Azzam Pasha quotation: Difference between revisions

{{Short description|Phrase by an Arab leader about the consequences of a Jewish state}}

 

The historian [[Efraim Karsh]] considers this quote a "genocidal threat".<ref name="karsh" /> The Israeli historian [[Tom Segev]] has disputed Karsh's interpretation, saying that "Azzam used to talk a lot" and pointing to another statement from May 21, 1948, in which Azzam Pasha declared his desire for "equal citizenship for Jews in Arab Palestine".<ref name=Segev/>

</ref> Azzam Pasha, who was held in high esteem by [[David Ben-Gurion]],<ref name=Segev/> met a [[Zionist]] delegation in London, consisting of [[Abba Eban]], [[David Horowitz (economist)|David Horowitz]], both liaison officers with the [[Jewish Agency]] who were accompanied by the journalist [[Jon Kimche]].<ref name=Segev/> The emissaries stated that there was no doubt that a Jewish state would be established and requested that the Arab states accept the consequences and cooperate. They were willing to give cast-iron guarantees against any form of Jewish expansionism.<ref>Howard Morley Sachar, ''A History of Israel: From the Rise of Zionism to Our Time'', Knopf, May 15, 2007, pp. 285, 333.</ref> Azzam Pasha, in his capacity as Secretary General of the Arab League, suggested that the Zionist project be abandoned, and that the Jews could integrate themselves into Arab society on the basis of autonomous entities. He argued that it was pointless to appeal to [[political realism]] when the whole Zionist project demonstrated the efficacy of will-power. There was no option but war. The Zionists, he argued, would be thrown out in the future, just as the [[Crusades|Crusaders]] had been. His Zionist interlocutors read this statement as a fascist declaration, unable, according to Henry Laurens, to see that, as with the Jews of Europe, emancipation from enslavement for the Arabs was seen as requiring recourse to force.<ref name=Segev/><ref>Laurens, ''La Question,'' p. 593.</ref>

 

 

Upon being informed of the meeting, Ben-Gurion, who had previously called Azzam the "most honest and humane among Arab leaders", and who had earlier ordered the [[Haganah]] to prepare for a war, summarized Azzam's position in a meeting with members of his political party:

 

At the pan-Arab summit of 19 September 1947, which convened at [[Saoufar]] in Lebanon, the League decided to employ all available means to ensure the independence of Palestine as an Arab state.

On October 11, the editor of ''[[Akhbar al-Yom]]'', [[Mustafa Amin]], ran an interview he had obtained from Azzam Pasha to report on the outcome of the summit. The article was entitled, "A War of Extermination,"^{(Arabic transliteration required)}, and in one passage contained the following words.<ref name="karsh"/>

 

 

In early December 1947 Azzam told a rally of students in Cairo that "The Arabs conquered the Tartars and the Crusaders and they are now ready to defeat the new enemy," echoing sentiments he had expressed to a journalist the previous day.<ref>{{cite news|title=British Institute Gutted; Demonstration near Cairo|newspaper=The Times of India|date=December 3, 1947|page=5}} &nbsp; {{cite news|author=Margaret Pope|title="Will Fight to Finish," Says League Official|newspaper=The Scotsman|date=December 1, 1947|page=2}}</ref>

A Jewish Agency memorandum, submitted on February 2, 1948, to the U.N. Palestine Commission, tasked with the implementation of the partition resolution, and yet again to the U.N. secretary-general on March 29, 1948, referred to the Azzam Pasha quotation, citing the October 11, 1947, article in Akhbar al-Yom.

 

 

== The uses to which the quotation was put ==

 

Azzam's quoted first sentence, without its initial caveat, appeared in English in a [[Jewish Agency]] memorandum to the United Nations Palestine Commission in February 1948.<ref>Jewish Agency for Palestine, Memorandum on acts of Arab aggression to alter by force the settlement on the future government of Palestine approved by the General Assembly of the United Nations, Submitted to the United Nations Palestine Commission. Lake Success, New York. February 2, 1948. A copy appears in [https://www.un.org/Docs/journal/asp/ws.asp?m=S/710 UN document S/710].</ref> During the next few years, the same partial sentence appeared in its correct 1947 setting in several books.<ref>{{cite book|last=Stone|first=Isidor Feinstein|author-link=I. F. Stone|title=This is Israel|publisher=Boni and Gaer|year=1948|page=21}}; {{cite book|last=Zilliacus|first=Konni|author-link=Konni Zilliacus|title=I choose peace|url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.237184|publisher=Penguin Books|year=1949|page=[https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.237184/page/n256 259]}}</ref> However, by 1952, many publications, including one published by the Israeli government, had moved its date to 1948,<ref>{{cite book|last =Levin|first=Harry| author-link=Harry Levin| title=I saw the Battle of Jerusalem|publisher=Schocken Books|year=1950|pages=164–165}} &nbsp; {{cite book|last =Carlson|first=John Roy|author-link=John Roy Carlson|title=Cairo to Damascus|url =https://archive.org/details/cairotodamascus013892mbp|url-access =limited|publisher=Alfred A. Knopf|year=1951|page=[https://archive.org/details/cairotodamascus013892mbp/page/n297 266]}} &nbsp; {{cite book|last=Learsi|first=Rufus|title=Fulfillment: the epic story of Zionism|url=https://archive.org/details/fulfillmenttheep008764mbp|publisher=World Publishing Company|year=1951|page=[https://archive.org/details/fulfillmenttheep008764mbp/page/n405 384]}} &nbsp; {{cite book|last=Schechtman|first=Joseph|author-link=Joseph Schechtman|title=The Arab Refugee Problem|publisher=Philosophical Society|year=1952|page=6}} &nbsp; {{cite book|author=Israel Office of Information|title=The Arabs in Israel|url=https://archive.org/details/TheArabsInIsrael|date=January 1952}}</ref> specifically to May 15, 1948, shortly after the outbreak of the [[1948 Arab–Israeli War]].<ref name="karsh"/> As the war got underway, ''[[The Jerusalem Post]]'' quoted a further declaration from him:

 

== Quotation source and authenticity debate ==

 

He concluded,

 

==See also==