Coming to Terms with Deir Yassin
Presented by the PEACE Middle East Dialog Group

Each side in the Mid-East has its own history of horrors, and is all too eager to point the finger of blame at the other side. If we are ever to make peace then each side must first point the finger of blame at itself, come to terms with its own conscience, and apologize for the lost lives, the lost loved ones, the dread and the sorrow we have inflicted on each other.

The bloody Palestinian-Israeli struggle over Jerusalem began in December 1947. The Arabs did not accept U.N. Resolution 181, of November 29, 1947. The resolution called for internationalization of Jerusalem and partition of Palestine into two states. Riots, and soon after that, fighting, broke out in Jerusalem and neighboring villages, and along the road to Jerusalem, where Arab irregulars tried to impose a blockade of Jewish Jerusalem.

As the months went by, the danger to Jewish Jerusalem, and the shortage of supplies, became increasingly acute. The Jewish population was under siege and demoralized. The Haganah defenders attempted repeatedly to open the road to Jerusalem, and succeeded in getting a bare minimum of supplies to the beleaguered populace at great sacrifice. The revisionist Irgun and Lehi armed groups remained separate from the Haganah and Jewish Agency control for quite a long period, because the revisionists claimed that Ben-Gurion and the mainstream Zionist leadership were prepared to accept internationalization of Jerusalem. Until April 9, 1948, the Irgun and Lehi had engaged in no actual combat in Jerusalem, other than terror attacks. Their popularity waned as the Haganah and Palmach became increasingly active in defense of the city.

On April 9, 1948, the Irgun and Lehi attacked the village of Deir Yassin near Jerusalem, which had had a peace pact with its Jewish neighbors, and massacred over a hundred noncombatants. This act had no significance in the defense of Jerusalem, and may have brought great harm by forming the motivation for subsequent Arab massacres. It has become a rallying point for hatred of Israel and Zionism.

There are several Deir Yassin memorial Web sites by Palestinian organizations and Arabs. This is only such site assembled by an Israeli and a Zionist, and to my knowledge it is the most comprehensive and most thoroughly researched one. This site includes following materials, some of which are original articles, others are translations appearing for the first time:

Deir Yassin - The Evidence

Comments by Readers

It is long past time for Israeli Zionists, like myself, to apologize. The Israeli government has never apologized for the massacre of Deir Yassin, though the Jewish Agency apologized to King Abdullah in April 1948. The perpetrators of the massacre at Deir Yassin were never punished, though there was a great hue and cry at the time. Victims were never offered compensation. Therefore, and as long as this is true, the massacre at Deir Yassin has become the dubious moral property of all Zionists. We cannot sit back and say 'this was the fault of the revisionists.' The massacre at Deir Yassin may have set the pattern for much similar behavior throughout the War of Independence. A similar massacre, by dissident troops incorporated in the IDF, occurred later at Al-Dawayima, near Hebron. Other massacres by the IDF are well documented as well. If we Israelis believe that we are a moral society, then we owe it to ourselves to face the past.

Deir Yassin: The History of the Conflict as Mass Psychosis
Equally, it is wicked to trade on the misery of past history in order to create new misery. The events at Deir Yassin were the doings of individuals in time of battle. Some Zionists perpetrated bad deeds, but that does not delegitimize the Zionist cause and those deeds should not be used to delegitimize Zionism and Israel. The massacre at Deir Yassin was not planned. It was not part of a Zionist "plot" to expel the Arabs of Palestine. Nobody ordered the massacre, and the mainstream Zionist leadership in Tel Aviv did not know about the attack in advance or order it as far as we can judge. Further commentary about Deir Yassin and the abuse of history in the conflict is here - Deir Yassin: The History of the Conflict as Mass Psychosis.

The Deir Yassin Massacre was not the beginning of massacres in Palestine, nor did the Jews begin the massacres. In 1920, 1921, 1929 and from 1936 to 1939 Arabs rioted and massacred Jewish civilians in pogroms and terrorist raids. In January of 1948, Arab villagers ambushed a convoy sent to the besieged Etzion Bloc. They murdered every one of its 35 members, and mutilated their bodies. All these massacres took place long before the attack on Deir Yassin. Time and again, Arab "civilians" had proven that there were no noncombatants in the fight. They proved it both by participation of their own villagers in blockading roads and attacking vehicles and settlements, and by their own disregard for Jewish civilians. It was this history, rather than any sinister Zionist plot, which formed the background and motivation for the Deir Yassin massacre. ( see - A history of Zionism and the creation of Israel ). At the very least, we need to acknowledge that some guilt lies on both sides, and that the "tradition" of massacres did not start with the Jews.

The material at this site is not ‘Arab propaganda’ or "anti-Zionist propaganda." It was researched and written by Zionists who are concerned about the moral image of our state. We cannot bring back the dead. We can tell the truth, offer our sincere apologies, and learn the lesson of Deir Yassin and teach it to our children.

Deir Yassin Revisited
Since the above was written, the sides in the Middle East have been busy creating new Deir Yassins. Since September 2000, over 300 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, and about 40 Israelis have been killed by Palestinians. Some were Palestinian terrorists, some were Israeli settlers and soldiers. Some, like 12 year old boy killed apparently by Israelis, or like the tiny Arab-Israeli girl wounded in a bus explosion in Hadera, or several reporters wounded or killed by Israelis, were innocent bystanders. This new violence will not bring us closer to a solution. It will only engender more Deir Yassins. We have not learned the lessons of Deir Yassin. Those who do not study history are condemned to relive it.
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The 1948 Massacre at Deir Yassin Revisited

http://www.deiryassin.org/mh2001.html

for all those americans' haters:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BgyY2aCe04Q&feature=related

handsome
as for the arab victims, are you saying that all of those children were actually killed by the israeli soldiers?
the arab government encourage every single child to fight jews. parents instead of moving children out of the war line, they opposite send them towards tanks

dont you see the reality? all our tv news showing israel in black colors and arabs as an angel?

if my country was attacked by uzbeks by uzbek suiciders, wouldnt allow any uzbek to enter my country.

thats for the checkpoints are. do you think jews would freely allow arabs to travel bcak and forth after having suicide attacks?
wheres your logic?

at the end: lets take your version: its a stolen land.
then whats your solution for the conflict?
to send back all jews or to give more land to arabs?

im watching this very interesting video

about arab and jewish children

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=po_ylNwzl5M

wothy to watch all the parts. I RECOMMEND.

Feature - Child victims of Gaza war lie close, but apart
Source: Reuters Foundation

Date: 13 Feb 2008

Child victims of the same war, the two young boys lie just metres apart in hospital, bruised, bandaged and fighting for their lives.

One is Israeli, the other Palestinian. They were wounded on opposite sides of a conflict fought out daily between the Jewish state and the Hamas Islamists who control the Gaza Strip.

Osher Twitto, eight, had his leg blown off last week when a rocket attack fired by Palestinian militants slammed into a street near his home in the southern Israeli town of Sderot.

A few weeks earlier, 6-year-old Yakuub Natil was dancing at an uncle's wedding in Gaza City when debris from an Israeli air strike crushed his legs and chest.

Now the two boys, both breathing by ventilators, lie in the emergency ward of Israel's Safra children's hospital near Tel Aviv. It is not in itself unusual for Israeli hospitals, better equipped than their Palestinian counterparts, to treat patients from the occupied West Bank and even from Gaza, whose borders Israel all but sealed when Hamas seized control there last year.

Many on both sides of the conflict hold up the quiet decency of Jewish and Arab doctors and patients, working and recovering alongside each other in Israeli hospitals, as a model of how the communities could be. But even doctors used to such cooperation have been struck by the poignancy of the two boys' stories.

"What's so unusual is that they are pretty much the same age with similar injuries," said hospital director Gidi Paret.

"It's the real story of life here."

"JUST KIDS"

Yet for all the symmetry, people on either side highlight differences. Gazans point out that they have suffered far higher casualties and hardship than Israelis. The Twitto family and other Israelis say Hamas rocket fire is indiscriminately hitting civilian streets while Israeli forces try to hit only fighters.

Israeli air strikes and ground raids into the Gaza Strip in recent months have killed and wounded dozens of Palestinians, many of them guerrilla fighters but also including civilians.

Militant rocket fire killed two Israeli civilians last year and has traumatised Sderot and nearby towns. The injury to young Osher -- the name means Happiness -- grabbed front pages and has increased public pressure on the Israeli government to hit back.

Yakuub's grandmother Amira, her head covered in the manner of Gazan women, whispers soothing Arabic into his ear. Across the ward, a bearded rabbi in a black hat prays over Osher. Many sick Gazans and their families have been denied entry to Israel for treatment due to the Israeli blockade on the territory that tightened after Hamas seized control in June. Yakuub's mother is still awaiting approval to visit her son.

It is in unclear who will pay for his treatment, although the hospital is hoping a medical charity will step in.

So far, the proximity of the two boys has not brought much open sign of conciliation between the families.

Nonetheless, Yakuub's grandmother seems outraged to hear that the boy across the room was hurt by a Palestinian rocket.

"These are little kids. They shouldn't be targets," she says, shaking her head and breathing out a deep sigh. "God should strike down the people who fired those rockets."

But Osher's parents, weary and drawn after days at their son's bedside, refuse to talk to reporters or have their son photographed alongside the Palestinian. They have expressed their anger at efforts to draw parallels between the two cases.

"Such a photograph tries to show equality between the two cases and there is no truth in that," they said in a written statement provided by the hospital. "Palestinians aim to attack our children. They are happy when we are hit."

Amira Natil, 52, says the story of the two boys illustrates the need for both sides to lay down their weapons.

Of course, she says, her family is angry at suffering they feel is inflicted by Israel, but for now, she is just happy her grandson is getting treatment across the border:

"First they strike us," she said, before adding with a laugh: "But at least they are putting as back together again."

Reuters)