Though armistice agreements had been signed with Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon in , the newly founded Israeli army committed a number of additional massacres and campaigns of forced displacement.
For example, in , the remaining 2, Palestinian residents of the city of Majdal were forced into the Gaza Strip, about 2, inhabitants of Beer el-Sabe were expelled to the West Bank, and some 2, residents of two northern villages were driven into Syria. By the mids, the Palestinian population inside Israel had become about , Between and the mids, some 30,, or 15 percent of the population, were expelled outside the borders of the new state, according to the BADIL refugee rights group.
While under the UN partition plan Israel was allocated 55 percent, today it controls more than 85 percent of historic Palestine. The Naksa led to the displacement of some , Palestinians, half of which originated from the areas occupied in and were thus twice refugees.
As in the Nakba, Israeli forces used military tactics that violated basic international rights law such as attacks on civilians and expulsion. Most refugees fled into neighbouring Jordan, with others going to Egypt and Syria. The more than three million Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem face home demolitions , arbitrary arrests , and displacement as Israel expands the plus Jewish-only colonies and steals Palestinian land to do so.
Palestinian movement is restricted by military checkpoints and the Separation Wall that has obstructed their ability to travel freely. The Gaza Strip , where some two million Palestinians live, has been under Israeli siege for more than a decade whereby Israel controls the air space, sea and borders; the Strip has also witnessed three Israeli assaults that have made the area close to uninhabitable.
Within Israel, the 1. Rights groups have recorded some 50 laws that discriminate against them for not being Jewish, such as ones that criminalise the commemoration of the Nakba. Since the creation of Israel, no new Palestinian towns or cities were built within its borders, in contrast to the Jewish municipalities that have been developed, according to Adalah, the legal centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel. Since , some one million Palestinians have been arrested by Israel, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.
Today, there are about 7. Some 6. Driven by a desire to return to his childhood village, Salman Abu Sitta is rebuilding the map of historic Palestine. Young Palestinian refugees across historic Palestine and Lebanon launch a joint campaign to commemorate Nakba day. Published On 23 May The Palestinian experience of dispossession and loss of a homeland is 69 years old this year.
Palestinians in , five months after the creation of Israel, leaving a village in the Galilee [Reuters]. European Jews arrive from the Nazi holocaust wave into the Palestinian Arab city of Haifa, five weeks before Israel is declared a state [Reuters]. A photo of Herzl hangs in the backdrop [Reuters]. Palestinian Arabs leaving the port city of Jaffa as Zionist forces advanced on the city [Associated Press]. Little children play amid lines of laundry drying out at Baqaa Camp in Jordan for Palestinian refugees of the war — some were refugees from [The Associated Press].
Cookie banner We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from. By choosing I Accept , you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies. What is the Nakba? Reddit Pocket Flipboard Email. Everything you need to know about Israel-Palestine. Delivered Fridays. Thanks for signing up!
Towns in Israel that formerly contained mixed Palestinian and Jewish populations, such as Jaffa, Haifa, and Tiberias, became largely Jewish towns with small Palestinian minorities after Only one Palestinian town in Israel, Nazareth, retained its Palestinian population and character. The Arab character of the West Bank and Gaza remained intact, however.
Beyond the destruction of their villages, the refugees lost an immense amount of land in Israel. The value of these property losses was staggering, and represented a significant dispossession. This figure did not include the value of collectively-owned village land, grazing land, lands devoted to public uses, and so forth.
A later study by Yusif Sayigh placed the amount of lost refugee property much higher. Even many of those Palestinians who remained in Israel had their land confiscated during and after the war.
The result was that by , 93 percent of the land inside Israel was controlled by the Israel Lands Administration.
Palestinian citizens only owned , dunums in Israel by that year — four percent of the total surface area of the country. Obviously, Palestinian demographic and socio-economic structures suffered from these traumatic events.
In Israel, much of the bourgeoisie and intelligentsia had fled in the refugee exodus, leaving behind an overwhelmingly rural and leaderless population. Agriculture was thrown into turmoil by the ongoing land seizures and the forced requisition of certain agricultural products like olive oil.
Some farmers in villages near the cease-fire lines were separated from their lands on the other side of the fences, while merchants were cut off from their traditional markets. Outside Israel, the Nakba severely impacted the material aspects of Palestinian life as well.
The 80, Palestinians living in what became Egyptian-controlled Gaza were swamped by the influx of nearly , refugees, while the , Palestinians in the Jordanian-annexed West Bank were joined by , refugees. These refugee populations put immense strain on local resources and social structures.
Although native West Bank and Gazan Palestinian society largely emerged intact from the war, the property-less refugees now living there lacked the landed capital required to rebuild their lives and livelihoods, and required international aid from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East UNRWA for survival.
While not all refugees lost land — only about 44 percent did, according to a UNCCP study — it was still a devastating blow for the refugees who formerly were farmers. Even native West Bank and Gazan farmers suffered. The ceasefire lines separated some West Bank and Gaza villagers from their land in Israel, and merchants and manufacturers found themselves cut off from their traditional markets elsewhere in Palestine.
The same problems faced those Palestinians who ended up in exile outside Mandate Palestine, in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, the Gulf states, and further afield.
Despite such negative impacts, the experience has, over the years, contributed to certain positive developments within Palestinian society as well. For example, the ongoing political struggle faced by Palestinians in most parts of the world has led to well developed civil society among them wherever they are located, including media organizations, unions, student and professional organizations, research institutes, and human rights groups.
This fact would shape Palestinian society in an indelible way throughout the six decades after the Nakba. The Nakba also left a permanent political impact on the Palestinians. In the immediate short term, the most tangible political effect was that no Arab state emerged in Palestine comparable to the new Jewish state. British Mandatory Palestine was divided among Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, while Palestinians who lived in exile throughout the Middle East were subject to the rule of states like Lebanon and Syria.
This meant the instant submission of the Palestinians to other states and national movements, most of which worked actively against the rise of a uniquely Palestinian political movement that could threaten them. Thus an already divided, fractured Palestinian political structure disintegrated even further.
For the first two decades after , no unified Palestinian political movement emerged as a result of the Nakba. Palestinian activists tended to look to movements in their countries of residsence that were wider in ideological vision, rather than those focusing on uniquely Palestinian issues. In Israel, where Palestinians were subject to military rule until December and openly Arab political parties like the pan-Arab nationalist al-Ard movement were banned, they turned to the binational, Jewish-Arab left: the Israeli Communist Party.
0コメント