On December 11, 1948, a historic General Assembly resolution passed - UN Resolution 194 consisting of 15 articles. Four were most important. Article 7 protected and provided free access to the Holy Places. Article 8 demilitarized Jerusalem and placed it under UN control. Article 9 called for free access to Jerusalem, and Article 11 is most remembered for granting Palestinian refugees the right of return or to be compensated for their loss if they chose not to. From 1948, to the present, Israel defied the UN mandate and got away with it. It was because of western support and Arab indifference. As a result, it was able to terrorize remaining Arabs inside Israel, and set in motion the eventual Gaza and West Bank occupation.
The War Ended - State Terrorism Was Just Beginning
Throughout 1949 in the war's aftermath, Israel pursued another one - a war of terror against the remaining Arab population. It set a six decade precedent. Israel now belonged to Jews. Arabs were unwelcome. State security forces cracked down to show how much.
Thousands of displaced Palestinians were rounded up and imprisoned. Others were targeted, harassed and abused. They lost everything - their land, homes, fields, crops, places of worship, freedom of movement and expression, and any hope for fair treatment in the new Jewish State.
Naked and undisguised racism confronted them. They were issued identity cards with penalties up to 1.5 years in prison and immediate transfer to an "unauthorized" and "suspicious" Arab pen if caught without them.
Persecution was relentless, much the way it is today. Roadblocks and checkpoints went up, curfews imposed, violators shot on sight, and systematic abuse inflicted. In addition, thousands of Palestinians were conscripted, sent to labor camps, and forced to help build the new Jewish state. Conditions there were deplorable. Quarry laborers performed arduous work, carried heavy rocks, and had to live on one potato and half a dried fish for daily sustenance. Complainers or slackers were beaten, many severely. Others, considered a threat, were simply shot.
Other Arabs weren't treated much better. Human rights abuses were appalling. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) documented them. Palestinians (now Israeli citizens) got no protections and were afforded no rights. They were subjected to relentless abuses. Their mosques were profaned, schools vandalized, homes robbed and at times stripped bare in broad daylight. Palestinians reported that not a single home or Arab shop escaped the onslaught. Authorities did nothing to deter it. They made things worse.
Palestinians (inside Israel) were transfered from their homes, moved to undesired locations, crammed into confined ghettos, they became open-air prisons, and treatment there was horrific. The ICRC and UN reported beatings, rapes and other abuses. Israel was undergoing transformation. Its Arab character was being erased. It affected about 150,000 remaining Arab Israelis in the new Jewish State.
Formal ethnic cleansing ended in 1949, dispossession and displacements nonetheless continued, and a new Committee for Arab Affairs was established to defuse growing international pressure to enforce UN Resolution 194, especially the right of return under Article 11.
Arab Israelis lost all their rights and were placed under military rule. In addition, discriminatory laws were passed, like the Law of the Land of Israel. It stipulated that the Jewish National Fund (JNF - the Jewish State landowner) was forbidden to sell or lease land to non-Jews.
From inception, Israel has had no formal constitution. It's governed instead by its Basic Law. Nine laws were passed between 1958 and 1988, all of which pertained to the institutions of state. No basic rights were enacted until 1992. That year, the Basic Law: Human Dignity and Freedom was passed authorizing the Knesset to overturn laws contrary to the right to dignity, life, freedom, privacy, property and to leave and enter the country. The law states: "There shall be no violation of the life, body or dignity of any person. All persons are entitled to protection" of these rights, and "There shall be no deprivation or restriction of the liberty of a person by imprisonment, arrest, extradition or otherwise."
Israeli Basic Laws are for Jews only. Arab Israelis have no rights under them with one exception - the right to run for public office in the Knesset, become a nominal legislative member, but have no power beyond a public stage for their views to be shouted down and ignored.
Palestinians have endured six decades of shattered hope and dreams. They were uprooted from their homes, denied their basic rights, given little outside recognition or aid, blamed for Israeli crimes, terrorized without mercy, falsely promised peace, yet condemned to a state of siege under which nothing will change without outside pressure to force it.
Since 1948, Palestinians have lived in a state of limbo. Their Nakba never ended. What's left of their country is occupied. They have no recognized nation and no power over their daily lives. They live in constant fear. They're economically strangled; dispossessed of their land and homes; isolated under siege; collectively punished; denied free movement; casually murdered; ruthlessly arrested, imprisoned and tortured; afflicted by random curfews; invaded, bombed, and shot at; extra-judicially assassinated; and constricted by roadblocks, checkpoints, electric fences and the Separation Wall that the World Court ruled illegal.
Israel: The World's "Worst Brand"
That's according a 2006 National Brands Index (NBI) study. On November 22, 2006, Israel Today reported the findings. They were compiled by "government advisor Simon Anholt and powered by global market intelligence solutions provider GMI (Global Market Insite, Inc.)."
I am a 72 year old, retired, progressive small businessman concerned about all the major national and world issues, committed to speak out and write about them.
