Massachusetts Daily Collegian

A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

Massachusetts Daily Collegian

A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

Massachusetts Daily Collegian

Victims of victims

When hearing arguments about Israel, its existence, and Zionism in general, rarely is the Holocaust not mentioned. Rarely are pogroms not mentioned. In fact, these are frequent arguments for the necessity for a Jewish homeland. Zionists argue that the persecution of the Jewish people justifies the need for a Jewish nation.

There is some validity to this argument. Yet still the way in which this argument became policy, and then reality, is impossible for me to agree with. Certainly, persecution of Jews can be a valid argument for the creation of their own nation. However, it should not be at the expense of another nation.

I realized that what really annoys me about this argument is the sheer hypocrisy of it. Pogroms and the Holocaust were the calculated, xenophobic eliminations of people, millions of which were Jews. Then we called it genocide. Today, once “genocide” received a legal connotation in the arena of international law, we are more careful with using that term. Instead we substitute the rather whitewashed term “ethnic cleansing.” However, there is yet more terminology in this regard. “Compulsory transfer” the predecessor to “ethnic cleansing” was on the tongues of many a Zionist even before the start of World War II.

There is a common misconception or myth, if you will, in the history of the conflict. Many believe, or are lead to believe, that Palestine was an uninhabited land before it was settle by Zionists. It’s hard to imagine a greater falsity. The Holy Land has been one of the longest constantly inhabited lands in human history. No one ever got up and left. Even on the eve of the declaration of the state of Israel in 1948, the land that is today controlled by Israel did not contain a Jewish majority.

This was a major problem for many Zionist leaders of the time. They could not envision ever sharing a land they themselves did not feel welcome in. It is because of this that “compulsory transfer” came into the forefront of Zionist debate in the 1920s and 30s. The same evil had only years earlier decimated Armenians and Greeks in Turkey. A similar evil would only years later wipe out part of Europe’s population.

On July 12, 1937, David Ben Gurion, who would soon become the first Prime Minister of Israel, wrote an entry into his diary. According to page 142 of “Righteous Victims,” the entry read: “The compulsory transfer of the Arabs from the valleys of the proposed Jewish state could give us something which we never had, even when we stood on our own during the days of the first and second Temples … We are given an opportunity which we never dared to dream of in our wildest imaginings. This is more than a state, government and sovereignty – this is national consolidation in a free homeland.”

Imagine dreaming of gaining freedom at the expense of others. This became the reality of the Zionist dream. A land had to be cleared to make room for their dreams, creating nightmares for Palestinians since then.

Benny Morris, in his “Expulsion of the Palestinians,” shows that on Dec. 20, 1940, Yosef Wietz, one of the forefathers of the transfer ideology wrote the following in his diary: “It must be clear that there is no room in the country for both peoples. There is no room here for compromises. There is no way but to transfer the Arabs from here to the neighboring countries, to transfer all of them, save perhaps for [the Palestinian Arabs of] Bethlehem, Nazareth, and the old Jerusalem. Not one village must be left, not one tribe. For this goal funds will be found. And only after this transfer will the country be able to absorb millions of our brothers and the Jewish problem will cease to exist. There is no other solution.”

Reading these diaries is absolutely fascinating. That last sentence always gets me. I always wonder to myself to what extent was this fervent Zionist aware of the “final solution” that was taking place in Europe as he was jotting his thoughts into his diary. If he knew of the evils that resulted, would he still think the same way? I suppose we will never know.

Wietz, who was the caretaker of transfer policies entered the following into his diary on April 18, 1948: “I made a summery of a list of the [Palestinian] Arab villages which in my opinion must be cleared out in order to complete Jewish regions. I also made a summery of the places that have land disputes and must be settled by military means.”

Think about the terminology: “cleared out” and “transfer.” Is this how you describe human beings? Obviously not, but this is the attitude of Zionists at that time, and many still carry this attitude today.

The fact that Israel was established as a safe haven for Jews using the same methods that they were fleeing shows that the Palestinians are victims of victims, a hypocrisy unrivaled.

This issue is one that people tend to shy away from, but it is the heart of the problem. As walls are being built and debates about transfers and bi-national statehood come to the forefront, the history of the removal of Palestinians becomes increasingly more important. The world turned away from the genocides of the war and then the transfer of Palestinians. It can’t shut its eyes today as the result of this negligence that dominates the headlines of international media.

Yousef Munayyer is a Collegian columnist.

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