The 1948 Arab–Israeli War, also known as the First Arab–Israeli War, was the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. It formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight on 14 May 1948; the Israeli Declaration of Independence had been issued earlier that day, and a military coalition of Arab states entered the territory of British Palestine in the morning of 15 May.
David Ben-Gurion was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first prime minister of Israel. Born in Płońsk, then part of the Russian Empire, to Polish Jewish parents, he immigrated to the Palestine region of the Ottoman Empire in 1906. Adopting the name of Ben-Gurion in 1909, he rose to become the preeminent leader of the Jewish community in British-ruled Mandatory Palestine from 1935 until the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, which he led until 1963 with a short break in 1954–55.
Killings and massacres during the 1948 Palestine war resulted in the deaths of hundreds of civilians and unarmed soldiers.
Operation Nachshon was a military operation of the Haganah during the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine and part of Plan Dalet. Its objective was to open the Tel Aviv – Jerusalem road blockaded by Palestinian Arabs, and furnish arms and supplies to the besieged Jewish community of Jerusalem. The operation was also known as "The operation to take control of the Jerusalem road," following which participating units later broke off to form the Harel Brigade. Following attempts to take control of the road to Jerusalem were unsuccessful and led to the construction of a makeshift bypass—Burma Road.
Benny Morris is an Israeli historian. He was a professor of history in the Middle East Studies department of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in the city of Beersheba, Israel. He is a member of the group of Israeli historians known as the "New Historians," a term Morris coined to describe himself and historians Avi Shlaim, Ilan Pappé and Simha Flapan.
Plan Dalet was a Zionist military plan executed in the civil war phase of the 1948 Palestine war for the conquest of territory in Mandatory Palestine in preparation for the establishment of a Jewish state. The plan was requested by the Jewish Agency leader David Ben-Gurion and developed by the Haganah and finalized March 10, 1948.
Yosef Weitz was the director of the Land and Afforestation Department of the Jewish National Fund (JNF). From the 1930s, Weitz played a major role in acquiring land for the Yishuv, the pre-state Jewish community in Palestine.He became known as the "Father of the Forests."
The Palestinian right of return is the political position or principle that Palestinian refugees, both first-generation refugees and their descendants, have a right to return, and a right to the property they themselves or their forebears left behind or were forced to leave in what is now Israel and the Palestinian territories, as part of the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight, a result of the 1948 Palestine war, and due to the 1967 Six-Day War.
The 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine was the first phase of the 1947–1949 Palestine war. It broke out after the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a resolution on 29 November 1947 recommending the adoption of the Partition Plan for Palestine.
During the 1948 Palestine war in which the State of Israel was established, around 700,000 Palestinian Arabs or 85% of the total population of the territory Israel captured fled or were expelled from their homes by Israeli forces. The causes for this mass displacement is a matter of great controversy among historians, journalists, and commentators.
Operation Gideon was a Haganah offensive launched in the closing days of the British Mandate in Palestine, as part of the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine. Its objectives were to capture Beisan, clear the surrounding villages and bedouin camps and block one of the possible entry routes for Transjordanian forces. It was part of Plan Dalet. The operation was carried out by the Golani brigade between 10–15 May 1948. Avraham Yoffe commanded the battalion that captured Beisan. The 1947 UN Partition Plan allocated Beisan and most of its district to the proposed Jewish state. It is possible that Irgun units were involved in parts of the operation. Following the operation, the town formally surrendered with most of its residents fleeing. Most Arab Christians relocated to Nazareth. A ma'abarah inhabited mainly by North African immigrants was also erected in Beit She'an, and it later became a development town.
The 1949–1956 Palestinian expulsions were a continuation of the 1948 expulsion and flight of Palestinian Arabs from Israeli-controlled territory that occurred after the signing of the ceasefire agreements. This period of the exodus was characterised predominantly by forced expulsion during the consolidation of the state of Israel and ever increasing tension along the ceasefire lines ultimately leading to the 1956 Suez Crisis.
Ezra Danin was the head of the Arab section of the SHAI, the intelligence arm of the Haganah, Israeli politician and an orange grower. Danin specialized in Arab affairs.
Gad Machnes was an Israeli politician and businessman. He was an orientalist in the Arab Affairs Department at the Jewish Agency as part of the Palestine Jewish Yishuv during the British Mandate of Palestine.
The 1948 Palestinian expulsion from Lydda and Ramle, also known as the Lydda Death March, was the expulsion of 50,000 to 70,000 Palestinian Arabs when Israeli troops captured the towns in July that year. The military action occurred within the context of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The two Arab towns, lying outside the area designated for a Jewish state in the UN Partition Plan of 1947, and inside the area set aside for an Arab state in Palestine, subsequently were transformed into predominantly Jewish areas in the new State of Israel, known as Lod and Ramla.
Daliyat al-Rawha' was a Palestinian village located 24.5 kilometers (15.2 mi) southeast of Haifa. It was the site of the signing of a ceasefire agreement between the forces of the Mamluks and the Crusaders in the 13th century. A small village of 60 Arab Muslims in the late 19th century, the kibbutz of Dalia was established on land purchased in the village in 1939. The population in 1945 reached 600 people: 280 Arabs and 320 Jews. It was depopulated of its Arab inhabitants in late March during the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine.
In 1948 more than 700,000 Palestinian Arabs – about half of prewar Palestine's Arab population – were expelled or fled from their homes by Zionist militias, during the 1948 Palestine war. The exodus was a central component of the fracturing, dispossession and displacement of Palestinian society, known as the Nakba, in which between 400 and 600 Palestinian villages were destroyed, village wells were poisoned in a biological warfare programme to prevent Palestinians returning, and other sites subject to Hebraization of Palestinian place names, and also refers to the wider period of war itself and the subsequent oppression up to the present day.
The New Historians are a loosely defined group of Israeli historians who have challenged traditional versions of Israeli history, including Israel's role in the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight and Arab willingness to discuss peace. The term was coined in 1988 by Benny Morris, one of the leading New Historians. According to Ethan Bronner of The New York Times, the New Historians have sought to advance the peace process in the region.
The 1937 Ben-Gurion letter is a letter written by David Ben-Gurion, then head of the executive committee of the Jewish Agency, to his son Amos on 5 October 1937. The letter is well known to scholars as it provides insight into Ben-Gurion's reaction to the report of the Peel Commission released on 7 July of the same year. It has also been subject to significant debate by scholars as a result of scribbled-out text that may or may not provide written evidence of an intention to "expel the Arabs" or "not expel the Arabs" depending on one's interpretation of whether such deletion was intended by Ben-Gurion.
