Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) posted a twitter message on Nakba day (May 15) accusing Israel of ethnically cleansing the Palestinian people from Israel.
“Today, Palestinians around the world commemorate the Nakba (النكبة), Arabic for “catastrophe” recognizing the ethnic cleansing of indigenous Palestine. ~530 Palestinian neighborhoods were uprooted + destroyed +750,000 Palestinians became refugees,” Tlaib wrote.
Today, Palestinians around the world commemorate the Nakba (النكبة), Arabic for “catastrophe” recognizing the ethnic cleansing of indigenous Palestine. ~530 Palestinian neighborhoods were uprooted + destroyed +750,000 Palestinians became refugees.
TY @shirien___ for this ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/9GuOS4iRc5
— Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) May 15, 2020
Nakba Day, the day of catastrophe, was inaugurated by PLO head Yasser Arafat in 1998 to emphasize the idea among Palestinians that the Biblical prophesied return of the Jewish people to their ancestral home and the resultant declaration of a Jewish state by the entire world was, in fact, a catastrophe for the Palestinian people. The celebration of Nakba Day in Israel is a criminal offense as it entails a call for the destruction of the Jewish state.
Rabbi Aryeh Spero, president of the Conference of Jewish Affairs (CJA), released a statement on Wednesday blasting Tlaib’s anti-Semitic historical revision.
“Over the weekend Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) made a despicable remark saying the existence of the State of Israel is an ‘ethnic cleansing’ of Muslim Arabs,” said Rabbi Aryeh Spero of the CJA.
“This is false, and she knows it. Since the establishment of the State of Israel 70 years ago, the Arab population in the Land of Israel has multiplied six-fold. Muslim Arabs within the Israeli territory have better access to modern amenities than in most places in the Arab world.”
“As the invasion by surrounding Arab states began in 1948, the Israeli government asked its Arab population not to leave. It promised them protection and citizenship; nonetheless many left at the request of Arab attackers who said it would be easier for them to perform their attacks if their Arab brothers were absent the area. Those who left did so of their own free will and with the hope that the Jews would be ethnically cleansed.”
“The fact is that the ethnic cleansing that happened after the establishment of the State of Israel was done to the Jews living in the Arab lands in North Africa and in the Middle East. Muslim countries expelled and threatened their Jewish population. The 850,000 Jews who for over 1,000 years had lived in and contributed to these countries were expelled and ethnically cleansed.”
“The ethnic cleansing going on today in the Middle East and northern Africa is being done mostly by Arab Muslim leaders and jihadists who are systematically purging these areas of age-old Christian communities, indigenous tribes, and remnants of the few Jews remaining in these areas.”
“The ‘Nakba’ is a carefully crafted 72-year-old lie designed to usurp the documented facts in order to deny Israel its legitimacy. The ultimate goal, of course, is to destroy the world’s only Jewish state.”
Rabbi Spero added: “When speaking of ethnic cleansing, Rashida Tlaib should look in the mirror and see that it is her ideology that is the greatest perpetrator of ethnic cleansing in the world today.”
“Tlaib is a sitting congressional representative who regularly engaged in anti-Jews blood libel and historical revisionism similar to the ones coming from the Holocaust denier.”
“The Democratic Party will ignore Tlaib’s ‘Nakba’ tweet. After all they wouldn’t/couldn’t pass a House resolution against anti-Semitism. Most major Jewish organizations have failed to protect Jewish interests and to represent well Jewish issues. Therefore, they will not step up because they are afraid they will not be welcome to the interfaith-diversity big tent.”
Demographer Sergio DellaPergola, from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, in his paper “Demography in Israel/Palestine: Trends, Prospects and Policy Implications,” provides estimates of the population of Palestine in different periods. As the demographic data below shows, most Muslims living in Palestine in 1948 when the State of Israel was created had been living there for fewer than 60 years:
1890: Arab Population 432,000
1947: Arab Population 1,181,000
Growth in Arab population from 1890 to 1947: 800,000…”
