Israel successfully fought off the pan-Arab army while other Israeli combatants terrorized and depopulated the countryside. Ilan Pappe termed the depopulation of Palestinians as “ethnic cleansing” but can this phrase be properly used when discussing the events of 1947-1948? To answer this question one must determine if there is a well-established definition of the phrase ‘ethnic cleansing’ and also establish that this was the intent of the Zionists, both initially and subsequently. This can be determined by examining Zionist policy and action previous to the U.N partition plan and after, which will demonstrate that the term is appropriately applied to the situation by Pappe.
The United Nations defines ethnic cleansing as; “The systematic expulsion of a group of people from an area because of their ethnic, racial or religious identity (ethnic cleansing), war crimes (attacks on non-combatants or civilian buildings and areas) and crimes against humanity (systematic and widespread violations such as murder, rape and torture of civilians)” (United Nations). This is the definition that Ilan Pape is using to expose the atrocities that the Zionists committed during the formation of Israel. Pape used this term because it encompasses exactly the actions being carried out against the, mostly, non-combatant local populations. The term “etnicheskoye chish cheniye,” or ethnic cleansing, is first used in 1988 by Russia to describe the events of the Nagorno-Karabakh war (New York Times). During this conflict the Central Committee of the Armenian SSR Communist Party approved a plan for violent expulsion of the ethnic Azeris from the territory of the republic, where people were terrorized and forced to leave. In all over 800,000 Azeris be...
... middle of paper ...
...ecessary while other terms imply non-aggressive tactics. Finally, the data collected by the JNF was used to make expulsion quicker and later a detailed outline was carried out through Plan D. Therefore, what does Pappe suggest is necessary for peace? He states "Neither Palstinians nor Jews will be saved, from one another or from themselves, if the ideology that still drives the Israeli policy towards the Palestinians is not correctly identified. The problem with Israel was never its Jewishness-Judaisim has many faces and many of them provide a solid basis for peace and cohabitation; it is the ethnic Zionist character."
Works Cited
New York Times -- http://www.nytimes.com/1993/03/14/magazine/on-language-ethnic-cleansing.html?src=pm
CNN -- http://articles.cnn.com/2001-03-30/world/milosevic.profile_1_ivan-stambolic-ethnic-cleansing-yugoslav-leader?_s=PM:WORLD
In a speech on 30 January 1939, Hitler told the Reichstag that another war would mean the “total annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe”. It seemed clear that Hitler intended to massacre the Jews - but many historians dispute this. They believe that the Nazis seriously considered forcing all the Jews to emigrate, or to resettle in a ‘Jewish homeland’, and that the idea of physically exterminating the Jews only gradually took over as the war went on. At a certain point, it came to be the most practical solution to the ‘Jewish problem’.
The word genocide was derived from the Greek root genos (people) and the Latin root cide (killing), and did not exist in the English language until 1944, which was the end of World War II (Power). According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, genocide is “the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group.” Such violence occurred during the Holocaust and during the separation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The problems of ethnic cleansing and repression have become so prevalent in the last century that they have contributed to two world wars, over fourteen million deaths, and a new word. United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, said, “Far from being consigned to history, genocide and its ilk remain a serious threat. Not just vigilance but a willingness to act are as important today as ever.”
Genocide, the systematic and planned extermination of an entire national, racial, political, or ethnic group. From 1992-1995 that was happening in Bosnia-Herzegovina. In the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, conflict between the three main ethnic groups, the Serbs, Croats, and Muslims, resulted in genocide committed by the Serbs against the Muslims in Bosnia.
The Middle East has since time immemorial been on the global scope because of its explosive disposition. The Arab Israeli conflict has not been an exception as it has stood out to be one of the major endless conflicts not only in the region but also in the world. Its impact continues to be felt all over the world while a satisfying solution still remains intangible. A lot has also been said and written on the conflict, both factual and fallacious with some allegations being obviously evocative. All these allegations offer an array of disparate views on the conflict. This essay presents an overview of some of the major literature on the controversial conflict by offering precise and clear insights into the cause, nature, evolution and future of the Israel Arab conflict.
The history of the Jewish people is one fraught with discrimination and persecution. No atrocity the Nazis did to the Jews in the Holocaust was original. In England in 1189, a bloody massacre of the Jews occurred for seemingly no reason. Later, the Fourth Lateran Council under Pope Innocent III required Jews to wear a badge so that all would know their race, and then had them put into walled, locked ghettos, where the Jewish community primarily remained until the middle of the eighteenth century. When the Black Death ravaged Europe in the medieval ages, many Europeans blamed the Jews (Taft 7). Yet, the one thing that could be more appalling than such brutal persecution could only be others’ failure and flat-out refusal to intervene. Such is the case with the non-Axis coutries of World War II; these nations failed miserably in their responsibility to grant basic human rights – even the right of life – to Jewish immigrants prior to World War II.
Considering that the Palestinians and Israelis both had Jews in their populous it is hard to understand why they did not seek to coincide and pursue a more practical unified state. This would allow them to pool their resources together and resolve issues that neither community could do on their own. Nonetheless, this was not the case, as time goes on it appears that neither side is no longer seeking out peace as the resources required to attain it seemed too hard to acquire. After the negotiations seemed to be going nowhere, it became obvious that both sides just resorted to what they know best: violence. Most of the conflicts still rage on today. While both sides still make efforts in order to finally establish peace, they are constantly impeded by radicals inciting violence, destroying what little progress they made towards ever reaching an
The crime of genocide is one of the most devastating human tragedies throughout the history. And the word genocide refers to an organised destruction to a specific group of people who belongs to the same culture, ethnic, racial, religious, or national group often in a war situation. Similar to mass killing, where anyone who is related to the particular group regardless their age, gender and ethnic background becomes the killing targets, genocide involves in more depth towards destroying people’s identity and it usually consists a fine thorough plan prearranged in order to demolish the unwanted group due to political reasons mostly. While the term genocide had only been created recently in 1943 by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish-Jewish legal scholar, from the ancient Greek word “genos” meaning race and the Latin word “cide” meaning killing , there are many examples of genocide like events that occurred before the twentieth century. And this new term brings up the question as whether genocide is a contemporary description defined through current perspectives towards the crime act or is it just a part of the inevitable human evolutionary progress caused by modernity.
Sanchmo, . "The Israeli Response to the 1972 Munich Olympic Massacre.” Response to terrorism. FreeRepublic, LLC, 10 Febuary 2001. Web. 5 Apr. 2014. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/fr/537799/posts.
Bourke, Dale Hanson. The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Tough Questions, Direct Answers. Downers Grove, IL: Inter Varsity, 2013. N. pag. Print.
Conflicts between people often have multiple causes and effects. A majority of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is an argument that dates back to Biblical times. The Jewish argue Palestine was the historical site of all Jewish kingdoms, which was promised to Abraham and his descendants. The Arabs argue that Ishmael, forefather of Arabs, is the son of Abraham so God’s promise that the land should go to Abraham’s descendents includes Arabs as well . Some of the main causes which worsen the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are the disparity between Sykes-Picot agreement and Balfour Declaration, The United Nation Partition plan of 1947, which was the separation of the boundaries, and Hitler’s Final Solution. While these causes affected both sides
Paradigms of Genocide: The Holocaust, The Armenian genocide, and Contemporary Mass Destructions, 156-168. Sage Publications Inc., 1996. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/1048550
Since the declaration of an Israeli state in 1948 and all the Arab-Israeli conflicts that have followed, the Palestinians have gradually lost their grip on what used to be their homeland and are still fighting for it today. As stated above, many fled to neighboring countries for safety, but many stayed within Israel and its Occupied Territories. According to Ewan W. Anderson, (2000, p. 112 ) after the 1967 conflict and the acquisition of more Palestinian land by the Israelis, 1.1 million Arabs fell under Israeli rule in their Occupied Territories (450,000 in the Gaza Strip and 650,000 in the West Bank). Regardless of where the Palestinian people settled, either in Israel's occupied territories or in neighboring Arab countries; they do not have a proper state and in turn have become the largest group of refugees on the planet (Brynan, unpublished, 1998). The Palestinian population in Israel and its occupied territories of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip alone number over the 4 million mark (de Blij and Miller, 2000, p.315). Many involved in the peace process today believe the Palestinian refugee crisis is the main problem stand...
...r under one leadership. The Arab forces were more so scattered and unable to join together under a single cause, creating instability within. The most effective strategy in war that helped the Israeli forces win was the occurrence of Plan D, which pushed thousands of Arabs out of zones that Israel deemed important. By executing Plan D, the Israeli forces were able to create a sense of fear throughout the Arab population, and ultimately lead the Palestinian Arabs to flee instead of supporting and fighting with the Arab forces. From being outnumbered to not pursuing the same goal, the Arab states were doomed from the beginning. Israel’s effective means of using every opportunity to grow and remain organized led it to win the War of 1948, thus creating a greater sense of pride within the newly established state, and creating a military that could not be tarnished.
Most war victims during the Kosovo War were considered victims of ethnic cleansing, which is the internationally condemned practice of driving out members of other nationalities from territories that had been part of the SFRY (Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia) . All of this began with the presidency of Slobodan Milosevic in 1988 who was president of the Serbian League of Communists and also Serbia a year later. He began a campaign to reassert communist dominance as well as Serb dominance. He purged into countries such as Croatia and transformed its army from one that wanted to preserve Yugoslavia to one that wanted unification of all Serb populated territories and eventually create a Greater Serbia. A way that Milosevic felt he could achieve that task was through a strategy of ethnic cleansing and the expulsion and massacres of the non-Serbs.
Firstly, we analyse source A. Source A is from a pamphlet written by the PLO in 1984 and is therefore a Palestinian view of the problem. It tells us that the party to blame for the Palestinian refugee problem is the Israelis and different Zionist groups such as the Stern Gang, Haganah and the Irgun. It is blaming these due to their brutal attacks on the Palestinian villages including Deir Yassin. The source as like any other has reliability issues. On the positive side, it is a secondary scope therefore meaning that it has a wider scope and perspective as it can take into account the events that took place at