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60 years ago, Israel fought
and won a war for its independence.
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For Palestinians,
defeat was a catastrophe.
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00:00:15,731 --> 00:00:18,799
The two sides have been
fighting ever since.
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00:00:48,119 --> 00:00:54,079
What happened 60 years ago still
shapes lives in Israel and the
occupied Palestinian territories.
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00:00:54,114 --> 00:00:59,639
If they want peace, they'll need
to overcome the legacy of l948.
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00:01:05,320 --> 00:01:08,565
Gaza - home to
1.4 million Palestinians,
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most of whom are refugees from
the land that became Israel.
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The current battleground
in this long war lies in
and around the Gaza Strip.
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Israel uses air strikes
and ground incursions.
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00:01:23,434 --> 00:01:26,199
Palestinians rocket
Israeli border towns.
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00:01:26,234 --> 00:01:29,359
Both sides blame each other.
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00:01:40,480 --> 00:01:45,245
Two miles to the north of Gaza,
this is kibbutz Yad Mordechai.
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00:01:45,280 --> 00:01:48,920
Some of the thousands of rockets
fired into Israel have landed here.
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History is never far away.
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00:01:56,440 --> 00:02:03,320
This kibbutz - or communal farm -
was founded in the 1930s by Jews
from Poland. They were Zionists,
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00:02:03,355 --> 00:02:07,599
who wanted to return to the biblical
home of the Jews to make a state.
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00:02:07,634 --> 00:02:11,885
We build a society
with our own hands.
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00:02:11,920 --> 00:02:14,800
By new forms of life,
not only by high-technology.
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00:02:14,835 --> 00:02:18,137
The kibbutz,
and the development towns.
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00:02:18,172 --> 00:02:20,966
Those are forms of life
that without it,
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00:02:21,001 --> 00:02:23,725
you cannot understand what Israel is.
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00:02:23,760 --> 00:02:26,920
We developed the best
agriculture maybe on earth.
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00:02:28,719 --> 00:02:34,559
The Zionists had neighbours -
Palestinian Arab farmers, who'd been
working the land for centuries.
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00:02:34,594 --> 00:02:40,559
The relationship between the two
was normal, and reasonably friendly.
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00:02:40,594 --> 00:02:46,039
It was after 1930, with
the massive land purchases,
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00:02:46,074 --> 00:02:48,924
with the massive immigration,
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00:02:48,959 --> 00:02:52,760
that the Palestinians became aware
that their existence was at stake.
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00:02:54,560 --> 00:02:59,445
In 1943, the kibbutz took
the name of Mordechai Anielewicz,
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the Jew who led the uprising in
the Warsaw Ghetto against the Nazis.
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They swore Jews would
never be defenceless again.
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There was no life
in a camp like Auschwitz.
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00:03:26,119 --> 00:03:31,920
So then I decided, should I survive,
I'd become a Zionist activist.
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00:03:31,955 --> 00:03:34,005
And by miracles, I did survive.
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00:03:34,040 --> 00:03:37,839
Yad Mordechai has its
own Holocaust museum.
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00:03:43,200 --> 00:03:47,680
They've also preserved
the field where they fought
the Egyptians during the 1948 war.
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00:03:50,399 --> 00:03:51,959
MACHINE GUN RATTLES
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00:03:56,039 --> 00:04:00,240
What happened here was
a critical moment in the fight
to create a Jewish state.
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00:04:00,275 --> 00:04:03,645
60 years on,
Israelis have a lot to celebrate.
39
00:04:03,680 --> 00:04:07,005
It's been an extraordinary
feat of nation-building.
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00:04:07,040 --> 00:04:11,440
But for Palestinians, every year,
this anniversary reminds them
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00:04:11,475 --> 00:04:13,964
of what they call their catastrophe.
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00:04:13,999 --> 00:04:19,360
For them, the last 60 years has
been about dispossession and exile.
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00:04:21,679 --> 00:04:28,640
During Israel's independence war,
around 700,000 Palestinians
became refugees.
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00:04:28,675 --> 00:04:30,764
They left everything.
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00:04:30,799 --> 00:04:34,324
They left everything intact
at their homes, everything.
46
00:04:34,359 --> 00:04:40,719
Some families even left their money,
their jewels at home...
47
00:04:41,920 --> 00:04:44,004
..and ran. Thinking that...
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00:04:44,039 --> 00:04:51,240
the storm will calm down and in two
or three months, they will come back.
49
00:04:53,279 --> 00:04:56,604
But Israel stopped them returning.
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00:04:56,639 --> 00:05:01,200
Many of Yad Mordechai's
old Palestinian neighbours
are still close by -
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00:05:01,235 --> 00:05:02,840
refugees in the Gaza Strip.
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00:05:03,839 --> 00:05:06,159
They call it the world's
biggest prison.
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00:05:07,840 --> 00:05:11,645
Here is a war, which had led
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00:05:11,680 --> 00:05:14,924
to the uprooting of a villager
from his village.
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00:05:14,959 --> 00:05:18,760
You know how attached a
villager is to his olive tree,
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00:05:18,795 --> 00:05:21,377
to his little home, to his house,
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00:05:21,412 --> 00:05:23,924
to his mode of life, to his...
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00:05:23,959 --> 00:05:27,005
It's something unimaginable. I mean,
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00:05:27,040 --> 00:05:30,080
the Palestinian people are
one of the oldest people
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00:05:30,115 --> 00:05:33,084
in their habitation of Palestine.
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00:05:33,119 --> 00:05:36,240
The Palestinians have to
do some soul-searching too.
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00:05:36,275 --> 00:05:39,084
Why did it become a catastrophe?
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00:05:39,119 --> 00:05:44,680
They could have accept most of
the land, a state of their own.
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00:05:44,715 --> 00:05:47,519
THEY refused, not us.
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00:05:47,554 --> 00:05:51,045
In 1947.
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00:05:51,080 --> 00:05:54,280
We cannot apologise
for their mistake.
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00:05:56,000 --> 00:05:59,720
In 1897, the Zionist movement in
Europe met and declared
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00:05:59,755 --> 00:06:03,440
that it wanted to found a state
for Jews in Palestine.
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00:06:04,919 --> 00:06:07,739
Two years later, the Arab Mayor
of Jerusalem
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00:06:07,774 --> 00:06:10,559
begged them to leave
Palestine alone, and warned
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00:06:10,594 --> 00:06:14,000
there'd be an Arab
uprising if they didn't.
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00:06:15,039 --> 00:06:20,880
After the meeting in 1897,
two rabbis were sent to Palestine
to see what the country was like.
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00:06:20,915 --> 00:06:26,204
They reported back,
"The bride is beautiful,
but she is married to another man."
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00:06:26,239 --> 00:06:33,239
Some of the early Zionists warned
that confrontation with the Arabs
was going to be unavoidable.
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00:06:33,274 --> 00:06:37,800
Others persuaded themselves that
Arabs would be glad to see them,
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00:06:37,835 --> 00:06:41,480
because they were bringing with them
European expertise.
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00:06:49,719 --> 00:06:52,919
The majority of Palestinian Arabs
lived traditional lives
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00:06:52,954 --> 00:06:56,800
in around 800 largely
self-sufficient villages.
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00:06:56,835 --> 00:06:59,519
Politics was local, and tribal.
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00:07:03,079 --> 00:07:04,685
Life was hard.
81
00:07:04,720 --> 00:07:10,480
These days in the refugee
camps, it is idealised,
a lost dream of a homeland.
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00:07:14,920 --> 00:07:17,364
"Village life was great.
83
00:07:17,399 --> 00:07:23,159
We worked the land and sold the crops
in Ramallah, Hebron and Jaffa.
84
00:07:23,194 --> 00:07:28,919
We had olives, watermelons,
cantaloupes, wheat and sesame.
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00:07:28,954 --> 00:07:31,764
All these things.
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00:07:31,799 --> 00:07:35,080
The people were happy and content.
87
00:07:40,280 --> 00:07:44,719
Britain controlled Palestine
between 1917 and 1948.
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00:07:47,879 --> 00:07:52,000
In November 1917, as British
troops were fighting
their way up to Jerusalem,
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00:07:52,035 --> 00:07:54,885
seizing Palestine from the Turks,
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00:07:54,920 --> 00:08:00,320
the Foreign Secretary in London
wrote a letter that became known
as the Balfour Declaration.
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00:08:08,840 --> 00:08:13,880
The Balfour Declaration said
the British would "view with favour
the establishment in Palestine
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00:08:13,915 --> 00:08:18,920
"of a national home for the Jewish
people, and use their best
endeavours to make it happen."
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00:08:18,955 --> 00:08:22,364
It also said it was clearly
understood that "nothing
shall be done
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00:08:22,399 --> 00:08:28,040
"which may prejudice the civil
and religious rights of existing
non-Jewish communities in Palestine,
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00:08:28,075 --> 00:08:32,800
"or the rights and political status
enjoyed by Jews
in any other country."
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00:08:32,835 --> 00:08:37,359
Now, there's a whole series of
incompatible promises in that,
97
00:08:37,394 --> 00:08:39,765
and the British never
found a way to keep them.
98
00:08:39,800 --> 00:08:44,240
As a result, they were regarded
as betrayers - by both sides.
99
00:08:46,720 --> 00:08:49,085
For the Zionists,
it was a big step forward.
100
00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:53,320
But, said the writer
Arthur Koestler, it was
an impossible idea -
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00:08:53,355 --> 00:08:57,965
one nation promising another
the land of a third.
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00:08:58,000 --> 00:09:02,519
It did a great deal to create
the conflict that continues today.
103
00:09:06,799 --> 00:09:12,520
Small communities of religious
Jews had remained in
Palestine since Roman times.
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00:09:12,555 --> 00:09:15,525
The new Jewish immigrants
were different.
105
00:09:15,560 --> 00:09:21,520
Many were socialists and atheists,
who wanted to escape persecution,
and to create a new society.
106
00:09:23,519 --> 00:09:28,564
A dream to change
the Jewish nature from a nation
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00:09:28,599 --> 00:09:34,520
of merchants and bankers to
a nation of farmers and fighters.
108
00:09:47,280 --> 00:09:50,799
In 1929, there was a serious
clash here at the Western Wall,
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00:09:50,834 --> 00:09:55,164
the holiest place in the world,
for Jewish prayer.
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00:09:55,199 --> 00:09:58,440
More than 100,000 Jews had arrived
in Palestine in the 1920s,
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00:09:58,475 --> 00:10:02,377
and some had good relations
with their Arab neighbours.
112
00:10:02,412 --> 00:10:06,280
But as immigration continued,
and as Arab land was sold
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00:10:06,315 --> 00:10:09,217
for Jewish settlement,
then tensions rose.
114
00:10:09,252 --> 00:10:11,946
The trouble here spread
across Palestine.
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00:10:11,981 --> 00:10:14,605
Religious Jews were
massacred in Hebron.
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00:10:14,640 --> 00:10:18,960
Hundreds died on both sides,
and after that, nobody could have
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00:10:18,995 --> 00:10:23,280
any illusions - the two communities
were on a collision course.
118
00:10:34,960 --> 00:10:37,445
Events in Europe brought
the collision closer.
119
00:10:37,480 --> 00:10:43,479
After 1933, Hitler turned
the power of the German state
against the Jews.
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00:10:43,514 --> 00:10:44,996
Heil! Heil!
121
00:10:45,031 --> 00:10:46,995
Heil! Heil!
122
00:10:47,030 --> 00:10:48,924
I came after...
123
00:10:48,959 --> 00:10:54,125
a year under Hitler, in Vienna,
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00:10:54,160 --> 00:10:58,880
which was a very, very bad year
for me as a child.
125
00:10:58,915 --> 00:11:00,965
And, er...
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00:11:01,000 --> 00:11:07,440
I asked my parents to go away
as fast...as fast as possible,
127
00:11:07,475 --> 00:11:10,760
and told them, "I don't
want to remain in the...hell."
128
00:11:10,795 --> 00:11:14,364
Jewish refugees regained a future.
129
00:11:14,399 --> 00:11:17,364
Palestinians felt
theirs disappearing.
130
00:11:17,399 --> 00:11:21,520
They were getting angry because
they saw that their country
131
00:11:21,555 --> 00:11:23,844
was becoming really threatened.
132
00:11:23,879 --> 00:11:28,599
The Jewish immigration was
threatening to overwhelm them,
133
00:11:28,634 --> 00:11:30,000
in their country.
134
00:11:37,559 --> 00:11:41,840
At the Independence Mosque in Haifa,
Palestinians were ready to fight.
135
00:11:48,640 --> 00:11:52,860
One of the most popular
preachers here was a man called
Izzedine al-Qassam.
136
00:11:52,895 --> 00:11:57,080
He became a guerrilla chief,
leading attacks on the British
and on the Jews.
137
00:11:57,115 --> 00:12:01,777
The British killed him,
in a gunfight near Jenin in 1935.
138
00:12:01,812 --> 00:12:06,440
His death was one of the sparks
for a full-scale Arab revolt.
139
00:12:06,475 --> 00:12:08,759
It took the British three years
to put it down
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00:12:13,840 --> 00:12:16,204
This is Qassam's grave.
141
00:12:16,239 --> 00:12:18,239
Thousands came to his funeral.
142
00:12:20,040 --> 00:12:26,560
These days, the armed wing of Hamas,
responsible for many suicide
attacks, is named after him,
143
00:12:26,595 --> 00:12:30,000
and so are the rockets that
Palestinians fire out of Gaza.
144
00:12:32,080 --> 00:12:37,760
The British crushed the uprising
so ruthlessly that Arab society
in Palestine fractured.
145
00:12:39,119 --> 00:12:42,520
It exhausted the stamina
of the Palestinian people,
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00:12:42,555 --> 00:12:46,937
three years of deprivation,
of imprisonment,
147
00:12:46,972 --> 00:12:51,284
of exile of the entire
Palestinian leadership.
148
00:12:51,319 --> 00:12:56,439
With the result that when
the real issue of our existence came,
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00:12:56,474 --> 00:13:00,804
Palestine was...had no
leadership whatsoever.
150
00:13:00,839 --> 00:13:05,960
Attacks on Jews also increased
their determination to fight.
151
00:13:05,995 --> 00:13:11,560
I saw suddenly Jews
running out of Jaffa
152
00:13:11,595 --> 00:13:15,285
to Tel Aviv. And I heard later on
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00:13:15,320 --> 00:13:19,164
that the Arabs
attacked the Jews in Jaffa,
154
00:13:19,199 --> 00:13:24,320
er...killing, murdering,
about nine and more than 50 injured.
155
00:13:24,355 --> 00:13:27,257
And they became refugees.
156
00:13:27,292 --> 00:13:30,125
I couldn't understand it.
157
00:13:30,160 --> 00:13:36,379
Because I couldn't understand
Jews refugees in their...in
their own homeland.
158
00:13:36,414 --> 00:13:42,599
The biggest Jewish militia
was called the Haganah -
Hebrew for "the Defence".
159
00:13:42,634 --> 00:13:46,559
From the l930s, it was expanded
into an underground army.
160
00:13:52,120 --> 00:13:57,760
It was directed from this
building in Jerusalem, the
headquarters of the Jewish Agency.
161
00:13:57,795 --> 00:14:02,640
Its leader and later Israel's first
Prime Minister was David Ben-Gurion.
162
00:14:02,675 --> 00:14:06,359
The Haganah was one of a number
of building blocks of a state,
163
00:14:06,394 --> 00:14:08,765
which the Jewish Agency established
164
00:14:08,800 --> 00:14:13,400
as it worked tirelessly to make
itself into a government-in-waiting.
165
00:14:15,760 --> 00:14:20,120
Just look at this place, designed
and built in the '20s and '30s,
166
00:14:20,155 --> 00:14:22,845
in what for the time
was an ultra-modern style.
167
00:14:22,880 --> 00:14:27,540
It shows the ambition there was
here, to create a Jewish state.
168
00:14:27,575 --> 00:14:32,165
They had a very, very clear
objective, and from this building,
169
00:14:32,200 --> 00:14:36,479
David Ben-Gurion designed and drove
the strategy to get them there.
170
00:14:37,519 --> 00:14:41,479
The Palestinian Arabs never had
anything like the Jewish Agency,
171
00:14:41,514 --> 00:14:45,516
and they never had a
leader like Ben-Gurion.
172
00:14:45,551 --> 00:14:49,484
A man that, from
the morning to the evening,
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00:14:49,519 --> 00:14:54,160
thought about the Jewish people
and the state, nothing private.
174
00:14:54,195 --> 00:14:58,497
A man of tremendous courage,
175
00:14:58,532 --> 00:15:02,765
honesty, historic obligation,
176
00:15:02,800 --> 00:15:06,680
thinking that the Jewish tradition
calls for the preference
177
00:15:06,715 --> 00:15:10,880
of the moral call
above all other consideration.
178
00:15:12,479 --> 00:15:18,279
With war coming, Britain wanted to
strengthen its position in the
Middle East against Nazi Germany.
179
00:15:18,314 --> 00:15:24,080
The British reckoned the Jews
would fight against Hitler, but
Arabs would need to be persuaded.
180
00:15:26,759 --> 00:15:30,484
So in May 1939, a British
Government White Paper restricted
181
00:15:30,519 --> 00:15:35,964
Jewish immigration to Palestine
to 75,000 over the next five years.
182
00:15:35,999 --> 00:15:41,879
After that, Palestinian Arabs
would have to acquiesce
in any more Jewish immigration.
183
00:15:44,560 --> 00:15:50,279
Ben-Gurion's response was that
Palestine's Jews would fight
the White Paper, and fight Hitler.
184
00:15:52,040 --> 00:15:54,645
32,000 of them joined
the British Army.
185
00:15:54,680 --> 00:15:59,319
Later,
they used the training to fight
both the Arabs...and the British.
186
00:16:07,799 --> 00:16:11,939
After 1945, knowledge
and guilt about the Holocaust,
187
00:16:11,974 --> 00:16:15,786
and the question of what
to do for the survivors,
188
00:16:15,821 --> 00:16:19,599
transformed the case for
a Jewish state in Palestine.
189
00:16:21,599 --> 00:16:26,319
We were not brought to
Auschwitz to survive, we were
brought to die there.
190
00:16:26,354 --> 00:16:29,837
Either immediately on arrival
in the gas chambers,
191
00:16:29,872 --> 00:16:33,320
or they worked us to death
in the heavy industry.
192
00:16:37,559 --> 00:16:40,720
But should I survive, I decided
I'd become a Zionist,
193
00:16:40,755 --> 00:16:42,204
because I did understand
194
00:16:42,239 --> 00:16:45,125
that the only solution
for the Jewish people
195
00:16:45,160 --> 00:16:49,019
would be an independent state,
a state like all the others,
196
00:16:49,054 --> 00:16:52,879
with all the rights, and all
the duties, with the government,
197
00:16:52,914 --> 00:16:56,204
a member in the
Concert of the Nations.
198
00:16:56,239 --> 00:17:01,039
A state that could protect
its citizens, a state that
could speak for its citizens.
199
00:17:02,680 --> 00:17:09,479
American pressure was decisive,
as the Holocaust created a new moral
argument for the Jewish state.
200
00:17:10,919 --> 00:17:15,965
It is my attitude that the American
Government couldn't stand idly by
201
00:17:16,000 --> 00:17:21,480
while the victims of Hitler's madness
were not allowed to build new lives.
202
00:17:22,760 --> 00:17:27,040
Truman pressed for
the immediate admission
of 100,000 Holocaust survivors.
203
00:17:27,075 --> 00:17:31,717
The closest some came were
British internment camps in Cyprus.
204
00:17:31,752 --> 00:17:36,324
Ernest Bevin, Britain's Foreign
Secretary, stuck to the quota.
205
00:17:36,359 --> 00:17:41,239
He believed mass Jewish
immigration would start
a civil war in Palestine,
206
00:17:41,274 --> 00:17:43,960
and ruin Britain's
relations with Arab states.
207
00:17:48,479 --> 00:17:52,485
Armed Jewish groups stepped up
their attacks on the British.
208
00:17:52,520 --> 00:17:57,645
'This is the voice of Fighting Zion,
this is the voice of Fighting
Zion, the underground radio.
209
00:17:57,680 --> 00:18:04,319
'Today, our soldiers, in defence of
their country, attacked the enemy's
police headquarters in Jerusalem.
210
00:18:04,354 --> 00:18:07,959
'This is voice of Fighting Zion,
broadcasting for
the freedom of Israel.'
211
00:18:12,760 --> 00:18:16,560
Two future Israeli Prime Ministers
were both wanted men.
212
00:18:16,595 --> 00:18:19,759
Yitzhak Shamir was a
leader of the Stern Gang.
213
00:18:19,794 --> 00:18:21,999
Their speciality was assassination.
214
00:18:23,800 --> 00:18:27,645
Menachem Begin commanded the Irgun.
215
00:18:27,680 --> 00:18:32,045
Its methods included
kidnapping and bombing.
216
00:18:32,080 --> 00:18:37,439
In July 1946, the Irgun blew up
the British military headquarters
217
00:18:37,474 --> 00:18:41,679
at the King David Hotel
in Jerusalem, killing 91 people.
218
00:18:43,479 --> 00:18:45,484
They called us terrorists.
219
00:18:45,519 --> 00:18:49,979
Not only they, also Begin
also called us terrorists.
220
00:18:50,014 --> 00:18:54,405
Now, a terrorist is a question
of definition, of course.
221
00:18:54,440 --> 00:19:00,599
For one, the act is terrorism, for
the other, they are freedom fighters.
222
00:19:02,480 --> 00:19:07,640
The British continued
to intercept ships full of
Jewish immigrants from Europe.
223
00:19:10,760 --> 00:19:15,880
'After being intercepted by
the Navy, the illegal immigrant ship
224
00:19:15,915 --> 00:19:18,479
'Exodus 1947 entered Haifa
harbour under escort.'
225
00:19:20,320 --> 00:19:25,004
We were stopped on the high sea
and then brought to Haifa.
226
00:19:25,039 --> 00:19:28,960
It was a catastrophe, of course. We
were in Palestine, we couldn't stay.
227
00:19:30,680 --> 00:19:34,240
How important was immigration
at that point for the Zionists?
228
00:19:34,275 --> 00:19:35,245
Very important,
229
00:19:35,280 --> 00:19:38,640
because we were already aware that
there would be a solution.
230
00:19:38,675 --> 00:19:42,564
And we wanted as many
as possible Jews in order to get
231
00:19:42,599 --> 00:19:47,080
a bigger piece of this territory,
so we wanted the Jews in Palestine.
232
00:19:47,115 --> 00:19:51,199
Why should the Palestinians,
who had not heard of it,
233
00:19:51,234 --> 00:19:56,204
pay the price of the Holocaust?
Why? Why?
234
00:19:56,239 --> 00:20:02,720
Why displace the Palestinian
people to pay a price for a crime
which they had not committed?
235
00:20:03,880 --> 00:20:08,840
As Jewish attacks continued, the
pressure for a solution increased.
236
00:20:08,875 --> 00:20:11,720
The British Empire
was forced to turn for help.
237
00:20:14,760 --> 00:20:18,320
Here in London, at the Foreign
Office, they'd had enough.
238
00:20:18,355 --> 00:20:21,325
They turned the problem
over to the United Nations.
239
00:20:21,360 --> 00:20:26,440
The UN voted at the end of November
1947 to partition Palestine
into two states -
240
00:20:26,475 --> 00:20:29,005
one Jewish and one Arab.
241
00:20:29,040 --> 00:20:35,200
The Jews got the best of it - more
than half the country, even though
they owned around 10% of the land,
242
00:20:35,235 --> 00:20:37,845
and there were twice as many Arabs.
243
00:20:37,880 --> 00:20:42,760
The Palestinian Arab leadership
rejected the plans straightaway.
244
00:20:42,795 --> 00:20:45,560
This was not going to be
settled by diplomacy.
245
00:20:48,160 --> 00:20:52,925
In Palestine, the Jews celebrated.
Since the 1930s at least,
246
00:20:52,960 --> 00:20:58,640
David Ben-Gurion had believed
that getting a state
was the first priority,
247
00:20:58,675 --> 00:21:01,719
but he knew they were going
to have to fight for it.
248
00:21:02,879 --> 00:21:06,804
At that time, the Jewish
population accepted it,
249
00:21:06,839 --> 00:21:12,439
and the night of 29th November,
we all danced in the streets.
250
00:21:12,474 --> 00:21:17,120
And we were still dancing
when the first news came
251
00:21:17,155 --> 00:21:19,164
that some of the...
252
00:21:19,199 --> 00:21:22,619
That some people were killed
on the roads.
253
00:21:22,654 --> 00:21:26,004
We were... We were shocked
by the thing.
254
00:21:26,039 --> 00:21:29,320
To see that the country
was going to be vivisected.
255
00:21:31,240 --> 00:21:37,000
There had been violence between Jews
and Arabs before the partition plan,
256
00:21:37,035 --> 00:21:39,357
but it escalated fast
after the vote.
257
00:21:39,392 --> 00:21:41,644
Within a week,
there was a civil war.
258
00:21:41,679 --> 00:21:46,600
The British, counting the days
until they could leave,
were stuck in the middle.
259
00:21:51,080 --> 00:21:55,119
The Jewish underground army was
rapidly coming into the open.
260
00:21:55,154 --> 00:21:57,577
They had clandestine arms factories,
261
00:21:57,612 --> 00:21:59,965
but they were still
short of weapons.
262
00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:02,644
Their biggest advantage over
the Palestinians
263
00:22:02,679 --> 00:22:06,760
was a leadership that had spent
years preparing for this moment.
264
00:22:06,795 --> 00:22:11,560
We were better organised,
because Ben-Gurion,
265
00:22:11,595 --> 00:22:15,165
with a very far-sighted look,
266
00:22:15,200 --> 00:22:19,325
he knew that we are going
to come to a conflict.
267
00:22:19,360 --> 00:22:23,720
And the Haganah - that was
the underground forces of Israel -
268
00:22:23,755 --> 00:22:26,004
were organising in such a way
269
00:22:26,039 --> 00:22:29,160
that they would become an army
eventually.
270
00:22:31,279 --> 00:22:34,579
The main Palestinian leader,
Haj Amin al-Husseini,
271
00:22:34,614 --> 00:22:37,880
the Mufti of Jerusalem,
lived in exile in Egypt.
272
00:22:39,520 --> 00:22:45,880
During the Second World War, he was
in Berlin supporting the Nazis.
273
00:22:45,915 --> 00:22:49,977
The Mufti controlled the biggest
Palestinian militia.
274
00:22:50,012 --> 00:22:54,040
Other Arab leaders saw him
as a rival, not as an ally.
275
00:22:55,880 --> 00:22:58,725
He appointed his cousin,
Abdel Khader al-Husseini,
276
00:22:58,760 --> 00:23:03,245
to lead his militia,
which was called the Holy War Army.
277
00:23:03,280 --> 00:23:09,320
In the minds of people, he was a
hero, and he deserved to be a hero.
278
00:23:09,355 --> 00:23:13,357
He was... He was
a top level fighter -
279
00:23:13,392 --> 00:23:17,359
courageous, brave,
and sincere, loyal...
280
00:23:18,359 --> 00:23:21,319
Husseini led a few thousand
guerrilla fighters.
281
00:23:21,354 --> 00:23:24,245
With the help of men
from local Arab villages,
282
00:23:24,280 --> 00:23:30,400
they cut the main Jewish supply
route from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem -
the city they all wanted.
283
00:23:32,599 --> 00:23:39,159
This was the biggest prize of
all - Jerusalem, a city holy to
Christians, Jews and Muslims,
284
00:23:39,194 --> 00:23:44,159
and which had a central part in
the dreams of both sides in the war.
285
00:23:44,194 --> 00:23:48,119
When the fighting started,
neither could imagine a future
286
00:23:48,154 --> 00:23:50,960
that didn't include being
in charge of this place.
287
00:23:58,760 --> 00:24:03,759
In the partition plan,
Jerusalem was supposed to be
under international control.
288
00:24:03,794 --> 00:24:06,885
Neither Arabs nor Jews wanted that.
289
00:24:06,920 --> 00:24:12,599
So once again in its bloody history,
the Holy City was at war.
290
00:24:14,279 --> 00:24:20,879
Jerusalem was under siege,
and the Jewish community in
Jerusalem was completely cut off.
291
00:24:20,914 --> 00:24:23,604
There was not enough water,
not enough food,
292
00:24:23,639 --> 00:24:26,885
not enough ammunition,
not enough soldiers in Jerusalem.
293
00:24:26,920 --> 00:24:31,780
And we used to have convoys
going from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem,
294
00:24:31,815 --> 00:24:36,640
carrying wheat and water and food
and ammunition and so forth.
295
00:24:37,679 --> 00:24:44,239
From February l948, the attacks
on the convoys from Tel Aviv
to Jerusalem intensified.
296
00:24:44,274 --> 00:24:47,000
Arabs controlled the hills
overlooking the route.
297
00:24:49,199 --> 00:24:52,120
The Haganah constructed
improvised armoured cars -
298
00:24:52,155 --> 00:24:55,000
known as sandwiches -
to protect themselves.
299
00:24:56,039 --> 00:25:00,359
We fought our way to Jerusalem,
fighting vehicle after vehicle,
300
00:25:00,394 --> 00:25:04,200
and the convoys were almost
suicidal operation.
301
00:25:13,560 --> 00:25:17,325
The situation was such that...
302
00:25:17,360 --> 00:25:21,760
we didn't want to fall
alive in the hands of...
303
00:25:21,795 --> 00:25:24,564
So, when you drove...
304
00:25:24,599 --> 00:25:30,084
a normal car,
with people inside, whatever,
305
00:25:30,119 --> 00:25:33,119
we used to have high explosives
inside the truck...
306
00:25:35,119 --> 00:25:40,080
..that if worst come to worst,
and you see that there is no hope,
307
00:25:40,115 --> 00:25:45,320
we prefer to die
than to fall alive in their hands.
308
00:25:45,355 --> 00:25:48,040
This was a war without
prisoners of war.
309
00:25:49,959 --> 00:25:54,099
In March 1948, the Jews
went on the offensive.
310
00:25:54,134 --> 00:25:58,205
Ben-Gurion and his generals
adopted Plan D.
311
00:25:58,240 --> 00:26:02,320
Its objectives are still
the subject of great controversy.
312
00:26:04,120 --> 00:26:11,040
Some historians say that Plan D
was a blueprint for the ethnic
cleansing of Arabs from Palestine.
313
00:26:11,075 --> 00:26:16,205
Others say it was simply a military
plan, for seizing strategic ground,
314
00:26:16,240 --> 00:26:21,919
and that there was no political
scheme to drive the Arabs
out of a future Jewish state.
315
00:26:23,240 --> 00:26:26,285
The priority was opening
the road to Jerusalem.
316
00:26:26,320 --> 00:26:29,485
As the Arab militias didn't
coordinate with each other,
317
00:26:29,520 --> 00:26:33,320
the Jewish forces were able
to pick villages off one by one.
318
00:26:35,919 --> 00:26:40,279
If the residents hadn't already
left, they were often expelled.
319
00:26:46,760 --> 00:26:51,440
Central to the plan
was the capture of Qastel,
the site of an ancient fortress.
320
00:26:53,441 --> 00:26:57,240
At the beginning of April 1948
it changed hands several times
321
00:26:57,275 --> 00:27:02,239
in fierce fighting, until the
Haganah drove the Palestinians out.
322
00:27:02,274 --> 00:27:04,564
They stormed the hill,
323
00:27:04,599 --> 00:27:10,760
and the...reinforcement came down
while they were firing.
324
00:27:10,795 --> 00:27:14,240
The commander said,
"The commander will cover,
325
00:27:14,275 --> 00:27:19,325
"and the soldiers...should retreat."
326
00:27:19,360 --> 00:27:23,639
So in a way, the commanders
covered the retreat.
327
00:27:23,674 --> 00:27:26,120
And we lost a lot
of people at that time...
328
00:27:28,120 --> 00:27:30,080
..Qastel cost a lot of blood.
329
00:27:32,800 --> 00:27:38,879
In the days before the battle,
al-Husseini had visited Syria
to get arms and ammunition.
330
00:27:41,560 --> 00:27:46,920
When Abdel Khader al-Husseini got
to Damascus, the Syrian President
refused to help him.
331
00:27:46,955 --> 00:27:51,679
Husseini stormed out, yelling
that they were "all traitors",
332
00:27:51,714 --> 00:27:55,679
and that history would record
that THEY lost Palestine.
333
00:27:55,714 --> 00:27:58,164
That was 5th April, 1948.
334
00:27:58,199 --> 00:28:02,519
Abdel Khader al-Husseini,
the strongest war leader
the Palestinians produced,
335
00:28:02,554 --> 00:28:05,000
came back to Qastel
to continue the fight.
336
00:28:05,035 --> 00:28:08,840
A few days later, he was killed.
337
00:28:11,399 --> 00:28:16,725
On the 9th of April,
a group of fighters from
the Irgun and the Stern Gang -
338
00:28:16,760 --> 00:28:21,280
the two Jewish
ultra-nationalist groups that
the British regarded as terrorists -
339
00:28:21,315 --> 00:28:24,519
were moving towards a village
nearby called Deir Yassin.
340
00:28:27,080 --> 00:28:30,324
The Haganah gave them fire support.
341
00:28:30,359 --> 00:28:34,799
Recent research suggests
the attack killed around
120 Palestinian civilians.
342
00:28:39,159 --> 00:28:41,720
"In every house they entered,
343
00:28:41,755 --> 00:28:43,405
they killed the people inside.
344
00:28:43,440 --> 00:28:47,680
The Jabar family, for example,
was killed.
345
00:28:47,715 --> 00:28:49,725
Eight of them.
346
00:28:49,760 --> 00:28:51,880
They were killed in the morning.
347
00:28:51,915 --> 00:28:54,337
There were still sleeping.
348
00:28:54,372 --> 00:28:56,759
They shot them and left.
349
00:29:17,480 --> 00:29:20,645
This is from a report
written by Itzak Levi,
350
00:29:20,680 --> 00:29:24,399
who was commander of the Haganah
intelligence service in Jerusalem,
351
00:29:24,434 --> 00:29:29,445
dated 12th April 1948, which is
three days after it happened.
352
00:29:29,480 --> 00:29:33,684
"The conquest of the village was
carried out with great brutality.
353
00:29:33,719 --> 00:29:39,759
"Whole families - women,
old people, children - were killed
and piles of corpses accumulated.
354
00:29:39,794 --> 00:29:44,279
"Some of the prisoners taken to
places of detention, including
women and children,
355
00:29:44,314 --> 00:29:46,885
"were brutally murdered
by their guards.
356
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:49,805
"Among the prisoners
was a young mother and baby.
357
00:29:49,840 --> 00:29:55,679
"The guards killed the baby in front
of his mother and after she fainted,
also murdered her."
358
00:30:00,879 --> 00:30:07,240
Palestinians had been
fleeing their homes for safer
places since December, l947.
359
00:30:07,275 --> 00:30:11,200
But after Deir Yassin,
a mass exodus began.
360
00:30:14,839 --> 00:30:19,325
Menachem Begin, the Irgun's
leader, said the massacre was a lie,
361
00:30:19,360 --> 00:30:24,100
propagated by his political rivals
and by Jew-haters around the world.
362
00:30:24,135 --> 00:30:29,007
But Begin said the "legend
of terror" was worth
half a dozen battalions,
363
00:30:29,042 --> 00:30:33,880
because Arabs were seized
with panic when they heard
the Irgun was coming.
364
00:30:38,920 --> 00:30:45,679
Palestinian radio made the atrocity
sound even worse than it was,
to stiffen Arab resistance.
365
00:30:45,714 --> 00:30:48,919
The reports made the civilians
even more terrified.
366
00:30:55,720 --> 00:30:59,480
"May God curse
the reporters who came to us.
367
00:30:59,515 --> 00:31:02,284
They were servants
of Jewish imperialism.
368
00:31:02,319 --> 00:31:05,920
They published stories about
their crimes, the massacre,
369
00:31:05,955 --> 00:31:08,617
how they violated our women.
370
00:31:08,652 --> 00:31:11,245
This helped the Jews, not us!
371
00:31:11,280 --> 00:31:15,520
It scared us,
and made us worry about our honour.
372
00:31:21,079 --> 00:31:27,799
King Abdullah of Transjordan and
other Arab leaders came under strong
domestic pressure to intervene.
373
00:31:27,834 --> 00:31:31,120
Ben-Gurion sent Abdullah an apology.
374
00:31:37,440 --> 00:31:41,445
Four days after Deir Yassin,
there was another massacre.
375
00:31:41,480 --> 00:31:47,639
A column of Jewish doctors and
nurses was attacked by Palestinians
at Mount Scopus in Jerusalem.
376
00:31:53,320 --> 00:31:58,240
Their vehicles were set on fire
and many were burnt to death.
377
00:31:58,275 --> 00:31:59,840
78 people were killed.
378
00:32:08,519 --> 00:32:10,485
Jaffa, just south of Tel Aviv,
379
00:32:10,520 --> 00:32:13,445
was in the Arab state
in the partition plan.
380
00:32:13,480 --> 00:32:18,680
What happened here helps explain
why so many Palestinians fled.
381
00:32:21,199 --> 00:32:27,040
In April 1948, Arab sniping
out of Jaffa was answered by
heavy shelling from the Irgun.
382
00:32:30,240 --> 00:32:32,325
The Jews attacked Jaffa.
383
00:32:32,360 --> 00:32:36,240
And by bombarding Jaffa, they, er...
384
00:32:37,840 --> 00:32:41,925
..they made the conditions
for the Arabs to leave,
385
00:32:41,960 --> 00:32:45,245
because the Arabs were afraid
that they would be killed.
386
00:32:45,280 --> 00:32:50,199
So, it wasn't voluntarily,
but it was a result of the battle.
387
00:32:51,240 --> 00:32:55,639
But the flight was triggered
by more than force.
388
00:32:55,674 --> 00:32:59,564
We let them know, in different ways,
389
00:32:59,599 --> 00:33:02,819
not in pamphlets, not over the radio,
not officially,
390
00:33:02,854 --> 00:33:06,039
we let them understand
that it's better if they leave,
391
00:33:06,074 --> 00:33:09,044
because the Jews are terrible.
392
00:33:09,079 --> 00:33:11,920
And, "Don't stay here
when the Jews come here."
393
00:33:11,955 --> 00:33:14,600
So this was psychological warfare?
394
00:33:14,635 --> 00:33:16,040
In a small scale.
395
00:33:18,000 --> 00:33:21,245
The people flee,
396
00:33:21,280 --> 00:33:25,284
because of this massacre
that happened in Deir Yassin.
397
00:33:25,319 --> 00:33:30,640
They were afraid that the same
thing will happen here in Jaffa.
398
00:33:32,639 --> 00:33:36,005
Palestinian society was collapsing.
399
00:33:36,040 --> 00:33:39,280
Some Israelis claim
that Palestinians were leaving
400
00:33:39,315 --> 00:33:42,520
on the orders of Arab leaders
to wait for victory.
401
00:33:43,880 --> 00:33:47,840
Jewish leaders had discussed moving
Arabs out of Palestine for years,
402
00:33:47,875 --> 00:33:50,680
but deny that was anything
to do with their departure.
403
00:33:55,080 --> 00:34:01,720
Does Israel bear
any responsibility for the exodus
of the Palestinians in 1948?
404
00:34:01,755 --> 00:34:03,444
No.
405
00:34:03,479 --> 00:34:10,480
Some historians say that Plan D
was a blueprint for the ethnic
cleansing of Palestine, of Arabs.
406
00:34:10,515 --> 00:34:12,285
Is that true? No.
407
00:34:12,320 --> 00:34:17,079
You know, as they say,
I was present at the creation.
408
00:34:17,114 --> 00:34:20,600
I don't mind what historians
write or think.
409
00:34:20,635 --> 00:34:24,044
I watched with my own eyes.
410
00:34:24,079 --> 00:34:27,725
Ben-Gurion did not want
the Arabs to leave the country.
411
00:34:27,760 --> 00:34:31,479
When we spoke to President Peres of
Jerusalem, he said that Israel bears
412
00:34:31,514 --> 00:34:35,639
no responsibility whatsoever
for the exodus of Palestinians.
413
00:34:35,674 --> 00:34:38,285
No responsibility whatsoever?!
414
00:34:38,320 --> 00:34:41,719
Then what caused
the exodus to happen?
415
00:34:41,754 --> 00:34:44,565
It was the Israeli massacre
416
00:34:44,600 --> 00:34:47,940
of villagers, of people
whom they encountered.
417
00:34:47,975 --> 00:34:51,280
I can count to you
the scores of massacres,
418
00:34:51,315 --> 00:34:53,359
which happened
all over the country.
419
00:34:53,394 --> 00:34:55,764
Do you think that anybody
would leave his home
420
00:34:55,799 --> 00:34:59,119
unless he was...really threatened?
421
00:35:02,399 --> 00:35:06,640
That's what Peres said to us.
I am surprised that
President Peres has said so.
422
00:35:08,200 --> 00:35:10,365
The 14th of May, 1948.
423
00:35:10,400 --> 00:35:13,565
The last day of the British mandate.
424
00:35:13,600 --> 00:35:16,599
Britain's legacy to Palestine
was a legal system,
425
00:35:16,634 --> 00:35:21,119
red pillar boxes, chaos and war.
426
00:35:27,599 --> 00:35:31,400
The same day, David Ben-Gurion
announced that the State of Israel
427
00:35:31,435 --> 00:35:34,919
would come into existence
at midnight.
428
00:35:38,879 --> 00:35:42,444
Within hours,
the country was under attack.
429
00:35:42,479 --> 00:35:45,239
We heard the explosions,
and I said to my wife, I said,
430
00:35:45,274 --> 00:35:48,164
"The game's on.
They're bombing Tel-Aviv."
431
00:35:48,199 --> 00:35:52,739
Their main targets were
the Reading power station,
432
00:35:52,774 --> 00:35:57,245
the Tel Aviv airfield,
the central bus station,
433
00:35:57,280 --> 00:36:02,000
and they were really bombing
Tel Aviv with impunity, because
there was nothing to stop them.
434
00:36:04,240 --> 00:36:07,199
That day, five Arab states invaded.
435
00:36:11,080 --> 00:36:13,524
The Egyptians advanced
from the south,
436
00:36:13,559 --> 00:36:16,244
towards the main
Jewish centre of Tel Aviv.
437
00:36:16,279 --> 00:36:19,365
The Lebanese barely
crossed the northern border,
438
00:36:19,400 --> 00:36:24,040
with the Syrians attacking at
either end of the Sea of Galilee.
439
00:36:24,075 --> 00:36:26,760
Further south came the Iraqis,
while in the centre,
440
00:36:26,795 --> 00:36:28,937
Transjordan's Arab Legion advanced
441
00:36:28,972 --> 00:36:31,044
towards the West Bank and Jerusalem.
442
00:36:31,079 --> 00:36:34,720
The invading force
was between 25-30,000,
443
00:36:34,755 --> 00:36:38,280
against around 35,000 Israelis.
444
00:36:40,760 --> 00:36:43,845
Although the invasion
was under the nominal command
445
00:36:43,880 --> 00:36:48,780
of King Abdullah of Transjordan,
each country made its own plans.
446
00:36:48,815 --> 00:36:53,187
Abdullah had been having secret
but inconclusive negotiations
447
00:36:53,222 --> 00:36:57,559
with Jewish leaders about
carving up Palestine between them.
448
00:36:57,594 --> 00:37:01,400
He also wanted to add Lebanon
and Syria to his kingdom,
449
00:37:01,435 --> 00:37:03,845
to make an Arab superstate.
450
00:37:03,880 --> 00:37:07,159
No wonder other Arab leaders
didn't trust him.
451
00:37:07,194 --> 00:37:09,204
They didn't trust
each other, either.
452
00:37:09,239 --> 00:37:12,804
They'd all have liked
a piece of Palestine for themselves.
453
00:37:12,839 --> 00:37:18,160
And destroying the Jewish state
at birth would have made them
into national heroes.
454
00:37:18,195 --> 00:37:22,560
But they knew their capacity
to do it was limited.
455
00:37:22,595 --> 00:37:26,565
Some of the Arab states went to war
456
00:37:26,600 --> 00:37:32,360
just to satisfy the ambitions
of their common classes.
457
00:37:32,395 --> 00:37:35,964
Some of the Arab states wanted
458
00:37:35,999 --> 00:37:40,560
to prevent King Abdullah
from controlling
459
00:37:40,595 --> 00:37:44,480
more areas from the Arab states.
460
00:37:46,040 --> 00:37:50,244
Some of the states, er...
461
00:37:50,279 --> 00:37:53,765
were forcing themselves
to go to war,
462
00:37:53,800 --> 00:37:58,359
otherwise the Arab people
will call them traitors.
463
00:38:00,040 --> 00:38:05,719
Most of the invading troops
were like Egypt's - well-armed,
but badly trained and led.
464
00:38:05,754 --> 00:38:11,440
Egypt's King Farouk
sent his men to war against
the advice of his government.
465
00:38:13,039 --> 00:38:17,044
Transjordan's Arab Legion
was commanded by British officers.
466
00:38:17,079 --> 00:38:21,804
It was the most effective
Arab fighting force,
but small - 8,000 men.
467
00:38:21,839 --> 00:38:27,320
It only fought for land allocated
to the Arabs by the partition plan,
and in Jerusalem.
468
00:38:31,400 --> 00:38:34,879
"The Jordanians
considered Jerusalem and Palestine
469
00:38:34,914 --> 00:38:36,885
as the diamond of the Middle East,
470
00:38:36,920 --> 00:38:43,200
because of the spiritual
and religious significance
we have as Muslims and Arabs.
471
00:38:43,235 --> 00:38:49,480
So we considered the capture
of Jerusalem as our incentive
as Jordanian fighters,
472
00:38:49,515 --> 00:38:52,400
and we fought hard to defend it.
473
00:38:59,399 --> 00:39:03,959
For the first month after
the invasion, it was touch and go
for the Israelis.
474
00:39:03,994 --> 00:39:08,084
The old city of Jerusalem was under
attack by the Jordanian army,
475
00:39:08,119 --> 00:39:11,959
so we were stretched all over the
place, and there were very few units,
476
00:39:11,994 --> 00:39:14,536
who were free to fight
everywhere else.
477
00:39:14,571 --> 00:39:17,044
And the situation
at that time I think
478
00:39:17,079 --> 00:39:22,120
was the most critical
during the war of independence.
479
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:33,805
Kibbutz Ramat Rachel near Bethlehem.
480
00:39:33,840 --> 00:39:36,405
Here, the Israelis fought
to stop the Egyptians
481
00:39:36,440 --> 00:39:40,919
linking up with the Arab Legion
to encircle Jerusalem.
482
00:39:42,559 --> 00:39:47,360
The building behind me
was the dining hall
here at Kibbutz Ramat Rachel.
483
00:39:47,395 --> 00:39:50,725
It was the strongest building
in the place, on the highest point,
484
00:39:50,760 --> 00:39:56,320
and it was there that the Israelis
set up their headquarters
and decided to make their stand.
485
00:39:59,360 --> 00:40:04,760
You know, it's been
60 years since I was here last.
486
00:40:04,795 --> 00:40:07,240
60 years, that's a long time.
It sure is.
487
00:40:08,919 --> 00:40:10,600
There's the wall.
488
00:40:12,680 --> 00:40:17,120
And all those pocket marks
from the bombardment.
489
00:40:17,155 --> 00:40:18,804
From the shelling.
490
00:40:18,839 --> 00:40:22,959
You were up here when you
were wounded. What happened?
491
00:40:22,994 --> 00:40:26,199
The truth is,
I don't know what happened.
492
00:40:26,234 --> 00:40:27,804
A shell exploded in my face
493
00:40:27,839 --> 00:40:31,479
and I got covered with shrapnel
all over my body.
494
00:40:31,514 --> 00:40:34,077
I couldn't see.
I thought I was blind.
495
00:40:34,112 --> 00:40:36,605
The Israelis held on
to Ramat Rachel,
496
00:40:36,640 --> 00:40:42,400
but the Arab Legion kept up
the pressure on
Jewish-controlled Jerusalem
497
00:40:42,435 --> 00:40:44,680
by cutting
the supply route from Tel Aviv.
498
00:40:50,720 --> 00:40:54,004
To reopen it,
the Israelis tried - and failed -
499
00:40:54,039 --> 00:40:58,124
repeatedly to take Latroun,
a strongpoint on the Jerusalem road.
500
00:40:58,159 --> 00:41:03,239
The first time they thought it was
defended by Palestinian irregulars.
501
00:41:03,274 --> 00:41:08,285
Instead, they faced well-dug-in
professionals from the Arab Legion.
502
00:41:08,320 --> 00:41:13,600
We were encountered by tremendous
fire of machine-guns and mortars,
and so forth.
503
00:41:13,635 --> 00:41:17,720
The heat was absolutely
about 40, 42 degrees,
504
00:41:17,755 --> 00:41:20,039
and in the shadow.
505
00:41:21,440 --> 00:41:23,720
We didn't have enough water,
of course,
506
00:41:23,755 --> 00:41:25,925
and people were hit all the time.
507
00:41:25,960 --> 00:41:29,120
I myself was wounded, first time,
in the morning.
508
00:41:29,155 --> 00:41:31,405
I got a bullet in my shoulder,
509
00:41:31,440 --> 00:41:35,280
and then, about 10 o'clock,
I got another shrapnel, in my chest.
510
00:41:35,315 --> 00:41:40,360
And the situation was hopeless,
as far as we are concerned.
511
00:41:40,395 --> 00:41:43,845
In Jerusalem's walled Old City,
512
00:41:43,880 --> 00:41:47,580
the Jewish Quarter fell
to the Arab Legion.
513
00:41:47,615 --> 00:41:51,245
Over 1,000 Jewish civilians
lost their homes.
514
00:41:51,280 --> 00:41:58,000
Almost 23,000 Palestinians left
districts of the city captured
by Jewish forces during the war.
515
00:41:58,559 --> 00:42:03,160
The Legion kept the
Jewish-controlled west of the city
under siege,
516
00:42:03,195 --> 00:42:06,320
but never risked
trying to capture it.
517
00:42:06,355 --> 00:42:08,765
I think that people fired...
518
00:42:08,800 --> 00:42:13,044
'For the Israelis, the breakthrough
was finding a cross-country route,
519
00:42:13,079 --> 00:42:18,000
'to ferry supplies and pump water,
that bypassed the Arab
Legion's positions.'
520
00:42:18,035 --> 00:42:20,205
We assembled 13 Jeeps.
521
00:42:20,240 --> 00:42:22,965
One of them belonged to Ben-Gurion.
522
00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:27,400
We loaded them with about more than
half a ton per Jeep
523
00:42:27,435 --> 00:42:30,484
medical supplies,
ammunition, weapons.
524
00:42:30,519 --> 00:42:33,725
We knew exactly
what the situation in Jerusalem is.
525
00:42:33,760 --> 00:42:38,720
How important was it for the Jewish
forces to hang on in Jerusalem?
526
00:42:38,755 --> 00:42:42,645
It's unbelievable
how people felt about Jerusalem.
527
00:42:42,680 --> 00:42:48,079
They knew that...that without
Jerusalem, there is no Jewish state.
528
00:42:49,240 --> 00:42:54,280
On the southern front,
the Egyptian army advanced north
towards Tel Aviv,
529
00:42:54,315 --> 00:42:56,279
avoiding smaller Israeli
settlements.
530
00:43:00,720 --> 00:43:05,059
But Kibbutz Yad Mordechai
was too big to ignore.
531
00:43:05,094 --> 00:43:09,399
On 24th May, Egyptian armour
and infantry attacked.
532
00:43:10,800 --> 00:43:17,079
Here, in front of me,
I have no bullets and I have
no rifles to reach them.
533
00:43:17,114 --> 00:43:20,524
I need a mortar,
or I need something...
534
00:43:20,559 --> 00:43:25,359
And I was very, very angry
that I can't shoot...
535
00:43:25,394 --> 00:43:28,037
there in front of me.
536
00:43:28,072 --> 00:43:30,255
And I can't do nothing,
537
00:43:30,290 --> 00:43:32,404
because, er, the distance,
538
00:43:32,439 --> 00:43:37,439
it's too wide. I have no rifle,
I have no munition.
539
00:43:37,474 --> 00:43:42,440
And no aims to defence myself,
or to attack them.
540
00:43:44,239 --> 00:43:46,799
Outnumbered and out of ammunition,
541
00:43:46,834 --> 00:43:49,324
the Israeli forces had to retreat.
542
00:43:49,359 --> 00:43:53,499
But they had bought time
to establish a defence line
further north,
543
00:43:53,534 --> 00:43:57,640
where the Egyptians were stopped
before they could reach Tel Aviv.
544
00:43:59,840 --> 00:44:01,725
After nearly a month's fighting,
545
00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:05,559
the United Nations secured
a four-week ceasefire.
546
00:44:07,319 --> 00:44:13,445
During the truce, both sides
re-armed, but Israel had the edge,
547
00:44:13,480 --> 00:44:20,320
with big deliveries from
Czechoslovakia of modern weapons,
including heavy guns and aircraft.
548
00:44:20,355 --> 00:44:24,520
Although hugely outnumbered
by Arabs in the Middle East,
549
00:44:24,555 --> 00:44:29,597
Israel was always able
to mobilise more soldiers.
550
00:44:29,632 --> 00:44:34,604
It was now better equipped,
organised and motivated.
551
00:44:34,639 --> 00:44:38,560
As far as you were concerned,
it was a life-or-death struggle.
Absolutely.
552
00:44:38,595 --> 00:44:40,857
This was Israel's most frightful war.
553
00:44:40,892 --> 00:44:43,686
It was a case of to be or not to be.
554
00:44:43,721 --> 00:44:46,445
When the ceasefire ended
after a month,
555
00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:50,359
the Israelis were ready for what
one of their top generals called
556
00:44:50,394 --> 00:44:54,239
a series of sharp, short,
decisive and victorious engagements.
557
00:44:56,320 --> 00:45:00,359
The priority was relieving the
pressure on Tel Aviv-Jerusalem axis.
558
00:45:00,394 --> 00:45:05,080
Lydd and Ramleh, two adjoining
Arab towns close to Tel Aviv,
559
00:45:05,115 --> 00:45:07,125
were the targets.
560
00:45:07,160 --> 00:45:11,800
What happened here was one of
the most controversial episodes
of the entire war.
561
00:45:11,835 --> 00:45:15,844
The Israelis scored
a major strategic victory.
562
00:45:15,879 --> 00:45:19,645
They secured Tel Aviv,
and the centre of their new country.
563
00:45:19,680 --> 00:45:25,160
In the process, tens of thousands of
Palestinian Arabs lost their homes,
564
00:45:25,195 --> 00:45:28,480
and hundreds of them
lost their lives.
565
00:45:41,719 --> 00:45:46,280
The Haganah killed
dozens of Palestinians
who were sheltering in a mosque.
566
00:45:51,239 --> 00:45:56,239
Some of them just left their houses
and found this place as a refuge,
567
00:45:56,274 --> 00:45:59,880
most of the families, and
they thought that this is the way,
568
00:45:59,915 --> 00:46:01,684
they are very safe in this place.
569
00:46:01,719 --> 00:46:04,564
The Haganah army,
when they got inside the city,
570
00:46:04,599 --> 00:46:10,520
after fears of fighting between
the Palestinians and the Haganah,
571
00:46:10,555 --> 00:46:13,485
they just came inside this mosque,
572
00:46:13,520 --> 00:46:17,120
and they just killed all of
the people inside here.
573
00:46:17,155 --> 00:46:21,004
Women, children, old people,
574
00:46:21,039 --> 00:46:23,800
all of them were shot.
It was a big massacre.
575
00:46:30,440 --> 00:46:34,479
Some of the residents
were forced to bury the bodies.
576
00:46:42,080 --> 00:46:46,600
'The army took us to the mosque,
to take the dead to the cemetery.
577
00:46:47,760 --> 00:46:52,645
'We entered one room.
there were 60 or 70 bodies inside.
578
00:46:52,680 --> 00:46:58,520
'Later, they covered them
with clothes and poured petrol,
and set them on fire.
579
00:47:00,480 --> 00:47:04,520
'There was a woman
dressed in peasant clothes.
580
00:47:06,319 --> 00:47:10,044
'Next to her were two little girls.
581
00:47:10,079 --> 00:47:14,525
'We carried them,
and put them over there.
582
00:47:14,560 --> 00:47:17,359
'They were the only ones
who had a proper burial.'
583
00:47:20,519 --> 00:47:27,280
There's a controversy over
whether Ben-Gurion authorised the
expulsions from Lydd and Ramleh.
584
00:47:28,399 --> 00:47:32,119
The Israeli commander who signed
the order believed that he had.
585
00:47:32,154 --> 00:47:35,920
More than 50,000 Palestinians
were forced out.
586
00:47:37,999 --> 00:47:40,759
It's not a secret any more.
587
00:47:42,599 --> 00:47:46,205
It was called Shualei Shimshon,
"the wolf of Samson".
588
00:47:46,240 --> 00:47:52,080
With Jeeps, with machine-guns,
it's not a secret any more.
589
00:47:53,759 --> 00:47:59,599
Many things we did we regret until
today. We...we regret until today.
590
00:47:59,634 --> 00:48:01,445
And I think that, er...
591
00:48:01,480 --> 00:48:04,480
Well, but in war,
you make mistakes. You...
592
00:48:06,119 --> 00:48:10,565
Anyhow, there was no clear order
from Ben-Gurion
593
00:48:10,600 --> 00:48:15,564
how to deal with the inhabitants
in an occupied village.
594
00:48:15,599 --> 00:48:21,199
But could Israel have functioned
with a big town like Ramleh...
595
00:48:21,234 --> 00:48:23,576
full of Arabs...?
596
00:48:23,611 --> 00:48:25,884
Ramleh? All Arabs...
597
00:48:25,919 --> 00:48:31,639
Could you have built a state if you
had that many Arabs living
right in the centre of the country?
598
00:48:31,674 --> 00:48:33,485
No.
599
00:48:33,520 --> 00:48:39,040
Many refugees died on the
long walk to the Arab lines.
600
00:48:39,075 --> 00:48:42,160
The offensive ended
with another UN truce.
601
00:48:46,280 --> 00:48:50,844
In ten days of fighting,
the Israeli general Yigal Allon
602
00:48:50,879 --> 00:48:55,240
estimated that 20% of the effective
Arab fighting force had been lost,
603
00:48:55,275 --> 00:48:58,720
and the war of independence won,
though not ended.
604
00:49:00,959 --> 00:49:05,200
In the remaining months of the war,
there were more Israeli offensives,
605
00:49:05,235 --> 00:49:09,084
more Palestinians were forced out,
and there were more ceasefires.
606
00:49:09,119 --> 00:49:16,279
Of the invaders, only the Arab
Legion, in Jerusalem and the
West Bank, could claim any success.
607
00:49:16,314 --> 00:49:18,520
The others were humiliated.
608
00:49:19,880 --> 00:49:25,640
When the second war came, it was not
in favour of the Arabs.
609
00:49:25,675 --> 00:49:28,879
It was totally in favour of the Jews.
610
00:49:30,400 --> 00:49:32,360
Because their...
611
00:49:32,960 --> 00:49:38,360
The Jews were able to make victory
in the south,
612
00:49:38,395 --> 00:49:40,965
and against
the Syrians and Lebanese.
613
00:49:41,000 --> 00:49:46,359
We were left alone in the West Bank,
defending ourselves.
614
00:49:47,760 --> 00:49:53,599
By the time Israel seized
the last corner of the
Negev Desert in March l949,
615
00:49:53,600 --> 00:49:55,900
armistice talks had
already started.
616
00:49:58,034 --> 00:50:02,939
Yad Mordechai was recaptured,
and became a symbol
of Israeli resistance.
617
00:50:03,840 --> 00:50:07,845
From November 1947 to January 1949,
618
00:50:07,880 --> 00:50:14,640
around 6,000 Israelis - 1% of
the population - had been killed.
619
00:50:14,675 --> 00:50:18,365
What do you think would
have happened if you hadn't won?
620
00:50:18,400 --> 00:50:22,340
Well, the Arabs really gave the
answer to that question, Jeremy.
621
00:50:22,375 --> 00:50:26,280
When someone said to them,
"But what will happen to the Jews
622
00:50:26,315 --> 00:50:28,365
"once you over-run them?"
623
00:50:28,400 --> 00:50:30,204
He says, "There won't be any Jews.
624
00:50:30,239 --> 00:50:32,680
"They will have been
drowned in the sea."
625
00:50:34,199 --> 00:50:37,845
And I have no doubt that it
really would have been a holocaust.
626
00:50:37,880 --> 00:50:43,639
One estimate is that
around 15,000 Arab soldiers
and civilians were killed.
627
00:50:43,674 --> 00:50:48,760
Defeat made the Arab world
even more unstable.
628
00:50:48,795 --> 00:50:50,565
There was no balance
629
00:50:50,600 --> 00:50:54,920
between the forces of Israel
and the forces of the Arabs,
630
00:50:54,955 --> 00:50:56,445
because in wars,
631
00:50:56,480 --> 00:51:01,840
you don't only depend on the number
of soldiers, or the number of tanks,
632
00:51:01,875 --> 00:51:06,845
you have also to have
political force,
633
00:51:06,880 --> 00:51:12,320
and you have to have unity
among those who are going to war.
634
00:51:12,355 --> 00:51:17,399
Unity did not exist among
the Arab states.
635
00:51:19,879 --> 00:51:23,319
Since l948, the Israelis
have built a modern state,
636
00:51:23,354 --> 00:51:26,760
the region's superpower,
a homeland for the Jews.
637
00:51:30,039 --> 00:51:34,040
Palestinians believe that it has
all come on the back of their loss,
638
00:51:34,075 --> 00:51:36,759
and that troubles some Israelis,
too.
639
00:51:38,600 --> 00:51:41,679
"I have no doubt that
the Arabs' deportation
640
00:51:41,714 --> 00:51:44,080
also helped the state of Israel.
641
00:51:44,115 --> 00:51:46,285
The truth should be said.
642
00:51:46,320 --> 00:51:48,924
It helped us because hundreds
of thousands fled,
643
00:51:48,959 --> 00:51:52,560
and new immigrants settled into
their villages and towns.
644
00:51:52,595 --> 00:51:55,325
It's difficult to say,
but this DID happen.
645
00:51:55,360 --> 00:51:59,760
We didn't ask for it,
but it happened nonetheless.
646
00:51:59,795 --> 00:52:04,160
On the other hand,
the situation of an ongoing war,
647
00:52:04,195 --> 00:52:07,644
day after day, for 60 years,
648
00:52:07,679 --> 00:52:12,119
big wars with names,
small wars with no names.
649
00:52:12,154 --> 00:52:16,360
The 1948 war is yet to end.
650
00:52:26,800 --> 00:52:31,679
For all Israel's strength,
its civilians still
get killed by Palestinians.
651
00:52:36,599 --> 00:52:39,764
And with their civilians dying, too,
652
00:52:39,799 --> 00:52:43,360
Palestinians believe that
what they called the Nakba -
653
00:52:43,395 --> 00:52:47,159
the catastrophe of 1948-
has never ended.
654
00:52:48,559 --> 00:52:53,159
The current peace process,
sponsored by President Bush,
655
00:52:53,194 --> 00:52:55,805
will fail, like all the others,
656
00:52:55,840 --> 00:53:00,920
if it cannot solve problems that
are hard-wired to l948.
657
00:53:00,955 --> 00:53:03,324
Partition is still on the agenda.
658
00:53:03,359 --> 00:53:08,759
They need to fix a border between
Israel and a Palestinian state.
659
00:53:08,794 --> 00:53:12,856
Jerusalem is still
claimed by both sides.
660
00:53:12,891 --> 00:53:16,919
And Palestinian refugees
await a future.
661
00:53:19,360 --> 00:53:23,480
Until 1948, that was a bare hill
on the edge of Bethlehem.
662
00:53:23,515 --> 00:53:25,565
Now it's Deheishe refugee camp.
663
00:53:25,600 --> 00:53:30,925
The original tents were
replaced by permanent structures
a long time ago,
664
00:53:30,960 --> 00:53:35,560
but there is no sense of permanence
in the minds of
the people who live there,
665
00:53:35,595 --> 00:53:40,160
because, for 60 years,
they have effectively been in limbo.
666
00:53:40,195 --> 00:53:43,565
The future of
the Palestinian refugees
667
00:53:43,600 --> 00:53:49,640
is still one of the Middle East's
great unsolved,
politically toxic issues.
668
00:53:52,439 --> 00:53:57,805
When the Palestinian camps were
new, 60 years ago,
669
00:53:57,840 --> 00:54:01,919
Israel was absorbing
hundreds of thousands of Jewish
refugees and migrants.
670
00:54:04,560 --> 00:54:11,840
Now almost all Israelis believe
a mass influx of Palestinian
refugees would destroy their state.
671
00:54:11,875 --> 00:54:16,000
'A UN resolution on their return
has never been implemented.
672
00:54:17,879 --> 00:54:23,680
'Some Palestinian refugees, still
dreaming of everything they lost,
will not hear of compromise.'
673
00:54:32,759 --> 00:54:35,085
'We said it more than once.
674
00:54:35,120 --> 00:54:39,245
'Even if they give us Heaven,
we will not give up on our country.
675
00:54:39,280 --> 00:54:44,960
'If they give us enough gold
to fill this room, we will
decline everything. Impossible!
676
00:54:44,995 --> 00:54:47,165
'I will die, and die a heretic,
677
00:54:47,200 --> 00:54:50,800
'if you take �1 million in gold
for an inch of Palestine,
678
00:54:50,835 --> 00:54:52,725
'you die as a heretic.
679
00:54:52,760 --> 00:54:56,600
'Not a Muslim, not a Christian,
not a Jew.
680
00:54:56,635 --> 00:54:58,880
'A heretic. And you go to Hell.'
681
00:55:05,039 --> 00:55:10,360
And even though most Palestinians
DO accept that they
will live alongside Israel,
682
00:55:10,395 --> 00:55:14,805
memory and history
stand on every street corner.
683
00:55:14,840 --> 00:55:19,079
My father has built here. My father,
he was denied to live,
684
00:55:19,114 --> 00:55:23,319
and he was dispossessed
to live in this beautiful house.
685
00:55:23,354 --> 00:55:26,657
It's been now
60 years for most of the people.
686
00:55:26,692 --> 00:55:29,925
There are weaknesses.
You want to advance,
687
00:55:29,960 --> 00:55:36,800
and I would want very much
to compete and advance as much as
the Israelis have advanced,
688
00:55:36,835 --> 00:55:40,879
but I am a Palestinian.
My...my...my land has been robbed
by the Israelis.
689
00:55:40,914 --> 00:55:45,440
We want them to have
a state of their own.
690
00:55:45,475 --> 00:55:49,017
Fair, independent, frank.
691
00:55:49,052 --> 00:55:52,525
And they want it, too.
692
00:55:52,560 --> 00:55:57,684
There is no division
in our destinies.
693
00:55:57,719 --> 00:56:04,080
Our problem, from our side, is they
are divisioned within themselves,
and their weakness.
694
00:56:07,119 --> 00:56:10,885
Others believe the main problem is
that Israel is still expansionist,
695
00:56:10,920 --> 00:56:17,759
breaking international law by
settling Jews on occupied land that
Palestinians say is theirs.
696
00:56:20,279 --> 00:56:23,619
They don't want to give up territory.
697
00:56:23,654 --> 00:56:26,924
They want to
squeeze the Palestinians.
698
00:56:26,959 --> 00:56:30,699
They want to take
as much territory as they can
699
00:56:30,734 --> 00:56:34,439
and give the Palestinians as little
as they can,
700
00:56:34,474 --> 00:56:38,160
which would not be conducive
to a solution,
701
00:56:38,195 --> 00:56:41,359
a self-sustaining
Palestinian state.
702
00:56:43,600 --> 00:56:49,480
60 years ago, Arab propagandists
boasted they would push
the Jews into the Mediterranean.
703
00:56:49,515 --> 00:56:54,760
Plenty of Israelis suspect
that's still something
Palestinians would like to do.
704
00:56:58,199 --> 00:57:00,524
Had they accepted the 1947...
705
00:57:00,559 --> 00:57:05,645
their part,
half of Palestine, the mandate,
706
00:57:05,680 --> 00:57:09,920
we would have two countries
since then, and no conflict.
707
00:57:09,955 --> 00:57:12,845
But what they wanted
is the whole country.
708
00:57:12,880 --> 00:57:16,759
They wanted to drive us into the sea,
to kill the Jews.
709
00:57:16,794 --> 00:57:19,444
This is why they
don't have anything today.
710
00:57:19,479 --> 00:57:23,779
I will continue to resist,
in an un-violent resistance,
711
00:57:23,814 --> 00:57:28,080
until we can co-exist,
until we can convince the Israelis
712
00:57:28,115 --> 00:57:30,757
that we want our freedom,
but this does not mean
713
00:57:30,792 --> 00:57:33,399
that we want to destroy
the state of Israel.
714
00:57:37,600 --> 00:57:43,679
The long war of 1948
has consumed two peoples with
two separate stories to tell.
715
00:57:44,920 --> 00:57:47,639
They'll have to find
a way to live with its legacy
716
00:57:47,674 --> 00:57:50,360
if they ever want peace.
717
00:57:53,080 --> 00:57:56,719
One day we shall have to
shake hands and sit together.
718
00:57:56,754 --> 00:57:58,640
We can't continue fighting for ever.
719
00:58:03,680 --> 00:58:07,880
You can't continue
killing and killing and killing.
720
00:58:07,915 --> 00:58:09,959
There must be an end to it.
721
00:58:34,919 --> 00:58:37,439
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
722
00:58:37,474 --> 00:58:39,959
E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk
67398
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