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.com 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 to deliver on this promise. This, he says, is what caused the Palestinians to lose their homeland. He adds that, today, the Arab regimes are pressuring the Palestinians to surrender to Israel, but they have learned their lesson and are ignoring this advice and defending themselves by manufacturing rockets and building tunnels. Al-Madhoun concludes that, 74 years after the Nakba, the Palestinians are on the verge of regaining all of Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.
Ibrahim Al-Madhoun with Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar (Source: Twitter. com/ibmadhun, May 6, 2022)
The following are translated excerpts from his article:[1]
"We are now marking 74 years since the loss of Palestine and the dispersal of its people across the world in what is known as the Nakba [literally, the catastrophe]. This [is how we refer to it] because of the torments and the [harsh] consequences that have been suffered by every Palestinian for decades, which we could not have imagined would ensue. The Palestinian people is a living people that adheres to its identity and its land, is rebellious by nature, makes sacrifices and is capable of defending its land. However, the loss of Palestine for all this time raises many questions and queries.
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"When our parents left their lands, their cities and their homes [in 1948] they left their money, belongings, clothing and jewelry behind, and took with them only the deeds to their homes and their keys, because [they thought] they were leaving only temporarily. Had they realized it would last [longer, even] for a single year, they would have preferred to die in their homes, their orchards and their fields.
"Sadly, the armies of several Arab regimes had a hand in persuading the people and the villages to leave and to abandon their homes, on the pretext of protecting [the villages] and fighting the Zionist gangs. The Palestinians believed and trusted them and the families left, hoping that the Zionist gangs would be defeated and their strength would be broken…
"Palestinians sold their wives' jewelry to buy a single rifle to defend their village, but the Arab armies collected their weapons and promised them they would fight on their behalf. They took the weapons and sent the [Palestinian] fighters away, and then they withdrew without putting up a fight.
"Had the Arab leaders only supported the Palestinian fighters with weapons and funds, or refrained from interfering and let them to do as they chose, Palestine would not have been lost. But they did not do that. [Instead] they interfered, planned, came together -- and then simply handed over the country [to the Jews].
"Today the ball and idea are back in the same court and the Arab regimes are playing the same role of colluding with the occupation. These regimes are besieging our people, fighting it and treating to it with hostility, and pressuring it to surrender its weapons and surrender to "Israel." The Arab regimes condemn our Palestinian people in Gaza for possessing weapons and insisting on manufacturing rockets and building tunnels. They [are trying to] convince it to hand over all of this, but today our people are [more] aware and experienced, and thus the Nakba will not recur as long as our people is armed and as long as the jihad fighters build their tunnels.
"The occupation gambled on the Palestinians surrendering of losing their sense of identity. Its leaders said: The adults will die and the younger ones will forget. But the next generations of Palestinians are [even] more attached and committed to their land. The Zionist idea was defeated to the core, as was the occupation's plan to diffuse the Palestinians and destroy their identity. We are moving closer to Jerusalem with every rocket produced by a member of the 'Izz Al-Din Al-Qassam Brigades [Hamas' military wing], with every tunnel built in the east of the [Gaza] Strip, with every knife and explosive belt in the West Bank, with every intellectual, pen and voice in the Triangle [the concentration of Israeli Arab towns and villages in northern Israel] and the Galilee, and with every voice and key in the refugee camps in Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan. Today there are more than seven million Palestinians in historic Palestine between the [Mediterranean] sea and the [Jordan] river, and another seven million outside [Palestine]. Not even one of these Palestinians who has forgotten his rights or his land or who considers forgetting Palestine or renouncing his right to return.
Today, 74 years after the Nakba and one year after the Sword of Jerusalem Campaign in Gaza [i.e. the May 2021 Hamas-Israel military conflict], and after the heroic operations carried out by individuals and by organizations in the West Bank, the ribat [mobilization on the frontlines] of the residents of Jerusalem at Al-Aqsa Mosque, the fidelity of the '48 Palestinians [i.e. the Israeli Arabs] to their national identity, the struggles of the Palestinians outside Palestine, their longing to return and their direct participation [in the struggle] – we are closer to victory and liberation. We are on the verge of the return that we discern from afar, and here we come."
[1] Palinfo.com, May 15, 2022.
