From: ifaz706@utxvms.cc.utexas.edu
Subject: Re: All Arabs are guilty
Organization: University of Texas @ Austin
Date: 21 Jan 93 18:28:13 CST

In article <1jgsgmINN4hv@tyl.anu.edu.au>, bdm@cs.anu.edu.au (Brendan McKay) writes:
> ifaz706@utxvms.cc.utexas.edu writes:
> 
>>In article <2008@spam.ua.oz>, jaskew@spam.ua.oz (Joseph Askew) writes:
>   
>>> begin quote
>  
>>> Ben Gurion's diary
>>> "The complusory transfer of the Arabs from the valleys of the proposed Jewish
>>> state could give us something which we never had, even when we stood on our
>>> own during the days of the First and Second Temples"
>>> Teveth, Ben Gurion page 181 quoting Ben Gurions diary entry for 12 July 1937
>  
>>> end quote
> 
> [...]
>>	But in order not to leave the scene in this defensive note,
>>	here's a quote from BG regarding the commission's recommendation:
>>	"The more I study the recommendations of the commission, I see
>>	above all the terrible difficulty in uprooting, by foreign force,
>>	some 100,000 Arabs from vilages which they have inhabited for
>>	hundreds of years." 
> 
>>		[Incidently, Ben Gurion Diary, 12 July, 1937 -- the same 
>>		as your quote! Have you failed to notice this entry, 
>>		Joseph?] 
> 
> Recognising the difficulty of something is a far cry from having
> moral qualms about it.  

	I read BG's comment as indicating a moral, rather than a
	physical difficulty. Don't you? 
	
	Does someone have the Hebrew original of this quote from BG's
	diary?

This is one of many examples where Teveth
> fails to provide evidence for his assertions.  


	Which assertion are you refering to? What are the other 
	examples you have in mind?


Below are MEQ #16-17
> which provide more detailed extracts from Teveth's book.
> 
>>Noam
> 
> Brendan.
> ================================================================
> 
> 
>       MEQ #16.  Teveth on Ben-Gurion on Population Transfer, 1937.
> 
> [In 1937, a British Royal Commission (the Peel Commission) recommended a
> partition of Palestine into a Jewish State and an Arab State.  The report
> included a recommendation for a "population transfer".]
> 
>    Even before the report's publication, Ben-Gurion learned that it
>    included a provision for the transfer of the Arab population within
>    the Jewish state to the territory of the Arab state.  The idea was
>    not new to Zionism, and had been advocated by Israel Zangwill, Jacobson,
>    and Jabotinsky.  Ben-Gurion had opposed the notion on moral grounds,
>    for it had always been his claim that "we did not come to dispossess
>    the Arabs of their land."  In 1929, when he drew up his federation plan,
>    with its strong resemblance to partition, he rejected the idea of an
>    exchange of population.  Once again, the issue proved a moral test of
>    Ben-Gurion's vision of Zionism as a just movement.
> 
>    He did not respond immediately.  To Sharett [Moshe Shertok, later
>    Prime Minister of Israel], Ben-Gurion wrote that "it is hard for me
>    to believe in compulsory transfer, and it is hard for me to believe
>    in voluntary transfer."  Would the British really agree to compel the
>    movement of people, and would any Arab agree to move voluntarily?
>    Only on a second reading of the report did Ben-Gurion determine that
>    the proposal's "importance exceeds that of the report's other merits,
>    and outweighs all of the report's shortcomings."  The idea was this:
>    some 225,000 Arabs lived in the area that would be included within a
>    Jewish state, and they were bound to constitute a problem once
>    partition was effected.  The Peel Commission suggested the transfer
>    of these Arabs to the Arab state, with British assistance.  In the
>    Galilee's valleys, where Ben-Gurion estimated that some 100,000 Arabs
>    lived, the Peel Commission recommended that "in the last resort the
>    exchange would be compulsory."  This was, in fact, an "exchange" in
>    name only, for only 1250 Jews lived in the territory earmarked for the
>    proposed Arab state.
> 
>    Ben-Gurion emerged from his inner struggle with the conviction that the
>    transfer of the Arab population would be a boon to the proposed Jewish
>    state.  "The compulsory transfer of the Arabs from the valleys of the
>    proposed Jewish state", he wrote in his diary, "could give us something
>    which we have never had, even when we stood on our own during the days of
>    the First and Second Temples": a Galilee almost free of non-Jews.  [...]
>    "We are being given an opportunity which we never dared to dream of in
>    our wildest imagination.  This is more than a state, government and
>    sovereignty---this is a national consolidation in a free homeland."
> 
>    Yet he carefully measured the expediency of the proposal against the
>    claims of justice.  "The more I study the recommendations of the
>    Commission," he added in his diary, "I see above all the terrible
>    difficulty in uprooting, by foreign force, some 100,000 Arabs from
>    villages which they have inhabited for hundreds of years."  But again,
>    the voice of expediency spoke.  A completely Jewish Galilee would give
>    the Jewish state another advantage: a northern border with Lebanon. [...]
> 
>    Then the doubts returned.  "Would Britain dare to do it?" in the face
>    of Arab and Muslim opposition?  Would Britain also set aside moral
>    calculations?  To this, Ben-Gurion replied that Britain "certainly
>    won't do it if we do not insist upon it, if we do not push with all the
>    force of our influence and conviction.  Even our maximum pressure may
>    not suffice.  But if because of our weakness, neglect or negligence,
>    the thing is not done, then we will have lost a chance which we never
>    had before, and may never have again."  Ben-Gurion's conclusion was
>    unequivocal: "We must uproot from our hearts the assumption that the
>    thing is not possible.  It can be done."  As a first "and perhaps
>    decisive" step, "we must prepare ourselves to carry out" the transfer
>    provision.
> 
>    [S. Teveth, Ben-Gurion and the Palestinian Arabs, Oxford University
>                Press, 1985; pages 180-182.   Teveth gives references
>                for all the quotations.]
>    Acknowledgment: Much of the above was first typed in by Eric Perlman.
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Middle East Quotes is an occasional series of quotations on Middle
> East history.  The editor does not necessarily approve of the sentiments
> expressed in quotes, nor will he necessarily join in any discussion
> they engender.  Contributions are welcome but will not necessarily be
> accepted.  Full sources are essential.      Brendan McKay.
> 
> ====================================================================
> 
> 
> 
>       MEQ #17.  Teveth on Ben-Gurion's vision of the future of Israel, 1937.
> 
>    [on the necessity of a strong Jewish armed force:]
>    But this mass immigration and military strength would serve still another
>    purpose, at which Ben-Gurion only hinted.  Only initiates knew that
>    Ben-Gurion regarded the creation of a Jewish state in part of Palestine
>    as a stage in the longer process towards a Jewish state in all of
>    Palestine.  In the small portion of Palestine allotted to the Jewish
>    state by the Peel Commission [quite a lot smaller than that offered
>    later by the UN - bdm], it would not be possible to absorb the whole
>    Jewish people or even most of it.  That people was in desperate straits.
>    And so Ben-Gurion spoke in ambiguous tones about a state being but a
>    step toward "a complete solution for the Jewish people and a powerful
>    instrument for the total fulfillment of Zionism, an instrument for the
>    redemption of all the land of Israel."  In a secret report to Mapai,
>    Ben-Gurion wrote that "there is the possibility that a Jewish state will
>    be established soon...which will serve as an important and decisive
>    _stage_ in the realization of Zionism."  In October 1938, he wrote to
>    his children that "I don't regard a state in part of Palestine as the
>    final aim of Zionism, but as a means toward that aim."  In September
>    1937, Ben-Gurion offered some insight into his thought to a group of
>    Jewish labor leaders in New York when he told them that "the borders
>    [of the Jewish state] will not be fixed for eternity."
> 
>    In a letter to his son Amos, in October 1937, Ben-Gurion forthrightly
>    embraced territorial expansionism.  A Jewish state in part of Palestine
>    was "not the end, but only the beginning."  Its establishment would give
>    a "powerful boost to our historic efforts to redeem the country in its
>    entirety."  For the Jewish state would have an "outstanding army ... and
>    so I am certain that we won't be constrained from settling in the rest
>    of the country, either by mutual agreement and understanding with our
>    Arab neighbours, or by some other way."
>    ...
>    [later in same letter] In reflecting on the transfer provision of the
>    Peel Commission's recommendations, Ben-Gurion planned his next step:
>    "We must expel Arabs and take their places."  He did not wish to do so,
>    for "all our aspiration is built on the assumption---proven throughout
>    all our activity---that there is enough room for ourselves and the Arabs
>    in Palestine."  But if the Arabs did not accept that assumption, "and if
>    we have to use force---not to dispossess the Arabs of the Negev and
>    Transjordan, but to guarantee our own right to settle in those places
>    ---then we have force at our disposal."
> 
>    [In a speech to Mapai activists in Oct 1937:]  He divided the
>    realization of "the historic aim of the Jewish state" into two stages.
>    The first stage, which would last ten or fifteen years, he called
>    "the period of building and laying foundations."  This would prepare
>    the state for the second stage, "the period of expansion."  The goal
>    of both stages was the "gathering in of the exiles in all of Palestine."
>    And so "from the moment the state is established, it must calculate
>    its actions with an eye towards this distant goal."  The concept of
>    peace through strength thus added two new principles to Ben-Gurion's
>    doctrine.  Unlike in the past, when he spoke of the division of the
>    country along national lines, Ben-Gurion now aspired to achieve a
>    "_Jewish_ Palestine."  And whereas in the past, he had spoken of
>    "conquering" the land through cultivation of barren wasteland and
>    feverish work, Ben-Gurion now assigned a role to armed force.
>    The state in the making would be Jewish and expansionist.
> 
>    [S. Teveth, Ben-Gurion and the Palestinian Arabs, Oxford University
>                Press, 1985; pages 187-190.   Teveth gives references
>                for all the quotations.]
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Middle East Quotes is an occasional series of quotations on Middle
> East history.  The editor does not necessarily approve of the sentiments
> expressed in quotes, nor will he necessarily join in any discussion
> they engender.  Contributions are welcome but will not necessarily be
> accepted.  Full sources are essential.      Brendan McKay.
Xref: sparky talk.politics.mideast:26395 talk.politics.soviet:10835 soc.culture.soviet:12513