Democratic Palestine : 24 (ص 26)
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- Democratic Palestine : 24 (ص 26)
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air force and a small but daring navy
was ready to give battle.»
No such violations were recorded on
the Arab side, and the Zionists’ build-
up turned out to be mainly a prepara-
tion for coming wars, though there are
several indications that they considered
a qualitative escalation at the time. The
May 31,1948 entry in Ben-Gurion’s
diary reads: «If there is no ceasefire, we
will prepare an operation to free
Jerusalem. We have decided to bomb
Amman and Cairo.» ” In June 1948, the
US military attaché in Cairo reported
«reliable indications» in Tel Aviv and
elsewhere that Zionist forces were
preparing to use gas against the
Palestinian population centers. 10
As it happened, the Zionist forces
used the stalemate that ensued, until
armistice agreements were signed with
the Arab states in 1949, to continue the
expulsion of Palestinians and the
destruction of their villages. By that
time, another 350,000 Palestinians had
been forced to leave, and the Zionists
controlled 77.4% of Palestine. In the
process, a less known but just as
atrocious massacre as Deir Yasin oc-
curred in Dawaymeh, west of Hebron,
in October 1948. On a Friday, the
Zionists entered the town in armored
vehicles, firing indiscriminately. It is
estimated that 70 people were killed in
the mosque, while 85 were
machinegunned down outside a cave
where they had sought refuge. As many
as 70 were later killed trying to return to
their homes after the Zionists occupied
and destroyed the village. The mukhtar
of Dawaymeh later compiled a list of
the missing, totalling 455. The
massacre in Dawaymeh was part of a
larger Zionist operation, designed to
extend their territory before the signing
of the armistice agreements. The attack
was carried out by the 89th Battalion of
the Israeli army, led by Moshe Dayan.
MORE WARS TO COME
An underlying war aim for the
Zionists in 1948 was showing their
strength and ability to be imperialism’s
foremost ally in the region. The
Zionists clearly stated their aims to the
US in advance: On May 3, 1943,
General Patrick J. Hurley, personal
representative of US President
Roosevelt in the Middle East, reported
to the president: «The Zionist
organization in Palestine has indicated
its commitment to an enlarged program
for:(1) a sovereign Jewish state which
would embrace Palestine and probably
eventually Transjordan;(2) an eventual
transfer of the Arab population from
Palestine to Iraq; (3) Jewish leadership
for the whole Middle East in the
fields of economic development and
control.»!! With the US having
emerged from World War II as the
strongest imperialist power, the Zionist
leadership underscored what it could
offer by allowing the US mission to
have military attachés, the only state
accorded this privilege.
Thus, the creation of the Zionist state
not only uprooted the Palestinian peo-
ple. It provided the US with a
bridgehead for spreading imperialist
dominance in the Middle East. The
resulting US—Israeli alliance, and their
joint drive to control the area, has
generated a series of wars since 1948, at
the expense of peace, progress and in-
dependence for the Arab people as a
whole. (See study in this issue.) Their
cooperation has also taken on interna-
tional dimensions: ‘Israel’ constitutes
one station in the US’s global military
network. It is one of few states ready to
join the most aggressive US projects
-from supplying the contras in
Nicaragua and shielding the apartheid
regime in Pretoria from sanctions, to
Reagan’s nuclear-powered Star Wars.
For these reasons, the struggle to
liberate Palestine is not only a just na-
tional cause concerning one people - the
Palestinians. It is part of the worldwide
struggle against imperialism, racism,
oppression and militarization. Suppor-
ting the Palestinians’ return to their
homeland means supporting peace and
progress in the entire area.
Hadawi, Sami, Palestine in Focus, Beirut: PLO
Research Center, 1968, pages 10-12.
both quotes from Sayigh, Rosemary, Palesti-
nians from Peasants to Revolutionaries, London:
Zed Press, 1979, p. 72.
Green, Stephen, Taking Sides: America’s Secret
Relations with a Militant Israel, New York:
William Morrow and Co., Inc., 1984, p.68.
ibid, pages 52-3.
Ben-Gurion, David, Rebirth and Destiny of
Israel, 1954.
Hadawi, op. cit, p.47.
Ben-Gurion, op.cit., p.47.
Jerusalem Post, March 2, 1986.
Rabinovich, Itamar and Jehuda_ Reinharz
(editors), Israel in the Middle East, Oxford
University Press, 1984, p.25.
10 Green, op. cit.
Hadawi, op. cit, p.13. Yd)
The Israeli Role in the Middle East
In previous issues we have printed a study on the role of ‘Israel’ in the Middle East, as perceived and
engineered by US imperialism. In this issue, we begin a series on how the Zionist leadership conceived and
developed their state’s role in practice.
From its inception, the Zionist movement clearly defined its
role in the Middle East. Theodor Hertzl, father of political
Zionism, argued as follows in his book, Der Judenstaat (State
of the Jews), published in London in 1896: «We should there
form a portion of the rampart of Europe against Asia, an out-
post of civilization against barbarism.» Clearly aligning with
colonial expansion and interests in the East, the Zionist
movement sought the help of the great powers to fulfill its
project. By establishing the state of ‘Israel’ on occupied
Palestinian land, the Zionist leadership began acting on this
pledge, enforcing a geopolitical division in the heart of the
26
Arab world, occupying the major portion of Palestine and
displacing more than half of its people. This accomplished, the
Zionists turned their efforts against the rising Arab national
movement, particularly its center in Nasser’s Egypt, and the
latter’s alliance with the Soviet Union. As early as March 1952,
the Israeli ambassador to the US, Abba Eban (later foreign
minister during the June 1967 aggression), urged that ‘Israel’
be included in any Western-Oriental Middle East defense
organization being planned.
Contrary to all demagogy about «saving the Jewish people,»
the Zionists turned them into cannon fodder in order to have - هو جزء من
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