Tension Along the Jordan

Problem of Arab Refugees in Israel Threatens to Start Another Uprising

By Nadia Lourie, Tel Aviv, Israel

Tension Along the Jordan — The Philadelphia Inquirer, 7 August 1949 — The Philadelphia Inquirer · Philadelphia, Pennsylvania · 7 August 1949

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“The State of Israel, now entering its second year of nationhood, is an island of efficient, modern ideas in an ancient sea of Arab backwardness.”… Today, in fact, one of Israel’s greatest difficulties, at home and abroad, is the question of what to do with some 800,000 Arab refugees now living in surrounding areas.

At Lausanne, at Lake Success and elsewhere, this problem is being discussed. Up until now the Arabs have insisted that before boundaries can be discussed, Israel must accept, in principle, the General Assembly resolution calling for the repatriation of those Arab refugees who want to return to Israel.

The Israelis have insisted that the question of how many Arab refugees are to return can be settled only as a part of the Palestine peace treaty. Meanwhile, many Arabs have taken the law into their own hands and are trying to get back into Israel by any means available… The Arabs in these villages were given the choice of getting out or becoming citizens of Israel.

Without exception, they chose the latter… One town, Kafr Kassim, had 5000 regular residents, plus another 5000 refugees.… “The attitude of the original Arab villagers to Arab refugees is one of pity mingled with contempt. Jobs are not plentiful, and the original villagers want them for themselves.

They seem equally unwilling to share their fields and crops with the refugees.”… “‘Honestly,’ one Arab, the Mukhtar of Taybeh, said to me, ‘we are very happy to be in Israel. The Israeli commanders are all educated men and they deal justly with us.

They don’t take things from us, and they don’t force us to work, and they don’t do bad things in the village—all of which the Iraquis did. Instead they brings things to us.

They brought us petrol, and the doctor, and the Tnuva (a food agency).’”… “One town, Kafr Kassim, had 5000 regular residents, plus another 5000 refugees.””

Context added by this archive

Villages named as taken into Israel under the armistice: Kalansawa, Ara, Taybeh, Baqa el-Gharbiyeh, Jatt, Kafr Kassim. The piece opens by calling Israel an island in a sea of Arab backwardness, and then quotes a Palestinian village head at length saying he is glad to be there. Both are on the page.

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"Tension Along the Jordan," The Philadelphia Inquirer, 7 August 1949, p. 1. Covering Palestine archive, CP-1949-006. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-1949-006