Tikvah
Editors’ Pick

December 20, 2021

Don’t Forget That Jews Were Massacred and Driven from Their Homes in 1948

The fate of every Jewish settlement that fell to the Arabs: the killing of fighters and civilians alike, mutilation of their bodies, and looting of property.

Recently declassified documents from Israeli state archives reveal concern from Israel’s first cabinet, in 1948, over reports of atrocities committed by the nascent IDF, and what could be done to bring them to a stop. In the left-wing Israeli daily Haaretz, these documents have given rise to handwringing over the nakba (Arabic for “catastrophe”)—as Palestinians call the creation of the Jewish state. But, according to Uri Misgav, none of the information in these documents about alleged war crimes is verifiable. Moreover, no discussion of the period can be undertaken without examining the massacres and expulsions that are all too verifiable. For instance:

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