Justice for Jewish refugees from Arab and Muslim countries has at long last become official Israeli government policy. It has taken more than sixty years, but here at Harif, the UK Association of Jews from the Middle East and North Africa, we are celebrating this momentous event.
No amount of grassroots campaigning could work without the official support of the Israeli government. And this week, that support came.
On Tuesday, the deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon held a conference in Jerusalem to launch his ministry’s report and recommendations for highlighting the issue of 870,000 Jewish refugees driven out of Arab countries. See full document.
Israel’s Jewish population is made up of 52% Sephardim/Mizrahim who were forced to leave their homes and possessions in Muslim lands. Not not only have they never received compensation, but their plight has never been internationally recognised.
Hitherto, the Israeli government has been hesitant to raise the Jewish refugee issue, for fear that the Arabs would raise the Palestinian refugee issue. But the Arabs have never ceased raising the Palestinian refugee issue while the Israeli government has been silent.
“I would call this conference Yemoth Ha-Mashiah (The Days of the Messiah Coming),” Levana Zamir, president of the Jews from Egypt in Israel, told me after attending the conference. At this very emotional event, Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon announced a new state policy regarding Jews who were forced to flee from their homes in Arab countries.
“We have to correct a historic injustice. But, in a very pragmatic way,” Ayalon told the audience. “We believe that settling the refugee problems on both sides —the Arab and the Jewish side — is the only way to really bring about a durable, comprehensive and lasting peace. Peace that will be built on truth and justice for all.”
Levana Zamir with Danny Ayalon, Meir Kahalon (Head of Lybian Jews), and David Nawi (Iraq). (Photo courtesy Levana)
Ayalon said that the issue of Jewish refugees should be raised in the framework of every peace negotiation, in keeping with a law the Knesset passed in 2010. The Prime Minister’s Office “will consolidate the issue [of Jewish refugees] into any future negotiations,” the document stated.
The deputy foreign minister broke new ground by publiclly laying responsibility for the creation of both the Arab and the Jewish refugees at the door of the Arab League. See speech here.
Ayalon recommended the creation of an “international fund” for the compensation of Jewish and Arab refugees and the absorption and rehabilitation of Arab refugees. Contributing countries might include Israel, Jordan and “perhaps Lebanon if it is willing to rehabilitate the descendants of Palestinian refugees in its territory.”
The basis for compensation will be the “value of the assets of the refugees at the time.”
During the conference Levana told the story about how her family fled Egypt in 1950. Their troubles worsened on May 14th 1948 when the State of Israel was declared. Her uncle, along with hundreds of other Egyptian Jews was arrested that same night. The next day, May 15, her father found his printing business employing 60 people, confiscated by the Egyptian authorities.
The pretext given was that Habib Vidal was a Zionist, an enemy of the country, and that the Egyptian government was confiscating any properties belonging to Egypt’s enemies. Bank accounts were seized. Three Vidal families – 24 people – found themselves with no livelihood. Some 2,000 other Jewish families found themselves in the same situation.
Levana said: “I realised that nothing would be the same again”. Jewish people, including Levana’s 17-year-old brother, were beaten in the streets, sometimes to death, under the eyes of Egyptian policemen. It was only 16 months later, when Levana’s uncle Habib was released from prison, that the rest of the Vidal clan left with him for France, taking only one suitcase for each. You can read her full story here.
After her father Victor Vidal died in 1984, Levana found addressed to her a letter detailing his claims for what he had lost. Levana broke down in tears at the conference as she recounted: “He was telling me to continue to ask for compensation. I have been working on that ever since. Nearly a million Jews were expelled and only 600,000 Palestinians. They can’t go back. Now, the State of Israel, after 64 years, is finally working on arousing international public opinion to get the compensation for us.”
Levana reminded Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon that this was not the first time the Foreign Ministry was dealing with compensation for the Jews from Arab Countries. “I remember when during the Seventies, I used to accompany my father to the Foreign Ministry, where he submitted hundreds and thousands of claims forms, filled by Egyptians Jews, to the man in charge, Mr. Zian Divon.
The Ministry of Justice was responsible for storing the claims of course, but the Foreign Ministry was also then involved.” Ayalon was surprised to hear of this”, Levana said, “but my father left for me many files in his drawer before he died which I will be showing to him.”
In view of the scandal that the doorman of the Eliyahu Hanavi synagogue in Alexandria was now running Jewish community affairs, Levana urged Danny Ayalon to call upon the United Nations to ensure that custody and ownership over the Jewish heritage sites and holy places in Egypt and in other Arab countries was retained by Jews and restored to them.
Seventy members from the Associations of Jews from Arab countries were at the conference. They believed that this time the Israeli Government was sincere. “Besides Levana Zamir, Zvi Gabay representing Jews from Iraq and Meir Kahlon of the World Association of Jews from Libya spoke. “They were talking from their guts and from their true aching heart,” says Levana. “They felt sorry not for themselves, but for their parents who suffered so much when their whole world fell apart overnight. They wanted justice for them and in their memory.”
As Jewish families the world over recount the Exodus from Egypt this week, the injustice of the modern-day exodus of nearly one million other Jews from Arab lands, may finally be acknowledged.
@ CuriousAmerican:
“Were still rooting for Israel” even after G.O.I. left the South Lebanese Army in the lurch when they pulled out in 2000?
I was thinking the same thing in 2006. Forget Hezbollah, go right after Damascus. But remember that at the same time, Israel had just come out of a fight in Gaza, where Shalit had been captured. Maybe they were afraid of a 2 front war.
He was not in war zone, which was in South Lebanon. The Christians could not believe Israel was going to attack them, or their infrastructure.
As noted, the Christians were still rooting for Israel until they started bombing Christian Jounieh.
He was not crazy. Israel was crazy to alienate Christians in Lebanon, the one group in the Mideast who does not hate Israel.
@ CuriousAmerican:
Granted, that Olmert’s prosecution of the Hezb’ollah War left a lot to be desired.
— I still don’t understand why they didn’t bomb Damascus (beginning with the parliament building, just to get the point across. . . .)
In the midst of a shooting war, he goes out for a jog? — h-e-l-l-o ?
@ yamit82:
thank you Yamit again as usual for informative links. every Jew should be intimate with this information. Every nation and entity that demands justice for the arabs should be given these and informed that the real justice would be now to visit on them what they have given to the jews for more than 1000 years. The greatest obscenity is that the govt of Israel allows the pollution and defamation of the Jews in the Jewish nation state of Israel by these muslims and their european collaborators. The obscenity that under the auspices of the govt of Israel the muslims can still speak and act to kill Jews on Jewish soil. In Jerusalem itself the muslim wakf is allowed to spread his vile filth. The Jews are owed a great debt from Islam, the arabs and their states and hopefully one day this debt will begin to be demanded and collected. It is they who should live in fear. the Israeli govt should move harshly to correct their evils. The one consoling thought is that all of the countries involved have not progressed one step and are now descending into the blood and fire of the “spring” they so rightly deserve.
@ bernard ross:
Bernard, realistically the Arab world doesn’t want peace, they want all of Israel and won’t rest until they have it or better yet when Israel stops worrying about world opinion and the anti-Semites and runs the Arabs out of the Holy Land. Sounds simple, no and it’s not. Having said that Israel needs to begin to consider what is best for Israel whether its good or not for the Arabs.
Jews have been the victim of injustice throughout history for no good reason and it needs to come to a halt.
It’s not that the Palestinians have no place to hang their hats, the Arab world is vast and it can absorb them in a wink.
The problem is the Arab worlds uses the Palestinians as an anti-Semitic tool, the Pals do enjoy the benefits of the Israelis while the Arab world is not a bed of roses, bottom line it sucks.
I have said it often enough here that its a wonder Ted doesn’t shut me up but, Israel needs a super PR program. Although a majority of Americans and Europeans support Israel, they don’t full understand the problems the Israelis face especially since the liberal left media only reports the lies and false accusations purported by the anti-Semites and the Arab world.
Time to retake the Holy Land, all of the Holy Land.
Faith and destiny – the miracle of Israel Part 1 Rabbi Berel Wein
Faith and destiny – the miracle of Israel Part 2 Rabbi Berel Wein
“We have to correct a historic injustice. But, in a very pragmatic way,” Ayalon told the audience——-this statement is interesting also by what follows. It shows how the Israelis always demand the least in their negotiations while the arabs demand the most. ““We believe that settling the refugee problems on both sides —the Arab and the Jewish side — is the only way to really bring about a durable, comprehensive and lasting peace.” Still coming with cap in hand trying to sell a deal. I note that the arabs never, in any of their proposals ever concern themselves with what the Jews will get, only what they will demand and get. The Jews always want to sell the other side with notions of what they will get. Perhaps the jews should stop trying to sell deals and start creating the fear that begs for a deal.
David Project
“The Forgotten Refugees”.
To Be a Jew in a Muslim Land
regarding Lebanon. Israel did betray their allies and missed a great opportunity. during the Lebanon civil war when Israel went to Beirut and epelled the PLO to Tunisia, they had the opportunity to create a separate Christian state in the south of lebanon. This was the greatest error of Israel. That state today would have retained Lebanons prior reputation as the Switzerland of the Mid east and the arab christians chased from other arab lands would have settled there. If Israel is not foolish, they will find a way to revive this idea as it is obviously needed for the Lebanese Christians who will ultimately be run out of Lebanon.
“We have to correct a historic injustice.” The disgraceful behavior of the global community and successive Israeli govts must be remedied. The injustice cannot be corrected with monetary compensation. A way must be sought to correct the UK swindle of 77% of the Palestine mandatory trust territory when they illegally created Jordan as a JEW FREE state. Precedent has been set by this creation and by the ethnic cleansing of the Jews from the arab lands. The fact that these transfers took place after the promulgation of the Geneva Conventions, and with no legal reaction from the world bodies, means that precedent has been set for allowable transfers of populations. In order for the transfer of the Jews as a result of arab israeli 48 war to be legal it can only be viewed as part of a population exchange which has still to be completed. The same is true with the creation of JEW FREE JOrdan in that 77% of the former mandate is dedicated exclusively to one of the former ethnicities resident in the former mandate. This must imply that the remaining balance of the former mandate should be dedicated exclusively to the other ethnicity.
Israel has royally screwed the Maronite Christian Lebanese since 1948. Actually in 1946, the Maronite Patriarch invited the Jews to the Mideast.
In the 50s, the Maronites awarded citizenship to ANY Palestinian Christian Refugee within their borders.
This may have been unique in the Arab world. But they could not give citizenship to the Sunni refugees. Israel left this time bomb ticking in Lebanon and that was not right.
Lebanon did not really attack Israel in 1948. An agreement was worked out through Charles de Gaulle that Lebanon would not really attack Israel, but would have to make a show of war, in order to keep the Muslim street happy. The Christins were only 51% of the population in 1948, and the Muslims were on the verge of Civil War if the Christians did not let Lebanon go to war.
Lebanon had only a 3000 man army in 1948, with only Christian officers, who made sure the soldiers had rifles but not bullets. This was worked out by Charles de Gaulle.
The Maronites wanted peace but were terrified that if they made peace, the Muslims would ask Syria to intervene and take over the country. Syria was furious that the French even carved out Lebanon and would have used any excuse to destroy Lebanon. With only a 3,000 man army, Lebanon could not have resisted.
Lebanon had no army because the Christians did not trust Muslims with weapons.
Lebanese Muslims were allowed to go to war, but usually had to attach themselves to Syrian units.
The problem is that the Lebanese army was so weak, it could not stop the PLO. Secondly, Israel tended to bomb Christian Beirut in retaliation for what the PLO did in the south, even though Christian Beirut despised the PLO.
This did not make friends among the Christians in Beirut.
As late as the 2006 war, the Christians wanted Israel to destroy Hezbollah, but when Israel started bombing NORTH LEBANON, where the Christians were, the Christians lost all heart.
From Ha’aretz
Wikileaks: Lebanese Christians sought ’06 Israeli victory
The Lebanese Christians I talk to are totally disenchanted with Israel now.
But they have NO illusions about the Muslims.
They want Israel to take back the Palestinians from Lebanon – NOT BECAUSE THEY HATE ISRAEL – but because they want the Palestinians out of Lebanon altogether. They blame the Palestinians for their Civil War.
Christian Lebanese are now disenchanted with Israel; but they are NOT stupid.
They despise the Muslims. The Muslims slaughtered Christians in Lebanon in the 19th and 20th centuries.
No compensation for Jewish refugees? And why should an “international fund” help re=settle the Arabs? What “international fund”, other than contributions from the Jews themselves, re-settled the Jewish refugees in Israel?
Curious, Lebanon is no longer a Christian country — most of the Christians have become refugees themselves, in Australia and America; and I have not seen any indication that they are pro-Jewish, refugee or otherwise. Small wonder — the Israelis royally screwed their Lebanese Christian allies in 2000, leaving them in the lurch.
Even if the numbers had been equivalent, there is simply no comparison.
Unlike the Jews of the Arab world, the overwhelming majority of local ethnic Arabs who left were NOT ‘expelled.’
As even the noted “revisionist” researcher, Benny Morris — who, arguably, had striven mightily (not to say, famously) during the early years of his illustrious career to make the case for Israel’s ‘Original Sin’ — has acknowledged, “[n]o comprehensive expulsion initiative…was ever issued; no hard and fast orders went out to front, brigade and battalion commanders to expel Arabs en masse or to level villages.”
What expulsions actually occurred were the result of pragmatic decisions made by local & regional commanders confronted with military conditions on the ground.
It cannot be too strongly emphasized: Populations were NEVER expelled for reasons relating to ethnicity — only for reasons pertaining to hostility. The truth, as Morris has — grudgingly — concluded, is that “[t]he Palestinian refugee problem was born of war, not by design…” [Benny Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947-1949 (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1977), p. 286]
Any Arab claim of a Jewish/Israeli policy of intentional ethnic cleansing of the Arab population is not only a cheap calumny — it is also pure & brazen projection: It was the Arabs — of Palestine and of the greater Arab world — who attempted to ethnically cleanse the land of Jews. Not the other way around.
Furthermore, the mere fact that the effort (and the multiplicity of subsequent ones as well) failed — that it indeed backfired on them — can neither morally nor legally relieve the attackers of the culpability for the UNDERTAKING — or for the deliberate, knowing & malicious smear against the good name of their intended victim.
Conservatively estimated, in today’s U.S. dollars, $100 billion in personal & communal assets of nearly 900,000 Jews exiled from their homes in the (until then) 2670-year-old Jewish communities in Middle Eastern & North African countries, heretofore loyal citizens of those countries, who were thus forced into indigence & abject refugee status, by their own Arab & Muslim govts: in a petulant & nakedly malicious decision to wreak vengeance on the Jewish People and on the all-but-exhausted yet still raggedly breathing, fledgling Jewish Commonwealth.
The Jewish refugees had lost everything, and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) offerred them, exactly. . . . nothing.
Quite so. “And then,” remarks Ya’acov Lozowick, “all memory of this awesome convulsion disappeared from the world’s consciousness — if it had ever been noticed in the first place.” [Ya’acov Lozowick, Right to Exist: A Moral Defense of Israel’s Wars (Doubleday/Random House, NY, 2003), p. 103]
But there is much MORE cost than that to be reckoned with.
The Provisional Government of the new Jewish state proceeded, unhesitatingly and not-withstanding its own battered condition, to promptly & cordially — for a period extending to four years — open its broken & bleeding arms to two-thirds of those betrayed and now-destitute, victims of state-sanctioned & state-sponsored robbery, dispossession and banishment: largely non-Hebrew-speaking refugees, one might add, whose numbers themselves equaled those of Israel’s then-entire existing, war-ravaged population;
and in addition to these, welcomed ALSO (and within the same time frame) an equal number of Jewish “displaced persons”: an exhausted & heartsick, surviving remnant from post-Shoah Europe
— housed them all, educated them all and found (or developed) employment for them all, at a cost of $1.3 Billion {$6 Billion in today’s currency; were it invested at a modest 6.5 per-cent over 60 years, close to a trillion dollars today} [Henry Atkinson, Security and the Middle East: The Problem and Its Solution (Ballantine, NY, 1955), p. 164].
Survival of that first war, in point of fact, had come only at a devastating & frightful cost:
• military expenditures of half-a-billion dollars (for a postage-stamp-sized country, a king’s ransom, in 1940’s currency — indeed, in present-day dollars invested as above, roughly $130 Billion today, and that’s ignoring the substantial inflation of six decades);
• a state infrastructure crippled & disabled;
• a countryside horribly ravaged and grotesquely disfigured — “[m]any of its most productive fields… gutted and mined; its citrus groves, for decades the basis of the Yishuv’s economy… largely destroyed” [Howard M. Sachar, A History of Israel: From the Rise of Zionism to Our Time, 2nd Revised Edition (Alfred A. Knopf, NY, 1996), p. 353];
• and the last — but by no means least — of the costs to the surviving newborn state: a massive one percent of Israel’s own Jewish citizenry lying dead — as well as another five times that number, wounded.
[To appreciate the traumatic dimensions of a figure like “one percent,” one might profit from noting that one percent of the (present) US population would be upwards of three mil-lion. Think: two 9/11’s per day, every day {every… consecutive… day…} for eighteen months, and you’ll have the mathematical proportions pretty close.]
And all of this, just a few short years after all of world Jewry had already been savagely reduced by a staggering one-third.
Yeah, there IS a reckoning due.
Sounds great,but it will backfire.
You have to remember that while many innocents were hurts, there was the LAVON AFFAIR.
Moreover, it won’t work for Lebanon where the Maronite Christians were NOT anti-semitic, but
actually allowed Jewish Arab refugees to settle in Beirut.
In fact, Iraqi and Syrian Jews often fled to Christian run (at that time) Beirut. They could remain Jewish and not have to learn Hebrew.
Jews did not leave Lebanon until after 1967 and later the Civil War, and you cannot blame the Lebanese government for that, as it was renegade Islamic elements fighting the government who were responsible. So suing Lebanon will have no effect, as the government was NOT responsible; moreover that still leaves Israel with counter-lawsuits for the Palestinian refugees in Lebanon who want to return.
In fact, with Lebanon, I am absolutely sure, the Lebanon gov’t today would welcome back the 20,000 plus Jews if Israel would take back the 500,000 Palestinians in Lebanon. In fact, I think the Lebanese government would applaud the transaction.
If you had to choose between 20,000 plus Jews or half a million Palestinians, which would you chose?
THINK TWICE.
You may make some money from Egypt (I doubt it) but Lebanon will backfire on you.
Lebanon will say: SURE, THE JEWS ALL OF THEM CAN RETURN … NOW LET THE PALESTINIANS IN LEBANON RETURN.
Be careful.
This scheme may backfire.