1.
Palestinians
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Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one half of the worlds Palestinian population continues to reside in historic Palestine, the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and Israel. Of the Palestinian population who live abroad, known as the Palestinian diaspora, the history of a distinct Palestinian national identity is a disputed issue amongst scholars. Palestinian was used to refer to the nationalist concept of a Palestinian people by Palestinian Arabs in a limited way until World War I, Modern Palestinian identity now encompasses the heritage of all ages from biblical times up to the Ottoman period. Founded in 1964, the Palestine Liberation Organization is an organization for groups that represent the Palestinian people before the international community. Since 1978, the United Nations has observed an annual International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, herodotus also employs the term as an ethnonym, as when he speaks of the Syrians of Palestine or Palestinian-Syrians, an ethnically amorphous group he distinguishes from the Phoenicians. Herodotus makes no distinction between the Jews and other inhabitants of Palestine, the Greek word reflects an ancient Eastern Mediterranean-Near Eastern word which was used either as a toponym or ethnonym. In Ancient Egyptian Peleset/Purusati has been conjectured to refer to the Sea Peoples, among Semitic languages, Akkadian Palaštu is used of Philistia and its 4 city states. Biblical Hebrews cognate word Plištim, is usually translated Philistines, the Arabic word Filastin has been used to refer to the region since the time of the earliest medieval Arab geographers. It appears to have used as an Arabic adjectival noun in the region since as early as the 7th century CE. The Arabic newspaper Falasteen, published in Jaffa by Issa and Yusef al-Issa, the first Zionist bank, the Jewish Colonial Trust, was founded at the Second Zionist Congress and incorporated in London in 1899. The JCT was intended to be the instrument of the Zionist Organization. On 27 February 1902, a subsidiary of this Trust called the Anglo-Palestine Company was established in London with the assistance of Zalman David Levontin and this Company was to become the future Bank Leumi. Following the 1948 establishment of Israel, the use and application of the terms Palestine and Palestinian by, for example, the English-language newspaper The Palestine Post, founded by Jews in 1932, changed its name in 1950 to The Jerusalem Post. Jews in Israel and the West Bank today generally identify as Israelis, Arab citizens of Israel identify themselves as Israeli and/or Palestinian and/or Arab. Anyone born, after that date, of a Palestinian father – whether in Palestine or outside it – is also a Palestinian. Thus, the Jews of Palestine were/are also included, although limited only to the Jews who had resided in Palestine until the beginning of the Zionist invasion. The Charter also states that Palestine with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate, is a territorial unit. The although the timing and causes behind the emergence of a distinctively Palestinian national consciousness among the Arabs of Palestine are matters of scholarly disagreement
2.
Arabs
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Arabs are an ethnic group inhabiting the Arab world. They primarily live in the Arab states in Western Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, the Arabs are first mentioned in the mid-ninth century BCE as a tribal people dwelling in the central Arabian Peninsula. The Arabs appear to have been under the vassalage of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, tradition holds that Arabs descend from Ishmael, the son of Abraham. The Arabian Desert is the birthplace of Arab, there are other Arab groups as well that spread in the land and existed for millennia. Before the expansion of the Caliphate, Arab referred to any of the largely nomadic Semitic people from the northern to the central Arabian Peninsula and Syrian Desert. Presently, Arab refers to a number of people whose native regions form the Arab world due to spread of Arabs throughout the region during the early Arab conquests of the 7th and 8th centuries. The Arabs forged the Rashidun, Umayyad and the Abbasid caliphates, whose borders reached southern France in the west, China in the east, Anatolia in the north, and this was one of the largest land empires in history. The Great Arab Revolt has had as big an impact on the modern Middle East as the World War I, the war signaled the end of the Ottoman Empire. They are modern states and became significant as distinct political entities after the fall and defeat, following adoption of the Alexandria Protocol in 1944, the Arab League was founded on 22 March 1945. The Charter of the Arab League endorsed the principle of an Arab homeland whilst respecting the sovereignty of its member states. Beyond the boundaries of the League of Arab States, Arabs can also be found in the global diaspora, the ties that bind Arabs are ethnic, linguistic, cultural, historical, identical, nationalist, geographical and political. The Arabs have their own customs, language, architecture, art, literature, music, dance, media, cuisine, dress, society, sports, the total number of Arabs are an estimated 450 million. This makes them the second largest ethnic group after the Han Chinese. Arabs are a group in terms of religious affiliations and practices. In the pre-Islamic era, most Arabs followed polytheistic religions, some tribes had adopted Christianity or Judaism, and a few individuals, the hanifs, apparently observed monotheism. Today, Arabs are mainly adherents of Islam, with sizable Christian minorities, Arab Muslims primarily belong to the Sunni, Shiite, Ibadi, Alawite, Druze and Ismaili denominations. Arab Christians generally follow one of the Eastern Christian Churches, such as the Maronite, Coptic Orthodox, Greek Orthodox, Greek Catholic, or Chaldean churches. Listed among the booty captured by the army of king Shalmaneser III of Assyria in the Battle of Qarqar are 1000 camels of Gi-in-di-buu the ar-ba-a-a or Gindibu belonging to the Arab
3.
Operation Yiftach
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Operation Yiftach was a Palmach offensive carried out between 28 April and 23 May 1948. The objectives were to capture Safed and to secure the eastern Galilee before the British Mandate ended on 14 May 1948 and it was carried out by two Palmach battalions commanded by Yigal Allon. Operation Yiftach was part of Plan Dalet which aimed at securing the areas allocated to the Jewish state in the UN partition plan before the end of the British Mandate in Palestine. With the ending of the Mandate in sight, British forces had begun to withdraw from less strategic areas such as north-eastern Galilee, in these areas there was a scramble by both sides to occupy abandoned police and military facilities. Local militias and Arab volunteers had taken over the Palestine Police forts in Safed, on 17 April the Haganah launched an attack on the fort at Nebi Yusha, which failed. A second attack on 20 April resulted in the deaths of twenty two of the attackers, as a result of this defeat Yigal Allon, the Palmach C. O. was given command of the operation. Nebi Yusha was finally taken on 20 April in an attack in which planes dropped bombs on the fort. The army camp at Rosh Pinna was handed over to the Haganah/Palmach by its British commander on 28 April, Allon approached the campaign believing that the best way of securing the frontiers was to clear the area completely of all Arab forces and inhabitants. This operation was to be the foundation of his reputation that he left no Arab civilian communities in his wake, Safed had a pre-war population of 10, 000–12,000 Arabs and 1,500 Jews, and was the base for 700-800 local and foreign irregulars. On 1 May 1948, the Palmachs 3rd Battalion attacked the village of Ein al-Zeitun 1 km North of Safed and it began shelling the village at 03,00 in the morning, using one of the first Davidka mortars as well as two 3-inch and eight 2-inch conventional mortars. The Davidka was a mortar that fired an oversized shell and was nearly useless due to its inaccuracy. Once they entered the village most of the adult males fled but 37 were taken prisoner and were probably amongst the 70 men executed in a valley between the village and Safed two days later. Those who remained in the village were rounded up and expelled, over the next two days Palmach sappers blew up and burnt houses in the village. There followed a sub-operation, Operation Matateh, starting on 4 May, on 6 May the Palmach launched a ground attack on Safed, but failed to take the citadel. The failure was blamed on insufficient bombardment, despite Arab attempts to negotiate a truce and the British Army being authorised to intervene, a second attack was launched on night of 9–10 May. It was preceded by a massive, concentrated mortar bombardment in which the Davidka was used again, following the capture of Safed, Palmach units moved north to secure the borders with Lebanon and Syria. On 14–15 May the Palmachs 1st Battalion was involved in a clash with Lebanese units at Qabas, in his later writing Allon claimed that a whispering campaign he launched was of great importance. An IDF intelligence report attributed success to this tactic in the case of ten villages, there is some evidence that Syrian officers or Arab irregular commanders ordered women and children be evacuated from villages north-east of Rosh Pinna
4.
Syria
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Syrias capital and largest city is Damascus. Religious groups include Sunnis, Christians, Alawites, Druze, Mandeans, Shiites, Salafis, Sunni Arabs make up the largest religious group in Syria. Its capital Damascus and largest city Aleppo are among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, in the Islamic era, Damascus was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate and a provincial capital of the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt. The post-independence period was tumultuous, and a number of military coups. In 1958, Syria entered a union with Egypt called the United Arab Republic. Syria was under Emergency Law from 1963 to 2011, effectively suspending most constitutional protections for citizens, Bashar al-Assad has been president since 2000 and was preceded by his father Hafez al-Assad, who was in office from 1970 to 2000. Mainstream modern academic opinion strongly favours the argument that the Greek word is related to the cognate Ἀσσυρία, Assyria, in the past, others believed that it was derived from Siryon, the name that the Sidonians gave to Mount Hermon. However, the discovery of the inscription in 2000 seems to support the theory that the term Syria derives from Assyria. The area designated by the word has changed over time, since approximately 10,000 BC, Syria was one of centers of Neolithic culture where agriculture and cattle breeding appeared for the first time in the world. The following Neolithic period is represented by houses of Mureybet culture. At the time of the pre-pottery Neolithic, people used vessels made of stone, gyps, finds of obsidian tools from Anatolia are evidences of early trade relations. Cities of Hamoukar and Emar played an important role during the late Neolithic, archaeologists have demonstrated that civilization in Syria was one of the most ancient on earth, perhaps preceded by only those of Mesopotamia. The earliest recorded indigenous civilisation in the region was the Kingdom of Ebla near present-day Idlib, gifts from Pharaohs, found during excavations, confirm Eblas contact with Egypt. One of the earliest written texts from Syria is an agreement between Vizier Ibrium of Ebla and an ambiguous kingdom called Abarsal c.2300 BC. The Northwest Semitic language of the Amorites is the earliest attested of the Canaanite languages, Mari reemerged during this period, and saw renewed prosperity until conquered by Hammurabi of Babylon. Ugarit also arose during this time, circa 1800 BC, close to modern Latakia, Ugaritic was a Semitic language loosely related to the Canaanite languages, and developed the Ugaritic alphabet. The Ugarites kingdom survived until its destruction at the hands of the marauding Indo-European Sea Peoples in the 12th century BC, Yamhad was described in the tablets of Mari as the mightiest state in the near east and as having more vassals than Hammurabi of Babylon. Yamhad imposed its authority over Alalakh, Qatna, the Hurrians states, the army of Yamhad campaigned as far away as Dēr on the border of Elam
5.
United Nations
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The United Nations is an intergovernmental organization to promote international co-operation. A replacement for the ineffective League of Nations, the organization was established on 24 October 1945 after World War II in order to prevent another such conflict, at its founding, the UN had 51 member states, there are now 193. The headquarters of the UN is in Manhattan, New York City, further main offices are situated in Geneva, Nairobi, and Vienna. The organization is financed by assessed and voluntary contributions from its member states, the UNs mission to preserve world peace was complicated in its early decades by the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union and their respective allies. The organization participated in actions in Korea and the Congo. After the end of the Cold War, the UN took on major military, the UN has six principal organs, the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council, the Secretariat, the International Court of Justice, and the UN Trusteeship Council. UN System agencies include the World Bank Group, the World Health Organization, the World Food Programme, UNESCO, the UNs most prominent officer is the Secretary-General, an office held by Portuguese António Guterres since 2017. Non-governmental organizations may be granted consultative status with ECOSOC and other agencies to participate in the UNs work, the organization won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001, and a number of its officers and agencies have also been awarded the prize. Other evaluations of the UNs effectiveness have been mixed, some commentators believe the organization to be an important force for peace and human development, while others have called the organization ineffective, corrupt, or biased. Following the catastrophic loss of life in the First World War, the earliest concrete plan for a new world organization began under the aegis of the US State Department in 1939. It incorporated Soviet suggestions, but left no role for France, four Policemen was coined to refer to four major Allied countries, United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and China, which emerged in the Declaration by United Nations. Roosevelt first coined the term United Nations to describe the Allied countries, the term United Nations was first officially used when 26 governments signed this Declaration. One major change from the Atlantic Charter was the addition of a provision for religious freedom, by 1 March 1945,21 additional states had signed. Each Government pledges itself to cooperate with the Governments signatory hereto, the foregoing declaration may be adhered to by other nations which are, or which may be, rendering material assistance and contributions in the struggle for victory over Hitlerism. During the war, the United Nations became the term for the Allies. To join, countries had to sign the Declaration and declare war on the Axis, at the later meetings, Lord Halifax deputized for Mr. Eden, Wellington Koo for T. V. Soong, and Mr Gromyko for Mr. Molotov. The first meetings of the General Assembly, with 51 nations represented, the General Assembly selected New York City as the site for the headquarters of the UN, and the facility was completed in 1952. Its site—like UN headquarters buildings in Geneva, Vienna, and Nairobi—is designated as international territory, the Norwegian Foreign Minister, Trygve Lie, was elected as the first UN Secretary-General
6.
E. L. M. Burns
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Lieutenant-General Eedson Louis Millard Tommy Burns, CC DSO OBE MC CD was a senior officer of the Canadian Army and diplomat. Burns was born on June 17,1897 in Montreal, Quebec and his father was a militia staff officer, a member of the Corps of Guides. He served with the 17th Duke of Yorks Royal Canadian Hussars and he had risen to the rank of signal sergeant by 1913. “Tommy” Burns, student #1032 graduated from the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston and he joined the Royal Canadian Engineers, into which he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in 1915. He served in Canada until March 1916 when he went overseas with the 3rd Canadian Division Signal Company which, was composed of engineers and he fought on the Western Front with the Royal Canadian Engineers from 1916 to 1918. He became an officer with the 9th Brigade in March 1917, dealing with supply. He became a staff learner and acted as liaison officer between forward battalions and brigade headquarters and he returned to Canada in 1919 and was stationed at St. John as an engineer officer. He attended the School of Military Engineering, Chatham, England and he was an instructor at the RMC in Kingston, Ontario. He returned to Halifax and served on duty during the strike at Glace Bay. He worked in the Survey Department in Ottawa, in 1924, he was appointed as an instructor at RMC in field engineering. He attended the Staff College at Quetta, British India and returned to Quebec, in 1939, as a Lt-Col, he attended the Imperial Defence College in London, England. During World War II Burns successively commanded the 4th Canadian Armoured Brigade, the 1st Canadian Infantry Division, the 5th Canadian Division and he served as Deputy Minister of Veterans’ Affairs. He served as a President of the UNAC during the 1950s and he played a critical role in the Middle East peace process from 1954 to 1959. He was instrumental in developing UN peacekeeping, as Chief of Staff in 1954, United Nations Truce Supervision Organization was designed to maintain the General Armistice Agreements until permanent peace could be formulated. He served as a Special Staff of the Truce Supervision Organization in Palestine with the Department of External Affairs and was nearby when the Suez Crisis of 1956 occurred. He led the UNEF from November 1956 to December 1959 and he was Canada’s principal disarmament negotiator from 1960-68. He held the chair of Strategic Studies at the Norman Paterson School for International Affairs and he wrote “Between Arab and Israeli”, “General Mud, memoirs of two World Wars” and Defense in the Nuclear Age. He was awarded the Military Cross for maintaining communications under heavy fire, in 1967 he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada for his services to Canada at home and abroad
7.
1948 Palestinian exodus
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The 1948 Palestinian exodus, also known as the Nakba, occurred when more than 700,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled from their homes, during the 1948 Palestine war. Between 400 and 600 Palestinian villages were sacked during the war, the term nakba also refers to the period of war itself and events affecting Palestinians from December 1947 to January 1949. The causes are also a subject of disagreement between historians. And an unwillingness to live under Jewish control, later, a series of laws passed by the first Israeli government prevented them from returning to their homes, or claiming their property. They and many of their descendants remain refugees, the expulsion of the Palestinians has since been described by some historians as ethnic cleansing, while others dispute this charge. The events of 1948 are commemorated by Palestinians both in the Palestinian territories and elsewhere on 15 May, a date now known as Nakba Day. The history of the Palestinian exodus is closely tied to the events of the war in Palestine, which lasted from 1947 to 1949, and to the political events preceding it. In the first few months of the war the climate in the Mandate of Palestine became volatile. According to historian Benny Morris, the period was marked by Palestinian Arab attacks and Jewish defensiveness, simha Flapan pointed out that attacks by the Irgun and Lehi resulted in Palestinian Arab retaliation and condemnation. Jewish reprisal operations were directed against villages and neighborhoods from which attacks against Jews were believed to have originated, the retaliations were more damaging than the provoking attack and included killing of armed and unarmed men, destruction of houses and sometimes expulsion of inhabitants. Their attacks on British forces reduced British troops ability and willingness to protect Jewish traffic, General conditions deteriorated, the economic situation became unstable and unemployment grew. Rumours spread that the Husaynis were planning to bring in bands of fellahin to take over the towns, some Palestinian Arab leaders sent their families abroad. Yoav Gelber claims that the Arab Liberation Army embarked on an evacuation of non-combatants from several frontier villages in order to turn them into military strongholds. Arab depopulation occurred most in villages close to Jewish settlements and in neighborhoods in Haifa, Jaffa. The poorer inhabitants of these neighborhoods generally fled to parts of the city. Those who could afford to fled away, expecting to return when the troubles were over. By the end of March 1948 thirty villages were depopulated of their Palestinian Arab population, approximately 100,000 Palestinian Arabs had fled to Arab parts of Palestine, such as Gaza, Beersheba, Haifa, Nazareth, Nablus, Jaffa and Bethlehem. Some had left the country altogether, to Jordan, Lebanon, other sources speak of 30,000 Palestinian Arabs
8.
Al-Bassa
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Al-Bassa, also known as Betzet in Hebrew, בצת, was a Palestinian Arab village in the Mandatory Palestines Acre Subdistrict. It was situated close to the Lebanese border,19 kilometers north of the capital, Acre. The village was stormed by Haganah troops in May 1948 and almost completely razed and its residents were either internally displaced or expelled to neighboring countries. Bassa has been identified with the border town Betset listed in the Tosefta and it was called Bezeth during the Roman period, and its Arabic name is al-Basah. In the period of Crusader rule in Palestine, it was known as Le Bace or LeBassa, imad ad-Din al-Isfahani, a chronicler and advisor to Saladin, referred to the village as Ayn al-Bassa. The site shows signs of habitation in prehistory and the Middle Bronze Age and it was a Jewish settlement between 70 and 425 AD. Blown glass pitchers uncovered in a tomb in al-Bassa were dated to circa 396 AD, an ancient Christian burial place and 18 other archaeological sites were located in the village. No Crusader era buildings have found in al-Bassa, and a cross once dated to the Crusader period was later re-dated to the Byzantine era. A-Bassa was the first village listed as part of the domain of the Crusaders during the hudna between the Crusaders based in Acre and the Mamluk sultan al-Mansur in 1283. In 1596, al-Bassa was part of the Ottoman Empire, a village in the nahiya of Tibnin under the liwa of Safad, with a population of 76 Muslim families and 28 Muslim bachelors. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including olives, barley, cotton and fruits, as well as on goats, beehives. In 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte described al-Bassa as a village of 600 Metawalis, a map by Pierre Jacotin from Napoleons invasion of that year showed the place, named as El Basa. He further noted that The inhabitants of Bussah are almost all members of the Greek Church, a few Musselmans live among them, and a few fellahs of a Bedouin tribe which wanders about in the neighborhood are frequently seen in the street. Bee-keeping, also, is not an unimportant item of industry, the village had about 1,050 residents. The village had an elementary school for boys, a private secondary school. The Franco-British boundary agreement of 1920 described an imprecisely defined boundary between Lebanon and Palestine and it appeared to pass close to the north of al-Bassa, leaving the village on the Palestinian side but cut off from much of its lands. However the French government included al-Bassa in a Lebanese census of 1921, meanwhile, a joint British-French boundary commission was working to determine a precise border, making many adjustments in the process. By February 1922 it had determined a border that confirmed al-Bassa as being in Palestine, the citizenship of the residents was changed to Palestinian in 1926
