Expulsion from Israel
SIR,—In your issue of June 16th you make the rather astonishing assump- tion that the " policy of violent expulsion [i.e., of Arabs seeking to return to Israel from neighbouring countries] is an official one," adding that " Israel apparently believes that terrorism is the most effective deterrent " to frontier violations. These assertions seem to me so misleading as to call for some comment in the light of the facts.
It is said that these statements are made " in the absence of any denial" from the Government of Israel. But in fact an official statement of the Israel Government on June 9th, another on June 14th and a statement by the Israel Chargé d'Affaires in London on June 13th have all made it abundantly clear that: (i) terrorism is no part of the policy of the Government of Israel ; (ii) an official investigation is in progress with regard to the incidents recently reported, and if the allegations of cruelty or undue harshness are established, the guilty will be punished.
There is, moreover, a background against which these incidents must be viewed. Since the signature of the Israel-Jordan Armistice Agreement, 107 Israeli Jews have been killed and 74 wounded in attacks by armed gangs raiding across the frontiers from Jordan. In the same period, 27 Arab citizens of Israel (excluding Beduin, for whom final figures are not
yet available) have been killed and 30 wounded in the same type of attack. Arab citizens of Israel in some expoSed border villages have had to be issued with arms for self-defence. fhe value of the goods stolen by these marauding gangs amounts to a very substantial sum. Most of the frontier incidents recently reported are due to this type of armed raid, rather than to Arabs desiring to return to Israel for peaceable settlement.
Nor is the increase of Israel's Arab population from the census figure of 108,000 (in autumn, 1948) to the present estimated 170,000 due, as your comment suggests, to infiltration across the borders. It is mainly the result of agreed rectifications of Israel's frontiers through armistice agreements with neighbouring Arab States, and of the omission from the census figure of the Arab populations of Galilee and the Negev. The proportion of infiltrators in the 62,000 increase is relatively small. There is also a constant flow of Arab legal immigration, due to the scheme ftir re-uniting Arab families separated during the fighting.—I am, Sir, 18 Manchester Square, W.I. Press Attache, Legation of Israel.
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