Palestinian exodus

The Palestinian Exodus (Arabic: ?????? ?????????? al-Hijra al-Filasteeniya) is the refugee flight of some 711,000 Palestinian Arabs (UN estimatehttp://domino.un.org/unispal.nsf/9a798adbf322aff38525617b006d88d7/93037e3b939746de8525610200567883!OpenDocument) during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, and is called the Nakba (Arabic: ??????), meaning "disaster" or "cataclysm", by Palestinians. The Israeli estimate of the refugees is 520,000 and the Palestinian estimate is 900,000. They fled or were expelled from their homes in the part of Palestine that would become the State of Israel to other parts of Palestine or to neighbouring countries.

Related Topics:
Arabic - Refugee - 1948 Arab-Israeli war - Palestinian - Palestine - State of Israel

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The degree to which the flight of the refugees was voluntary or involuntary is hotly debated, with some citing attempts by the surrounding Arab governments to evacuate women and children, and the attempt by some Jewish leaders, especially in Haifa, to stem flight, and others citing a score of the well-documented direct expulsion of the residents of some towns and villages, including Lydda and Ramle.

Related Topics:
Haifa - Lydda and Ramle

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In 1949 at the Lausanne conference, Israel proposed to allow 100,000 refugees to return, this number including an alleged 25,000 who had returned already surreptitiously and 10,000 projected family-reunion cases. The offer was conditional on a full peace treaty that allowed Israel to keep all the territory it had captured and on the Arab states agreeing to absorb the remaining refugees. The offer was rejected by the Arab states.

Related Topics:
1949 - Lausanne conference

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