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A review by books_ergo_sum
The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine by Ilan Pappé
informative
reflective
5.0
It’s hard to put into words how shocking, chilling, and overwhelming this book was. And how amazing it was.
It was the zoomed-in account of events in Palestine in 1947-1948 (aka ethnic cleansing, aka the Nakba); as told by the meeting minutes, personal diaries, letters, and recorded speeches of the PERPETRATORS THEMSELVES. Oof.
The (openly stated) goal of the paramilitary activity of David Ben-Gurion (later the first Prime Minister of Israel) and his crew in the 1940s was solving the “population problem.” And Pappé demonstrated that they wanted the newly arrived European Jews to make up the majority of the population in the region. The debates weren’t about ‘if’ they should be the majority, it was about how much of a majority they should be, which is why Ben-Gurion said things like, “there can be no stable and strong Jewish state so long as it has a Jewish majority of only 60%,” in 1947 (he wanted it to be 80%). What’s WILD is that, in 1947 Jews were 30% of the population in Palestine (up from 8% in 1917).
And what’s EVEN WILDER is that… mission accomplished? In just a few months, Muslim and Christian Palestinians went from being 70% of the population to 17% (living on 2% of the land).
There are no words for how horrible those few months were. It was death and destruction on a massive scale. Plus the outright looting of the property, bank accounts, and businesses of every Muslim and Christian Palestinian in the region. To the point where it was the exhaustion of the Israeli soldiers (and a dwindling supply of bullets and dynamite) that became the limiting factor.
Pappé completely destroys the classic narrative about 1948 (if it’s acknowledged at all), that 'it was all in self-defense'. But really, these guys told on themselves. The ethnic cleansing was openly acknowledged, even encouraged, because us Eurocentric westerners were still in our Colonialism Era™️ and people didn’t think they were doing anything wrong.
Also, the parts about the national parks particularly wrecked me.
It was the zoomed-in account of events in Palestine in 1947-1948 (aka ethnic cleansing, aka the Nakba); as told by the meeting minutes, personal diaries, letters, and recorded speeches of the PERPETRATORS THEMSELVES. Oof.
The (openly stated) goal of the paramilitary activity of David Ben-Gurion (later the first Prime Minister of Israel) and his crew in the 1940s was solving the “population problem.” And Pappé demonstrated that they wanted the newly arrived European Jews to make up the majority of the population in the region. The debates weren’t about ‘if’ they should be the majority, it was about how much of a majority they should be, which is why Ben-Gurion said things like, “there can be no stable and strong Jewish state so long as it has a Jewish majority of only 60%,” in 1947 (he wanted it to be 80%). What’s WILD is that, in 1947 Jews were 30% of the population in Palestine (up from 8% in 1917).
And what’s EVEN WILDER is that… mission accomplished? In just a few months, Muslim and Christian Palestinians went from being 70% of the population to 17% (living on 2% of the land).
There are no words for how horrible those few months were. It was death and destruction on a massive scale. Plus the outright looting of the property, bank accounts, and businesses of every Muslim and Christian Palestinian in the region. To the point where it was the exhaustion of the Israeli soldiers (and a dwindling supply of bullets and dynamite) that became the limiting factor.
Pappé completely destroys the classic narrative about 1948 (if it’s acknowledged at all), that 'it was all in self-defense'. But really, these guys told on themselves. The ethnic cleansing was openly acknowledged, even encouraged, because us Eurocentric westerners were still in our Colonialism Era™️ and people didn’t think they were doing anything wrong.
Also, the parts about the national parks particularly wrecked me.