zionism4

Land in Palestine is considered by Zionism to be one of its principle foundations. The basis of the settlement enterprise is to bring Jews from their countries of origin, or the "Diaspora" to use the Zionist expression, and put them in place of the Palestinian Arabs living on Palestinian territory. The basic condition for settlement in Palestine was to wrest the land away from those in whose possession it might be and take it over by any means necessary. For this reason, Zionism and its organs have not hesitated to adopt terrorist methods for the sake of achieving control over the land in its capacity as "the land of promise."

And since Zionist settlement in Palestine is based on the two processes of evacuation and replacement, that is, ensuring that the Arabs occupying the land evacuate it, then replacing them with Jews, it has therefore been based on land takeovers and the notion of emptying the land of its inhabitants by various means, means in which violence and massacres have held a central place. And this is what distinguishes Zionist settlement from other settlement experiments throughout ancient and modern history. The Zionist settlement policy was clear in the minds of Zionist planners from the beginning, since it depended upon establishing a Jewish territory in Palestine, not only by means of political maneuvering, but also by means of colonies and an armed Zionist presence in such colonies(1) in preparation for the establishment of the Zionist entity in the land of Palestine.

At the same time, we may not separate the operations of uprooting and mass expulsions of the Palestinian people from Zionist settlement plans, since they represent two sides of one coin. After all, the second cannot come about without the achievement of the first, and consequently the presence of Palestinian inhabitants was a political problem which imposed itself on the Zionist enterprise in Palestine. The Zionist movement considered this to be a dilemma to which they referred as "the Arab question" in Palestine. The first person in the modern history of Zionism to propose the idea of expulsion or forced emigration was Zionist leader Zanghfoul who in 1905 stated, "There is no solution to the Jewish problem but by expelling the Palestinians by the sword, or making certain that they emigrate." Moreover, this idea found acceptance among other Zionist leaders.(2)

This was likewise reflected in Zionist propaganda, which found expression by those who participated in the Basel conference of 1898 on Palestine in the words, "a land without a people for a people without land". Yousef Vaits , who worked for a long time as director of the Jewish National Fund and also as Arab Affairs Consultant to the president of the Zionist government, wrote in his memoirs for the year 1940: "It must be clear among us that there is no place in a single country for two peoples. As long as the Arabs are present, we will not be able to achieve our goal of being an independent people in this country. The only solution is for the land of Israel, or at least the land of western Israel - to be free of Arabs. There is no other way to achieve this than to transfer the Arabs from here to neighboring countries. And this means transferring every last one of them such that not a single Arab village remains. Only by means of such a transfer will the country be able to absorb the millions of our [Jewish] brethren."(3) Moreover, Zionist leaders looked upon such ideas and plots as representing no violation of the rights of Palestinian citizens, nor did they see them as being in the least terrorist. Samha Flaban mentions this saying, "The plans for mass expulsion (or 'transfer') always appeared during Zionist discussions of Arab opposition in Palestine, yet Weizman and others refused to acknowledge that the notion of 'mass transfer' was immoral."(4)

By the end of the 1930's, there was unanimous agreement among Zionists on the idea of a Palestinian 'transfer', and on this basis they formed a committee which included a number of leaders of the Zionist movement. Its purpose was to draw up plans for the expulsion of the Palestinians wherever they might be found [within Palestine]. Another of the committee's duties was to bring Jews into Palestine and find them employment. The committee was referred to as "The Transfer Committee."(5)

In this study we shall merge the operations of settlement, and forced emigration or uprooting practiced against the Palestinians, in order to simplify the comparison and to show the heinous nature of what has been done to the Palestinian people by Zionism and its various organs.

The beginning of settlement and the mandate period
The Zionist entry into Palestine and settlement there began in the late eighteenth century. Until the end of the nineteenth century (specifically, until 1898), Jewish settlement operations were limited to the establishment of 22 settlements. Then with the establishment of organized Zionism in the beginning of the twentieth century, settlement expanded to include new areas of Palestine. Actual settlement activity began in 1901, after the establishment of the "Jewish National Fund". The number of settlements reached 47 with the beginning of the First World War in 1914, and by 1918 the Jews owned approximately 2.5% of the lands of Palestine.(6)

However, the British mandate period witnessed a dramatic jump in the number of Zionist settlements, since the Zionist movement cooperated with British colonialism in seeking to expel the Palestinians and wrest their lands away from them in order to offer them to Zionists, who in turn would plant their own settlers there. The degree of cooperation between the Zionist movement and British colonial forces may be seen through a reading of British author Francis Newton. She writes that she witnessed with her own eyes how British forces intervened against the Palestinian people during clashes which occurred between Jewish settlers and Palestinian peasants in the town of al-Afoula. When the settlers sought to prevent the Palestinian peasants from farming their land, the mandate forces removed the Palestinians from their lands by force and forbid them to farm it.

Newton comments on this saying, "The law of the mandate government was biased in favor of Zionist settlement and emptying the land of its original inhabitants. Nor did the colonialist government stop there. It even resorted to forcing people to leave and detainment of Palestinians at spear point. And all of this was taking place at the behest of the Zionist movement."(7)

By the end of the British mandate, the number of Zionist settlements in Palestine had risen to 304.(8)

The difficult years of the past
In an elegy to a friend of his by the name of Ray Rotberg who was killed in a clash with Arabs several months before the 1956 war, terrorist Moshe Dayan confesses saying, "Let us cease hurling accusations at those who killed him. Who are we to discuss their hatred and resentment? Eight years have now passed [since 1948], and as they look on from their camps in Gaza we take into our possession the lands and the villages where their fathers and grandfathers lived. We are a generation of settlers, and without steel helmets and cannons, we would not be able to plant a single tree or build a single house."(9)

This statement reveals the manner in which the Zionists took possession of most of the Palestinian lands, and the degree to which they depended upon arms in order to expel the Palestinian inhabitants and confiscate their properties. Ben Gurion confirms this when he says, "We must take military operations as the foundation for settlement, as a reality which will oblige all to bow before it."(10)

The mayors of some Arab villages in Palestine sought to protect their villages' properties and inhabitants from attacks by Zionist terrorist gangs by signing local truce agreements with the Jews.(11) However, these agreements did not prevent Zionist forces from attacking these very villages, the most notable example of which is Dair Yasin, which suffered a well-known massacre in which many women, children and elderly lost their lives. Thus it is clear that the non-aggression pacts signed between Palestinians and Zionists held no value for the Zionists. The Dair Yasin massacre send a wave of panic among the Palestinian people, causing them to leave their homes and villages for fear of the tyranny of Zionist gangs. Commenting on this, terrorist Menachim Begin states, "This operation [the massacre at Dair Yasin] yielded great and unexpected results. After the news of Dair Yasin got out, the Arabs were stricken with terror and began fleeing for their lives."(12)

Nor was Dair Yasin some capricious act carried out by a few isolated terrorists. Rather, it was a link in a series of plans referred to as "C-2" which included the execution of terrorist operations throughout Palestine against the Palestinian Arabs and launching repeated raids against them in order to accomplish the first stage of their plan to expel the Palestinian people. For the second stage a plan referred to as "Dalt" had been laid, the basis of which was to enter into battles with Arab armies and expel the Arabs from their villages and cities as far as the partition line which represented the borders of the Jewish state. Another, related aim was to gain control over the other part of Palestine referred to in the partition resolution and to expel what remained of the Palestinian people.(13)

Describing the terrorist methods adopted by the Zionists to achieve their goals, Bighal Alon, military commander of the Palmakh terrorist organization states, "We have only five days left before that ominous day, that is, May 15 (the date set for the withdrawal of the British forces). We have seen that there is a need to cleanse inner Galilee of its Arab inhabitants in order for us to set up a Jewish regional territory throughout upper Galilee. Our forces have been weakened by long battles, and before us lie momentous duties, namely, to close off the way before an Arab invasion. For this reason we have searched for means by which we could refrain from using our rear-guard forces and thereby force tens of thousands of stubborn Arabs who have remained in Galilee to flee. After all, these Arab inhabitants would strike at our rear if there were to be an Arab invasion. We sought to employ a tactic which relied on the effect left by the fall of Safad and the Arabs' defeat in the region which was cleansed by means of the 'matateh' ('broom') operation. And this tactic did its job admirably. I gathered together the Jewish mayors who had contacts with Arabs and asked them to whisper in some of the Arabs' ears that massive Jewish reinforcements had arrived in Galilee and that the Jews would be setting fire to all the villages of al-Hawla. The rumor spread all over al-Hawla, and the plan accomplished its purpose perfectly. The police station in al-Khalisa fell into our hands without a single shot from our side, and vast areas were cleansed. The danger was removed, and it became possible for us to organize ourselves against the invaders all along the borders without having to fear for our rear guard."(14) Ben Gurion confirms this, saying, "The Arabs didn't enter or occupy any Jewish settlement, even the most remote, before the British forces left Palestine, whereas Hagana occupied several Arab posts, and 'liberated' Tiberias, Haifa, Jaffa and Safad. And thus it was that the area in which Hagana forces were supposed to begin their work were 'cleansed' of Arabs on the Night of Power (May 14, 1948)."(15)

Hence, before the entry of the Arab armies into Palestine, Zionist organizations had managed to gain control over Palestine and turn it into a base for the fulfillment of what remained of the Zionist dream to establish "the Kingdom of Greater Israel". As of the day before the battles ended, Jewish gangs had destroyed nearly 472 Palestinian villages and cities after carrying out massacres against women, elderly people and children.(16)

The Transfer, 1948-1967
When Zionist forces undertook in 1948 to surround and invade Palestinian areas one after another, most of the Palestinian civilians fled behind enemy lines. At that point, Zionist military units began to occupy Palestinian properties in order to turn them over later to local Jewish authorities or to settlement leaders. They then began settling Jews in place of the Palestinian people, who had been scattered and made homeless all throughout the land, seeking safety and protection from the Zionist terror which they had suffered.

When Ben Gurion went to inspect West Jerusalem, he said that Jerusalem had not been inhabited by such large numbers of Jews since the destruction of the kingdom of Solomon. And now here was West Jerusalem without a single Arab in it. Then when he visited the city of Haifa and saw it razed to its foundations and practically free of its Arab inhabitants, he said in amazement, "We will fill it with Jewish inhabitants, who will rebuild it and restore it such that it becomes more beautiful than ever." And after marveling at the unexpected conditions which he found in Jerusalem and Haifa, he ordered all Arabs expelled from the areas designated for Jews in the partition resolution by any means necessary."(17)

The process of replacing Palestinian society with a society of settlers reached ridiculous proportions. It is reported that disputes would break out among neighboring settlers over who would get to enjoy the Arab crops and fields. Zionists would even burn fields to prevent [Arab] farmers from planting them or gathering in their harvest in order to force them to move away. Eventually, however, they realized that they were in need of houses ready to be lived in and useable agricultural lands, so they took to forcing the residents to leave without harming their properties.(18) In addition, the fledgling Zionist government relied upon a number of procedures the purpose of which was to carry on with its policy of evacuation. Hence, for example, it forbid freedom of movement and kept British martial law in place. It also destroyed Christian and Muslim places of worship, the total coming to approximately 350 churches and mosques.(19)

By May, 1949, the Zionists had set up 1,947 colonies atop the ruins of the villages and other locales which had been left behind by their Arab inhabitants, either by fleeing or being forced out. By October of the same year, 25,255 Jewish immigrants had arrived in the Zionist entity from a number of different countries.(20) And as an indication of the importance of forced immigration and expropriation of Arab homes for the Zionist enterprise, the Zionists demonstrated the exceptional importance of the Palestinian villages and cities which had been destroyed and whose inhabitants had been forced out of them by officially inaugurating a new settlement over the same spot where the Dair Yasin massacre had taken place, and this only one year after the event, in the presence of several Labor Party ministers, as well as rabbis and mayors.(21)

After the establishment of the Zionist entity, it issued numerous laws in the service of its aims and goals. Among these was the "law of return" passed in December, 1951 and according to which every Jew has the right to enter "Israel" and to become a resident there. This was followed by the "nationality law" of 1952 according to which every Jew who emigrates to Israel is considered an "Israeli" citizen. Thus, at the very time when the Palestinian people had been ousted from their homeland while being forbidden to return there, the Jews were being given the "eternal" right to Palestine.(22) Then in 1965, the Zionist entity passed a law according to which everyone who had left the areas occupied by "Israel" for somewhere outside Palestine or to areas under the control of Arab forces in Palestine was to be considered to have emigrated and, being absent from his land, no longer held title to such land which would now become the property of the state. By virtue of this law, the Zionist entity took possession of 2,000,000 dunams of Arab land, in addition to 2,000,990 dunams of Arab land containing 73,000 rooms in houses which had been evacuated by their owners, and 8,700 commercial establishments in the cities and villages which had been left by their proprietors with all of their contents including merchandise, furniture, etc.(23)

From the foregoing we may say that during the period from 1948 to 1967, the Zionist dream of establishing a Zionist entity in the land of Palestine and driving most of its inhabitants from their homes (78% of the land area of Palestine) was fulfilled. This period also saw an increase in the intensity of the process of obliterating the Arab presence and replacing Arabs with Jews. During this time the insignificant Arab presence within the Jewish state was restricted as far as possible. For this purpose, all the laws [at the state's disposal] were put to use, as well as confiscation operations within the remaining Arab pockets..(24)

Since 1967
The Zionist entity's occupation of Arab territories in 1967 is considered a fundamental development with regard to the possibility of bringing the Zionist enterprise to completion, since Palestine in its entirety, in addition to other lands, came under Zionist control. From this year onward there began the establishment of scattered settlements in various occupied territories. With settlement fever escalating to an unprecedented level, emphasis was placed on settlement within or around major Arab cities. There also came to be settlement blocks composed of several settlements in close proximity to each other. The percentage of lands controlled by occupation forces on the West Bank had now reached more than 50%, and on July 30, 1980, Jerusalem was officially annexed to "Israel". On December 14, 1982 the Golan Heights were annexed, while a number of other areas became threatened with the same fate: gradual Judaization leading ultimately to complete annexation.(25) The Zionists looked upon settlement in the West Bank from a strategic point of view, as they considered it to be a basic foundation for their taking control over the West Bank and the most successful means of besieging Arab cities and villages and forcing their inhabitants to emigrate. As Mordechai Chibouri stated in a speech inaugurating the Inab settlement near Inabata in the mountains of Nablus: "The continuation of settlement is the backbone of the Zionist movement on the West Bank. It is the only way to frustrate any peaceful initiative aimed at returning Judah and Samaria to foreign rule. The existence of an Arab majority on the West Bank must not deter Israeli authorities from hastening the settlement process. I was born in Batah Takfa, which used to be surrounded by numerous Arab villages such as Kufr 'Ana, Abu Kishk and al-Khayria. Yet not a trace of these villages remains now. All that is left is Batah Takfa."(26)

Yet despite the resemblance among the various [Zionist] settlement schemes, the settlement activity after 1967 has been distinguished in two ways:(27)
1. It is official settlement supervised and funded by the Zionist Israeli government out of its national budget, while the role of other Zionist and settlement organizations is limited to that of supporting the government's efforts in this area.
2. This settlement is taking place in areas which are still inhabitanted by Arabs, who represent the vast majority of the population, and on lands owned by Arabs. Hence, these settlement operations are related to the goal of getting rid of the Arabs residing on the land in order to guarantee the success of the settlement enterprise.

In order for the leaders of the Zionist entity to avoid the demographic change which has been caused by their expansionist policy of taking over the West Bank and parts of other Arab nations, Zionist occupation forces began from the time they overtook Arab lands to carry out operations involving the razing of Palestinian neighborhoods, villages and camps. Palestinians have been driven from their homes outside and inside the borders of Palestine. There likewise began rapid land take-over operations and the establishment of Jewish settlements whether in the centers of Arab cities or around them, or in the Arab villages scattered throughout the West Bank in the mountainous area and in the Palestinian valleys. In 1967, the Magharibah neighborhood within the walls of Jerusalem was razed, as well as the villages of Baytar Nouba, Yalo and 'Amwas to the west of Ramallah in the Latroun area, and the villages of al-'Ajajira, al-Makhzouq and al-Satariya in the lowland area. The people in all these areas as well as those in the Palestinian camps in the Jericho area were scattered from their homes.(28) And in order for these campaigns to bear the desired fruit of dispersing the Palestinian people, this Zionist policy of brute force has been accompanied by terrorist campaigns aimed at frightening civilians into leaving their land as happened in the years 1947-1948. In the city of Ramallah, for example, members of the Zionist army harassed and murdered some Palestinians, then burned their corpses.(29)

The ugliness of Zionist terrorism against the Palestinian people may be seen clearly in the account of one Zionist army gang member, who recounts what they did to the Palestinians who tried to return to their homes after the war of 1967. He says, "The Palestinians would try every night to cross the Jordan River to the West Bank. We had ambushes set up along the river, and we had received orders from the army command to fire on anyone who crossed the river, be it man, woman or child, including old people. Even some children got killed. Then the next day we would do a mopping up operation in the area, combing it for bodies. If we found anyone still alive or wounded we'd finish them off, then pile dirt on top of the bodies if there weren't very many. If there were a lot of them, though, we'd call for an army bulldozer to bury them so as to preserve the environment."(30)

As a result of these terrorist practices against the Palestinian people, the Zionists succeeded somewhat in achieving their dreams of expelling Palestinian civilians from their lands. The Arab population of the West Bank before the Israeli occupation of 1967 was approximately 845,000, whereas it went down to about 600,000 by the end of the year. In the Gaza strip, the Arab population prior to the Israeli occupation of 1967 was approximately 385,000, whereas by the end of the same year it was about 380,000.(31)

Year	The West Bank	Gaza Strip
1967-68	38,700	44,700
1969-74	13,800	12,700
1975-79	61,100	21,100
1980-82	32,900	10,500

Hence, Zionist terrorism has led to the forced emigration of thousands of Palestinians from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip to Jordan and some of the Arab countries in the Gulf. Moreover, expulsion operations have continued, with individual expulsion being the most common method, while the Zionist authorities have continued to adopt the same methods as those employed after 1948.

It is thus clear that the Zionist entity has adopted the notion of imposing the status quo by means of constructing material realities to support political goals and to make the settlement process into the cornerstone of the application of this method. Nor do the authorities of the Zionist entity content themselves with announcing their right to annex [Arab lands] and to exercise control over them. In addition, they support these claims by setting up facilities, residences and entire neighborhoods, then transferring people to live in such facilities in order to confirm the rights which it claims over these areas. The Zionist entity has adopted this policy in order to impose its influence and to extend its control in fulfillment of the dream of "Greater Israel". In the words of Golda Meir, former Prime Minister of the Zionist entity, "We have not, and we shall not, specify borders for ourselves. In any place where we settle and in any place where you defend the country, there shall be our borders."(32) Therefore, the reality of the Zionist threat appears in the statements, practices and attitudes of the leaders of the Zionist entity, who make calls for more Jewish immigration to the land of Palestine couched in religious, nationalist and ideological terms. Nevertheless, the fact of the matter is that they are nothing but attempts to obscure their true goals, goals which are based on expansion, aggression, and the necessity of providing the "human factor" in order to launch wars of aggression, continue settlement in and thereby "Judaize" the occupied territories, perpetuate their occupation of these territories and expel their Palestinian inhabitants.

1. Dr. Kamal Abd al-Fattah, "Zionist Settlement in Palestine, 1870-1988", in Dr. Abd al-Aziz al-Dawri (ed.), The Palestinian Issue and the Zionist-Arab Struggle, Part II, Section II, Secretariat General of the Union of Arab Universities, p. 723.
2. Ibrahim Abu Zahra, The Zionist Movement, Colonialism and the Palestinian Expulsion "Transfer", Hebron Collegiate Association, Hebron, 1993, p. 56.
3. The Palestinian Encyclopedia, Part I, Damascus, 1984, p. 583.
4. Abd al-Fattah, op. cit., p. 731.
5. Abu Zahra, op. cit., p. 43.
6. Dr. Adnan al-Sayyid Husayn, Expansion in Israeli Strategy, Beirut: Dar al-Nafa'is, 1989, p. 31.
7. Abu Zahra, op. cit., p. 53.
8. Abd al-Fattah, op. cit., 726.
9. Dr. George Tu'ma, "Resources for the Study of Zionist Terrorism", in the Shu'un Filastiniyah [Palestinian Affairs] magazine, No. 25, September 1973, pp. 49-50.
10. Samir Ahmad Ma'touq, The Geographical Basis for Zionist Settlement Colonialism in the West Bank, 1967-1985, Amman: Dar al-Bashir, 1992, p. 51.
11. Salih al-Shar', Palestine: Reality and History, Amman: Maktabat Majdalawi, 1996, p. 220.
12. Menachem Begin, The Revolt, London, 1st Edition, 1972, p. 165.
13. Abu Zahra, op. cit., 57.
14. The Palestinian Encyclopedia,, Part I, op. cit., pp. 585-586.
15. Ibraham al-Abid, On Violence and Peace: A Study in Zionist Strategy, Beirut: PLO, Markaz al-Abhath [Research Center], 1967, p. 35.
16. Abd al-Jawad Salih and Dr. Walid Mustafa, Palestine: Mass Destruction of Palestinian Villages and Zionist Settlement Colonialism Over One Hundred Years (1882-1982), London: Markaz al-Quds lil-Dirasat al-Inma'iya (The Jerusalem Center for Development Studies), 1987, p. 15.
17. al-Shar', op. cit., p.223.
18. Dr. Yazid al-Sayigh, "Zionist Policy to Uproot the Palestinians", Shu'un Filastiniya, No. 192, March 1989, p. 93.
19. Abu Zahra, op. cit., p. 77.
20. al-Shar', op. cit., p. 225, paraphrased.
21. al-Sayigh, op. cit., p. 93.
22. Abu Zahra, op. cit., p. 68.
23. al-Shar', op. cit., p. 202.
24. Abd al-Fattah, op. cit., p. 741.
35. Khalid 'Ayid, Settlement Colonialism of Occupied Arab Territories During the Likud Era, 1977-1984, Nicosia: The Foundation for Palestinian Studies, 1986.
26. Abd al-Fattah, op. cit., pp. 741-742.
27. Dr. Nizam Barakat, Israeli Settlement in Palestine: Between Theory and Application, Riyadh: Kind Sa'oud University, 1985, pp. 89-90.
28. Abd al-Fattah, op. cit., pp. 745-746.
29. Abu Zahra, op. cit., p. 81.
30. Ibid.
31. Barakat, op. cit., p. 142.
32. Abu Zahra, op. cit., p. 50.