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1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War?
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> Just because a religion says it is the promised land doesn't make it "disputed."
It's not "religion" - it's historical fact. Among historians it's consensus that Kingdom of Israel existed there around 900 BCE.
> Go to r/Palestine and lurk there for a month and tell me there is nothing off.
100% of this suffering is of course Israel's fault, the Palestinians are poor victims that want to live in peace with Israel and the only obstacle to peace is Israel's "apartheid" policies. Of course I'm being a cynic here... The fact is while the suffering is real, you are being manipulated into buying their narrative - but that doesn't help solve the problem, it will only make it worse, I promise you that.
The suffering is real and unfortunate... But help yourself to a history book if you really want to understand the situation, and what the solution could be. I'll recommend one that is fairly balanced and doesn't save on criticism on both sides (read the reviews if you don't believe me...) - "1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War".
It's a lot more complicated than that -- others have suggested some excellent resources, which I'm sure you'll check out. I'd recommend that, in addition to wiki pages and encyclopedia articles, you read a couple of long-form history books.
In particular, 1948 by Benny Morris is a really strong source of reliable information, and Benny Morris is one of the most objective historians you'll find.
You seem to literally no nothing about Israel, so I thought Wikipedia would be a good initial primer, to let you know the basic facts surrounding the country. If that’s not good enough and you want to dive straight into the deep end, I recommend this book by Benny Morris to understand the founding of Israel. https://www.amazon.com/1948-History-First-Arab-Israeli-War/dp/0300151128
Per is latin for by (and not part of his name)
Benny Morris is an academic author who's written the best reviewed, most thorough books on the subject. I excerpted this from, as I said, <em>1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War</em>
Many of your questions can be answered by reading the footnotes. I'd suggest what you're looking for can more easily be found in a library loan of this book, than a post on this forum.
There is a LOT of basics to understand to fully understand the war at the level of detail you want to.
Not OP but it's in here. The Yishuv were seen by the Druze as losing during the initial phase of the war, and switched sides following the end of the first ceasefire when the former got the upper hand.
>do you interpret criticism on the IDF as also criticism of the state of Israel?
Constructive criticism is fine, destructive criticism is not.
Constructive criticism: IDF was wrong in doing ___ because reason1, reason2 etc.
Destructive criticism: IDF are murderers/terrorists/use excessive force.
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>Do Israelis hate Palestinians and vice versa?
Israelis do not hate Palestinians (only a minority do)
Palestinian hate towards Israelis varies depending on your source or how you interpret the data. It's anywhere from a minority to a majority.
Both sides do not trust the other (which is a problem when discussing/suggesting negotiations)
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>Is there any advice you can give me to better understand my partner's perspective/pain/outlook on the situation?
No. Our community is practiced in debates so know to quote their sources. Most Israelis/Palestinians wouldn't know to explain themselves, their reasoning or their emotion sources very well and depending on how the argument turns out can even lash out.
One thing to understand is that the conflict is at least about a century old and has "religious reasoning" for more then a millennia before it.
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>Do you have any recommendations of books or websites to educate myself further on the situation?
There are almost no sources which both sides will claim are unbiased & therefor completely objective.
Here's a 40 min YouTube video about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict history (biased towards the Israeli side, yes) that goes all the way to the events of May 2021 (last year)
There's the book 1948 by Benny Morris (Amazon Link) which starts with a background and history of the conflict pre-1948, then goes in details of the actual war (you can skip that part at first) then has a conclusion section at the end. Most agree that this is a good account on history although there are more pro-Palestinian books.
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>understand his perspective but also not lose my moral compass
Both sides have morals. Different but still morals. You can always return here to ask questions.
If you really want to understand this topic in depth and with a high degree of academic rigor I highly recommend 1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War by Benny Morris. He has done more primary source archive digging for both the Israeli, Arab, Western, and Soviet components of the war than anyone else. And probably understands the conflict better than anyone who wasn't a mover and shaker in 1948.
https://www.amazon.com/1948-History-First-Arab-Israeli-War/dp/0300151128
If you want a really in-depth understanding to the run up to the 1948 war and the implementation of Zionism in mandatory Palestine, that is as fair to all sides as I've ever seen, I would highly suggest Bruce Hoffman's Anonymous Soldiers: The Struggle for Israel, 1917-1947
This book does a good job answering your question.
>The wiki article says they had an army of 70,000, that sounds like they were trying to stop the conflict to me.
They already had a force of 70,000 there ... they had just finished fighting WWII there. They certainly did not ramp up troop deployments in anticipation of the fighting.
I'm sorry, but I gotta tap out now ... if you want access to all the evidence, you're going to have to read a history book. I'd recommend starting with 1948 by Benny Morris, and then (for a little bit of a more Arab-biased perspective), The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine by Ilan Pappe.
Reading your post history, you learned the British didn't 'give the Jews' Israel yesterday; there's a real awful lot to know about the conflict, and there just is not a substitute for directly reading the work of respected historians.
The “stolen land” and “ethnic cleansing” claims of many Anti-Zionists/Pro-Palestinian advocates that relate to the 1948 war are so lacking in context concerning the civil and Independence war LLP 1947 - 1949 as to be “big lie” gaslighting on the order of “stab in the back” or Trump’s “election fraud”.
Assuming good faith but lack of knowledge, it seems like folks who want to point to examples of cleansing or grabbing on the Jews part point to various battles like Deir Yassin, based on quick research on Wikipedia or Anti-Zionists such as Pappe, and remove any context of war so that the listener concludes that the action was like the Srebrenica massacre or Einsatzgruppen, rather than the more garden variety movements of columns or fronts in a mobile war, like, say the Battle of Bastogne which is a more apt analogy of that wartime situation.
Assuming we’re educating (hopefully) a few people at a time of the silliness of the “grabbing/cleansing” tropes as relate to the 1948 wars, perhaps (a modest suggestion) we should require posters discussing this topic to have read one or more BOOKS (not Wikipedia or some “Free Palestine” screed) on the 1948 war to be allowed to comment or post and to certify book(s) were read and which ones. I’d suggest Benny Morris’ “1948: A History of the First Arab-Israeli War” (2008)” as a good place to start.
Seria muito legal se o pessoal parasse de interpretar tudo que acontece no Oriente Médio como se fosse proveniente da religião e passasse a ver as pessoas como seres humanos iguais aos que conhece no mundo real. Coisa de louco, eu sei.
> Quando Abraão teve seus dois filhos, ambos com diferentes esposas, um foi Ismael e o outro Isaac — o primeiro cresceu longe do pai e descendeu todo o povo islã,
Não existe (nem nunca existiu) "povo islã". A grande maioria dos muçulmanos não reivindica descendência de Ismael, e mesmo os que reivindicam (que são poucos) não são vistos com mais importância. As narrativas são irreconciliavelmente incompatíveis, e isso que você está dizendo é uma daquelas tentativas que o pessoal faz de observar a história de povos do Oriente Médio num framework compatível com a narrativa bíblica, que vai necessariamente gerar discrepâncias enormes comparado ao mundo real.
> Recomendo que você leia alguns capítulos de Gênesis pra entender melhor, é muito interessante.
Não fale isso nem brincando. Recomendação séria de livros para o OP:
Esse último é um pouco mais difícil, mas eu acho crucial para entender bem as narrativas históricas árabes e seus precedentes. Tem um pessoal mais pró-palestina no Reddit que também recomendaria ler alguma coisa do Ilan Pappé ou do Avi Shlaim. Acho capaz de ser fácil de encontrar todos esses disponibilizados em pdf de graça nesses sites de Universidade.
No, Pappe is not a credible source and a review on Amazon is hardly a better one. Try someone who doesn't write history with an agenda. His work has been discredited.
There was no ethnic cleansing. There was a war that the Palestinians instigated and brought foreign armies in to fight on their behalf instead of sharing the land with their neighbors.
https://newrepublic.com/article/85344/ilan-pappe-sloppy-dishonest-historian
>At best, Ilan Pappe must be one of the world’s sloppiest historians; at worst, one of the most dishonest. In truth, he probably merits a place somewhere between the two.
You should read what Benny Morris has to say. He's a far more credible source. And while you're at it, read 1948, one of the best histories on that conflict you can get. That book is the go-to source, and Morris is the subject matter expert.
https://www.amazon.com/1948-History-First-Arab-Israeli-War/dp/0300151128
That's the best and most objective source you can find on the war.
Do you use David Irving as a source also? I would hope not. Just because someone published a book, doesn't mean it's a good source.
I see you didn't address the points I made about denying self-determination to Jews is in fact anti-Semitism, and that the American Muslim communities do indeed have a problem with anti-Semitism unrelated to Israel. Do you have anything to say about that?
>instead of feeling like you have a duty to argue this point, step back and try to actually explain to yourself why a tiny land mass like Israel needs 38 billion dollars for military operations
Ever hear of the Suez Canal? The Cold War? The aide program to Israel and Egypt which is why Israel and Egypt haven't fought a war in 40 years (something they used to do every 5-7 years prior to the US brokered 1978 Camp David Peace Deal).
Good for you for questioning things, but it seems like you have allowed yourself to follow a pretty biased and incomplete set of sources (600 babies killed in the 'Hannibal' raid - I mean come on).
And frankly
>we're all being completely duped into this shit
Is such a incomplete, shorthanded, non-nuanced view of the world that you should really stop and think about what leads you to believe you can boil complex geopolitical situations into such a tight and tidy narrative. The world is not that easy - it may be easier to believe you can see "behind the curtain" and understand the evil rich capitalists controlling the entire world like a comic book super-villain... but I submit to you that such a belief is frankly lazy and self centered.
This type of belief only allows you to feel like you have some deep understanding of the workings of the world and the multi-facted interests, dynamics, and peoples who shape history - but without the true historical knowledge to back it up.
>tribal loyalty and religion is extremely blinding and biasing
Is it possible that political and other beliefs are equally as blinding? Anti-Zionism doesn't have a monopoly on "truth"
Drugs are awesome, but try reading some books also:
>Morris's work on the Arab–Israeli conflict and especially the Israeli–Palestinian conflict has won praise and criticism from both sides of the political divide. He is accused by some academics in Israel of only using Israeli and never Arab sources, creating an "unbalanced picture".[3] Regarding himself as a Zionist, he writes, "I embarked upon the research not out of ideological commitment or political interest. I simply wanted to know what happened."[4] >>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benny_Morris
>This history of the foundational war in the Arab-Israeli conflict is groundbreaking, objective, and deeply revisionist. A riveting account of the military engagements, it also focuses on the war's political dimensions. Benny Morris probes the motives and aims of the protagonists on the basis of newly opened Israeli and Western documentation. The Arab side―where the archives are still closed―is illuminated with the help of intelligence and diplomatic materials. >>https://www.amazon.com/1948-History-First-Arab-Israeli-War/dp/0300151128
Or even a documentary:
>The 50 Years War Israel And The Arabs >>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSAD9pS8NIw
Being baked and learning can be fun. :)
And there are tons of other sources out there including Illan Pappe (who I hate and think does incredibly poor scholarship) and everything in between.
But please stop adopting such a, frankly, ZOG-like view of the world. Nothing is that easy, even if it can feel good when it provides a simple framework for a complex and interconnected world.
Ummm.... How the hell am I "cherry picking" when not only did I provide the links to the full interview and original source, the rest of the material I supposedly ignored actually further supports my point -- which is why I provided the links for everyone else to read themselves
>an author who at best is incendiary and at worst is a bit addled
Benny Morris is actually not just pretty mainstream and a professor of one of Israel's top universities, he is also an avowed Zionist who...ironically as the rest of your post proves... defends the ethnic cleaning atrocities that he just described.
In fact, again ironically as your own submission shows, he called it a case of "breaking a few eggs" and "necessary to get your hands dirty" and even explicitly says that ethnic cleansing really is not all that bad
Yes, that's the pro-Zionist argument. Love it
So I'm not sure why you would suggest that I want to "hide" this. So in case there's any doubt:
PLEASE EVERYONE, READ MORRIS' FULL INTERVIEW, and BUY HIS BOOK http://www.amazon.com/1948-History-First-Arab-Israeli-War/dp/0300151128
LOL
Furthermore, Benny Morris is hardly the only Israeli historian who says all this -- there's a whole new generation of Israeli historians who have had access to recently declassified documents and who have all reached pretty much the same conclusions, that for example the Palestinians were indeed ethnically-cleansed. Even WIkipedia could have told you this
>Much of the primary source material used by the group comes from Israeli government papers that were newly available as a result of being declassified thirty years after the founding of Israel.[2] Benny Morris, Ilan Pappé, Avi Shlaim, Tom Segev, Hillel Cohen, Baruch Kimmerling[3] and (retrospectively) Simha Flapan are counted among the "new historians." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Historians
In fact that Israel engaged in ethnic cleansing is WAS accepted in Israel (before Likud and the Right came so powerful) -- so much that a TV series on the 50th anniversary of Israel acknowledged it.
But if you don't want to read a book, listen to Professor Ilan Pappe
Read a fairly objective (archival fact based) history like this and get back to me. :-)
Quite simply, the Irish are a wonderful people with a well founded dislike of the British, however look more closely at 1948 than the politics of the previous WWI generation (Balfour Declaration etc.) and they might be surprised about their largely fact free suppositions about things like supposed “ethnic cleansing”.
Actually it was Benny Morris and a host of other "New Historians" who wrote about this, not just Ilan Pappe, the subject of your smear attempts.
Benny Morris' book is http://www.amazon.com/1948-History-First-Arab-Israeli-War/dp/0300151128
Here's a lovely excerpt of an interview he gave
>What the new material shows is that there were far more Israeli acts of massacre than I had previously thought. To my surprise, there were also many cases of rape. In the months of April-May 1948, units of the Haganah [the pre-state defense force that was the precursor of the IDF] were given operational orders that stated explicitly that they were to uproot the villagers, expel them and destroy the villages themselves...
>According to your new findings, how many cases of Israeli rape were there in 1948?
>About a dozen. In Acre four soldiers raped a girl and murdered her and her father. In Jaffa, soldiers of the Kiryati Brigade raped one girl and tried to rape several more. At Hunin, which is in the Galilee, two girls were raped and then murdered. There were one or two cases of rape at Tantura, south of Haifa. There was one case of rape at Qula, in the center of the country. At the village of Abu Shusha, near Kibbutz Gezer [in the Ramle area] there were four female prisoners, one of whom was raped a number of times. And there were other cases. Usually more than one soldier was involved. Usually there were one or two Palestinian girls. In a large proportion of the cases the event ended with murder. Because neither the victims nor the rapists liked to report these events, we have to assume that the dozen cases of rape that were reported, which I found, are not the whole story. They are just the tip of the iceberg.
>According to your findings, how many acts of Israeli massacre were perpetrated in 1948?
>Twenty-four. In some cases four or five people were executed, in others the numbers were 70, 80, 100. There was also a great deal of arbitrary killing. Two old men are spotted walking in a field - they are shot. A woman is found in an abandoned village - she is shot. There are cases such as the village of Dawayima [in the Hebron region], in which a column entered the village with all guns blazing and killed anything that moved.
>The worst cases were Saliha (70-80 killed), Deir Yassin (100-110), Lod (250), Dawayima (hundreds) and perhaps Abu Shusha (70). There is no unequivocal proof of a large-scale massacre at Tantura, but war crimes were perpetrated there. At Jaffa there was a massacre about which nothing had been known until now. The same at Arab al Muwassi, in the north. About half of the acts of massacre were part of Operation Hiram [in the north, in October 1948]: at Safsaf, Saliha, Jish, Eilaboun, Arab al Muwasi, Deir al Asad, Majdal Krum, Sasa. In Operation Hiram there was a unusually high concentration of executions of people against a wall or next to a well in an orderly fashion.
>That can’t be chance. It’s a pattern. Apparently, various officers who took part in the operation understood that the expulsion order they received permitted them to do these deeds in order to encourage the population to take to the roads. The fact is that no one was punished for these acts of murder. Ben-Gurion silenced the matter. He covered up for the officers who did the massacres. http://www.logosjournal.com/morris.htm and http://www.haaretz.com/survival-of-the-fittest-1.61345
I did read, mostly Morris books (The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, and ordered this (not from amazon but that is the name of the book) ) to Kimmerling. that is why I asked for a citation.
Your version of truth is distorted. I recommend a standard history from a book.
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