Tsabag is a third-year psychology student.
By Sharon Tsabag
When dealing with such a sensitive topic as the conflict in the
Middle East, it is expected that one should go about the research
in an unbiased way and examine both sides. The submission written
on Tuesday by Darren Wang (“Israel is a perpetrator of
injustice, not a true democracy,” Daily Bruin, Viewpoint, May
22) represents the exact opposite of an unbiased scholarly
work.
Illustration by JARRETT QUON/Daily Bruin As educated and
open-minded students, we need to make sure that this conflict is
approached in a sensitive and sympathetic manner. Especially at
such a prestigious and respected university as UCLA, it is expected
that the literature and debate that arise here would be grounded in
fact and not in propaganda.
We are dealing here with a conflict that dates back thousands of
years, and anyone who has not read up on the topic will not extract
that from modern-day politics.
Before Ariel Sharon and Yasser Arafat were around, there existed
the Arab and Jewish conflict. The current conflict in Israel is
simply another form of a conflict that has existed for centuries.
Having said that, there are some incorrect and skewed issues in
Wang’s submission that I would like to address.
Regarding the debate over Israel being a democracy, it is unfair
for Wang to criticize its democratic character before knowing its
laws. Had Israel not been a democracy, it would not have accepted
Arabs as Parliament members. Israel’s election process, its
institutions and its basic human laws that make up an informal
constitution are additional examples of its democratic nature,
closely resembling that of the United States.
Considering the threat that surrounds it and the constant state
of war in which it is involved, Israel shows more remarkable
democratic character than any other country in the Middle East, and
is thus well-deserving of its title as “the only real
democracy in the Middle East.”
The right of return for Palestinian refugees is an especially
sensitive topic. It should be noted that Palestinian residents who
became refugees did not reach that status only by means of
expulsion. Rather, it was a combination of transfer projects and
Arab leaders’ persuasion which led to their status.
Around the time of the partition, the Arab League issued orders
advising the people to seek temporary refuge in neighboring
countries, which would help in the Arab war against Israel. In the
words of one refugee, “The Arab governments told us: Get out
so that we can get in. So we got out, but they did not get
in”(Samuel Katz, “Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in
Palestine,” 1973, 18).
The Arab Higher Executive made announcements on the air that
urged all Arabs to flee, since those Arabs who remained in
Palestine and accepted Jewish protection during the planned Arab
army invasion, “would be regarded as renegades” (Ira
Hirschmann, “Questions and Answers About Arabs and
Jews,” 1977, p. 44).
The neighboring Arab countries promised to help the Palestinian
Arabs move back to their former homes ““ including the homes
of the hopefully annihilated Jews ““ after they had
“driven the Jews into the sea.”
Unfortunately, many of these countries did not live up to their
promises. Many of these Arabs were not received well by the
“host” nations. In fact, only in Jordan were they given
citizenship rights and Jordanian passports. It is precisely the
nations that previously urged the Palestinian Arabs to flee that
were now creating and facilitating their refugee status.
When these Arab leaders could not live up to their promises,
after losing the war to Israel, they shifted the blame of the
refugees onto the state of Israel.
Furthermore, it is noted in many scholarly works that Jews
living peacefully with their Palestinian neighbors at the time
pleaded that they not leave the land. Such appeals took place in
cities like Haifa, where Jews and Arabs lived cooperatively
side-by-side. These and other important facts were not included in
Wang’s submission. It is crucial that sources from both sides
be examined before making claims of injustice.
It is impossible to allow all of the Palestinian refugees back
into Israel if Israel is to remain a Jewish state, a fact that has
been admitted even by Arab leaders. If all the Palestinian refugees
were allowed back into Israel ““ including the offspring they
have produced ““ they would outnumber the Jews in Israel and
therefore have the ability to vote Israel out of being a Jewish
state.
In addition, Israel claims that if compensation is to be paid to
Palestinian refugees, then it should also be paid to Jews who were
persecuted and expelled from their former homelands in the Middle
East. The only reason these Jews are not considered refugees is
because they had a new homeland to go to.
On the other hand, Palestinian refugees have been shunned by
many of the surrounding Arab countries in a claim that those
countries could not afford to absorb so many refugees.
The state of Israel was designed to be a Jewish state, and in
that design lies the expected flaw that they will favor their
Jewish citizens above the rest. But it was agreed upon by the
United Nations that the Jewish people, having been persecuted and
discriminated against throughout history, needed a land of their
own, a safe haven to practice the religion which too often was used
to justify violence against them.
Even before the creation of the U.N., Britain’s Balfour
Declaration of 1927 recognized the Jews’ historic ties to the
land and their right to build a state there. It was not until 1947
that the U.N. partition plan divided former Palestine into two
adjacent states, giving about half of the land to each of the
groups.
The Arabs rejected this plan and demanded all of the land. In
addition, the U.N. offered the Arabs a way of legally regulating
Jewish immigration.
This is not the first time that Palestinians have rejected such
plans. In 1922, the British mandatory government proposed the
establishment of a legislative council in which the Arabs would
have a five-to-one advantage over the Jews. The Arabs rejected this
proposal because they believed that sitting on a legislature with
Jews would imply their acceptance of the presence of the few
thousand Jews already in Palestine (Mark Tessler, “A History
of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict,” 1994).
So if people like Wang are going to talk about Israelis
rejecting U.N. proposals, why don’t they begin with a
discussion of the Arab rejection of proposals by the U.N. and
others? If you are going to discuss this very complex topic, you
must take a holistic approach to it, examining the shortcomings and
the injustices of both parties.
There is truth in both sides, but mainly, as the conflict
continues, both sides are generating more propaganda and hate
toward the other. It is up to us, the academic minds of society, to
insure that this propaganda be stopped and that this issue is
addressed in a civil and sympathetic manner.
We need to learn about the other party and about their fears and
memories, and if we continue to produce such ignorant statements
found in propaganda and other hate literature, this learning
process can never occur.