Gruesome details of massacres against Palestinians in classified Israeli documents
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The Israeli media has published a report detailing discussions the Israeli government had on the massacres committed against Palestinians in 1948.
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A Palestinian adult and child during the 1948 Nakba
In an investigative study, this week was the first time Israeli media published Israeli government conversations regarding the atrocities committed by Israeli soldiers against Palestinians in 1948.
The List of Massacres in Palestine 1947 – 1948 https://t.co/3ljf81l1KQ
— Th2shay (@Th2shay) December 9, 2021
The report titled "Classified Docs Reveal Massacres of Palestinians in '48 – and What Israeli Leaders Knew" exposes two operations in October of 1948, "Operation Yoav", which took place in the south of Palestine, and "Operation Hiram", which occurred in the north of Palestine.
Arbitrary practices exposed
Details list that during "Operation Hiram", Israeli soldiers assaulted dozens of Palestinian villages, expelling tens of thousands, while others fled.
Of the 120,000 Palestinians that used to dwell in the area, only 30,000 remained following the Israeli massacre.
Haaretz reported that within less than three days, the Israeli forces "had conquered the Galilee and also extended its reach into villages in southern Lebanon."
The investigation also disclosed information of previously undisclosed massacres in the villages of Al-Reineh, north of Al-Nasra, Meron, and Al-Burj.
Gruesome details revealed
Prior to "Operation Hiram", Al-Burj had been raided in July 1948.
According to the investigation, after the village was captured, four men remained. One of them was sent to pick vegetables eight days after the Israeli forces raided the village. The goal was to keep the man away while the massacre happened since he worked in the military kitchen.
The document reveals how the three others were taken to an isolated house. "Afterward an anti-tank shell was fired. When the shell missed the target, six hand grenades were thrown into the house. They killed an elderly man and woman, and the elderly woman was put to death with a firearm," according to the document.
The bodies were then burned, and the house was torched. When the man who worked in the kitchen returned, he felt suspicious and did not believe the story they told him, "and a few hours later he too was put to death, with four bullets."
The current state of Israel was built on the back of mass expulsion, massacres, and war crimes against Palestinians.
— amit dadon (@amit_dadon) December 10, 2021
Can’t imagine why the Israeli government continues to censor and prevent the release of further documents. https://t.co/cgBvYL5aDK
The archives included testimonies of a member of the Provisional State Council (now known as the Knesset), who detailed the massacres in the Meron region.
Irgun terror
The member had sought an explanation from former PM David Ben-Gurion regarding acts carried out by members of the Jewish terrorist group, Irgun.
Irgun terrorist acts exposed in the document included:
A. They annihilated with a machine gun 35 Arabs who had surrendered holding a white flag in their hands.
B. They took as captives peaceful residents, among them women and children, ordered them to dig a pit, pushed them into it with long French bayonets, and shot them one by one until they were all murdered. There was even a woman with an infant in her arms.
C. Arab children of about 13-14 who were playing with grenades were all shot.
D. A girl of about 19-20 was raped by men from Altalena [an Irgun unit]; afterward she was stabbed with a bayonet and a wooden stick was thrust into her body.
Other atrocities extended to Lebanon
The archives also include details of the Hula massacre in Lebanon, as well as Deir Yassin village in Palestine. A keynote in the documents states that many more details remain unknown, and "this is not surprising, considering how much material remains locked away in the archives."
The 1948 Nakba
The Palestinian Nakba stands for the Palestinian people’s catastrophe caused by the Israeli occupation in 1948, with the help of British forces, where it carried out ethnic cleansing and expelled the largest part of the Palestinian people from their homes and villages in what was later known as the ’48 occupied territories.
In the Nakba, more than 15,000 Palestinians were martyred and more than 800,000 out of 1.4 million Palestinians were displaced from their villages and cities, with the majority heading to the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and neighboring Arab countries.
