From: Ismail Zayid
To: Globe& Mail
Sent: Tuesday, July 06, 2004 5:08 PM
Subject: Blaming the victims.

July 6,2004
 
The Editor,
The Globe & Mail.
 
Dear Editor:
 
Arthur Kaell, {letter 'Mideast refugees" July 5}, blames the Palestinians and Arabs for the plight of the Palestinian refugees. The expulsion and the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian refugees was planned by all Zionist leaders from Theodor Herzl in 1897 to Sharon, and effected in 1948 by Ben Gurion and levi Eshkol in 1967. Mr Kaell's statement brings to mind the response of the great Jewish thinker, Nathan Chofshi, to similar statements by the American, Rabbi Kaplan. Chofshi stated :" If Rabbi Kaplan really wanted to know what happened, we old settlers in Palestine, who witnessed the flight, could tell him how and in what manner we,Jews, forced the Arabs to leave their cities and villages....We came and turned the native Arabs into tragic refugees. and we still dare to slander and malign them, to besmirch their name. Instead of being ashamed of what we did and of trying to undo some of the evil we committed by helping these unfortunate refugees, we justify our terrible acts and even attempt to glorify them." {Jewish Newsletter, Feb. 9, 1959.}
 
As to Jewish refugees from Arab countries, perhaps Israel's apologists should remember how Israel's secret agents, like Mordechai Ben
 Porat, arranged, in 1950-51, to force Iraqi Jews to emigrate to Israel by tossing hand grenades in the