So, if I attack you with a club, and you have a gun, it would be wrong of you to use the gun??

So if someone drops fully armed onto your boat in international waters would it be wrong to defend yourself with a club?


The history of the Palestinian refugees, like most historical accounts, depends on who is writing it; history is usually written by the 'victors'

However I don't think I have ever come across such a blatant misrepresentation as that presented by BB!


During the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, around 750,000 out of 900,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled from the territories that became the State of Israel
-United Nations Conciliation Commission for Palestine.

As Wiki states

"The causes and responsibilities of the exodus are a matter of controversy among historians and commentators of the conflict

Whereas historians now agree on most of the events of that period, there remains disagreement as to whether the exodus was the result of a plan designed before or during the war by Zionist leaders, was the result of a plan designed before or during the war by Arab leaders, or was an unintended consequence of the war.

Between December 1947 and March 1948, around 100,000 Palestinian Arabs fled. Among them were many from the higher and middle classes from the cities, who left voluntarily, expecting to return when the Arab states took control of the country.
When the Haganah went on the offensive, between April and July, a further 250,000 to 300,000 Palestinian Arabs left or were expelled, mainly from the towns of Haifa, Tiberias, Beit-Shean, Safed, Jaffa and Acre, which lost more than 90 percent of their Arab inhabitants.
Expulsions took place in many towns and villages, particularly along the Tel-Aviv-Jerusalem road and in Eastern Galilee.

About 50,000-70,000 inhabitants of Lydda and Ramle were expelled towards Ramallah by the Israel Defence Force during Operation Danny and most others during operations of the IDF in its rear area

During Operation Dekel, the Arabs of Nazareth and South Galilee were allowed to remain in their homes.
Today they form the core of the Arab Israeli population.

From October to November 1948, the IDF launched Operation Yoav to remove Egyptian forces from the Negev and Operation Hiram to remove the Arab Liberation Army from North Galilee during which at least nine massacres of Arabs were carried out by IDF soldiers. These events generated an exodus of 200,000 to 220,000 Palestinian Arabs. Here, Arabs fled fearing atrocities or were expelled if they had not fled. After the war, from 1948 to 1950, the IDF expelled around 30,000 to 40,000 Arabs from the borderlands of the new Israeli state.
Many of these figures are from research by Israeli historian Benny Morris who basically claimed that all the Israeli historiography that preceded his book and several other writings was completely fabricated, a series of untrue myths designed to serve the Zionist need for legitimacy.


"As for Palestinian Christians, refugees and non-refugees, they are found mostly in urban areas of the Middle East but many have opted to leave to far away lands such as the USA, Central and South America, Australia and Canada.

The dispersal of Palestinians since 1948 has spared no one family or group.
The demographics of Palestinian Christians is as much shaped by the politics of the Arab-Israeli conflict, as it is the demographics of Palestinians in general.

Palestinian Christians in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip belong to fifteen different denominations, the largest of which are the Greek Orthodox (51 percent), and the Roman Catholics (32 per cent.) Some smaller denominations, such as the Copts who are originally from Egypt, do not number more than a score of families. Yet each denomination or community maintains a rich tradition of rites and rituals, beside educational and other institutions, that speaks of its long presence and attachment to the land called holy"
- Bernard Sabella Associate professor of Sociology Bethlehem University

p.s. Of course I'm also aware of the number of Jewish people that immigrated into Israel from the surrounding Arab countries too during this conflict but then I'm not attempting to minimise or dispute this!