaging peace efforts, saying, “You’re adapting yourselves to Hizbullah and al-Qaeda.

In the past Israel allowed ships to transfer equipment to Gaza, but has apparently decided to increase the pressure on Hamas following the recent attacks on Israel.

Three sails have reached the Strip’s shores in recent months, despite the Israeli siege. The first sail of peace activists arrived in Gaza in August with Israel’s approval.

In November, another group of activists reported that it had managed to reach the Strip’s shores after sailing from Cyprus. Several weeks later, 11 European parliament members from Britain, Ireland, Switzerland and Italy also decided to visit Gaza via sea in order to examine the humanitarian situation in the Strip.

Um Kamel Al-Kurd returns to her original home in Talbyieh, West Jerusalem

On Thursday 4th December 2008 Um Kamel accompanied by Israeli, Palestinian and International activists returned to her original home of her parents in the Talbyieh area in West Jerusalem, where they symbolically set up a tent and demanded the right of return for all Palestinian refugees.

Around thirty activists and supporters of Um-Kamel Al-Kurd marched through the Talbyieh area of West Jerusalem and constructed a tent on a roundabout. Um-Kamil and her supporters issued their demand for the right of return of all refugees with banners and placards that they displayed to passing traffic. The demonstration lasted for an hour under scrutiny from the police and although several motorists shouted insults at the group the demonstration was peaceful and ended after an hour when the activists dismantled the tent and left the area.

The Al-Kurd family were survivors of the Nakba of 1948 where they, along with 750 000 others were made refugees from their homes of which Palestinians had been living for generations. The Al-Kurd family had been living in housing created for Refugees by the Jordanian government and UNWRA in 1956 in Sheikh Jarrah, before on the 9th of November 2008 they were evicted by Israeli police after a seven year dispute with settlers who had occupied half of their house. Israel supported the settlers’ action although it was illegal under UN resolutions 242 and 338 that call for Israel to withdraw from the territories occupied including East Jerusalem in the 1967 War. Since Um-Kamil was evicted from her home in the refugee housing her supporters demand that she should be allowed to return to her original home.

All Palestinian refugees have the right to return under UN resolution 194 that Israel has refused to comply with for 60 years. The actions taken by the Israeli government in settlement expansion and house demolitions in Jerusalem show that their illegal annexation of Jerusalem does not extend the same rights that Israelis have to the citizens in the occupied territories.

Letter of Palestinian Refugee Organizations to President Mahmoud Abbas

The following letter was presented to President Mahmoud Abbas’s office on behalf of 78 Palestinian organizations on Wednesday September 22, 2008

Dear Mr. President,

Greetings of Return

We, the undersigned Palestinian refugee organizations, civil society movements and institutions in the Palestinian homeland and in exile are national organizations working to defend the right of return. We appeal to you now because we are convinced that the alignment of the official Palestinian position and the position of the Palestinian people with regards to the final status negotiation issues is of the highest priority. Foremost among these issues is the cause of the Palestinian refugees.

We are convinced that the alignment of popular and official positions is the main guarantee of a strong Palestinian position in the current negotiation process, which is taking place in a local, regional and global context that jeopardizes the national rights of the Palestinian people. In this context, we are concerned in particular about the rights of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons to return to their original lands and properties, restitution of their homes, lands and properties and compensation for damages incurred over the past 60 years. Based on the fact that all of these rights are guaranteed under international law, and based on our awareness of the enormous pressures faced by Palestinian negotiators and the tactics of negotiations, such as secrecy with regards to the negotiation proceedings, we call upon you to adopt a negotiation strategy that is based on openness with the entirety of the Palestinian people – irrespective of their current place of residence – regarding all aspects and details of the negotiation process. Implementation of the Palestinian refugees’ right of return was and continues to be the main purpose for which the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was established, a purpose which forms the central pillar of the PLO’s legitimacy as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. Transparency and candidness of our representatives with all sectors of our society will guarantee that our rights are best defended, and strengthen our position in the face of enormous pressures.

It has been clear at all stages of the negotiations that this process aims to eliminate the core issue of the Arab/Palestinian struggle for freedom and justice: the Palestinian refugees and their rights of return and restitution. In fact, elimination of these central Palestinian/Arab demands form the center-piece of both Israeli and US policies. It is also no secret that during the so-called “Oslo Peace Process” these policies have employed insidious tactics in order to nullify these rights altogether. Such tactics include attempts to substitute the return and restitution of the refugees with monetary compensation; to reduce the number of those entitled to exercise these rights from over 7 million Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons to a tiny minority, including so-called “hardship cases” that would be arbitrarily defined by Israel; to suggest that the refugees return to homes located in the areas administered by the Palestinian Authority; and other humiliating “trade offs” whereby Palestinians are expected to surrender the right of refugees to return to homes, lands and properties of origin in exchange for other rights and demands, such as self-determination, borders, the reclamation of Jerusalem and removal of the illegal settlement-colonies. The Palestinian leadership has rejected such degrading bargaining tactics in previous negotiations, notably those known as the second Camp David summit and the Clinton initiative. The late President Yasser Arafat rejected these tactics, and he was made to pay for that with his liberty and his life.

Whereas the rights of return, restitution and compensation are enshrined in international law and specifically affirmed in UN General Assembly Resolution 194 and UN Security Council Resolution 237;
Whereas we see that increasing US pressure aims to force Palestinian negotiators to agree to an obscure framework for a solution that is to be achieved by any means and at the soonest date, and that such a framework is largely for internal US consumption in the context of a US Presidential election;
Whereas it has become clear that the US administration is working on other fronts to market its obscure framework for a solution in the September 2008 session of the UN General Assembly;
Whereas we realize, as a result of our movement’s long and difficult experience with Israeli politics, that Israeli political actors seek to solve the internal Israeli political crisis by venting destruction on the Palestinian front through various policies and practices, all of which work to entrench Israeli occupation, colonialism, and apartheid, and aim to attain international recognition of Israel as a ‘Jewish State;’
Whereas Western and Israeli election platforms must not be employed to put pressure on the Palestinian negotiators, who should in no way be a party to the political maneuvers of US and Israeli political candidates, particularly in order to protect the legality, legitimacy, and sanctity of Palestinian national rights regardless of who emerges victorious in foreign elections;
Whereas we perceive the retreat of the once principled European position, and the transformation of this position into one that conforms to the US policy of total complicity and support for Israel;
Whereas we clearly see the weakness and inability of the Arab countries to take action or play any effective role;
Whereas we witness the sharp, painful and unprecedented deterioration in the internal Palestinian political arena;
Whereas it has become plain and obvious that powerful external pressures aim to annul Palestinian refugee rights, particularly the right to return to their original lands and properties and the restitution of these lands and properties;
Whereas Israel and the US, according to Israeli officials, are intensifying their efforts to reach a framework for a solution that is acceptable to both Israel and the US and will be viable regardless of the ruling party;

Whereas the primary measure of the legitimacy of any solution remains the extent to which it will lead to the exercise of the right of self-determination by the Palestinian people, including foremost the right of Palestinian refugees to choose to return to their original homes and lands regardless of their current place of refuge,

We approach you with this statement based on our strong desire to chart a way forward that is built on the highest levels of clarity and candidness with the Palestinian people; a way forward that aims to strengthen the Palestinian position in this sensitive stage of the Palestinian struggle; a way forward that ensures that any framework for a solution will include the following principles in clear and immutable language :

1. The rights of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons to return, restitution and compensation are fundamental rights under international law and relevant UN resolutions – particularly UN General Assembly Resolution 194 and UN Security Council Resolution 237. The content of these rights is non-negotiable irrespective of the manner in which they will be exercised;
2. The right of return is an individual right held by every Palestinian refugee and internally displaced person. This right is passed on from one generation to the next, based on the individual’s choice on whether or not to return, an inalienable and indivisible right, and not affected by any bilateral, multilateral, or international treaty or agreement. Any such agreement must respect the fundamental precepts and principles of international law;
3. The right of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons to return is a collective right that is not limited to one group or another, and it is an integral part of the Palestinian right of self-determination;
4. The right of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons to return is not subject to referendum.

May you remain steadfast in our struggle for freedom and dignity

Drafted: August 2008

Signed:

1. 194 Association (Syria)
2. Abassiya Association (Palestine)
3. Abnaa Al-Balad Center for the Defense of the Right of Return (Syria)
4. Aidun Group (Lebanon)
5. Aidun Group (Syria)
6. Al-Awda Palestine Network (Holland)
7. Al-Awda Palestine Right to Return Coalition (North America)
8. Arab Cultural Forum (Gaza, Palestine)
9. Arab Liberation Front
10. Arab Palestinian Front
11. Association for the Defense of the Rights of the Internally Displaced (Palestine)
12. Badil Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights (Palestine)
13. Beit Nabala Association (Palestine)
14. Bisan Association (Syria)
15. Coalition of Right of Return Defense Committees (Jordan)
16. Coalition of Right of Return Defense Committees (Jordan)
17. Committee for the Rights of Palestinian Women (Syria)
18. Confederation of Right of Return Committees (Europe: Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Greece, Germany, France, Holland, Poland, Finland)
19. Coordinating Committee of Palestinian Organizations Working in Lebanon (Lebanon)
20. Council of National and Islamic Forces in Palestine (Palestine)
21. Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine
22. Democratic Palestine Committee
23. Depopulated Towns and Villages Associations (Gaza, Palestine)
24. Farah Heritage Society (Syria)
25. Grassroots Palestinian Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign (Palestine)
26. Higher Follow-up Committee on Prisoners (Palestine)
27. Higher National Committee for the Defense of the Right of Return (Palestine)
28. Inevitable Return Assembly (Syria)
29. Islamic Jihad Movement
30. Islamic Resistance Movement [Hamas]
31. Istiqlal Youth Union (Lebanon)
32. Istiqlal Youth Union (Syria)
33. Ittijah: Union of Palestinian Non-Governmental Organizations (Palestine)
34. Jafra Youth Center (Syria)
35. Jimzo Association (Palestine)
36. Lajee Center, Aida Camp (Palestine)
37. National Assembly of of Palestinian Civil Society Organizations (Palestine)
38. National Committee to Commemorate the Martyr Ahmad Al-Shuqairy (Jordan)
39. National Nakba Commemoration Committee (Palestine)
40. Palestine Democratic Union [Fida]
41. Palestine House Educational and Cultural Center (Canada)
42. Palestine Liberation Movement [Fatah]
43. Palestine Remembered (USA)
44. Palestine Right of Return Coalition (Global)
45. Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (Palestine)
46. Palestinian Civil Society Coordinating Committee in Palestine and Abroad (Global)
47. Palestinian Liberation Front
48. Palestinian National Democratic Movement (Palestine)
49. Palestinian National Initiative
50. Palestinian People’s Party
51. Palestinian Popular Struggle Front
52. Palestinian Refugee Rights Defense Committee (Balata Camp, Palestine)
53. Palestinian University Professors Union (Gaza, Palestine)
54. Palestinian Women’s Grassroots Organization (Syria)
55. Palestinian Youth Democratic Union (Syria)
56. Palestinian Youth Organization (Syria)
57. Palestinian Youth Struggle Union (Syria Branch)
58. People’s Assembly of the Towns and Villages Depopulated in 1948 (Palestine)
59. Platform of Associations in Solidarity with Palestine (Switzerland)
60. Popular Committees to Defend the Right of Return (Gaza, Palestine)
61. Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
62. Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command
63. Refugee and Right of Return Committee (Syria)
64. Refugee Camp Popular Committees (West Bank & Gaza, Palestine)
65. Refugee Executive Office (Palestine)
66. Right of Return committee (Switzerland)
67. Ruwwad Cultural Center (Aida Camp, Palestine)
68. Salameh Association (Palestine)
69. Secular Democratic State Group (Gaza, Palestine)
70. Union of Right of Return Committees (Syria)
71. Union of Women’s Activity Centers, West Bank Refugee Camps (Palestine)
72. Union of Youth Activity Centers, Refugee Camps (Palestine)
73. Vanguard for the Popular Liberation War [Sa’iqa]
74. Women’s Activity Centers (Gaza, Palestine)
75. Yaffa Charitable Fund (Jordan)
76. Yaffa Cultural Center (Balata Camp, Palestine)
77. Youth Assembly (Gaza, Palestine)
78. Youth Struggle Union (Lebanon)