Deir Yassin, West Jerusalem (Israel)

"For Palestinians, the 1948 massacre by Irgun & allied Stern Gang soldiers of more than 200 residents of Deir Yassin, a tiny village near Jerusalem (Israel), resonates sharply as a focal point of history. The dead victims -- almost all women, children & old men -- became irrefutable evidence of the consequences for Palestinians of the creation of the new Jewish state. The resulting forced exile of over 750,000 Palestinians in 1948 -- over two million scattered in a far-flung diaspora today -- remains at the heart of the Israel-Palestine conflict."

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"I grew up [in Jerusalem] knowing that Deri Yassin was a rallying cry among Palestinians.
And of course every Israeli schoolchild is taught to remember the massacre of the seventy-seven Jews killed in the convoy to Mount Scopus."
-- Kai Bird, "Crossing the Mandelbaum Gate: Coming of Age Between the Arabs and Israelis"

Right click image to enlarge.

V I L L A G E April 9, 1948 - Palestinian Village of Deir Yassin, near Jerusalem (Israel). Unintentional monument. Scene of the Deir Yassin Massacre (part of the Palestinian Nakba or Holocaust). Left photo taken in December 1996. Right photo is Deir Yassin (in the green trees to the right of the water tower) as seen from Yad Vashem. Village is now occupied by the Krar Shaul Mental Health Center & closed to the public. Click here for video by Deir Yassin Remembered (DYR).

S C H O O L

April 10, 1948 - Dar El Tifl Orphanage & School, East Jerusalem. "In April 1948, Hind al-Husseini [1916-1994], a 31-year-old teacher, came across 55 young orphaned children—most under the age of nine—wandering near the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. They were survivors of the massacre in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. Husseini immediately rented them two rooms. Subsequently, she established an orphanage in her Jerusalem home, a mansion built by her grandfather in 1891... Until Israel recently closed off the West Bank’s access to Jerusalem with walls & checkpoints, Dar al-Tifl al-Arabi ("The House of the Arab Child") was the largest Palestinian orphanage, serving over 1500 pupils. Today, it stands virtually empty. /// Chick here for a 6-1/2 minute 1950 newsreel. The film "138 Pounds in My Pocket" [by Sahera Derbas] asks how al-Husseini & her successor filled gaps left by the absence of a state able, or willing, to provide adequate welfare for disadvantaged children." The feature-length film "Miral" by American filmmaker Julian Schnabel also covers this story.

L E T T E R

April 10, 1948 - "The Stern Gang received money collected under the name [of the] American Friends of the Fighters for the Freedom of Israel. Mr. Shepard Rifkin was executive director after the UN Partition of Palestine & prior to the creation of Israel in May 1948. Rifkin solicited Albert Einstein to help the Stern Gang raise American money for arms to drive out the Arabs & help create a Jewish state. On April 10th, the day after the infamous massacre of Arabs at Deir Yassin, Einstein replied calling the Stern Gang terrorists & misled criminals." Text of Einstein's letter: "Dear Sir: When a real and final catastrophe should befall us in Palestine the first responsible for it would be the British and the second responsible for it the Terrorist organizations build up from our own ranks. I am not willing to see anybody associated with those misled and criminal people. Sincerely yours, Albert Einstein."/// "Purchased at auction June 21, 2007, by Daniel McGowan, executive director of Deir Yassin Remembered, for $8,500 plus $1,700 commission & $175 shipping. It will become a part of the Deir Yassin Remembered Archives, which includes documents, photographs & audio accounts of the massacre." The Deir Yassin Massacre took place on April 9, 1948.

A M B U S H

April 13, 1948 - Hadassah Hospital Convoy Massacre, Nashashibi Bend, Nablus Road, East Jerusalem. Near American Colony Hotel (qv). 79 killed by Arab forces in retalliation for Deir Yassin. From BackSpin: "At junction where Nablus Road suddenly veers left & also connects to the Mount of Olives Road on the right. It was at this hairpin turn where Arabs ambushed a Hadassah medical convoy going up to the Mount Scopus hospital. It was a massacre by any standards: 79 doctors & nurses & Haganah escorts were killed. The monument is [in the upper left photo &] at the right of the [upper right] photo. The taxi is turning left onto the continuation of Nablus Road. The monument is so close to the street I didn't feel safe standing in front of it for any length of time as cars passed awfully close behind me. The junction gave me the creeps; it was indeed the perfect place for an ambush." Lower images show memorial at the Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus.

May 14, 1948 - Israel is declared independent by David Ben-Gurion, executive head of the World Zionist Organization & chairman of the Jewish Agency for Palestine... The event is celebrated annually in Israel with a national holiday called Yom Ha'atzmaut.

G A T E

1949-1967 - Mandelbaum Gate, Jerusalem (Israel). On the Green Line. "Next to Tourjeman Post... The gate was established [in 1949] at the intersection directly to the north at the building as [the only] border crossing between Israel & Jordan. Every two weeks the convoy that constituted the only contact with the Israeli enclave on Mount Scopus passed through Mandelbaum Gate." The first checkpoint for the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan/Israel Mixed Armistice Commission at the Mandelbaum Gate, from the close of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War in 1949 until August 1952, was moved from the Israeli side of the Gate to the Demilitarised Zone after the 'Barrel Incident.' The second checkpoint existed until the 1967 Six-Day War." Left image shows the gate before July 1967. Right image shows monument erected since 1967. Note light rail in foreground.

H O S P

1951 - Kfar Shaul Mental Health Center, West Jerusalem (Israel). From Wikipedia: "An Israeli public psychiatric hospital located between Givat Shaul & Har Nof, Jerusalem. A affiliated with Hadassah Medical Center & Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Jerusalem's designated psychiatric hospital for tourists who display mental health disturbances. Is widely known for its research on Jerusalem Syndrome. Also known for having been established on the intact Palestinian village of Deir Yassin, which was depopulated by Jewish paramilitary forces in April 1948, one month before the creation of the state of Israel."

M U S E U M

October 29, 1956 - Kafr Qasim Massacre, Kafr Quasim (Israel). Also spelled Kafr Kassem. About 20 km east of Tel Aviv, near the Green Line between Israel & the West Bank, in the southern portion of the "Little Triangle" of Arab-Israeli towns & villages. The Israel Border Police kill 49 civilians... [Muslim residents] of Kafr Qasim annually observe the massacre, and the commemorative memorial was raised in the village. The Museum of the Martyrs was opened on [the 50th anniversary] October 29, 2006 [but apparently has no website]. In December 2007, Israel President Shimon Peres formally apologised for the massacre" which happened at the beginning of the 10-day Suez Crisis. News of the massacre was suppressed for weeks, then considered by Palestinians to be another Deir Yassin.

P O L E

Date? - Peace Pole?, Kafr Quasim, (Israel). Airview shows what appears to be a Peace Pole on top of some kind of mound or tell.

F O R E S T

1950's - Jerusalem Forest, Jerusalem (Israel). "Surrounded by the Jerusalem neighborhoods Beit HaKerem, Yefe Nof, Ein Kerem, Har Nof, Givat Shaul, and a moshav, Beit Zeit. The forest was planted during the 1950's by the Jewish National Fund (JNF or KKL), financed by private donors. At its largest, the forest extended over about 4 square kilometres. Over the years, it has shrunk due to urban expansion, & today it covers about 1.2 square kilometres. The Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial is located in the forest near Mount Herzl." Image shows the forest from the exit of Yad Vashem's new (2005) Holocaust History Museum. "At the conclusion of the heart-rending walk through the museum, visitors walk up & outside, almost as if exiting from a tomb, to a balcony with a moving view of the hills, trees & dwellings of modern Israel" -- & Deir Yassin.

S C U L P T U R E 1976 - Children's Memorial, Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, Jerusalem (Israel). Designed by Moshe Safdie. Two different clusters of white pillars. The lower cluster leads to an underground cavern (right image). "A tribute to the approximately 1.5 million Jewish children who perished during the Holocaust. Walking through the [cavern in the dark], visitors hear the names of murdered children, their ages & countries of origin in the background." When they emerge into daylight, they are immediatly confronted with a view of Deir Yassin on the other side of Jerusalem Forest.

S C U L P T U R E 1979 - Dachau Memorial, Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, Jerusalem (Israel). Also called the "Torah Memorial." Cast bronze reproduction by Marcelle Swergold of the famous "International Monument" by Nandor Glid [1924-1997] at Dachau Concentration Camp near Munich, Bravaria (Germany). Near the Memorial to the Death March Victims (qv). Temporary white construction fence in the middle image. Right image shows Deir Yassin (qv) as seen from the Dachau Memorial.

S T O N E

Before 1988 - Stone & Plaque, Dar El Tifl School & Orphanage (qv), East Jerusalem. First of three "Deir Yassin Remembered" memorials (DYR). Across from Orient House (qv) where Hind al-Husseini [1916-1994] sheltered orphans of Deir Yassin on April 10, 1948.

P L A Q U E

Date? - Plaque, south side of East 60th Street at 5th Avenue, Manhattan, New York City, New York (USA). In the sidewalk just east of the "R" subway station. Inscription: "1945-1948. This building sheltered the clandestine mission of the 'Haganah', Israel's pre-state defense forces, which labored unceasingly for Israel's independence and rurvival." /// "Celebrates the fund-raising center of the Haganah, Israel’s pre-state military, a group which took part in Menachem Begin’s massacre of the villagers of Deir Yassin in April 1948, before the State of Israel was officially created..."

T R E E

April 9, 1988 - Fortieth Anniversary Memorial Tree, Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum, Glasgow (Scotland). Inscription: "Deir Yassin. 9th April 1948. This plaque was unveiled by the Lord Provost Robert Gray O.St.J. J.P. L.L.D. in memory of the victims. 9-4-88" Second of three "Deir Yassin Remembered" memorials (DYR). Right image shows Brian Filling, DYR Scotland Coordinator, Chair of the Action for Southern Africa (ACTSA) Scotland & former Chair of the Scottish Anti-Apartheid movement, standing next to the memorial tree.

B O O K

June 10, 1988 - McGowan, Daniel A. & Marc H. Ellis, ed. by, "Remembering Deir Yassim: The Future of Israel & Palestine," Deir Yassim Remembered (DYR), Geneva, New York (USA). Brings together Palestinians & Israelis, Jews, Muslims & Christians, Jewish theologians & Palestinian priests, to reflect on the 50-year legacy of Deir Yassin." See video of almost the same name. Daniel A. McGowan is professor emeritus at Hobart & William Smith Colleges & executive director of Deir Yassin Remembered (YSR). Marc H. Ellis is Professor of Jewish Studies & Director, Center for Jewish Studies, Baylor University, Waco, Texas (USA), & Board Member, Society of Jewish Ethics Steering Committee, Ethics Section, American Academy of Religion.

P L A Z A + S C U L P T U R E 1995 - Family Plaza, International School for Holocaust Studies, Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, Jerusalem (Israel). "Endowed by Felix & Ruta Zandman in memory of their families who perished in the Holocaust. Within the plaza is a [steel] sculpture, strategically placed to overlook the impressive view of Jerusalem & its suburbs [i.e. Deir Yassin], by renowned artist Menashe Kadishman, winner of the Israel Prize for Art in 2000. The sculpture, which was also endowed by Ruta & Dr. Felix Zandman, was inspired by Zandman's personal story during the Holocaust." All three photos taken June 27, 2011.

T R E E

September 24, 2003 - "Deir Yassin Remembered," DYR Headquarters, Seneca Lake (western shore), Geneva, New York, New York (USA). Bronze sculpture of an uprooted olive tree by [political cartoonist] Khalil Bendib. Inscription: "Earth torn roots yearning, Palestine landscape mourning displaced descendants. Randa Hamwi Duwaji. Perpetrated by terrorists of the Irgun and Stern Gang, the massacre of Palestinian men, women, and children at Deir Yassin on April 9, 1948 is arguably the most pivotal event in 20th century Palestinian history. // The massacre symbolizes the Zionist quest to build a Jewish state on land inhabited for centuries by Muslims, Christians, and Jews. It marks the begining of the descruction of over 400 Palestinian villages and the exile of more than 700,000 Palestinians. // Over half the population in the land controlled by Israel is not Jewish. Most of these non-Jews are Palestinians. Yet there are few memorails to mark their history and none to mark the massacre at Deir Yassin, which lies 3 km west of the Old City of Jerusalem and only 1,400 m to the north of Yad Vashem, the most famous of all the Holocaust memorials. The irony is breathtaking. // Khalil Bendib, Sculptor, 2003. www.deiryassin.org" Third of three "Deir Yassin Remembered" memorials (DYR).

V I D E O

April 9, 2006 - "Remembering Deir Yassin." Two-minute on-line video produced by Zochrot of tel Aviv (Israel). Shows the Zochrot ceremony on the 58th anniversary of the Deir Yassin massacre.

V I D E O

2006? - "Deir Yassin Remembered." "A 33-minute on-line documentary video produced by Deir Yassim Remembered (DYR), Geneva, New York (USA). It features Deir Yassin Remembered Executive Director Daniel A. McGowan, massacre survivor Zeinab Akel, Palestinian activists Raneen Jeries & Fahmi Nashashibi, Dar Al Tifl Al Arabi School & Orphanage Director Mahira Dajani, Zochrot founder Eitan Bronstein, International Solidarity Movement activist Neta Golan, founder & coorinator of Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions Jeff Halper & others." See book of almost the same name.

B O O K

2006 - Pappe, Ilan, "The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine," Oneworld, Oxford (England), pp. 313. Ilan Pappe is "professor, College of Social Sciences & International Studies, University of Exeter (England), director of the university's European Centre for Palestine Studies, co-director of the Exeter Centre for Ethno-Political Studies, and a political activist."

F I L M

2007 - "138 Pounds in My Pocket". Twenty-minute film by Sahera Derbas. "Asks how Hind al-Husseini [1916-1994] & her successor filled gaps left by the absence of a state able, or willing, to provide adequate welfare for disadvantaged children. Part biographical, it offers unique insight into the commitment and personal struggle of a remarkable Palestinian woman."

F I L M

September 3, 2010 - "Miral." Feature length "biographical political film directed by [American artist & filmmaker] Julian Schnabel. Screenplay by [Palestinian journalist] Rula Jebreal based on her autobiographical novel. Released on 3 September at the 2010 Venice Film Festival & on 15 September 2010 in France... On April 4, 2011, days after the film's US release [at the UN General Assembly], Juliano Merr-Khamis [1958-2011], an actor and peace activist who plays Seikh Saabah in the film, was shot to death in his car outside a theatre he had established in the Jenin Refugee Camp (Occupied West Bank)."

B O O K

August 2011 - "Nurit Peled-Elhanan, a professor of language & education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has studied the content of Israeli school books for the past five years, and her account, "Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education," is to be published in the UK this month. She describes what she found as racism but, more than that, a racism that prepares young Israelis for their compulsory military service... The killing of Palestinians is depicted as something that was necessary for the survival of the nascent Jewish state, she claims. 'It's not that the massacres are denied, they are represented in Israeli school books as something that in the long run was good for the Jewish state. For example, Deir Yassin was a terrible slaughter by Israeli soldiers. In school books they tell you that this massacre initiated the massive flight of Arabs from Israel & enabled the establishment of a Jewish state with a Jewish majority. So it was for the best. Maybe it was unfortunate, but in the long run the consequences for us were good.' Children, she says, grow up to serve in the army & internalise the message that Palestinians are 'people whose life is dispensable with impunity. And not only that, but people whose number has to be diminished.' Peled-Elhanan approaches her subject from a radical political background. She is the daughter of a famous general, Matti Peled [1923-1995], who became convinced that Israel's future lay in a dignified peace with the Palestinians. After leaving the army, he became active in the peace movement." /// According to Wikipedia, Nurit Peled-Elhanan is an Israeli peace activist, one of the founders of the Bereaved Families for Peace. After the death of Elhanan's 13 year-old daughter in 1997, she became an outspoken critic of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank & Gaza.

V I L L A G E

Future - Palestinian Village of Lifta, West Jerusalem (Israel). "Last visible remnant of the Nakba" [sic]. "Lifta is an anomaly. Among the hundreds of Palestinian villages abandoned in 1948, Lifta is the only one that was neither destroyed nor reinhabited. The villages of [nearby] Ein Karem & Ein Hod [near Haifa], for example, remained standing but were inhabited by Jews. [Former Lifta resident] Yakub Odeh, 67, & others see the remaining 55 homes in Lifta & surrounding terraces as a kind of memorial to Palestinian society before Israel’s War of Independence. After the village was abandoned, the ceilings in the buildings were deliberately destroyed to deter intruders, however the homeless & others on the margins of society took up residence there. Plans call for 212 luxury housing units & a small hotel. Israelis & Palestinians dedicated to Lifta’s preservation have called the plan the end for the last Arab village of its kind."

Maps from 1870's & 1940's showing Deir Yassin, Lifta, Ein Karem & Jerusalem.

V I L L A G E

Since 1948 - Palestinian Village of Ein Kerem, Jerusalem (Israel). Also called Ain Karem. "The 1947 UN Partition Plan placed [Arab] Ein Kerem in the Jerusalem enclave intended for international control. In February 1948, the village's 300 guerilla fighters were reinforced by a well-armed Arab Liberation Army force of mainly Syrian fighters, and on Mar. 10 a substantial Iraqi detachment arrived in the village, followed within days by some 160 Egyptian fighters. On March 19, the villagers joined their foreign guests in attacking a Jewish convoy on the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem road. Immediately after the April 1948 massacre at the nearby village of Deir Yassin (2 km to the north), most of the women and children in the village were evacuated. It was attacked by Israeli forces during the 10-day truce of July 1948. The remaining civilian inhabitants fled on July 10-11... One one of the few depopulated Arab localities which survived the war with most of the buildings intact. The abandoned homes were resettled with new [Jewish] immigrants. Over the years, the bucolic atmosphere attracted a population of artisans & craftsmen." N.B.: I was taken here by my Palestinian taxi driver after he told me he came from a nearby village (this one?) depopulated of Arabs in 1948. He drove me to the Basilica & Crypt of the Visitation (built by Antonio Barluzzi [1884-1960] in 1955) & waited (lower image) while I was inside.

C H A I R

July 15, 1995 - The Surreal Peace Chair, Village Entrance, Ein Hod (Israel). South of Haifa. Bronze 320 cm high. By American artist Dorothy Robbins [1920-1999]. "Great Travel Moment: During our visit to Ein Hod, my sister took a brief rest in the 'Surreal Peace Chair,' which was so enormous her feet didn't touch the ground. The village was chock-full of statues, sculptures, murals, studios & galleries. We couldn't afford anything except the photos we took, but it was a beautiful September day, and we felt like Alice in Wonderland as we ambled along and discovered unusual pieces around every bend of this hilly town." (After a failed attempt to create a moshav on the site, Ein Hod became an artists' colony in 1953. It's not to be confused with nearby Ein Hawd. See road signs at far right. For many years, Ein Hawd was an "unrecognized village" -- as other Palestinian villages still are. "In 1988 Ein Hawd joined the Association of Unrecognized Arab Villages in Israel & was recognized by the state in 1992. In 2005, it achieved full recognition, including connection to the Israeli electric grid.") On June 23, 2011, we visited Ein Hawd & drove past Ein Hod (seeing only some of its statues on the side of the road).

V I L L A G E Since 1948 - Palestinian Village of Al-Ghabisiyya, near Nahariya (Israel). Unintentional monument. Close to the Lebanese border. Village (also called Samniyya?) was ethnically cleansed during the War of 1948. All houses were later destroyed. Ruined mosque (left image) is the village's only remaining building. Village land now used for forestry & a Jewish cemetery. This is representative of more than 500 Palestinian villages that were ethnicly cleased during the 1948 war & Palestinian Exodus (Nakba). Right image shows Daoud Bader (Arab citizen of Israel), Committee of Displaced Palestinians, showing visitors his former village. Both photos were made on June 21, 2011. Click here for Wikipedia article.

V I L L A G E . D A T A B A S E Ongoing - PalestineRemembered.com. Website which "provides a comprehensive source of information about [all of] the villages & cities that were ethnically cleansed, looted & destroyed by the Israeli army. At each town's homepage, you will find pictures (both before and after 1948), the current status of the town, the Israeli colonies that [now] occupy the town's lands, a brief history of the town before & after Nakba, detailed accounts of atrocities & any acts of terror, personal accounts from the refugees themselves, and above all live interviews from refugees reciting their experiences before, during & after al-Nakba."