This blog post presents a strong, polemical argument centered on the demographic origins of the 1948 refugees and a comparison with the Jewish exodus from Arab lands.
"The refusal of the Arab League—specifically Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt—to absorb their fellow Arabs stands in stark contrast to Israel’s absorption of 900,000 Jewish refugees. While the world funds the perpetuation of the 'refugee' status through UNRWA, the historical reality suggests a migration driven by employment under the Mandate, followed by a strategic flight encouraged by Arab broadcasts."
The “former Arabs of the Mandated Areas,” today’s so-called “Palestinians,” claim that there are 5 million descendants of those who fled in 1948. This entry effectively utilizes the "migrant worker" narrative (supported by the Ivor Wilks excerpt) to challenge the definition of what is a "Palestinian". That this is a myth based on the some 750,000 “forefathers” who fled the British Mandated Areas during the 1947-1948 period.
The burning question is: HOW MANY of the original
refugees were ACTUALLY land-owning (holders of land titles— “Taboo”) verifiable
long-time residents, and NOT those who migrated to the area AFTER the
beginnings of the British Mandate for reasons of employment?
The Witness of History: Ivor Wilks
Excerpt from Page 16 of Ivor Wilks’ A Once And Past Love:
Palestine 1947, Israel 1948 - A Memoir:
"Balad esh-Sheikh straggled up the lower eastern slopes
of Mount Carmel. Not many years before it had been much smaller... the old
'feudal' families still lived in Balad esh-Sheikh, under their mukhtar... but
most of the people were recent immigrants, drawn to the area by the petroleum
industry. They were 'proletarians'... many of them were not Palestinians but
Syrians, particularly from Hawran... There were also immigrants from Lebanon,
Iraq, even Egypt."
In Chapter 2, page 20, Wilks notes:
"We should understand, he said, that most of the Arabs
who worked at the refineries were not true Balad esh-Sheikh people. They were
immigrants, many of them not even Palestinians but Syrians.”
The British Perspective: Sir Ronald Storrs & The Peel
Commission (1937)
Even the British authorities recognized this regional
dynamic.
Sir Ronald Storrs, the first British Military Governor of Jerusalem,
provided a candid assessment in his memoirs, Orientations (1937).
Storrs
identified a "magnet effect," where the infrastructure built by
Zionist investment and British administration drew workers from across the
region.
This was officially confirmed in the 1937 Peel Commission
Report.
The Report documented that while Jewish immigration was strictly
regulated, Arab immigration from Syria, Transjordan, and Egypt was unrecorded
and porous.
The Commission noted that the "Hourani" influx from Syria
alone accounted for thousands of new arrivals annually, drawn by wages that
were double or triple those in neighboring countries.
Storrs famously
articulated the British strategic interest in supporting a Jewish National
Home, stating it would create:
"...for England a 'little loyal Jewish Ulster' in a sea of potentially hostile Arabism."
This observation identifies the "Arabism" of the time as a broad, regional sentiment rather than a specific "Palestinian" national identity.
Storrs noted that while Zionism was a "world movement," Arab grievances were "essentially local in character." This confirms that the population was a collection of long-settled families mixed with a constant influx of migrant laborers who were "proletarians" from the surrounding Arab world.
The Gellhorn Testimony: Gaza is Egyptian
The transformation of these migrant workers into a permanent "refugee" class was documented by the legendary war correspondent Martha Gellhorn. In her 1961 Atlantic Monthly report, "The Arabs of Palestine," she exposed the cynical nature of the refugee status.
Gellhorn was remarkably specific regarding the Gaza Strip, identifying its population as essentially Egyptian in character and origin.
She described Gaza as a "closed box" maintained by the Egyptian government, noting that the "refugees" there were ethnically and culturally indistinguishable from the Egyptians of the Sinai and the Nile Delta. Gellhorn concluded:
"The unique misfortune of the Palestinian refugees is that they are a weapon in what seems to be a permanent war... Their function is to hang around and be constantly useful as a goad."
Her report confirmed that the "Great Hate" taught in the camps was a deliberate policy to prevent the integration of these people into their "host" countries—specifically Egypt, which refused to allow "its own people" in Gaza to move into the underpopulated regions of the Nile to work.
The Weaponization of "Dezinformatsiya"
The clear and unapologetic policy of the Palestinian
Authority was stated in a New York Times article from 1966. Ahmed
Shukairy, then-chairman of the PLO, declared:
“The Arab states will not integrate the Palestine refugees
because integration would be a slow process of liquidating the Palestine
problem.”
The Palestinians have used dezinformatsiya to place
the onus of suffering on Israel.
In Lebanon, UNRWA claims 479,000 registered
refugees, yet only 45% live in camps. If the Lebanese government forbids them
from living outside camps, where is the other 55%, and where is that funding
going?
The Gaza Reality and the Bedouin Connection
Ever since the "Great Nakba," no Arab country has
been willing to absorb their fellow Arabs—many of whom were originally from
those same countries.
As Martha Gelhorn related an outstanding example, that a vast number of residents in the
Gaza Strip are originally residents of Egypt.
The Doghmush clan, for instance, came to Gaza from Turkey via Egypt, while
many others are sub-clans of the Tarabin—the largest Bedouin tribe in the Sinai
and Egypt, with over 500,000 people.
The Forgotten Jewish Refugees
Israel has consistently failed to raise the issue of nearly
900,000 Jews expelled from Arab lands. On May 16, 1948, The New York Times
reported: "Jews in Grave Danger in all Moslem Lands."
Unlike
the Palestinian refugees, these 900,000 Jews of Arab lands were absorbed by Israel and became
viable citizens. They ceased being refugees because of Jewish charity and
national resolve—as these refugees were not given a status of the perpetual UNRWA receipients.
Conclusion: The Failure of Holocaust Guilt
This Western sense of guilt for the Holocaust, which
codified a "perpetual victimhood" for Arab refugees to "balance
the scales," has been the major source for the failure to achieve a just
and lasting peace. By subsidizing a permanent grievance through UNRWA, the
international community incentivized the Arab world to never resolve the
refugee issue.
The blame for the current situation—specifically regarding
the plight of the "innocent residents of Gaza"—rests entirely with
the Arab Muslim nations, namely Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt, for their
refusal to absorb their fellow Arabs.
We must return to the historical and legal facts: was Judea
and Samaria not explicitly included in the League of Nations Mandate
as an area designated for a "future Jewish Homeland"?
Furthermore,
this "disputed territory" was never claimed by a "Palestinian" entity during the
decades it was under Ottoman or British control.
If an Arab can live as a full
citizen inside the "Green Line" in Israel, why should a Jew not have
the inherent right to live in the heartland of the Jewish people?
The resolution to this conflict lies in finishing what was
started with the Abraham Accords.
By completing these historic
agreements and supporting President Trump’s plan to end the war, we move
away from the UNRWA-funded cycle of dependency.
Real peace will only be
achieved when the surrounding Arab nations take responsibility for their own,
acknowledging that the "Right of Return" is a political fiction
designed to prevent the very stability the Abraham Accords seek to build.
Works Cited
Ennab, Wael R. Population and Demographic Developments in
the West Bank and Gaza Strip until 1990. UNCTAD, 1994.
Gellhorn, Martha. "The Arabs of Palestine." The
Atlantic Monthly, Oct. 1961, pp. 45-65.
Great Britain, Palestine Royal Commission. Report (Peel
Commission). Cmd. 5479, H.M. Stationery Office, 1937.
"Jews in Grave Danger in all Moslem Lands." The
New York Times, 16 May 1948, p. 1.
League of Nations. Mandate for Palestine. 24 July
1922.
Shukairy, Ahmed. Quoted in "The Arab-Israeli
Conflict." The New York Times, 1966.
Storrs, Ronald. Orientations. Ivor Nicholson &
Watson, 1937.
United Nations General Assembly. Resolution 181 (II).
Future Government of Palestine. 29 November 1947.
UNRWA. "Palestine Refugees." UNRWA Official
Site, 2024.
Wilks, Ivor. A Once And Past Love: Palestine 1947, Israel
1948 - A Memoir. Horizon Books, 1994.