Former Prime Minister of Syria Khalid al-Azm recalled in his memoirs:

Since 1948 it is we who demanded the return of the refugees to their country, while it is we who made them leave it. […]
We brought disaster upon one million Arab refugees, by inviting them and bringing pressure to bear upon them to leave their land, their homes, their work and their industry. We have rendered them dispossessed, unemployed, whilst every one of them had work or a trade by which he could gain his livelihood.

After the war, a few Arab leaders tried to present the Palestinian exodus as a victory by claiming to have planned it. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Said was later quoted as saying: "We will smash the country with our guns and obliterate every place the Jews shelter in. The Arabs should conduct their wives and children to safe areas until the fighting has died down."

Contemporary Jordanian politician Anwar Nusseibeh believed that the fault for the exodus and military loss was with the Arab commanders:

"the commanders of the local army thought in terms of the revolt against the British in the 1930s. The rebels had often retreated to the mountains, which made sense, as the British had not sought to take control of the country. But the Jews were fighting for complete domination, so the fighters had erred in withdrawing from the villages instead of defending them […]. He blamed himself as well. 'I underestimated the strength of my own people,' he wrote. […] His central thesis, however, was that the Palestinian Arabs could have won the country had their leaders not sabotaged the war effort and known how to cooperate."

The Arab National Committee of Haifa, the Arab leadership in Haifa in 1948, wrote and delivered a report on the flight of roughly 60,000 Arabs from Haifa. The report said, "[T]he removal of the Arab inhabitants from the town was voluntary and carried out at our request."

"Brotherly advice was given to the Arabs of Palestine to leave their land, homes and property and to stay temporarily in neighboring, brotherly states, lest the guns of the invading Arab armies mow them down," wrote Habab Issa of Al-Hoda, the leading newspaper for Lebanese Maronites in the United States. A Muslim weekly newspaper in Beirut similarly reported, "Who brought the Palestinians to Lebanon as refugees, suffering now from the malign attitude of newspapers and communal leaders […]? The Arab States [sp], and Lebanon amongst them, did it!"

Mahmoud Abbas, at the time Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority, would later recall: "The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny but, instead, they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and to leave their homeland, and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live."

Spot on. It is blatantly political. It has two purposes. The first is to undercut historical post-WWII sympathy for the Jews after what can only be described as a holocaust. There was a thoroughly documented, industrial scale, effort by the Nazis to literally exterminate every Jew within that portion of Europe under their control. In some places (like Riga or in Poland) they essentially reached their goal. Then there is the symbolism of the cremation of hundreds of thousands or perhaps millions of the bodies of the murdered.

The second purpose is to gain sympathy for the Palestinian cause. That is why pictures of children are to be used in the memorial. I think it is a safe bet that ther won't be any martyrdom tapes on display....you know...with a caption underneath ..."Here is the martyrdom tape of Ibrahim which was made just before he blew up a bunch of grey-haired ladies on a bus..."

Similarly, it seems silly to talk about "survivors" of the occupation when 99.9 % of those who have lived under Israeli occupation are either still alive are died of natural causes.

That the occupation has been a terrible burden for those living through it is certain and there continue to be many injustices, but nobody in the West is going to fall for this analogy. It would be more effective to have a well produced documentary on the villages cut in half by the security wall and how Palestinains are treated at checkpoints or new Israel sttlements...etce, etc.

Of course, if you are just trying to get the locals riled up to continue the Intifada and keep money flowing from foreign agencies to corrupt Palestinian leaders....then this is exactly the right thing to do. It might be a good idea to make some children's cartoons where Jews are portrayed as evil to keep the young kids in line, too.

if they wanted.. lol ... rite i can see that... man they want it.. but they cant do it... talkin all that sh*T 60 years.. i bet u dont know nothin of there so called planns to take over the whole middle east n wipe us out... n when they were in war with lebanon.. compare to them .. they r much stronger than them.. n they still lost......

That is a silly claim(responding to the line you quoted) and one often used. Israel coulden't wipe out the Palistinians openly without loosing the support of Americans, and they need our funding.

Israel has no intention of conquoring the middle east, that dosen't mean the arn't doing horrid things in the OT

[quote=wth1257;947390]That is a silly claim(responding to the line you quoted) and one often used. Israel coulden't wipe out the Palistinians openly without loosing the support of Americans, and they need our funding.

Israel has no intention of conquoring the middle east, that dosen't mean the arn't doing horrid things in the OT[/QUO

it might be silly to u but its the truth ... n how do u know wat intentions they got.. ur problem is that ur not lookin at the whole picture.. n since when american cares about the plai... " since u said losin the support of the americans * why would they lose it.. thats part of the whole plann.. salamz

[quote=arabianprincess;947392]
I wasen't callig anything you wrote as silly, liveing in Michagin I'm sure you know a typical neocon argument aghinst Israeli atrocities in the OT's is to claim that Israel could wipe openly slaughter the Palistinians if the wished to so therefore they must not be doing much that's to bad in the OT's.

While that is probably true militairly, gross military power isin't the final determinate on what a given nation can do.

I can't be sure, however given the tramendous PR work Israel does in the US I'd be willing to bet they care somewhat about their image here?

What would stop Israel from wiping out the Pals?

[quote=wth1257;947400]You think so? Did we do anything to stop Rwanda? Dafur? How long did the holocaust go on? Serbia?

[quote=Izyan;947543]Yes

Firstly, in most instances the atrocities did not receive due coverage in the American media, but more importantly we were not actively funding any of the regimes commiting the atrocities you mentioned.

The question of weather Americans would be willing to send their forces into a foreign land to forceable stop atrocities in distant lands is entirely different from weather Americans would be willing to stop funding the regime commiting atrocities.

[quote=wth1257;947561]Ok how long did it take the US to tell Israel to knock it off in Lebanon? They leveled the placce.

Salaam/peace;

to wipe out the whole nation , I guess they need to use Nuke ?? But as neighbour , nuke will harm them , too.

By using bullet , bomb ....it will take much time & strength to wipe out a whole nation. Also , as the sis pointed out , the Israel Army is not that powerful as we are told. The Lebanon war is a good example of it.

Israel "could" wipe out the Palestinians, but the end result would be a little more than simply losing U.S. support. Israel only has two concrete allies on the U.N. security council and probably not much more than that in the General Assembly. The result would be Israel being coined a "rogue nation". Rightly so of course. The U.S. isn't dependant upon Israel for much of anything besides intelligence and certain anti-insurgent techniques they have developed over the years. I also think most people would be surprised how many people inside of Israel would oppose any such action on the part of their government.

Salaam/peace;

yes , many Jews are against the Zionists...Thanks God.

hmmmmmm losing n also losin there lives obviously .. compare to the other side.. they dont care,, well thats how i see it.. plus if they do that i believe arab will unite n that wont be a pretty picture for them... they always say never keep arab/ muslims united cuz they will be a threat salamz

There aren't any Arab states that can threaten Israel militarily at this point, and even if they unite it would more than likely be more of a fiasco than the 1967 war.

In any event, Israel has no intention of killing all Palestinians so the subject is pointless.