Palestinian Refugees Hate Us For Helping Israel

By Drew Pearson

Transcribed from the clipping

“WASHINGTON — One undisclosed incident before the crisis between Israel and Jordan was a talk between Premier Eshkol of Israel and Myer Feldman, former White House aide. Feldman was in Israel on private business, and Eshkol asked his advice about taking retaliatory measures against the Jordanian village of Es-Samu which harbored Jordanian commandos.

Feldman’s advice to Eshkol was not to permit the Jordanian border raid. He warned that it would bring a rebuke from the United States. Feldman’s advice was sound. The U.N. Security Council has now unanimously censured Israel. U.S. Ambassador Goldberg, now Chairman of the Security Council, a Jew and a strong Zionist, was also emphatic in his rebuke.

Goldberg has sometimes differed with the State Department, but in this case there was no difference between them. Both the State Department and Ambassador Goldberg were aware of the fact that King Hussein of Jordan has been a stabilizing influence for peace and has had trouble curbing some of his own populace who have long wanted to attack Israel.

An unofficial army of Palestinian refugees has been on the Israeli - Jordanian border, some of them bitter against King Hussein. He has had difficulty restraining them. REFUGEE BITTERNESS. Some time ago I visited Jericho, at the north end of the Dead Sea, where there is a huge Palestinian refugee camp. It has been there for 16 to 17 years.

During these years it has been Arab policy to discourage Palestinian refugees from getting jobs in Arab countries or planting their roots in Arab soil. Actually many of the Arab countries bordering Israel need labor. Some refugees have disregarded the rule by migrating to Iraq to work on reclamation projects; but the great majority have remained in refugee camps.

One notable exception was Musa Alami, who left the Jericho camp, drilled a well, struck water, and started a truck farm. He raised chickens, installed a refrigeration plant, planted bananas, and soon operated a thriving business, hauling his produce to American Oil Company employees in Saudi Arabia.

But one day when Jordan was seething against the West, the refugees at Jericho decided to take out their vengeance on one of their own number. Storming down the road to Musa Alami’s farm, yelling ‘Get the traitor!’ they destroyed his refrigeration plant, and wrung the necks of 35,000 chickens. Musa had employed at times as many as 1,200 refugees.

However, he made the fatal mistake of accepting the permanency of his residence in Jordan. He had given up the idea of returning to Israel. This made him a ‘traitor.’ During the long years the refugees have been sitting in heat and idleness at the head of the Dead Sea, they have built up a burning, passionate hate.

They hate Israel, and they hate Britain and the United States who have befriended Israel. Fanatic Arab leaders have used this as a weapon. Moderate Arab leaders have bowed to it because they are prisoners. King Hussein has been trying to resist becoming a prisoner.”

Context added by this archive

A syndicated Washington columnist under a headline that puts the feeling in the refugees and the cause in American generosity. What the column underneath actually reports is narrower and stranger. Pearson had been to Jericho.

He gives an account of Musa Alami, who left the camp, drilled a well, struck water, farmed, raised chickens and employed up to 1,200 refugees — and whose refrigeration plant was wrecked by a crowd from the camp shouting Get the traitor!, who

wrung the necks of 35,000 chickens. His offence, as Pearson explains it, was accepting the permanency of his residence in Jordan. He had given up the idea of going back.

The column also records that the United Nations Security Council had unanimously censured Israel over the Samu raid, and that the American ambassador — a Jew and a strong Zionist — was emphatic in the rebuke.

Cite this item

"Palestinian Refugees Hate Us For Helping Israel," Goldsboro News-Argus, 29 November 1966. Covering Palestine archive, CP-1966-002. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-1966-002