Section One
Section One
Terror And Massacres Before The War Of 1948
Two days later,
a huge bomb exploded at a major bus station near Jaffa street killing three and injuring 19 others.
During the same day,
two passers by were killed and four injured in Jerusalem’s Old City, as a result of a terrorist stationed at a roof top hurling a grenade at the street below.
During the same month
a huge bomb, some 30 kg of dynamite, planted in a box of cucumber was carried on a motorbike to the center of the Arab market where it exploded. British Police, fearing an Arab backlash, played down the death toll, placing it at 35, however, according to non-official estimates the number of those killed was at least twice as many.
Years later, an Etsel historian boasted about this lethal operation, describing it as an unparalleled massacre since the eruption of the current hostilities”.[i]
Leaders of Etsel issued their statistics with much comfort and content:
“During July, the number of Arabs killed has reached 140, i.e. more than Jewish losses in a year and a half, and is equal to total losses since the eruption of the hostilities”.
Zeif Jabotinski has summed up this terrorist policy in the following words:
“In war, if you do not wish to harm civilians, you will be killed. If you do not wish to be killed then you would better shoot and stop blabbering”.
Hangby adds: “Sixty-three years have passed since and apparently nothing has changed. They value life by death and impose peace by blood”.
Within a week from those incidents
a huge explosion rocked the nearby vegetable market which at the time was hustling with shoppers killing 10 and injuring more than 30.
All this happened during July 1938, 63 years ago to the month, where “Etsel” – a Zionist military organization – accused the leaders of Zionist settlements of undue restraint and called for revenge, “an eye for an eye and terror for terror”.[i]
Zionist booby-trapped a car in a market in Arab Jerusalem killing 34 Arabs and injuring 35 others.
This was in addition to a series of other attacks using bombs and booby-trapped cars, which resulted in the killing of scores and the maiming of hundreds of Arabs.
between 150 – 200 Zionists descended from the hills south east of Haifa and attacked Balad Al-Sheikh. Using a heavy barrage of hand grenades and rifles as a cover, they stormed into the homes of sleeping Palestinians killing and injuring in the process 30 Arabs, including women and children.
Terrorism And Bloody Massacres During The 1948 War
the Hagana gangs attacked and scorched the village of Naser Al-Din near Tiberius. After a spree of killings, the majority of its inhabitants were moved out in preparation for an assault on Tiberius. On the eve of April 14, a Jewish force disguised as Arabs arrived at the village. The inhabitants mistook them for the Arab Legion they were awaiting for to repel the Zionist attack, so they welcomed them with open arms. As soon as the arriving force has entered the village, they opened their fire on the ‘welcoming crowd’ and destroyed every single dwelling in the village. Only 40 Arabs (those who managed to escape to a nearby village) out of a total of 90, survived the massacre.
If one considers the details of this massacre committed by the Zionist forces against the inhabitants of the village of Tantoura, the ugliness of the atrocities overshadows those of Deir Yassin.
The importance of this massacre lies in that it was uncovered by an Israeli researcher named Teddy Kats, a lecturer at Haifa University.
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The researcher “Shoshani” revealed “that the Supreme Court of Israel refused the solicitation whose purpose was to reopen the archives of the Israeli army that was related to the massacre of Deir Yassin; the sixty third commemoration of which was on Friday”.
Shoshani also demanded to “compel the Israeli army to open its archives to see the pictures of this massacre which were taken by the photographer Haganah”.
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- a huge Zionist force backed by armoured vehicles attacked the village of Beit Daras, north east of Gaza. After laying siege to the village to prevent any rescue from nearby Arab villagers, they started bombarding it with artillery. Not aware that their village was under total siege, Arab defenders, feeling the gravity of the situation, decided to vacate the women, children and the elderly in an attempt to minimize their potential losses. As soon as the women and children had reached the outer parameter of the village, heavy fire from the attacking Zionist forces resulted in a massacre, the magnitude of which is no less than that of Dier Yassin. Taking advantage of the horror that had befell the village’s defenders of their families’ fate, Zionist gangs proceeded with systematically demolishing the village’s homes and burning its crops and plantations.[i]
The following is a detailed account of one of the ugliest and most hideous massacres committed by the Zionists against the Palestinians. This massacre, in hindsight, constituted a turning point in the 1948 War, and has left an indelible print on the Palestinians’ collective psyche for over five decades after its commission.
[i]. Ibid; also see Dr. Haitham Al-Kilani, “The War of 1948: Ten Major Massacres and Expulsions”, Al-Hayat Newspaper, London, 24/3/1998.
During 2010, Eilabun village located in the north of Palestine, observed a popular march in the streets of the village, with national buntings and candles. The march ended by a visit to the tombs of the martyrs of the genocide committed at the hands of the Zionists.
Despite the fact that Sheikh Saud Atiya (Abu Atiya) had not exceeded the age of ten when the crime occurred, he still remembers well how the Israeli patrols raided Al-Mawasi tribe who lived adjacent to the village of Eilabun, on the 2nd of November 1948, and took at gunpoint 15 men who were executed in cold blood.
Abu Attiya narrates the tragedy while wiping his tears, saying:
“At the beginning, the Israeli patrol gathered 8 or 9 people from the local inhabitants and as soon as the leader took out of his pocket a list of names and arrested 14 men, the small village had surrendered to the rest of the Galilee and raised white flags on the roofs of their homes”.
“However, the occupation army –according to Abu Attiya- escorted the men from the tribe to the neighboring village of Maghar, where they were imprisoned in the courtyard of the house of one of their agents for the whole day after their failed release attempt, recalling how two women walked barefoot from their village to the village of Maghar and begged the owner of the house to release the men, but he claimed he was unable to release the detainees.”
A day after their arrest, the detainees were killed by gunshot by the Israeli soldiers, only Saad Theeb Al-Mawasi was spared as he faked his death after suffering multiple gunshot wounds and recovered in Damascus. Before passing away in the early sixties, Saad Al-Mawasi informed his relatives who stayed in their homeland that the soldiers mowed the victims with machine guns.
The remains of the martyrs were buried inside a cave until 1968 before being transferred to the Muslim cemetery in Eilabun which was one of the main stops during the popular march of 2010, where the Fatiha was read for the souls of the martyrs and roses were laid on their collective tombs.
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,
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Not only one massacre, but several were carried out against the people of the sad village of Ilut.
Thus started the march to the Christian cemetery in the village where the monument for the martyrs of the second massacre of Eilabun is located. In this massacre the Israeli army killed 16 young men after gathering the inhabitants in the courtyard of the church.
According to one of the massacre survivors, Sheikh Farid Zraik (90 years old), “the people of Eilabun woke up in panic at the dawn of Saturday, the 30th of October 1948 to the sound of soldiers of the “Haganah” and speakers inviting them to gather in the town square”.
Abu Zraik mentioned that “in the face of the panic and crying children and women, the priests intervened and everyone took shelter inside the church, but the army deported them after arresting 16 young men who were executed an hour after displacing the inhabitants of Eilabun who returned from Lebanon two weeks later due to the intervention of the Vatican”.(90)