Al-Dawaimeh Massacre
Al-Dawaimeh Massacre:
Children’s Skulls Crushed / Smashed
The conspiracy hatched against the Palestinian people prior to the creation of the Jewish State, aimed at vacating Palestine of its native inhabitants by forced expulsion, aided by Western Powers’ collusion, coupled with Arab Regimes’ oblivion, all these factors combined paved the way for the Zionists to pursue their goals unhindered by any ethical or moral considerations.
This is indeed attested to by the fact that Ben Gurion, Moshe Dayan, Itshak Shamir and Menachem Begin have all masterminded and conducted systematic crimes in 1948 which led to the total destruction of more than 500 villages and the expulsion of their inhabitants; in addition to committing the most hideous massacres in around 35 of these villages.
One of those villages was Al-Dawaimeh, near Hebron which was raided by Commando Brigade 89, an auxiliary of the 8th Battalion under the command of Moshe Dayan. Members of this brigade were selected from among ex-members of the Stern and Irgun gangs. The Israeli State tried to conceal this massacre since orders were issued to bury the dead in mass graves and a total news blackout was imposed.
– The Location :
Al-Dawaimeh lies on a hill 24 km west of Hebron. Its location is regarded as strategic as it lies astride the urban and bedouin areas and between the sea and the mountain region. Its population on the eve of its occupation was 8,000 people with a total area of 60,585 Dunums.
– The Name :
There is more than one story circulating among the village’s inhabitants on why the village was named so. The majority, however, agree that Al-Dawaimeh was a name given to the village by a pious Sheikh after his father, Abduldaiem, who was unjustly executed by the Ottomans in Jerusalem. Indeed, a shrine for his father still exists to this day in the Hebron Gate area in Jerusalem, frequented by many of the village residents.
2-11-1- The 1936 Revolution
The Mandatory Power, Britain, has facilitated the acquisition of land by the Zionist Movement, which led to the deterioration of the economic conditions and the surge in Jewish immigration. This sparked the flames of the 1936 Revolution.
The village did play its part in this revolution through strict observance of the national strike called for by the revolution’s leaders and other manifestations of resistance, i.e. armed struggle. Examples follow:
- The kidnapping of a Mr. Lobby, a British official, a banker.
- The Kasla battle, where Rashid Abu Haniya was killed.
- Gorat Bohlus battle.
- Beit Ummar battle of 1943, where Ibrahim Al-Awameh was killed.
– Courage :
One of the villagers narrated how the Viceroy had once called for a meeting of the village elderly and notables at his residence. When the invitees arrived, the Viceroy noticed that one of their lot, Musa Abu Hadeeb, was late. Upon arriving, Musa proceeded to occupy the seat of the Viceroy himself. When the astonished Viceroy inquired about why the villager did so, Musa responded: “You couldn’t tolerate me occupying your seat for a minute, and yet you want us to accept Israel occupying our homes?”.
2-11-2- The Occupation of the Village
As was customary, the villagers had performed their Friday prayers at the village mosque on October 29th, 1948. As the sermon was coming to a close, they heard the sound of bullets being fired from three directions, the north, the south and west. The east was apparently kept quiet to enable the villagers to escape.
One of the villagers described how he saw Israeli tanks approaching from the west heading north and east towards Al-Qabiba village. Right before noon, the tanks started moving eastward towards Al-Dawaimeh village, unconcerned by the sporadic resistance from the village residents.[i]
2-11-3- The Massacre
Al-Dawaimeh massacre was not far detached in that it didn’t take place in isolation from the series of killings and expulsions perpetrated against the Palestinians. The aim being to kill as many as possible and to instill fear in those who survive to compel them to flee in order to vacate the village.
What took place at Al-Dawaimeh contradicts all known human norms, laws, conventions and morals. What crime have the children of Al-Dawaimeh committed to deserve their skulls being smashed with clubs and sticks? Where is the humanity of the military commander who had ordered the destruction of homes over the heads of their elderly inhabitants after denying them food and water?
2-11-4- Three Stages
The Hebrew newspaper, Hadshout, published an extensive report on the massacre, indicating that its execution could be divided into three phases, as follows:
– Stage I: Around 80 to 100 people (including women and children) were killed in the initial raid on the village; the majority killed in their houses or on the streets.
– Stage II: Generally speaking, places of worship enjoy a special sanctity, which should not be violated at all times. However, what happened in Al-Dawaimeh was worse than storming and desecrating a mosque. Atrocities and massacres were committed against those people who had sought refuge and safety in their mosque. Soldiers had even killed elderly pious Sheikhs reciting their holy book.
Villagers narrated the following regarding the mosque’s massacre. At around 10:30 two armoured vehicles passed by Al-Zawiya Mosque where there were between 100 to 150 worshippers, the majority of whom were elderly, who had gone there early to perform the Friday prayers. As they were about to start their worship, heavy gunfire was heard which prompted some to rush outside while others favoured staying inside thinking that it would be safer. However, Zionist troops stormed their way inside the mosque shooting sporadically in all directions.[ii]
Yeola Harshafi, an Israeli journalist, noted in an article published in the Hadshout Newspaper, that “the death toll reached 332”; however, historian Benny Morris noted that the number of victims who fell in Al-Dawaimeh massacre ran into tens and probably hundreds. He further stated that according to the Israeli Defence Force sources, the UN and Arab sources, the death toll was somewhere between 70 to 100.
It is however certain that the number of victims had surpassed any other massacre committed by the Israelis during the 1948 war. Hence, it is not an overstatement to conclude that Al-Dawaimeh massacre was by far more hideous and horrific than either Deir Yassin or Abu Shosheh massacres, not so much for the number of its victims but in that it was executed in cold blood.
- Stage III : Tor Al-Zagha massacre started when Zionists discovered a cave where 35 horrified families have taken refuge.
A woman survivor narrated the following: “As we heard the sound of gunfire getting closer and closer to us, we huddled the walls of the cave for fear of being discovered. An eerie silence engulfed the place as women rushed silently to their kids comforting them and hugging them”.[iii]
She added that as the soldiers arrived, they pointed their guns at the crowd and ordered them to walk out of the cave. The children burst in tears and clung to their mothers’ dresses. An old man took off his white headdress (kufiyyeh) and waived it in a gesture of surrender, and asked all those in side to leave. One of the men who had just exited attempted to run but was shot instantly by the soldiers; he managed to escape. This incident was probably responsible for the frenzy that followed. Soldiers ordered the crowd to line up in two rows, one for men and another for women. Two or three soldiers picked up three young girls from the women’s row which prompted their mothers to plead with the soldiers to leave their daughters alone and not to harm them. Soldiers responded by shooting the mothers and dragged away the screaming girls. Within moments, a soldier screamed at the top of his voice, “harvest them”, and the massacre started. Bullets reigned in like heavy rain. Many people were killed in a pool of blood and the woman fell to the ground pretending to be dead.
During all that, she could hear mumblings followed by shootings. She attempted to raise her head but was fired at by the soldiers. The bullet missed her and hit a dead man lying next to her and then penetrated her toddler girl’s head, killing her instantly. By then she was certain that the soldiers were shooting at anything that moved. The soldiers jumped into their vehicles and departed the scene towards the village.
Surrounded by dead bodies, the woman attempted to stand up in vain. She looked for her brother and managed to locate him. He had seven bullet wounds and was unconscious. He survived.
Historian Benny Morris had included in a research he had conducted on Israeli massacres committed against Palestinians in the 1948 War, the contents of a personal letter sent by a “Mapam” Party member to the editor of Al-Hamishmar, Kiflan Aliazer Fray.
The soldier mentioned in the letter was an eyewitness to the massacre committed at Al-Dawaimeh. He requested avoiding the use of what he called “armed diplomacy” based on “blood and murder” and called for the intervention of the press and the Party to uncover the massacre. The said letter was never published before by Israeli newspapers. It is hereby presented in an abridged version:
“Aliazer Fray,
Greetings,
I have just read today’s Al-Hamishmar’s op-ed handling the conduct of our troops, which is occupying everything but have difficulty controlling their emotions. I’m presenting you with an eyewitness testimony of a soldier who took part in Al-Dawaimeh massacre. The soldier is one of us; an educated human being and he is honest one hundred percent. He had allowed me to gain access to his inner feelings, as he is in dire need to share the psychological horror caused by the crime which points to the barbarity that our educated men could reach. He has done so since people who are willing to listen are rare”.[iv]
He adds: “He arrived at Al-Dawaimeh upon its occupation by Brigade 89. there were no Egyptian troops in the village, but rather a force called “irregular” or maybe “paramilitary” comprised mainly of old men and women. What is important is that no battle took place and there was no resistance. The occupiers initially killed 80 to 100 Arab women and children; children were killed by smashing their skulls; there is hardly a house that doesn’t have a dead one”.
2-11-5- Demolishing Homes
The second raid was conducted by the battalion to whom the eyewitness belonged. Arab men and women were locked inside their homes and denied food and water. Then explosives experts were called to detonate the houses. A commander instructed an explosives expert to force two elderly ladies to enter a house about to be detonated. The expert refused stating that he could take orders only from his commander. The battalion commander instructed other soldiers to execute the order; which they did and the women were killed.
Another soldier boasted how he had raped an Arab woman before killing her. While another spoke of how he had forced an Arab woman who had just given birth to sweep the yard where soldiers have just finished eating. When she was done, she was shot dead along with her newborn.[v]
2-11-6- Expulsion and Annihilation
The soldier states:
“Decent and civilized commanders, regarded as the best that our society has produced, were transformed into murderers and thugs. This didn’t happen as a result of a stormy emotional episode which was hard to inhibit, but as a result of a systematic policy of expulsion and annihilation. This is fast becoming the political incentive which is hardly met by any criticism by the State. I personally have spent two weeks there and have heard stories from soldiers and commanders boasting how much of good “hunters” of Arabs they are. This is the one sphere where soldiers compete against each other”.
According to testimonies this massacre might be the worst in the history of atrocities committed during the Nakba by battalion 89 that’s affiliated to the eighth Israeli Brigade. The Documentation Commission on Palestine, affiliated to the United Nations and which replaced Count Bernadotte in mediation efforts, organized a special session to investigate what happened on October 28, 1948, in this village located less than three miles away from the city of Hebron and which originally had a population of 2,000, but 4,000 refugees came to it and tripled its population.
The United Nations report, dated June 14, 1949 stated the following: “The reason for how little we know about this massacre, which outweighs – in many ways – in its brutality the Deir Yassin massacre, is that the Arab Legion (the army, which controlled that area) feared that if the news and details about the massacre would spread, it would have the same impact of the Deir Yassin massacre on the morale of peasants and that it would cause another wave of asylum seekers”(75).
The report of the conciliation commission is mainly based on the statements of the Mukhtar[vi], Hassan Mahmoud Hdaib, and the reports saved in the archives of the Israeli military confirm several of his statements. The well-known Israeli writer, Amos Kinan, who participated in the massacre, confirmed the reality of the massacre in an interview conducted with him in the late nineties by the Palestinian actor and director Mohammed Bakri, for his documentary, on 1948. The Mukhtar mentioned as well that “half an hour after the Friday prayers on October 28, twenty armored vehicles entered the village from Alqabaybeh side, while being attacked simultaneously by soldiers from the opposite side, and the fear instantly paralyzed the twenty people who were guarding the village. The soldiers opened fire from their automatic weapons from the armored vehicles and mortars, while they were making their way inside the village in nearly circular movements and as usual, they surround the village from three sides, leaving the eastern side open in order to expel its population of 6,000 people within one hour. When that did not happen, the soldiers jumped out of their vehicles and started shooting people indiscriminately, among which, many fled to the mosque for protection and to a near sacred cave called Iraq Alzagh. When the Mukhtar dared to return to the village, he saw piles of dead bodies in the mosque and scattered on the streets, among them men, women and children including his own father. When he reached the cave it was blocked by dozens of bodies. According to his census 455 people were missing, among them 170 children and women.
Jewish soldiers who participated in the massacre provided a description of the hair-raising scenes mentioning that “skulls of babies were smashed; women were raped or burned alive inside their homes and men were stabbed to death”.
2-11-7- International and Israeli testimonies about the massacre
– After several days of the massacre, a team of United Nations observers headed by the Belgian first officer, Van Vossen Hovey, arrived in the village, accompanied by a group of Israeli military. When one of the observers requested access to the closed mosque, he was denied entry on the grounds that entry to the mosque is not allowed for non-Muslims. However, the observer saw smoke rising from the mosque, he approached the window and smelled the burning bodies, when he asked the Jewish officer about the smoke and smell he was forbidden to continue his investigation. He asked as well about a house that they were preparing to blow up, and was told that “The home is infected by toxic insects and this is why we will blow it up” (79).
– The international observers sent a confidential report to their superiors stating the following: “We have no doubt that there was a massacre and that the odor emanating from the mosque was the smell of human bodies “(80)
– Whereas Zionist statements regarding the massacre are mentioned by the Israeli historian “Benny Morris” in his book “Correcting a Mistake: Jews and Arabs in Palestine/Israel, 1936-1956”, which was published in several columns in the Jordanian newspaper “Al Dostor” starting 15 March 2001, states that “the massacre was done upon the orders of the Israeli government and that few paragraphs about the atrocities committed in the village of “Dawayima”, were deleted from the minutes of meeting of the “Mapam party” Committee and that the soldiers had massacred hundreds of villagers to force the rest of them to leave “.
– In his testimony about the massacre, “Israel Galilee”, the commander of the Operations Branch in the Israeli army in the War of 1948 and one of the leaders of the Israeli “Mapam party” said that he saw “horrific scenes of the killing of prisoners and rape of women and other indecent acts”.
– Regarding Zionist crimes in Palestine in general we quote the testimonies of some historians, rabbis, including that of “Aaron Cohen”, one of the historians of the new stream in Israel, said: “Entire populations of villages were slaughtered and the ears and fingers of women were cut off to remove their golden jewelry.”
– The Zionist Rabbi “Yael Bin Nun” says in this regard that “The historical injustice we inflicted on Palestinians was more than the one the world had inflicted on us”.
2-11-8- Victims of the Massacre of “Dawayima”: General estimations
The number of martyrs from the Dawayima massacre varies according to Arab estimates, the “United Nations” and the Israeli occupation army itself, ranging between 700 to 1,000 Arab citizens, apart from those who were trying to infiltrate the village to take their belongings and their food, days following the massacre. In any case the final outcome estimation could be clarified as follows:
- In the first two days of the massacre on the 29th and the 30th of October 1948, there were 580 martyrs of whom 75 were elderly and located in the mosque around the corner.
On the 29th of October 1948, 110 villagers became martyrs as they were trying to infiltrate the village to take their belongings and food.
- The number of wounded individuals was 8; it was a small number as Jewish soldiers tried not to keep them alive.
- Nine prisoners were killed, among them , 3 who were in Israeli jails.
[i]. Ibid.
[ii]. Hadeshot Hebrew Newspaper, 24/8/1984.
[iii]. Ibid.
[iv]. Al-Hamishmar, Haaretz, Maariv, Yedeot Aheranot, 23/11/2001.
[v]. Ibid.
[vi]. Mukhtar (also spelled Muktar, meaning “chosen” in Arabic:المختار, refers to the head of a village or neighborhood in many Arab countries The name refers to the fact that Mukhtars are usually selected by some consensual or participatory method, often involving an election.