Palestine
…“An error of this magnitude committed in this century will have repercussions on our descendants in the next…”
The school of prejudice, M.C., Le Jour, December 3rd, 1947.
…“The decision to partition Palestine with the creation of a Jewish State will prove to be the worst universal error ever committed. What appears to be a seemingly small act will have the most unexpected consequences and it is by no means an exaggeration to say that this little affair will shake the world to its core…”
An absurd policy, M.C., Le Jour, December 5th, 1947.
Typed letter:
“Too often we forget that Israel is a prejudiced and confessional state. There is nothing new about this fact but it behooves us again and again to remind the so-called democratic nations that they are in contradiction of themselves by supporting a state like Israel.
It might be argued that their support represents the reality of international affairs, that it embodies the virtues of cooperation, tolerance and the protection of minors and that in doing so the democratic nations are pursuing civil equality. The reality is that they are doing exactly the opposite.
When you have campaigned against a politically and socially racist entity, as was the case in the last war, you do not now have the right to establish, with equal brutality, a surrogate entity in favour of the Jewish people. It is our belief that, in the long term, by supporting this kind of Jewish sectarianism we would be doing a serious disservice to the Jewish people in general. Should the US and the others continue to support the State of Israel the increasingly persecuted and brutally repressed Jewish people will to turn to the sectarian metropolis they are trying to establish which cannot absorb them all and that the outcome of this would be recurrent hardship for the ‘chosen people’, disarray in the world through the very existence of Israel, her self-serving encroachments and any number of further crises.
Nonetheless, the main point that needs highlighting here is the irrational approach of those nations most proficient with the concept of democracy who now champion the State of Israel. We are as cognisant of the concept as they are but why is it that the most intransigent version of democracy has led them toward Jewish exclusionists and to a Jewish confessional State as if it were a universal virtue?…
…Not enough thought has been given to this matter or rather what was lacking was the courage to face the truth, to serve it faithfully and to see it triumph.
Ignoring the facts and voting for the partition of Palestine is simply not acceptable. Those nations who chose to support partition also chose the outrageous option of creating the most prejudiced and the most exclusively confessional state in the world. This is the fact that liberals will not face and what the so-called ‘democracies’ are recommending…
…Never has anything so illogical and so contrary to the tenets of the United Nations been seen before. Members of the UN seem oblivious to the fact that the contagious nature of this will incite the most acute form of discrimination and an explosion of fanaticism in those who are being asked to show broadmindedness and tolerance for the Jewish people.
If so much ambiguity is allowed the Jewish people and that in every country and in every capital the manifest existence of a discriminatory and exclusively confessional Israeli state is allowed, then why is this not allowed for others? How is this hypocrisy justified? Why are there two sets of rules? And how can this be defended?”
Michel Chiha archives
…“The war in Palestine has challenged the Arab League like no other organisation has ever been challenged before. In such particular circumstances one might have expected absolute solidarity and foresight. This was not the case and the outcome is an established and well-armed state of Israel with the Arab countries disorganised, discredited and at loggerheads with one another…”
Vicissitudes of the League, M.C., Le Jour, June 13th, 1950.
…“When it came to the matter of Israel, in its usual naked recalcitrance, Jordan pursued its own stratagem in defiance of the League. The Arabs paid the price. What is at issue now is the collective defence of the Mediterranean region. What do we do if Jordan and Iraq underestimate the long term repercussions? Unlike them, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon are particularly affected by this matter as we all have an extensive Mediterranean coastline, one which is patently bound to consociate all Mediterranean nations…”
League policy, M.C., Le Jour, May 12th, 1951.
…“In the State of Israel’s Declaration of Independence signed on the 14th of May 1948 by M.D. Ben Gurion and Mr. Moshe Shertok, it affirms that the State of Israel will be open to all members of the Jewish Diaspora. It goes on to call “all Jewish people of the world to immigrate to Israel There exists no other nation that has recruited its population in this manner and then proceeded to give complete strangers the right of abode on the single proviso that they be of the Jewish faith. Neither the Christians nor the Muslims nor any other faith has ever acted in this way and it is entirely unprecedented everywhere. The legal provisions for discrimination and acute confessionalism embodied in the very charter of the Jewish State, whereby religion determines nationality, are unique. Therefore it is ludicrous to exhort the neighbouring countries to believe that a state with such laws and such objectives is amenable to reasonable terms for peace and incomprehensible for the Peace Commission to persist in proposing conciliation in all good faith!”
Immigration to Israel, M. C., Le Jour, October 5th, 1951.