Alwaght- May 15 marks the 72nd anniversary of the creation of the Israeli regime which is dubbed by the Palestinians the “Nakba” (misery) day.
It was in such a day that in 1948 David Ben-Gurion, the head of the Jewish Agency, for the first time recited the declaration of Israel creation. For the Zionists, this is the “independence day.”
The idea of the formation of a Jewish state in the Palestinian territories, which the Zionist Jews say belong to their ancestors because Moses and Solomon as the two Jewish prophets lived there. Although Europe did not spare any efforts in helping the move, the initial colonial actions by the Jews in Palestine did not succeed. Despite the efforts made between 1882 and 1897, a small number of Jews from around the world, mainly Europe, migrated to the Palestinian territories. A large number of them chose to migrate to Argentina and the US, bringing the plan to an early failure.
In the early 20th century, Palestine’s Jews even did not account for 8 percent of the whole population of Palestine. They accounted for 1 percent of the world's Jewish population and hardly seized 2.5 percent of the Palestinian lands. But when the world wars began, a fresh landscape for the Zionists was drawn. WWI shaped an alliance that in 1917 set bonds between British imperialism and the colonialist Zionism. On November 2, 1917, Britain published the Balfour Declaration, announcing support for the establishment of a "national home for the Jewish people" in Palestine. 30 years later, this alliance opened the Palestinian gates to the Zionist settlers and paved the way for the purchase and seizure of Palestinian lands to the Jewish migrants. Palestinians were expelled from their lands as a result. In 1948, the Jewish state declared existence on the ruins of Palestine. Foundation of the Israeli regime marked the beginning of the Palestinian misery, lingering to our date.
An overview of Israeli historical crimes
Looking back at the violent and criminal record of the Zionists in Palestine defines the misery of the Nakba day in Palestinian history. The Deir Yassin, Ein al-Zeitun, and Salahaddin massacres in 1948 were just three among many crimes committed to expel the Palestinians from their homes using terror. On April 9, 1948, Irgun and Lehi Zionist militia organizations with full military equipment attacked the Deir Yassin village in western Al-Quds (Jerusalem), destroying the homes and massacring between 250 and 360 villagers there.
The eyewitnesses later said that the Zionists dismembered the bodies of the Palestinian residents, cut the pregnant women’s stomachs, burnt alive many of the villagers, and raped many young women and then beheaded them.
That was not the end of the Israeli crimes. The Israelis committed crimes in other villages and towns of Palestine like Iqrit (1953), Kfar Qassem (1962), Aka (1956), Hama (1961, Calpia (1955) and Gaza (1962).
One of the most heinous crimes of the Israelis that is marked as a black day by the Palestinians is the Sabra and Shatila massacre on September 17, 1982. As the Palestinian groups stepped up their guerrilla attacks on the Israelis from the Lebanese soil and endangered the occupying regime’s security, Tel Aviv along with Washington and the Lebanese Phalangists orchestrated a plot against the Palestinian activists. In 1982, the Israeli army, led by Ariel Sharon, launched aggression against neighboring Lebanon and seized the capital Beirut. As a result of the attack, thousands of Palestinian guerrilla fighters were killed and the surviving fighters had to leave Lebanon. The Christian Phalangists also killed civilians especially the women and children under a cover provided to them by the Israeli forces. Many pregnant women’s stomachs were cut and many young women were gang-raped by the aggressors.
The case of such big massacres, seizure of lands, destruction of homes, displacing of the people, and killing the civilians in the Israeli aggression in the early years of its foundation and also in the recent years like the Gaza war of 2007, 2009, and 2014 are yet to be opened until the day comes and a fair and independent international court can see into the crimes and bring to justice the Israeli criminals.
The contradicting record of compromising and resisting
The Nakba day can certainly serve as a good chance for the Muslim world to dig into the reasons behind the defeats and victories of the Palestinians and other nations in dealing with the Israeli aggressions.
Over the past seven decades, the Israeli regime made it clear that it does not respect the agreements and international treaties. At the same time, it has the unquenchable will to occupy Palestinian lands and the occupation will not end until it fully seizes the Palestinian territories.
But history has proven that whenever negotiation and compromising have been the Palestinian and the Arab world’s way to retake the seized rights of the Palestinians, the outcome has been further Israeli arrogance and atrocities. But when they choose to resist the Israeli aggression by intifadas (uprisings), Tel Aviv failed to move ahead with its occupational projects and at the same time, the Palestinians made triumphs in their fight for their rights.
When the united Egyptian and Syrian forces received a defeat from the Western-backed Israeli army in 1973, Cairo changed its approach towards Tel Aviv. In 1978, Anwar Sadat-led Egypt was the first Arab country to recognize the Israeli regime following a peace agreement in Camp David, US. The Camp David agreement stood basis to the next deals between the Israelis and the Arab countries in 1991 (Madrid) and 1993 (Oslo). From the heart of these agreements came out the so-called Arab peace initiative in 2002. The initiative called for two Israeli and Palestinian states on the Palestinian territories.
As a result, the newly-founded Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) recognized an Israeli state.in 1994, Jordan also signed an agreement with Tel Aviv in its Wadi Araba region. They officialized their diplomatic relations by exchanging embassies.
The Arab peace initiative that is based on the United Nations Security Council’s resolutions 338 and 342 has the following articles:
1. Israeli retreat from the occupied pre-1967 territories, including the Syrian Golan Heights and Eastern Al-Quds.
2. Formation of an independent Palestinian state with Eastern Al-Quds as its capital.
3. Return of Palestinian refugees to their lands
4. The Arab League will promise to end the dispute with the Israeli regime and establish normal relations with Tel Aviv.
None of these agreements have ever brought to the Palestinians minimum benefits as the Israelis continue to behave treacherously. Tel Aviv has never sought to settle the crisis behind the so-called peace negotiations. Rather, it has always sought two essential goals: First, getting privileges and concessions from the Palestinian side and officializing them, like the recognition is managed to get from the Palestinian side in the 1993 negotiations without conceding any benefits to the Palestinian side. Second, buying time to improve its conditions and strengthen itself even if it takes using force to develop its settlements and getting international support. The result of this policy is the further weakness of the Palestinian side.
And now that all of the Israeli parties express their loyalty for the Trump recognition of the Israeli illegal settlements in West Bank and other Palestinian regions and also the full seizure of Al-Quds, the tragic results of choosing a compromising approach to the Israeli occupation have become clear to the Palestinians.
When the Iranian Islamic revolution succeeded to overthrow the pro-Western monarchy in 1979, new life was breathed into the Palestinian cause and also other oppressed regional nations. It taught them that resistance is the best choice. The Israeli retreat from Lebanon in 2000, the defeat of the Israeli military from Lebanese Hezbollah in a 33-day war in 2006 that shattered the legend of the Israeli army invincibility, and the Israeli retreat from Gaza Strip in 2005 following the adoption of an armed resistance strategy by the Palestinian groups were part of the outcomes of adopting the Iranian revolution-inspired resistance approach.
Nakba for Zionism is close
72 years after the Nakba day and the birth of the “cancerous tumor” in the region, Israeli has never been weaker and more hit by home and foreign crisis. Now Imam Khomeini’s prediction about the disappearance of the Israeli regime is never unlikely with regard to the critical conditions the Israelis are experiencing currently.
After all, the Arab and Islamic nations have been waked up by the developments that engulfed the region following the Islamic revolution of Iran. Now as the inspirations of the revolution keep unfolding, the compromising rulers in the Arab world will have to succumb to the demands of their nations for resistance in the face of Israeli aggression. The fact is that now the ideal of liberation of Palestine has afresh returned as a top agenda for the Islamic nations.
The best example is the incapability of the US-led camp to proceed with Trump’s initiative “the deal of the century” despite the Arab rulers’ silence and even support to it. The initiative seeks to recognize the Israeli occupation and strip the Palestinians’ right for return. Now almost the whole world’s public opinions are aware of the Israeli aggressive and criminal nature and this adds to the obstacles ahead of Tel Aviv’s way of reaching its goals.
Furthermore, with the disclosure of treasonous elements in the body of the Palestinian Authority, the new generation will certainly re-raise the flag of intifada and resistance not only in Gaza but also in other Palestinian territories. This will reveal the shaky foundation of the Israeli regime.
Recent experiences show that the Israeli parties even are unable to settle their home differences to form a new cabinet in critical conditions, for example after the defeat in their assault on Gaza. The political system is hit by corruption. Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is serving his jail time for corruption. The current PM Benjamin Netanyahu is also struggling with corruption cases. This is while the protests on corruption and inequity every day flare up in the occupied territories. Furthermore, as the threats increase, the number of Jews migrating to the occupied territories with a dream of welfare and peace decreases. Even worse, many are reverse migrate in reaction to an increasing feeling of insecurity. Now the Israelis will have to wait for a Nakba day for Zionism and a freedom day for the Palestinians including millions leaving in displacement in many countries. The hour does not seem far away.
