Pro-Ethnic
Cleansing Quotes from Zionists Through History
Below are quotes from influential Zionists and
Israeli leaders that illustrate that Israel is a nation which was born
in, expanded by and is maintained only by brutal and systematic ethnic
cleansing of the indigenous Arab peoples – peoples who can still
identify and prove what land was formerly theirs and who still want it
back. They prove that leading Zionists openly planned ethnic
cleansing of Arabs from the inception of Zionism, well before the
horrific 1915-23 ethnic cleansing of Armenians by the Turks, Stalin’s
mass starvation of Ukrainians and deportations of Chechans and other
recalcitrant ethnic groups, and the Nazi ethnic cleansing and later
genocide of European Jews. Many in favor of justice for the
Palestinians, including many Jews, are not away of or are in denial
about this history.
Included
also are a few quotes from famous Jews and others who spoke out against
this policy and practice of ethnic cleansing. For truly
terrifying quotes see my listing of Israel leader and supporters
“Samson Option” threats to attack cities worldwide with nuclear weapons
if it is every seriously damaged in any attack. Http://carolmoore.net/nuclearwar/israelithreats.html
The original
list from which this is excerpted and put in date order is at http://www.al-awda.org/famousquotes/
1891: After
paying a visit to Palestine in 1891, the Hebrew essayist Achad Ha-Am
commented: “Abroad we are accustomed to believe that Israel is almost
empty; nothing is grown here and that whoever wishes to buy land could
come here and buy what his heart desires. In reality, the situation is
not like this. Throughout the country it is difficult to find
cultivable land which is not already cultivated."
1895: The
removal of Arabs bodily from Palestine is part of the Zionist plan to
"spirit the penniless population across the frontier by denying it
employment...Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the
poor must be carried away discreetly and circumspectly." Theodore
Herzl, founder of the World Zionist Organization Complete Diaries, June
12, 1895 entry.
1901: Israel
Zang wrote in1901 that Palestine was a "land without people for a
people without land."He retracted the statement in 1920 upon admitting
evidence it was filled with Arabs.
1919: "In
Palestine we do not propose even to go through the form of consulting
the wishes of the present inhabitants of the country" Lord Balfour in
private memorandum to Lord Curzon, 11 August 1919. (Note:
Organized Zionist organizations and weathy Zionists in Britain and the
U.S. funded the British World War I effort and pressured the U.S. to
enter World War One to ensure a decisive defeat of the Germans in
exchange for Britain's promise of a Jewish homeland in Palestine.)
1922: "If we are
going to admit claims on conquest thousands of years ago, the whole
world will have to be turned upside down." Lord Sydenham, Hansard,
House of Lords, 21 June 1922.
1923: "Zionist
colonization must either be terminated or carried out against the
wishes of the native population. This colonization can, therefore, be
continued and make progress only under the protection of a power
independent of the native population - an iron wall, which will be in a
position to resist the pressure to the native population. This is, in
toto, our policy towards the Arabs...... Zionism is a colonization
adventure and therefore it stands or falls by the question of armed
force. It is important... to speak Hebrew, but, unfortunately, it is
even more important to be able to shoot - or else I am through with
playing at colonizing." Vladimir Jabotinsky, The Iron Wall, 1923.
(He was a right wing founder and advocate of Zionist terrorist
organizations.)
1930s: "If I
knew that it was possible to save all the children of Germany by
transporting them to England, and only half by transferring them to the
Land of Israel, I would choose the latter, for before us lies not only
the numbers of these children but the historical reckoning of the
people of Israel." David Ben-Gurion (Quoted on pp 855-56 in Shabtai
Teveth's book Ben-Gurion in a slightly different translation).
1937: "We must
expel Arabs and take their places." David Ben Gurion, future
Prime Minister of Israel, 1937, Ben Gurion and the Palestine Arabs,
Oxford University Press, 1985.
1938: “Palestine
belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the
English or France to the French. It is wrong and in-human to impose the
Jews on the Arabs. What is going on in Palestine today cannot be
justified by any moral code of conduct. The mandates have no sanction
but that of the last war. Surely it would be a crime against humanity
to reduce the proud Arabs so that Palestine can be restored to the Jews
partly or wholly as their national home....But if they must look to the
Palestine of geography as their national home, it is wrong to enter it
under the shadow of the British gun. A religious act cannot be
performed with the aid of the bayonet or the bomb. They can settle in
Palestine only by the goodwill of the Arabs. They should seek to
convert the Arab heart....” M.K. Gandhi, November 1938
1940: "Between
ourselves it must be clear that there is no room for both peoples
together in this country. We shall not achieve our goal if the Arabs
are in this small country. There is no other way than to transfer the
Arabs from here to neighboring countries - all of them. Not one
village, not one tribe should be left." Joseph Weitz, head of the
Jewish Agency's Colonization Department in 1940. From "A Solution to
the Refugee Problem" Joseph Weitz, Davar, September 29, 1967, cited in
Uri Davis and Norton Mevinsky, eds., Documents from Israel, 1967-1973,
p.21.
1947: "There is
no other way than to transfer the Arabs from here (Palestine) to the
neighboring countries, to transfer all of them; not one village, not
one tribe should be left." Jospeh Weitz, Davar, 29 September 1947
from "My Diary and Letters to the Children", Massada, 1965, III, p.
293.
1948 "What
is necessary is cruel and strong reactions. We need precision in time,
place, and casualties. If we know the family, we must strike
mercilessly, women and children included. Otherwise, the reaction is
inefficient. At the place of action, there is no need to distinguish
between guilty and innocent." January, 1948 David Ben-Gurion
diary entry. As the first Israeli Prime Minister, he is quoted as
having said at some point: "If I were an Arab leader, I would never
sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their
country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest
them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti-Semitism, the
Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one
thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they
accept that?" Quoted by Nahum Goldmann in Le Paraddoxe Juif (The
Jewish Paradox), pp. 121-122.
1948: "If it is
proper to 'reconstitute' a Jewish state which has not existed for two
thousand years, why not go back another thousand years and reconstitute
the Canaanite state? The Canaanites, unlike the Jews, are still there."
H.G. Wells, quoted in Palestine Dilemma: Arab Rights Versus Zionist
Aspirations, by Frank C. Sakran, Public Affairs Press, 1948, p. 204.
1948: "Among the
most disturbing political phenomena of our time is the emergence in the
newly created State of Israel of the Freedom Party (Herut), a political
party closely akin in its organization, method, political philosophy
and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties." Albert Einstein,
Hanna Arendt and other prominent Jewish Americans, writing in The New
York Times, protest the visit to America of Menachem Begin, December
1948. Begin and Yitzhak Shamir who were members of the party became
Prime Ministers.
1949: Martin
Buber, Jewish Philosopher, addressed Prime Minister Ben Gurion on the
moral character of the state of Israel with reference to the Arab
refugees in March 1949: "We will have to face the reality that Israel
is neither innocent, nor redemptive. And that in its creation, and
expansion; we as Jews, have caused what we historically have suffered;
a refugee population in Diaspora."
1952: "It lies
upon the people's shoulders to prepare for the war, but it lies upon
the Israeli army to carry out the fight with the ultimate object of
erecting the Israeli Empire." Moshe Dayan (Israel Defense and
Foreign Minister), on February 12 1952. Radio Israel.
1960: "We shall
reduce the Arab population to a community of woodcutters and waiters"
Uri Lubrani, PM Ben-Gurion's special adviser on Arab Affairs, 1960.
From "The Arabs in Israel" by Sabri Jiryas.
1967: Aba Eban,
Israeli Foreign Minister: " If the [United Nations] General Assembly
were to vote by 121 votes to 1 in favor of "Israel" returning to the
armistice lines-- (pre June 1967 borders) Israel would refuse to comply
with the decision." New York Times June 19, 1967.
1967: "Hitler's
legal power was based upon the 'Enabling Act', which was passed quite
legally by the Reichstag and which allowed the Fuehrer and his
representatives, in plain language, to be what they wanted, or in legal
language, to issue regulations having the force of law. Exactly the
same type of act was passed by the Knesset (Israeli Parliament)
immediately after the 1967 conquest granting the Israeli governor and
his representatives the power of Hitler, which they use in Hitlerian
manner." Dr. Israel Shahak, Chairperson of the Israeli League for
Human and Civil Rights, and a survivor of the Bergen Belsen
concentration camp, Commenting on the Israeli military's Emergency
Regulations following the 1967 War. Palestine, vol. 12, December 1983.
1969: "Jewish
villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know
the names of these Arab villages, and I don't blame you because
geography books no longer exist, not only do the books not exist, .The
Arab villages are not there either. Nahal arose in the place of Mahlul;
Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibat; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of
Huneifis; and Kfar Yehushu'a in the place of Tal al Shuman. There is
not one single place that did not have a former Arab population." Moshe
Dayan's address to the Technion, Haifa (as Quoted in Haaretz, April 4,
1969).
1969: "How can
we return the occupied territories? There is nobody to return them
to."Golda Meir, March 8, 1969.
1972: "The
thesis that the danger of genocide was hanging over us in June 1967 and
that Israel was fighting for its physical existence is only bluff,
which was born and developed after the war." Israeli General Matityahu
Peled, Haaretz, 19 March 1972.
1982: The
Palestinians are "..beasts walking on two legs." Menahim Begin, speech
to the Knesset, quoted in Amnon Kapeliouk, 'Begin and the "Beasts"',
New Statesman, 25 June 1982.
1983: "When we
have settled the land, all the Arabs will be able to do about it will
be to scurry around like drugged cockroaches in a bottle." Raphael
Eitan, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defence Forces, New York Times, 14
April 1983.
1983: "We have
to kill all the Palestinians unless they are resigned to live here as
slaves." Chairman Heilbrun of the Committee for the Re-election
of General Shlomo Lahat, the mayor of Tel Aviv, October 1983.
1989: "Israel
should have exploited the repression of the demonstrations in China,
when world attention focused on that country, to carry out mass
expulsions among the Arabs of the territories." Benyamin
Netanyahu, then Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister, former Prime Minister
of Israel, tells students at Bar Ilan University, From the Israeli
journal Hotam, November 24, 1989.
1989: "I am a
black South African, and if I were to change the names, a description
of what is happening in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank could describe
events in South Africa." Archbishop Desmond Tuto, observes during
Christmas visit to Jerusalem, December 25, 1989. From Israeli daily
Ha'aretz, cited in Palestine Perspectives, January/February 1990.
2000: "If we
thought that instead of 200 Palestinian fatalities, 2,000 dead would
put an end to the fighting at a stroke, we would use much more
force...." Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, quoted in Associated
Press, November 16, 2000.