PALESTINIAN ARABS SIR,—One of the Suez casualties was the previously
friendly attitude of the Spectator and of Ian Gilmour towards Israel. Nevertheless, credit is often given where it is due. (Pre-war credit, usually; parcere subiectis only as long as they remain underdogs.) Dubious facts are hardly ever asserted to be un- assailable. One therefore feels that a correction is called for as regards the number of Arab refugees and the beginning of their plight which in terms of human suffering can be understood by none better than by Jews and Israelis who have indeed borne already more than a fair share of the alleviation of this human misery, and have on countless occasions shown their readiness to do more than the 'brethren' of the refugees have ever been willing to do.
Whether the 600,000 Palestinian Jews did or did not take an unfair advantage of their numerical superiority over the seventy million Arabs and their seven pillars, whether ethnic migrations in compar- able circumstances (Turco-Greek, Indo-Pakistani or Slavonic-Germanic) have ever been immobilised for a decade, in the expectation that the exact status quo ante be restored, or whether you can both lose a race you were confident of winning because you had had a hand in its rigging and claim back your money because your betting calculations proved wrong—all these are matters of opinion.
So is, to a certain extent at least, a story (fully believed in Israel) that relates how not only the Arab neighbours but also 'the third force' in Palestine dissuaded some important Arab communities from staying and coming to terms with their Jewish friends. One point is, however, beyond dispute and but for it this letter would not have been written. It is the number of Arab refugees, not their numbers now, but the number of 'Arabs leaving their homes in 1948' ('The Last of the Pashas,' Spectator, April 10) which was nowhere near one million as stated in the article mentioned. UNRRA rolls which are certainly not underestimating the numbers (because of the food rations involved) and WHO statistics, to quote but two sources, spoke at the time of something like half a million. This in itself is no mean figure, but those who simply double it make it no easier for the average Israeli to be fair about this thorny problem. (Nor is there fairness in the argument which seeks to belittle the achievement of Israel's welcome to one and a half million Diaspora Jews, by substituting 'one million' vacated homes for the crumbling mud-huts of about half a million.)
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