Probably not because it is one of those inconvenient historical truths that is buried by the media and policy-makers in their six-decades-old lament about “Palestinian refugees.”
Jewish refugees cross the desert in Yemen. Photo: Courtesy Israeli National Photo Archive
There is a good summary at Frontpagemagazineearlier this month (hat tip: Richard Falknor at Blue Ridge Forum). We have covered this subject in several previous posts which can be found in our Israel and refugees category, here.
June 20 was World Refugee Day, dedicated to nearly 60 million people worldwide who were forcibly displaced by conflict or persecution. One group of refugees rarely acknowledged is the Jews who were indigenous to Muslim lands but compelled to flee around the time that the State of Israel was established.
A Google search for “1948 refugees” produces about 6 million results. All but a few (at least through page six) are about the Palestinian Arab refugees, as if they were the only refugees of 1948. But it is estimated that from the beginning of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War through the early 1970s, up to 1,000,000 Jews fled or were expelled from their ancestral homes in Muslim countries. 260,000 of those refugees reached Israel between 1948 and 1951 and comprised 56% of all immigration to the fledgling state. By 1972, their numbers had reached 600,000.
In 1948, Middle East and North African countries had considerable Jewish populations: Morocco (250,000), Algeria (140,000), Iraq (140,000), Iran (120,000), Egypt (75,000), Tunisia (50,000), Yemen (50,000), Libya (35,000), and Syria (20,000). Today, the indigenous Jews of those countries are virtually extinct (although Morocco and Iran each still has under 10,000 Jews). In most cases, the Jewish population had lived there for millennia.
Mustafa Ibrahim, a researcher for the Independent Commission for Citizens’ Rights, told Al-Monitor that eight citizens were killed in the Gaza Strip in May. The deaths were the result of family disputes, robberies, tunnel collapses and suicides.
He pointed out that the commission observed a significant increase in the rate of violence in the West Bank and Gaza from the beginning of the year until April compared to the same period last year.
He added that about 61 people were killed in Gaza and the West Bank because of family disputes, misuse of weapons, tunnel collapses on the border with Egypt, apartment building collapses and the lack of safety measures in industrial workshops and other places.
Wait for it! You knew it would be in the article somewhere!
Ibrahim said that the crime rate is related to the living conditions, particularly in Gaza. He said that the high unemployment rate, the Israeli blockade and the continual power outages are frustrating the people.
This reminds me, take 5 minutes and watch “We con the World!”from Latma. 2.6 million views to date!
….saying they are “a threat to the long-term viability of the Jewish state.” Yes, they are! I don’t know why people don’t get this point. Mass migration will eventually bring down a country. It will happen more quickly in small countries like Israel or some European countries and more slowly in the US, but it will happen.
Here is my big question—-what is the third country to which these tens of thousands will be sent?
***Update June 8th*** Here is a reportthat says they will be deported to an African country.
We have already seen the erosion of the concept of legitimate refugee protection as in the case of Malta* where the US State Department took off Malta’s hands thousands of illegal (economic) migrants from Africa, transformed them into refugees and sent them to America.
I sure hope Obama didn’t make some deal when he visited Israel and that America is the third country they have in mind!
Israel’s new border fence. That isn’t an illegal alien, just a worker making repairs. Photo: Reuters
Israel plans to expel thousands of African refugees to an unidentified third country, according to a court document obtained Monday, in an initiative that has provoked concerns from human rights groups.
The program is an effort to confront one of Israel’s more persistent problems: What to do with some 60,000 African migrants – the majority from Eritrea and Sudan – who have illegally crossed the border into Israel from Egypt over the past eight years.
During a Supreme Court hearing on Sunday that questioned the legality of detaining asylum-seekers who entered Israel secretly, a government attorney said an agreement to resettle “infiltrators from Eritrea” had been reached with an unidentified third country, according to Reuters.
“There is an arrangement with one country, which will be an end-destination and not a transit point,” the lawyer said, according to a transcript provided by the Justice Ministry on Monday.
There are an estimated 35,000 Eritreans currently living illegally in Israel, but deporting them to their homeland, a state accused of torture last year by the UN human rights chief, is difficult under international law.
Resettling the migrants in another country could also raise legal issues. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees says resettlement can only be considered once refugee status has been granted – which Israel has not done – although exceptions can be made.
Under the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, states are obligated not to send refugees to countries where they would face physical or political danger. It is unclear whether that requires the convention’s signatories, of which Israel is one, to monitor the refugees indefinitely after they are deported.
Making sure this won’t happen again, Israel builds a border fence!
While the fate of the migrants remains uncertain, Israel has taken rather dramatic steps to stem the influx in illegal immigration. Over the past year, Israel has constructed a barrier along its border with Egypt that has dramatically reduced the number of illegal arrivals. Israel is also incarcerating individuals who attempt to cross into the country while authorities determine whether they are eligible for refugee status.
He is right!
Israel’s plan to deport many of the estimated 60,000 migrants began in earnest in July of last year, when Netanyahu said the African migrants “are seen by many Israelis as a law and order issue and even a threat to the long-term viability of the Jewish state.”
So, what is the third country (one acceptable to the UN)?
For more on the problems Israel is having with illegal migrants, visit our category entitled‘Israel and refugees.’
* For the Malta policy started under the Bush State Department, go here for dozens of posts on the topic.
The wise Eric Hoffer — the longshoreman who became a philosopher — said this in 1968, and it’s true today. As quoted by Fred Gottheil on American Thinker:
The Jews are a peculiar people. Things permitted to other people are forbidden to the Jews. Other nations drive out thousands, even millions, of people and there is no refugee problem. Russia did it; Poland and Czechoslovakia did it; Turkey drove out a million Greeks, and Algeria a million Frenchmen; Indonesia threw out heaven knows how many Chinese — and no one says a word about refugees. But in the case of Israel, the displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab. … Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in this world.
The only update would be all the instances of nations driving out people since then. And we can add that some people would like the United States to take all those other refugees in. Israel still has to take the Palestinians, and all their descendants.
This is the latest news on the ever-growing conflict between African migrants and the residents of lower income neighborhoods in South Tel Aviv. See our previous post, here.
I sure hope the US isn’t considering extending its Malta doctrine to Israel. What is the Malta doctrine (my name for it)? That is where we take illegal aliens off the hands of another country after declaring they are legitimate refugees when they are largely economic migrants. (Just type ‘Malta’ into our search function and you will see how we have helped to make Malta an even bigger target for illegal aliens to aim for by holding out the hope that getting there is a ticket to America’s streets paved with gold!).
African refugees wait for a job offer near the central bus station in southern Tel Aviv, Israel. Photo by Abir Sultan/EPA/Newscom
Touring South Tel Aviv Tuesday, Interior Minister Gideon Sa’ar said that the issue of African migrants is one of the most vexing problems facing Israel, and that the government would keep working to deport illegal migrants to their nations of origin or to third countries.[Heads up! What third countries?—ed]
Billed as his first working tour in his new post, Sa’ar walked around Neve Sha’anan, a low-income and middle-class neighborhood in south Tel Aviv that’s become an epicenter for many of the tens of thousands of African migrants in Israel, to get a firsthand glimpse of the area.
“This is one of the most difficult, sensitive and charged issues Israel has had to deal with,” Sa’ar noted.
One of the main controversies surrounding the migrants is that the government permitted them entry but doesn’t grant them work visas, creating a situation that fosters crime and illegal activity. Residents have become increasingly vocal about their frustration with what they say is the government’s inaction on the issue.
“There’s no life here anymore. Everyone here lives in fear,” one resident said, while others complained that their businesses have greatly suffered in recent years.
“If they are refugees, give them what they deserve. If they’re infiltrators, then deport them,” a resident said as the minister toured.
[…..]
Human rights groups contend Israel isn’t doing enough for the asylum-seekers, including not giving them the right to work, and that it lags behind much of the West in handling cases of migrants seeking asylum. The government, however, claims that many of the migrants aren’t actually refugees but individuals seeking better economic opportunities.[Readers, by definition economic migrants are not refugees or asylum seekers under UN law—ed]
Funny thing how those border fences do work!
The stream of migrants into Israel, which saw tens of thousands enter the country, has slowed to a near-halt since Israel accelerated construction of a much-upgraded fence along the Egyptian border last year.
About the photo: It is from this Jewish Journal article from Januaryreporting that US activists are telling the Israeli government what they should do—let them stay and give them jobs!
