Free Republic

The Journal of Architectural Education (JAE), the field's premier scholarly journal, has dedicated past issues to topics like the "various nuances through which water and design mix" and the "relationship between stories and architecture." Last year, the journal landed on a different topic for its fall 2025 issue: The "ongoing Israeli genocidal campaign against Palestinians in Gaza." The journal's "call for papers"—a prompt for essay submissions—was littered with anti-Semitic rhetoric. It lauded "siege and prison breaks" as methods of "anti-colonial life- and land-protection" and justified Hamas's Oct. 7 attack as "the rupture of settler containment." The fall issue, the journal...

The history of the conflict between Israel and Palestine has become a contest of one-sided interpretations and outright myths. For Israelis, Palestine was never a country. For Palestinians and their supporters in the West, Israel is an illegitimate settler-colonial state. There is perhaps no historical moment that has been more distorted by such mythmaking than 1948, the year the British colonial ‘mandate’ ended and the modern state of Israel was founded. It was a moment of celebration for the Zionist movement, which had finally realised its dream of a Jewish homeland. But it was a moment of misery for Arabs....

Israel’s amb. to UN launches first exhibit showing Jewish expulsion from Iran, Arab countriesBy Halwy Cohen, The Jerusalem Post, November 30, 2022.https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-7236831947-1948 - Forced transfer or mass escape?Ha’aretz claims that 800,000 Arabs were expelled from the country by the Jews during the War of Independence. The purpose of this lie is to hide the shameful truth: the great majority were not deported but fled on their own initiativeHanan Amior, Presspectiva, 29.11.22https://presspectiva-org-il.translate.goog/1947-1948-%d7%98%d7%a8%d7%a0%d7%a1%d7%a4%d7%a8-%d7%9b%d7%a4%d7%95%d7%99-%d7%90%d7%95-%d7%91%d7%a8%d7%99%d7%97%d7%94-%d7%94%d7%9e%d7%95%d7%a0%d7%99%d7%aa/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=enThe fate of the Jews in Arab countriesConrad Myrland, Miff.no, June 28, 2022.https://miff.no/jodenes-skjebne-i-arabiske-landhttps://miff-no.translate.goog/jodenes-skjebne-i-arabiske-land?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=enFrom Hitler to Putin: Palestinian habit of always backing ‘wrong side’Opinion: In 1940s, then-Palestinian leader Mufti Hajj Amim...

The UN General Assembly this week passed a resolution to characterize the founding of the modern state of Israel in 1948 as a “catastrophe,” in what has been heralded as a major victory for pro-Palestinian activists. The word “Nakba,” which means catastrophe or disaster in Arabic, was also a term coined by the Palestinians to commemorate the Jewish state’s founding. The UN resolution acknowledges the Palestinian version of the events that led to Israel’s creation, and calls for the “commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the Nakba,” with a “high-level event” at the global body on May 15th, 2023. May...

Hamas-Affiliated Gazan Journalist In Article On Occasion Of Nakba Day: Palestine Was Lost Because Palestinians Heeded Advice Of Arab Regimes To Leave Their Homes On Nakba Day this year (May 15, 2022), Ibrahim Al-Madhoun, a Gazan journalist affiliated with Hamas, published an article on the Hamas website palinfo.. discussing the reasons for the Nakba and for the situation of the Palestinians today. Titled "The Nakba from a Different Perspective," the article claims that the Palestinians left their homes and villages in 1948 in compliance with the advice of the Arab armies, who promised to fight on their behalf but failed...

The longer only one side of the so-called Palestinian Catastrophe is cultivated, the longer hatred will continue to be nurtured, while historical facts point to Palestinians openly supporting Nazi propaganda during WWII. We're told time and time again that we must recognize the Palestinian "narrative" of the conflict's origins in order to understand their pain, and usher in peace. The truth is that we need to do just the opposite. The Palestinian narrative has already become widely endorsed by many in the academia, and the more it continues to gain recognition, the more miniscule the chances for peace will become....

Perpetrator As Victim: No End To A Self-Inflicted "Tragedy" What "Nakba" commemorations really disclose. May 16, 2016 Daniel Mandel    Yesterday, May 15, Palestinians and their supporters, as they have done increasingly over recent years, marked the nakba (Arabic for ‘catastrophe’) –– the day 68 years ago that Israel came into existence upon the expiry of British rule under a League of Nations mandate. That juxtaposition of Israel and nakba isn’t accidental. We’re meant to understand that Israel’s creation caused the displacement of hundreds of thousand of Palestinian Arabs.  But the truth is different. A British document from the...

Brown University’s Hillel has pulled its sponsorship of a Wednesday event commemorating the 1948 Palestinian Arab exodus from Israel — more commonly referred to as the “Nakba” — following heavy backlash, The Algemeiner has learned. Hillel, along with other pro-Israel and Jewish student organizations, initially agreed to sponsor the campus event set to feature a film screening and discussion of the Nakba, an Arabic word which literally translates as “disaster” or “catastrophe.” Nakba Day is generally observed on May 15, the day after Israel’s Independence Day on the Gregorian calendar, and often sees heavy rioting and violent protest by Palestinians...

Here's the video maker's description: I went along to this nakba event with two signs. 'Palestinian christians are persecuted by palestinian muslims how can this church support this?' The other saying 'If you dont believe me ask Christy Anastas' (A palestinian christian who is pro Israel and exposes the PA and Hamas. Those two girls confronting me. Imagine how they would be treated dressed like that under hamas control? Or being harassed by men who go unpunished in the PA?! Yet they want to blame Israel, where Palestinians in Jerusalem have applied for Israeli citizenship I wonder why?! Let's go...

Israeli soldier and police killed two Palestinian Authority rioters on Thursday during violent “Nakba Day” riots in Judea and Samaria. Across the ocean, radical pro-Arabs at New York University are to stage a “die-in” protest to “simulate the massacre of Palestinians by Zionist forces.”

Palestinians marched in the West Bank and Gaza on Thursday to commemorate their displacement in the 1948 Mideast war that followed the establishment of the state of Israel. Sirens wailed at noon in Ramallah and elsewhere across the West Bank for 66 seconds to symbolize the number of years since the “Nakba,” or “catastrophe” in Arabic—the term Palestinians use to describe their defeat and displacement in the war. Israel overcame the armies of surrounding Arab states as well as local Arabs who attacked after the Jewish state was declared on May 15, 1948. […] “It is time for the leaders...

Those who get their news from the mainstream media (or the Guardian) could be forgiven for believing that there are nearly 5 million Palestinian refugees from the 1948-49 Arab-Israeli War. So often is that figure bandied around that most don’t understand that it only reflects the number of Palestinians qualifying for “refugee” benefits under the bizarre formula of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency by which the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren (ad infinitum) of actual refugees continue to inherit this status. This designation is even bestowed upon those Palestinians who are already citizens of other countries. (Using such demographic...

Dozens of Palestinian Authority Arabs on Tuesday created a hole through the security barrier that runs between the Arab village of Abu Dis and Jerusalem. The Arabs said that IDF forces who were stationed nearby dispersed them using tear gas and stun grenades. A similar incident took place two months ago, when dozens of Arab men held a protest against the security barrier, taking large hammers and creating a gaping hole in the wall. Several men used the hole to enter Jerusalem without going through a security checkpoint. That protest was part of the “Nakba Day” events in which Arabs...

Israeli soldiers have opened fired on pro-Palestinian protesters in Syria as they marched on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

... But was he expelled? Hardly. Not only did Abbas reveal a couple of years ago, in an Arabic interview, that his family had not been forcefully expelled and that his father was affluent enough to provide for them for a year after their flight (so no canvas tent), but none of the 170,000- 180,000 Palestinian Arabs fleeing urban centers, in the five-and-a-half months from the passing of the UN resolution to Israel's proclamation on May 14, 1948, were expelled by the Jews. Quite the reverse in fact, huge numbers of these refugees were driven from their homes by their...

The real “nakba,” which is the story of the Arab apartheid. Tens of millions, among them Jews, suffered from the “nakba,” which included dispossession, expulsion and displacement. Only the Palestinians remained refugees because they were treated to abuse and oppression by the Arab countries. Below is the story of the real “nakba” In 1959, the Arab League passed Resolution 1457, which states as follows: “The Arab countries will not grant citizenship to applicants of Palestinian origin in order to prevent their assimilation into the host countries.” That is a stunning resolution, which was diametrically opposed to international norms in everything...

Sovereignty: The "Arab Spring" is supposed to be about the liberation of the Middle East from the despotisms of the past. Funny that Arab protesters' latest target is the one and only stable democracy in the region: Israel. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak may be history after mass demonstrations led to an end to his rule and an uncertain future for the land of the Pharaohs, a nation that in the not-too-distant past warred with Israel and allied itself with the Soviet Union. Moammar Gadhafi may not be in as comfortable...

The real “nakba,” which is the story of the Arab apartheid. Tens of millions, among them Jews, suffered from the “nakba,” which included dispossession, expulsion and displacement. Only the Palestinians remained refugees because they were treated to abuse and oppression by the Arab countries. Below is the story of the real “nakba”

By Sunday afternoon, the infiltrators began to make their way back to Syria following negotiations between the IDF, police and Druze elders. The forces tried not to intervene as the Syrian youngsters marched back to their country while calling out "we'll be back," encouraged by applause from the Druze villagers who looked on. By 5 pm Sunday, the IDF said that all infiltrators left Israeli territory. 'We come in peace' "I'm tired of living in Syria, we'd rather die than see more bloodshed," one of the Syrian infiltrators into Majdal Shams told Ynet earlier. He called on Israel to grant...

It's that time of the year again...May 15th. Arabs and their stooges get to prance around and curse the Jews over the "catastrophe" (nakba)--Israel's rebirth. A resurrection which occurred on about 12% of the original April 25,1920 Mandate of Palestine after what is now Jordan made off with the lions' share (about 80%) upon its own creation in 1922...a gift of British imperialist shanigans. In 1947, Arabs were offered about half of the 20% that was left but refused that second partition. In their eyes, almost 90% of Palestine was not enough. The name "Palestine" was bestowed upon Judea by...