#The Arab-Israeli War of 1948

[cavalierzee]

Gaza: The World's First LiveStreamed Genocide

As we mark the 81st anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, we are collectively watching the world’s first “livestreamed genocide.”

For so many of us, the images are unavoidable: Our social media feeds are full of Palestinian death and dehumanization by the Israeli military: children left as the sole caregivers of their siblings after their parents are killed, Palestinian prisoners stripped naked and handcuffed, amputations and c-sections with no anesthesia, survivors of the Nakba traumatized again and again, adults and children lined up and numbered, the bodies of Palestinians discarded after execution by Israeli soldiers.

For many American Jews who grew up in the shadow of the Holocaust, the parallels we see with our ancestors’ own subjugation and dehumanization are undeniable.

For many of us, we are yet again compelled to answer the urgent warning of “never again.”

The experiences of our ancestors’ persecution and mass death under fascism now serve as the foundation for how we define modern genocides.

The genocide we are witnessing in Palestine by the Israeli military is yet another outgrowth from the same fascist mechanisms that extinguished the lives of over 6 million Jews during the Nazi Holocaust.

Journalist Masha Gessen’s comparison of Palestinians in Gaza to ghettoized Jews in Nazi Germany holds power not only due to its accuracy, but because any discussion of Jews during the Holocaust inevitably invokes their harrowing fates.

The Warsaw Ghetto uprising is the most well known act of Jewish resistance to the Nazi regime’s fascism.

The refusal of Warsaw Jews to accept the violent fate the Nazis prescribed to them, and instead fight back, reminds us all of our duty to resist oppression wherever it is.

We hold these ancestors close and affirm our commitment to ensuring their values of solidarity, collective liberation, and anti-imperialism are carried on into the future as we fight for justice in Palestine.

As Jews, as we continue to witness and struggle against Israeli oppression of Palestinians, we also must engage our collective knowledge of where these ongoing atrocities will lead to, and do everything we can to stop that outcome

Our beliefs, our history and our duty demand we stand up to stop this genocide before it escalates even further.

By Jewish Voices For Peace

[captain-price-unofficially]

Haganah armored tractor armed with a Browning wz. 1928, a Polish version of the M1918 BAR chambered in 7.92x57mm Mauser.

[dcyllom]

Show the first celebrity, aesthetic pic, quote, and outfit on pinterest

Tag Game :)

(thanks for tagging me @merriell-allesandro-shelton)!

okay so i've been watching sas rogue heroes with my father, and despite our joint distaste for stirling we really love paddy mayne, and i must say he looks really good all sweaty and dishevelled.

this is some mediaeval city in western europe (i think), but im not sure where -- i've been getting a lot of pins like this as i was creating a moodboard for an idea i have for an sas rogue fic. no idea if i'll even write the thing or not, but its so fun to think about :).

camus! i love this quote, it's very hozier vibes. i like camus's philosophy (vibing w absurdism) but that man's personal life and morals were... interesting... to say the least.

I love this outfit!! I dress like this in everyday life when I can, but I'm not a big fan of the bag; I think a Jackie bag or a Kelly would look better but the day I can afford those is the day i get to marry audrey hepburn. so basically, it's never going to happen.

tagging (no pressure) @malarkgirlypop, @yeahcurrahhe-e :)

[truthaholics]

Diverging Paths: Israel’s Political Consensus Against a Two-State Solution | Elijah J. Magnier

Recent statements by Israeli leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Centre Party leader Benny Gantz and opposition leader Yair Lapid, underscore a significant Israeli consensus against the establishment of a Palestinian state.   Despite differences in rhetoric, the consensus among Israeli leaders effectively defines the official Israeli position against the formation of an…

[stuckinapril]

please take everything you read with a grain of salt. misinformation spreads everywhere like wildfire, and i've been having major trouble wading through false journalism to get actual updates on everything. some resources i've compiled for myself and anyone who's interested:

fact sheet: israel and palestine conflict (october 2023)

live updates - intense israeli bombardments strike gaza as the war rages on

live updates - israel plans to step up attacks on the gaza strip

little light, no beds, not enough anesthesia: a view from the 'nightmare' of gaza's hospitals

what international law has to say about the israel-hamas war

a dangerous new phase in the israeli-palestinian conflict - expert commentary by the foreign policy research institute (FPRI)

the global conflict tracker (israeli-palestinian conflict)

the arab-israeli war of 1948

the 1967 arab-israeli war

the 1973 arab-israeli war

dr. ghassan abu sitta is a doctor on-site who's also been reporting about the atrocities transpiring in gaza.

also some palestinian aid orgs to donate to. if you have some money to spare/know anyone who does, please consider donating/spreading the word:

palestine children's relief fund

palestine red crescent society

medical aid for palestine

gaza emergency appeal

donate to arab.org with one click

the middle east children's alliance gaza emergency fund

help UNRWA USA reach their palestinian aid fundraiser goal

[esyra]

Haven't heard from family in days. I feel like it's time to accept they're gone. I know in my heart Palestine will, one day, be free, but it wasn't supposed to be like this.

We feared another Nakba, and it happened. 700,000 pushed out of their homes in 1948 to 1 million being forced to leave their homes in 2023.

We thought it couldn't get worse or more deadly than the Israeli invasion in 2014, and it happened. We lost 2,251 people in 50 days then. Now we're past 2,300 in one week.

What I heard most from my grandmother the first days it's that "this time is different". And I feel like a rock is crushing my heart in pieces because i've been hoping that speaking out, teaching people about the historical oppresion of Palestine would help but it's not helping. Nothing is changing.

I feel like I'm screaming into a void. There's some sympathy from people online, until I see content documenting Palestinian oppresion being flagged as 'hate speech' or check the comments of any updates on Gaza and it's: "blame it on hamas", "tell them to give up hamas", "the hamas asked for it". They're not even among civilians!!!!!

My heart feels full seeing the manifestations in favor of Palestine, then I see police forces breaking protests apart and remember that the people that can actually save Gaza don't care.

If there's nothing left to do but to watch the extermination of my people, then I'm going to beg for anyone reading this to please don't forget. Please.

Israel is hiding behind Judaism to commit genocide against Gaza. Netanyahu supported the Hamas militant group to prevent the establishment of the Palestine State, and now he's using them to justify his agenda of ethnic cleansing. He abandoned Israelis and left them to die because he cares more about seeing Gazans dead!

Every single person and institution supporting and financing Israel is complicit. I hope the deaths of every Palestinian haunts you for the rest of your lives and that you never find an ounce of forgiveness, for you do not deserve it.

Just as in the Iraq War, the US government is financing and cheering for the slaughter of millions of innocent Arab lives. The media is complicit by engaging in biased propaganda and other nuclear powers, such as the UK and Germany, are complicit too. You are fascists and war criminals and every drop of Palestinian blood is in your hands. I hope every single day, for the rest of your lives, you look in the mirror and see nothing but the blood you've helped spill.

This serves as yet another proof that not a single Western in a position of power, be it in the media or in government, sees Arabs as humans beings.

For decades, the US has comitted terrorism and crimes against humanity in the Middle East and has NEVER been held accountable. Over one million in Iraq; over 150,000 in Afghanistan; and now they'll turn Gaza into a graveyard. Punishing selected soldiers over the years does not erase the fact that the American military and its government validates their crimes during execution and are never punished for it.

Please never forget: Joe Biden is a genocidal terrorist, Rishi Sunak is a genocidal terrorist, the American Democrat Party and UK's Labour Party are led by genocidal terrorists, the European Union is led by genocidal terrorists, fuckass Walt Disney Company is led by genocidal terrorists; every celebrity that called for Palestinian death or stood by silently while ignoring our suffering is a genocidal terrorist.

May Allah protect the people in Palestine and grant the martyrs the highest level of Jannah. Wallah what keeps me here is knowing that the Akhirah is theirs. May Almighty Allah grant us imaan and Taqwa as high as the people of Gaza. Ameen.

[palipunk]

Palestine Masterlist 

Introduction to Palestine: 

Decolonize Palestine:

Palestine 101

Rainbow washing 

Frequently asked questions 

Myths 

IMEU (Institute for Middle East Understanding):

Quick Facts - The Palestinian Nakba 

The Nakba and Palestinian Refugees 

The Gaza Strip

The Palestinian catastrophe (Al-Nakba)

Al-Nakba (documentary)

The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917-2017 (book)

The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (book)

Nakba Day: What happened in Palestine in 1948? (Article)

The Nakba did not start or end in 1948 (Article)

Donations and charities: 

Al-Shabaka

Electronic Intifada 

Adalah Justice Project 

IMEU Fundraiser 

Medical Aid for Palestinians 

Palestine Children’s Relief Fund 

Addameer

Muslim Aid

Palestine Red Crescent

Gaza Mutual Aid Patreon

Books:

A New Critical Approach to the History of Palestine

The Idea of Israel: A History of Power and Knowledge

Hidden Histories: Palestine and the Eastern Mediterranean

The Balfour Declaration: Empire, the Mandate and Resistance in Palestine

Queer Palestine and the Empire of Critique

From Haven to Conquest: Readings in Zionism and the Palestine Problem until 1948

Captive Revolution - Palestinian Women's Anti-Colonial Struggle within the Israeli Prison System

Palestine: A Four Thousand Year History

Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics

Before Their Diaspora: A Photographic History of The Palestinians 1876-1948

The Battle for Justice in Palestine Paperback

Uncivil Rites: Palestine and the Limits of Academic Freedom

Palestine Rising: How I survived the 1948 Deir Yasin Massacre

The Transformation of Palestine: Essays on the Origin and Development of the Arab-Israeli Conflict

A Land Without a People: Israel, Transfer, and the Palestinians 1949-1996

The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood

A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples

Where Now for Palestine?: The Demise of the Two-State Solution

Terrorist Assemblages - Homonationalism in Queer Times

Militarization and Violence against Women in Conflict Zones in the Middle East

The one-state solution: A breakthrough for peace in the Israeli-Palestinian deadlock

The Persistence of the Palestinian Question: Essays on Zionism and the Palestinians

Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel and the Palestinians

The False Prophets of Peace: Liberal Zionism and the Struggle for Palestine

Ten myths about Israel

Blaming the Victims: Spurious Scholarship and the Palestinian Question

Israel and its Palestinian Citizens - Ethnic Privileges in the Jewish State

Palestinians in Israel: Segregation, Discrimination and Democracy

Greater than the Sum of Our Parts: Feminism, Inter/Nationalism, and Palestine

Palestine Hijacked 

Palestinian Culture:

Mountain against the Sea: Essays on Palestinian Society and Culture

Palestinian Costume

Traditional Palestinian Costume: Origins and Evolution

Tatreez & Tea: Embroidery and Storytelling in the Palestinian Diaspora

Embroidering Identities: A Century of Palestinian Clothing (Oriental Institute Museum Publications)

The Palestinian Table (Authentic Palestinian Recipes)

Falastin: A Cookbook

Palestine on a Plate: Memories from My Mother's Kitchen

Palestinian Social Customs and Traditions

Palestinian Culture before the Nakba

Tatreez & Tea (Website)

The Traditional Clothing of Palestine

The Palestinian thobe: A creative expression of national identity

Embroidering Identities:A Century of Palestinian Clothing

Palestine Traditional Costumes

Palestine Family 

Palestinian Costume

Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion, v5: Volume 5: Central and Southwest Asia

Tent Work in Palestine: A Record of Discovery and Adventure

Documentaries, Films, and Video Essays:

Jenin, Jenin

Born in Gaza

GAZA 

Wedding in Galilee 

Omar

5 Broken Cameras

OBAIDA

Indigeneity, Indigenous Liberation, and Settler Colonialism (not entirely about Palestine, but an important watch for indigenous struggles worldwide - including Palestine)

Edward Said - Reflections on Exile and Other Essays

Palestine Remix: 

AL NAKBA

Gaza Lives On

Gaza we are coming

Lost cities of Palestine 

Stories from the Intifada 

Last Shepherds of the Valley

Voices from Gaza

Muhammad Smiry

Najla Shawa

Nour Naim

Wael Al dahdouh

Motaz Azaiza

Ghassan Abu Sitta

Refaat Alareer (murdered by Israel - 12/7/2023. Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un)

Plestia Alaqad

Bisan Owda

Ebrahem Ateef

Mohammed Zaanoun

Doaa Mohammad

Hind Khoudary

Palestinian Voices, Organizations, and News 

Boycott Divest and Sanction (BDS)

Defense for Children in Palestine

Palestine Legal 

Palestine Action

Palestine Action US

United Nations relief and works for Palestinian refugees in the Middle East (UNRWA)

National Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP)

Times of Gaza

Middle East Eye

Middle East Monitor

Mohammed El-Kurd

Muna El-Kurd 

Electronic Intifada 

Dr. Yara Hawari 

Mariam Barghouti

Omar Ghraieb

Steven Salaita

Noura Erakat

The Palestinian Museum N.G.

Palestine Museum US

Artists for Palestine UK 

Eye on Palestine 

[heritageposts]

Germany's leading Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the opposition Christian Democratic Party (CDU) have ordered high schools in Berlin's borough of Neukolln to distribute brochures titled The Myth of Israel #1948. [...] Neukolln is one of Berlin's most diverse and international boroughs with a large Palestinian community. [...] The brochure states there are five "myths" around the creation of the state of Israel, which are subsequently refuted in short essays by various authors. In the first section, debunking myth #1, that Jews and Arabs lived together in peace before Israel was founded, Israel's pre-state militia, the Haganah, responsible for the destruction of 531 Palestinian villages and the expulsion of 700,000 Palestinians between December 1947 and the summer of 1948, is promoted as a merely "defensive" Jewish resistance movement. Under 'Myth #2: Israel was established on stolen Palestinian land', Masiyot states that the acquisition of land by Jewish immigrants to Palestine took the form of a legal exchange of capital for an official title deed. At no point in history was land illegally conquered by Jewish immigrants, the author of the text, Michael Spaney, claims. Even land conquered following the wars of 1948 and 1967 and the subsequent construction of settlements, which are internationally recognised as a violation of international law, did not occur unlawfully, it says. "Anyone who uses the accusation of land theft as an argument demonises Israel and denies its legitimacy, i.e. acts out of antisemitic motives," Spaney wrote. "Myth #5: Israel is to blame for the Nakba", includes a text by researcher Shany Mor titled "the UN is distorting the meaning of the Nakba: its view of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is extremely one-sided". In the text, Mor states that "displacement during war - then and now - was nothing unusual". He also labels the UN's attention to the Palestinian cause "obsessive" and the Arab defeat of 1948 a myth.

. . . full article on MME (23 Feb 2024)

[opencommunion]

"Like all foreigners, the Jewish settlers sailed first to Alexandria, took a ferry to Jaffa, and were taken ashore by small boats. This mundane arrival at the shore appears in the settlers’ statements as aggressive and alien treatment: ‘Aravim Hetikifu Ottanu’ – ‘the Arabs assaulted us’ – is the phrase used to describe the simple act of Palestinian boys helping settlers to small boats on the way to Jaffa; they shouted because the waves were high and asked for baksheesh [tips] because this was how they managed to live. But in the settlers’ narrative they were assailants. Noise, presumably a normal feature of life in the Jewish townships of Eastern Europe, becomes menacing when produced by Palestinian women wailing in the traditional salute of joy to the sailors returning safely home. For the settlers this was the behaviour of savages, ‘with fiery eyes and a strange garroted language.’ Whether the topic is their language, their dress or their animals, reports back to Europe concerning the Palestinians were all about unpleasantness and weirdness. ... Again and again, Zionist settlers behaved as a people who had been insulted – either objectively in the form of a physical attack, but more often simply by the very presence of Palestinians in Palestine. ... The Zionist settlers instituted retaliation for ‘theft’, which was how they characterised the rural tradition of cultivating state land, a practice that was legal under Ottoman law. Picking fruit from roadside orchards became an act of robbery only after Zionism took over the land. The words shoded (robber) and rozeach (murderer) were flung about with ease when Palestinians involved in such acts were described. After 1948 these terms would be replaced with ‘terrorist’ and ‘saboteur’. ... Cleansing the land of its farmers and tenants was done at first through meeting in the Zionist madafa and then by force of eviction in Mandatory times. The ‘good’ Palestinians were those who came to the madafa and allowed themselves to be evicted. Those who refused were branded robbers and murderers. Even Palestinians with whom the settlers sometimes shared ownership of horses or long hours of guard duty were transformed into villains once they refused eviction. Later on, wherever Israelis would control the lives of Palestinians, such a refusal to collaborate would be the ultimate proof for Palestinian choice of the terrorist option as a way of life. ... Following the 1967 war ... both Israeli academics and Israeli media commonly used the term ‘terrorism’ when referring to any kind of Palestinian political, social and cultural activity. ‘Palestinian terrorism’ was depicted as having been present from the very beginning of the Zionist project in Palestine and still being there when academic research into it began in earnest. This characterisation was so comprehensive and airtight that it assigned almost every chapter in Palestinian history to the domain of ‘terrorism’ and absolved hardly any of the organisations and personalities that made up the Palestinian national movement from the accusation of being terrorists."

Ilan Pappé, The Idea of Israel: A History of Power and Knowledge (2014)

[fiercynn]

poetry outlets that support a free palestine

after finding out that the poetry foundation/POETRY magazine pulled a piece that discussed anti-zionism because they "don't want to pick a side" during the current genocide, i decided to put together a list of online outlets who are explicitly in solidarity with palestine where you can read (english-language) poetry, including, except where otherwise stated, by palestinian poets!

my criteria for this is not simply that they have published palestinian poets or pro-palestine statements in the past; i only chose outlets that, since october 7, 2023, have done one of the following:

published a solidarity statement against israeli occupation & genocide

signed onto the open letter for writers against the war on gaza and/or the open letter boycotting the poetry foundation

published content that is explicitly pro-palestine or anti-zionist, including poetry that explicitly deals with israeli occupation & genocide

shared posts that are pro-palestine on their social media accounts

fyi this is undoubtedly a very small sample. also some of these sites primarily feature nonfiction or short stories, but they do all publish poetry.

outlets that focus entirely on palestinian or SWANA (southwest asia and north africa) literature

we are not numbers, a palestinian youth-led project to write about palestinian lives

arab lit, a magazine for arabic literature in translation that is run by a crowd-funded collective

sumuo, an arab magazine, platform, and community (they appear to have a forthcoming palestine special print issue edited by leena aboutaleb and zaina alsous)

mizna, a platform for contemporary SWANA (southwest asian & north africa) lit, film, and art

the markaz review, a literary arts publication and cultural institution that curates content and programs on the greater middle east and communities in diaspora

online magazines who have published special issues of all palestinian writers (and all of them publish palestinian poets in their regular issues too)

fiyah literary magazine in december 2021, edited by nadia shammas and summer farah (if you have $6 usd to spare, proceeds from the e-book go to medical aid for palestinians)

strange horizons in march 2021, edited by rasha abdulhadi

the baffler in june 2021, curated by poet/translators fady joudah & lena khalaf tuffaha

the markaz review has two palestine-specific issues, on gaza and on palestinians in israel, currently free to download

literary hub featured palestinian poets in 2018 for the anniversary of the 1948 nakba

adi magazine, who have shifted their current (october 2023) issue to be all palestinian writers

outlets that generally seem to be pro-palestine/publish pro-palestine pieces and palestinian poetry

protean magazine (here's their solidarity statement)

poetry online (offering no-fee submissions to palestinian writers)

sundog lit (offering no-fee submissions to palestinian writers through december 1, 2023)

guernica magazine (here's a twitter thread of palestinian poetry they've published) guernica ended up publishing a zionist piece so fuck them too

split this rock (here's their solidarity statement)

the margins by the asian-american writers' workshop

the offing magazine

rusted radishes

voicemail poems

jewish currents

the drift magazine

asymptote

the poetry project

ctrl + v journal

the funambulist magazine

n+1 magazine (signed onto the open letter and they have many pro-palestine articles, but i'm not sure if they have published palestinian poets specifically)

hammer & hope (signed onto the letter but they are a new magazine only on their second issue and don't appear to have published any palestinian poets yet)

if you know others, please add them on!

[sayruq]

The brochure states there are five "myths" around the creation of the state of Israel, which are subsequently refuted in short essays by various authors.In the first section, debunking myth #1, that Jews and Arabs lived together in peace before Israel was founded, Israel's pre-state militia, the Haganah, responsible for the destruction of 531 Palestinian villages and the expulsion of 700,000 Palestinians between December 1947 and the summer of 1948, is promoted as a merely "defensive" Jewish resistance movement. Under 'Myth #2: Israel was established on stolen Palestinian land', Masiyot states that the acquisition of land by Jewish immigrants to Palestine took the form of a legal exchange of capital for an official title deed.

At no point in history was land illegally conquered by Jewish immigrants, the author of the text, Michael Spaney, claims.Even land conquered following the wars of 1948 and 1967 and the subsequent construction of settlements, which are internationally recognised as a violation of international law, did not occur unlawfully, it says. "Anyone who uses the accusation of land theft as an argument demonises Israel and denies its legitimacy, i.e. acts out of antisemitic motives," Spaney wrote. "Myth #5: Israel is to blame for the Nakba", includes a text by researcher Shany Mor titled "the UN is distorting the meaning of the Nakba: its view of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is extremely one-sided". In the text, Mor states that "displacement during war - then and now - was nothing unusual".He also labels the UN's attention to the Palestinian cause "obsessive" and the Arab defeat of 1948 a myth.

[captain-price-unofficially]

Arab soldiers during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Palestine.

[matan4il]

Today is Erev Yom Ha'Shoah (Eve of Holocaust Memorial Day) in Israel. It will be observed by Jews outside of Israel, too.

The Hebrew date was chosen to honor the outbreak of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. It's also a week before Erev Yom Ha'Zikaron Le'Chalalei Ma'archot Yisrael (Eve of Israel's Memorial Day for its Fallen Soldiers and Terror Victims), which is itself observed a day before Yom Ha'Atzmaut Le'Yisrael (Israel's Independence Day). A lot of people have remarked on the connection between the three dates. On Yom Ha'Atzmaut, we celebrate our independence, which allows us to determine our own fate, and defend ourselves without being dependent on anyone else, right after we remember the price in human life that we have paid and continue to pay for this independence, and a week before we mourn the price we've had to pay for not getting to have self defence during the Holocaust. NEVER FORGET that in one Nazi shooting pit alone (out of almost two thousand) during just 2 days (Erev Yom Kippur and Yom Kippur 1941), more Jewish men, women and kids were slaughtered than in the 77 years since Israel's Independence War was started by the Arabs. This unbreakable connection between the living and the dead, between our joy and our grief, is often addressed with the Hebrew phrase, במותם ציוו לנו את החיים, "With their death, they ordered us to live."

On this Erev Yom Ha'Shoah, I'd like to share with you some data, published on Thursday by Israel's Central Bureau for Statistics (source in Hebrew).

The number of Jews worldwide is 15.7 million, still lower than it was in 1939, before the Holocaust, 85 years ago (that is what a genocide looks like demographically).

7.1 million Jews live in Israel (45% of world Jewry) 6.3 million Jews live in the US (40% of world Jewry)

Here's the data for the top 9 Jewish communities in the world:

There are about 133,000 Holocaust survivors currently living in Israel. Most (80%) live in big cities in central Israel. Around 1,500 are still evacuated from their homes in northern and southern Israel due to the war (back in January, on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, there was a report about 1,894 survivors who also became internal refugees due to the war. Source in Hebrew). One Holocaust survivor, 86 years old Shlomo Mansour, is still held hostage in Gaza. He survived the Farhud in Iraq.

I haven't seen any official number for how many survivors had been slaughtered as a part of Hamas' massacre, despite everyone here being aware that Holocaust survivors had been murdered on Oct 7, such as 91 years old Moshe Ridler. Maybe, as we're still discovering that some people thought to have been kidnapped during the massacre, were actually killed on that day, no one wants to give a "final" number while Shlomo has not yet been returned alive.

Out of all Israeli Holocaust survivors, 61.1% were born in Europe (35.8% in the countries of the former Soviet Union, 10.8% in Romania, 4.9% in Poland, 2.9% in Bulgaria, 1.5% in Germany and Austria, 1.3% in Hungary, 4.2% in the rest of Europe), 36.6% were born in Asia or Africa (16.5% in Morocco, 10.9% in Iraq, 4% in Tunisia, 2.6% in Libya, 2.1% in Algeria, 0.5% in other Asian and African countries) and 2.3% were born elsewhere.

Out of all Holocaust survivors in Israel, 6.2% managed to make it here before the establishment of the state, despite the British Mandate's immigration policy against it (up until May 13, 1948). 30.5% made it to Israel during its very first years (May 14, 1948 until 1951), another 29.8% arrived in the following decades (1952-1989), and 33.5% made Aliyah once the Soviet Union collapsed, and Jewish immigration to the west (which included Israel) was no longer prohibited by the Soviet regimes (1990 on).

The second biggest community of survivors in the world is in the US, the third biggest (but second biggest relative to the size of the population) is in Australia. I heard from many Holocaust survivors who chose to immigrate there that they wanted to get "as physically far away from Europe as possible."

For a few years now, there's been this project in Israel, called Maalim Zikaron, מעלים זיכרון (uploading memory. Here's the project's site in Hebrew. In English it's called Sharing Memories, and here's the English version of the site) where Israeli celebs are asked to meet up with a Holocaust survivor (it's done in Hebrew), and share the survivor's story and the meeting on their social media on Erev Yom Ha'Shoah (which is today). Each year, there's also one non-Israeli Jewish celeb asked to participate (in English. This time around it's Michael Rapaport, he's meeting Aliza, an 81 years old survivor from the Netherlands, who was hidden along with 9 other Jewish babies for two years. He uploaded a preview of his meeting with her here, where he asked her what it means to her to be a Jew, and from what I understand, he will upload more today to the same IG account). This year, there will be an emphasis on Holocaust survivors who also survived Oct 7 (with 6 of the 20 participating survivors having survived Hamas as well). Here's a small bit from an interview with one such survivor, 90 years old Daniel Luz from kibbutz Be'eri:

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[laineystein]

How do you make peace with the IDF storming into hospitals and UN schools? How do you make peace with the news that the IDF opened fire on Israeli citizens on October 7th? Why do the Palestinians deserve to be chased out of their homes since 1948? Do you know about Rachel Corrie? Do you know that the IDF has killed a record breaking amount of journalists? I don't understand how you can be so close to this tragedy and act like it is anything other than genocide.

You make peace when you understand international law and learn that the only war crimes being committed are being committed by Hamas. We’re not storming hospitals or schools. International law also states that as soon as a faction begins using an area for military purposes, it is no longer protected. It is no longer a “civilian” area, even if civilians still reside there. So many sources (that notably hate Israel and Jews) have come out confirming that Al Shifa is Hamas HQ. Many sources have come out confirming that Hamas is using schools to store weapons and indoctrinate children *and* that NGOs like the UN have turned a blind eye.

You make peace when you learn to educate yourself instead of falling victim to jihadist propaganda. The “Israelis killed their own people on October 7th” lie has been debunked. No sources could be found confirming that and the IDF and the Israel Police both came out saying that was factually inaccurate. If you know reporting out of those groups you know that when we’ve fucked up, we admit it. This was all a fabrication to excuse terrorism and continue to wrongfully demonize Israel.

You make peace when you deal with actual facts. There was a two-state solution planned before 1948 and then four countries attacked Israel and we defeated them all which lead to what y’all refer to as the Nakba. BUT!!! The Jewish population did not want their Arab neighbors to leave. Arab nations encouraged the Nakba. Arab nations have always used the plight of the Palestinian people to further their agenda of demonizing Israel in an attempt to eradicate it and kill Jews. But if we’re going to talk to about being expelled from your homes - Jewish families were expelled from Gaza in 2005 when we gave the land to the Palestinians. Do you care about that? Where are the Jews in Iraq? Yemen? Afghanistan? Syria? Sudan? Morocco? Feel free to talk about how those people were ethnically cleansed from those countries - but if that doesn’t interest you then your activism might be performative and you might just hate Jews.

I know it is not genocide because I’m so close to it. I spent all of last week ensuring the safe passage of Palestinians out of Gaza, into the South. I had Palestinians thank me. I administered aid to Palestinian children and the elderly. I watched them pray to Allah that Hamas would go away. What happened to my people on October 7th was an attempted genocide - something that Hamas has admitted to. What we are doing in Gaza is working to prevent a genocide, one of Hamas’ own doing.

Please read a book. Please get off social media. Please stop regurgitating lies fed to you by influencers and antisemites that did not care about this conflict before October 7th. You clearly need to be educated and messaging an IDF soldier on anon isn’t the way to do it. I have better shit to do. Yalla bye✌🏼

[the-library-alcove]

In the midst of the current Hamas/Israel conflict, the Antizionist movement has gone from being generally ineffectual to a state of being actively harmful in regards to their stated cause of Palestinian liberation.

And from what I've seen there are three primary issues with the Antizionist movement, as it currently stands, that contribute to that harmfulness and also actively inhibit their ability to achieve any of their stated goals regarding Palestinian liberation.

1. Maximalist Stance Focused on Ideological Purity

To the apparent mainstream of the Antizionist movement, there is no other acceptable position than the destruction or dissolution of Israel, possibly featuring a replay/do-over of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, and anyone who disagrees is treated as a heretic. Diplomacy? Mutual peace processes? Two state solutions? All of these are not only Wrong, but a cause for shunning the disbeliever.

And, as part of this, people who are actually affected by the issue are spoken over and ignored, if not actively ostracized and attacked. This goes for both Israelis and Palestinians; in particular, Palestinians who are not onboard with this stance are treated as sellouts and traitors deserving of punishment and death, which goes to show how little concern there is in the movement for actual Palestinians, as opposed to the idealized concept of "Free Palestine".

Also affected are Jews living in the Diaspora, who are harm indirectly by the threats to their fellow Jews in Israel, but also directly from the rampant antisemitism in a movement that demands complete ideological conformity in order not to be shunned and demonized. Since 90%+ of them do not conform with that ideological stance, they are essentially freely targeted by the movement.

2. Cargo Cult Activism

This is a problem across the board of the antizionist movement. On one end we have BDS, which is predicated on using the same tactics as worked on Apartheid South Africa against a target, Israel, which has a completely different economy, history, and ethnic structure. And on the other end, we have random protestors trying to "raise awareness" by engaging in truly random acts of protest, sabotage, and arguably terrorism. As part of that, there is a noted tendency of such activists inserting the I/P issue into every other activism issue out there and treating those other issues as subservient and secondary to the I/P issue, if not outright "distractions".

The problem is that these movements and individuals are imitating the feel of effective activism without first identifying why those pieces of activism were effective in the first place. As part of this, there is also an intense willingness to ignore reality that doesn't conform with the narrative they've adopted as part of their activism, because they tell themselves that they are right, and if they try hard enough, reality will conform with what they want it to be... and the planes with cargo will arrive.

3. Rampant Conspiratorial Antisemitism

For a variety of reasons, including the above two, the Antizionist movement is rapidly turning into a Leftist version of QAnon, full of recycled Jew-hating conspiracy theories from the last two thousand years. Blood libel, "Jewish control of the government/economy/media", "Jews killed Jesus" deicide, and more, are not only commonplace, but egregiously popular in ways that make it actively hostile for any but the most compliant or ignorant Jew to be a part of the movement.

This accomplishes nothing in terms of gaining sympathy (as per point 1), but feels good (point 2) and just makes the general Jewish population fearful, and shows that the movement is full of hypocrisy when it comes to anti-bigotry principles, and is thus untrustworthy to the vast majority of Jews in regards to their safety.

[palipunk]

If you know anything about Al-Nakba, everything you see now feels like deja vu. I look at the escalation of genocidal violence in Gaza and I am eerily reminded of the stories of the Nakba survivors in my own family because time is really just a flat circle and I would argue that Al-Nakba never really ended for Palestinians. Because how could you say Al-Nakba, literally meaning the Catastrophe, has ever stopped for us?

I mean, look at what we've been seeing. I see schools and homes and hospitals bombed in Gaza and I think of the terror campaigns of the Hagana, the Irgun, and Lehi (who integrated into the literal IOF - terrorist colonizers through and through), who blew up homes and schools and threw bombs into crowds of Arabs. I see the IOF drop leaflets from the sky in Gaza warning Palestinians to flee to the south or face punishment and I think of the loudspeakers in Palestinian villages warning if they did not leave their homes they would face terrible consequences like mass murder and rape of Deir Yassin.

I see the men (and as many pointed out, children and women too) in Gaza rounded up, stripped of their clothes, and carted off to who knows where, and then I think of people like Haim Avinoam, who was ordered by the Hagana to circle Balad al-Shaykh and kill as many men as they could. Or how in the villages and towns that were taken over by the Hagana, men of military age were expelled or imprisoned in POW camps.

I see IOF soldiers in Gaza looting Palestinian homes and rummaging through their belongings for all of social media to see and think of the looting that happened in 1948 - settlers taking precious belongings like jewelry and books but also entire stores and homes. I see the openly genocidal statements of Israeli officials and think of the letters and dreams of Zionists who orchestrated the Nakba, like David Ben-Gurion (the first prime minister of Israel), who would write to Moshe Sharett about starving Arabs out of Jaffa and Haifa and even to his own son wrote: 'The Arabs will have to go, but one needs an opportune moment for making this happen, such as a war.'

I push back strongly on the Israeli notion that all of this started on Oct 7th, because it is 1) ahistorical and 2) frames everything that is happening as a reaction to 'Palestinian violence' that just came out of nowhere and not that Palestinian violence is a reaction in itself to over 75 years of consistent Israeli settler violence. This is Al-Nakba.