The Pals.' Nakba Nightmare: A Jewish State

The Nakba, the term the Arabs use to describe their failure to establish a state in 1948, has become of monstrous destroyer of the local Arabs ability to function as a people and to set themselves on the path of healing and reconstruction.

I found two comments I agree with, both from the left and centrist camp.

First, Professor Shlomo Avineri:

...As Jews and Israelis we cannot be indifferent to this pain, as it is clear the Nakba is directly tied to the founding of the State of Israel. But maybe it could be expected that the Palestinians recognize that their behavior - their refusal to accept the UN partition plan and the decision to respond to it with force - is part of the reason for what happened to them. None of this appears in the Palestinian narrative, which contains only the injustice committed against them.

It could all have been different. Had in 1948 the Palestinians accepted the partition plan as did the Jews (albeit grudgingly), two states would have been born and hundreds of thousands of people would not have been uprooted from their homes and become refugees. Arab and Palestinian literature and public relations completely lack this self-criticism. Even today, when the idea is raised of matching Israeli recognition of a Palestinian nation state with Palestinian recognition of Israel as the home of the Jewish people, the moderates in the Palestinian Authority respond with unqualified refusal. This is not a tactical rejection, it is deeply rooted in Palestinians' unwillingness to recognize that in 1948 they made an enormous, tragic mistake; even today they are unable to accept the principle of partition.

The Palestinians are willing to talk about two states, but not for two nations, since that would imply recognition of the Jews as a people. Maybe it is too much to ask the Palestinians to demonstrate awareness of the other side's rights.

The second by Dr. Alexander Yacobson:

The Palestinians reject the demand that they recognize Israel as a Jewish state. They cannot be forced to accede to this request. The Palestinians are right when they say the diplomatic custom is to recognize a country, not its regime. Of course, our situation is more complex.

The matter of a Jewish state is not only a question of regime - it is the very reason for partitioning the land into two states. The partition alone is far from a reason to celebrate. The Palestinians and the right wing have always had good reasons not to divide the land - there is no justification for dividing it unless it is necessary to grant national independence to its two peoples.

The 1947 United Nations committee that recommended partitioning the land into "a Jewish state" and "an Arab state" cited the presence of two peoples, Arab and Jewish. In contrast to the well-known claim that the Jews were a religious community and not a nation, the committee determined that there were two peoples, and that only by means of partition could both achieve their conflicting national aspirations and take their places as independent nations in the international community.

The Palestinian Arabs rejected this principle and went to war, and are now demanding that Israel take responsibility for the war's outcome. If indeed they have come to terms with the principle of partition, it would be very helpful in fostering an atmosphere of trust if they would specifically state what should be obvious: The two-state solution means two states for two peoples.

And, once again, let me emphasize that none of the nations who dealt with the question of the Palestine Mandate in all the world's legal forums considered that the reconstitution of the country was other than to permit to rise of a Jewish national home and in fact, all the other residents and future citizens of that country who were not Jews were not defined as Arabs or any other national description but in religious, or ethnic-religious terms: as non-Jews:

Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have also agreed that the Mandatory should be responsible for putting into effect the declaration originally made on November 2nd, 1917, by the Government of His Britannic Majesty, and adopted by the said Powers, in favour of the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing should be done which might prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine...

Definition by the negative was not unintentional. It was simply the easiest way to sescribe the two types of persons: Jews - and everyone else, but on one else in particular. And certainly not something called the "Palestinian Arab", because nothing like that existed. There were Southern Syrians at the most. In March 1920, the General Syrian Congress proclaimed independence of Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and Transjordan with Prince Faisal as King.

That independence was a bit geographically imperialistic:

In March 1920, the Syrian national congress in Damascus, headed by Hashim al-Atassi, adopted a resolution rejecting the Faisal-Clemenceau accords. The congress declared the independence of Syria in her natural borders (including Palestine), and proclaimed Faisal the king of Arabs. The congress also proclaimed political and economic union with neighboring Iraq and demanded its independence as well. A new government headed by Ali Rida ar-Rikabi was formed on May 9, 1920.

In other words, Arabs had no intention of permitting to any other minority the 'natural' right they demanded for themselves. Very exclusionist were they. And they still are in refusing to recognize a "Jewish state" concept.

Too bad. For them.