Yesterday, the
United Nations marked “International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.” The date, November 29, was not chosen by chance. On November 29, 1947, the UN accepted the Partition Plan that would lead to the establishment of the State of Israel. The Arab world rejected the partition and declared war on the nascent Jewish state, hoping to swiftly eradicate it.
This is the origin of the “Nakba,” the Palestinian “catastrophe.”
Choosing to commemorate one side of the conflict – the side that launched the war – and on that particular date, is more than cynical. It’s manipulative; a reframing of the narrative. It also deliberately ignores the other half of the story. Hence on November 30, Israel commemorates the expulsion of more than 800,000 Jews from Arab and Muslim lands who came to Israel. These are the Middle East’s most overlooked refugees.
Two years after the
Hamas-led invasion and mega-atrocity on October 7, 2023, to mark International Solidarity with the Palestinians, while ignoring what has been inflicted on Israel and the Jewish world, is particularly jarring. Oh well.
Thanks to the UN granting the Palestinians “perpetual refugee status,” the number of Palestinian refugees has risen in the past 70-plus years from some 750,000 to more than five million. So much for the charges of “genocide” by Israel.
The Jews who once lived in the Muslim world have all but disappeared. In places like Algeria and Libya, once the homes of vibrant Jewish communities, not one Jew is left. In Yemen, the Jewish population dropped from more than 55,000 in 1948 to less than a handful today – and that includes poor Levi Salem Musa Marhabi, who has been languishing in a Houthi prison since 2016 for helping to smuggle a Torah scroll out to Israel.
Apart from launching a war on the newborn
Jewish state in 1948, the Arab world also took revenge on the Jews living among them with devastating riots and anti-Jewish measures. According to Israeli Foreign Ministry statistics, “[Since 1948]: In the North African region, 259,000 Jews fled from Morocco, 140,000 from Algeria, 100,000 from Tunisia, 75,000 from Egypt, and another 38,000 from Libya. In the Middle East, 135,000 Jews were exiled from Iraq, 55,000 from Yemen, 34,000 from Turkey, 20,000 from Lebanon, and 18,000 from Syria. Iran forced out 25,000 Jews.”
In other words, the Jews have been the victims of real ethnic cleansing. And when the Jews disappeared, thousands of years of Jewish heritage, history, and culture were wiped out with them. Oh well.
Two years after October 7, 2023, to mark International Solidarity with the Palestinians, while ignoring what has been inflicted on Israel and the Jewish world, is particularly jarring.
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