The origins of the 'exchange of populations'

The origins of the 'exchange of populations'

It was in 1949, when Nuri al-Said took office as Iraqi Prime Minister, that the idea of exchanging the 160,000 Jews of Iraq for the Arab refugees created by the war in Palestine was first floated. In an essay entitled 'The break between Muslims and Jews in Iraq', in Jews among Arabs (Ed Cohen and Udovitch) the late, lamented Iraqi-Jewish historian Professor Elie Kedourie shows how the idea started as a threat, then took on a life of its own.

The Jews of Iraq - settled in the country since Biblical times but increasingly being driven from their jobs and treated as if they had no right to be there - were now seen as 'pawns and hostages to...allow Nuri to appear as champion of the Palestinian Arabs'. The outside powers too, cynically viewed the Iraqi Jews as useful pawns for resolving the Israeli-Arab conflict.

The Israeli foreign minister, Moshe Sharrett, initially refused any possible linkage between the two sets of refugees. As the Jewish exodus got underway, Levi Eshkol, treasurer of the Jewish Agency, told the Zionist Underground in Baghdad that they must not rush: Israel did not have enough tents. "If they come, they'd have to live on the street," he said.

Even before the passing of a law allowing Jews to renounce their Iraqi citizenship and leave for Israel, some 30 or 40 a day were fleeing Iraq illegally through Iran. When the law was passed it was thought that not more than 10,000 Jews would leave Iraq. By the time the law expired at the end of March 1951,some 120,000 had chosen to leave. A thirst for vengeance seemed to be driving Nuri al-Said, who tried unsuccessfully to get the Jordanians to agree to truckloads of Jews, whom he branded exploitative, seditious and worthy of punishment, being dumped on the border with Israel.

Now came Nuri's masterstroke. A law passed in secret froze the property of the Iraqi Jews, in contravention of all undertakings Iraq had made to safeguard minority rights. The property of those who were abroad and failed to return within two months would also be confiscated, even if the Jews had not given up their Iraqi citizenship. There were 25 such cases in Britain.

By then Sharrett had accepted the linkage of the two sets of refugees. A Foreign Office memo approvingly spoke of the two accounts, of the Iraqi Jews and the Arab refugees, standing in perfect symmetry and precise balance. And all this before the expulsion of Egyptian, Syrian and North African Jewry, with all their lost assets, were added to the equation.

1859 British Consulate report: The Muslims of Jerusalem do not exceed a fourth of the entire population.

1867 American author Mark Twain visited the Holy Land, and wrote about it in his book “The Innocents Abroad”: “…[a] desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds -a silent mournful expanse….A desolation is here that not even imagination can grace with the pomp of life and action….We never saw a human being on the whole route….There was hardly a tree or a shrub anywhere. Even the olive and the cactus, those fast friends of the worthless soil, had almost deserted the country.”

Starting in 1878 enormous waves of Muslim immigration began arriving in what was essentially an empty territory.

Unlike Arabs, when Jews immigrated to the Holy Land, it was the indigenous people returning.

1922 – 1947: Arab population increased the most in cities with large Jewish populations that had created new economic opportunities. The non-Jewish population increased 290 percent in Haifa, 131 percent in Jerusalem and 158 percent in Jaffa. The growth in Arab towns was more modest: 42 percent in Nablus, 78 percent in Jenin and 37 percent in Bethlehem.

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DNA links among Cohanim of BOTH Ashkenazim and Sefardim:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Aaron

It is amazing that all the non-Muslims face the same issues with Muslims. Here in India, there were three prominent Hindu religious sites, out of which one was a temple which was destroyed and a Mosque built on the site. The Mosque was demolished by the Hindu zealots in 1992 and since then the matter is with the court. The other two temples have a Mosque each built beside the temple. Kashmir which used to be a Hindu majority area a couple of centuries back is now a complete Muslim majority area. All the Hindus numbering around 700-800 thousands have been thrown out of the valley since 1989 when the terrorists from Pakistan made life difficult for the Hindus. The Muslims of India demanded separate nation for themselves and got away with it. And while the Hindus were forced to migrate from Pakistan, more than 90% Muslims of India chose not to migrate. 66 years later, the non-Muslim population of Pakistan is less than 3% and that of Bangladesh less than 6%. And the population of Muslims in India is approaching 17-18% from a mere 8% in 1947. A couple of decades later they will sure demand a second Pakistan. What an ideology? Kill the infidels and take their women as war booty – children will automatically become Muslims. Produce as many babies as you can to increase your population, kill the apostates who dare to go across the fence, indulge in all sort of barbarity and then go to the roof top and cry victim. Amazing.

There is no real country of Palestine. There has NEVER been a nation called Palestine. “Palestine” is a corruption of “Philistine”. Why Philistines? Who were they?

They were a bunch of non-Semitic, ( non-Arab to some), raiders from a group of islands near Greece. Their name is not an “ethnic” name but derived from “Pelensheth”, (from the verb “pelesh”), “dividers”, “penetrators” or “invaders”.

Why was the home of the Jews, (Judea) suddenly called Palestine? Ask the Romans, Emperor Hadrian in particular. After Masada and several other unpleasant incidents, Hadrian decided to obliterate the name of Israel and Judah from the face of the earth. (Sound familiar?)

So he renamed the place Palestina, after the historically well known, but by that time defunct, bunch of sea lice. There is NO record, ANYWHERE, of the name “Palestina” nor of any tribe, society or camel-fancying club referred to as “Palestinian” before its imposition by Hadrian.

I’m about as Kosher as a pork chop, but I like my history STRAIGHT.

But of course there were Arabs in that country. Some came, some went away (Mamluks, Saracens, Bedouins etc.), and by the end of the seventeenth century, the land was quite empty (except he Old Yishuv). Until more Jews came after 1800, and after the Jews had dehydrated the swamps etc., more Arabs came.
But even Mark Twain visiting the region about 1860 saw a nearly empty and quite devastated land.
And THEN, by 1900, Arabs tried to colonize the land by claiming that it had always been theirs.

In deed, “sound familiar”! : (
And you’re right to be straight and stick to historical facts!
Thank you.

Just a little notification: it is not wrong to consider the Philistines a ‘nation’ itself that happened to live in the west of Canaan as mentioned in the Tanach.
But they were -as you mention- invaders from “Indo-Germanic” west, in my opinion descendants from “Illyric” origin just like probably the Greek tribes that will built Greek “nation” after dark years beginning at around 8th century before general time, just like probably the Phrygians invading Little Asia and so on.
My Illyric “theory” is not proofed but made up based on the incidents as far as we are able to reconsider.
It is not exactly correct to speak of the “Illyrians” as a nation but their evidence is clear. Their origin, as well as the origin for instance of the Philistines or Phrygians is unclear.
At the least, I wouldn’t speak of “Greeks” invading Canaan at about 1200 before general time.

The land of Yisrael has always been the Jewish land.
It has been invaded by quite a few looters like the Muhammad-Arabs in later times, too. But it has always been the Jewish Land, until now.
And it will be.

though you’re right about the origin of the word I doubt that the Arabs called themselves Philistines for the reasons you give. Nu, do we know?
It would fit the “plot”, of course.
By coincidence?

What they did many centuries before was invasion by the sword.
(Long after Plishtim were gone, already.)

What they do calling themselves “Philistines” (since the end of 1960’s) is invasion, too.
Invasion by the word.

They kind of robbed the word to change its meaning from “people living in Palestine/State of Yisrael” to “the Arabs living in Palestine to destroy the State of Yisrael and all Jews!”.
Too many Europeans and even Americans love the idea!
That’s how the new tribe “the (only Arab) Palestine's (to annihilate the Jews!)” got strong and accepted. 

That’s how anti-Semitism works and even “prospers”.
“Repeat a lie until it’s known as the truth.” (free citing of Gobbles).
“Prosperity of Ill”.
All time problem?

if there were few Arabs in Israel in the 17th century (and in 1867 as told by Samuel Clemens), your question becomes moot. today’s faux-“Palestinians” are predominantly Arabs from the surrounding countries.

you might as well ask how many Saudis are descended from the Jews of Arabia, since the Koran itself contains stories of Mohammed and his less than honorable dealings with the local Jews in Arabia.

today we see Jewish women being abducted by Moslems and held against their will in Arab villages. will their children be considered as being of “Jewish origin”, by those who want to make aboriginal claims for the “Palestinians”?

The Koran mentions with pride how Mohammed exterminated the Jewish tribe Banu-Kuraiza (s”l) who inhabitated the city of Medina. Six hundred to nine hundred Jews were brutally slaughtered and their woman and children were enslaved.
In Islam, everything Mohammed did is said to be sacred and untouchable…

In 628, Mohammed’s troops assaulted the city of Khaibar inhabitated by Jews, and they murdered all (of course violating and enslaving the women). Within Islam, up to today, to shout “Khaibar!!” means pride and the will to repeat this.
Among ‘Palestinians’, to do so is taught to the children by every imam and by every politician