Jewish Refugees from Arab States

Jewish Refugees from Arab States

INTRODUCTION
When the issue of refugees is raised within the context of the Middle East, people invariably refer to Palestinian refugees, virtually never to Jews displaced from Arab countries.
In reality, two major population movements occurred as a result of over a half century of turmoil in the Middle East. Securing rights for these former Jewish refugees has never been adequately addressed by the international community. For any peace process to be credible and enduring, it must address the rights of all Middle East refugees, including Jewish and other minority populations that were displaced from Arab countries.
Historically, Jews and Jewish communities have existed in the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf region for more than 2,500 years. Jews in substantial numbers resided in what are to-day Arab countries over 1,000 years before the advent of Islam. Following the Moslem conquest of the region, for centuries, while relegated to second-class status, Jews were nonetheless permitted limited religious, educational, professional, and business opportunities.
It is important to note that the treatment of Jews by Arab leaders and Islamic populations varied greatly from country to country. By way of example, in some countries, Jews were forbidden to leave (e.g. Syria); in others, many Jews were expelled (e.g. Egypt) or displaced en masse (e.g. Iraq); while other Jewish communities lived in relative peace under the protection of Muslim rulers (e.g. Tunisia, Morocco).
When Arab countries gained independence, followed by the rise in Arab nationalism, statesanctioned measures, coupled often with violence and repression, made remaining in the land of their birth an untenable option for Jews.
In 1948, the status of Jews in Arab countries worsened dramatically as many Arab countries declared war, or backed the war against the newly founded State of Israel. Jews were either uprooted from their countries of longtime residence or became subjugated, political hostages of the Arab-Israeli conflict. In virtually all cases, as Jews left the country, individual and communal properties were confiscated without compensation.
Since 1948, over 850,000 Jews have left their birthplaces and their homes in some 10 Arab countries. To-day, fewer than 7,000 Jews remain in these same countries.
The fact that Jews displaced from Arab countries were indeed bone fide refugees, under international law, is beyond question.
• On two separate occasions the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
ruled that Jews fleeing from Arab countries were indeed ‘bona fide’ refugees who “fall under the mandate of my (UNHCR) office”.1
1 Mr. Auguste Lindt, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Report of the UNREF Executive Committee, Fourth Session – Geneva 29 January to 4 February, 1957; and Dr. E. Jahn, Office of the UN High Commissioner, United Nations
High Commissioner for Refugees, Document No. 7/2/3/Libya, July 6, 1967.
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• In all relevant international bilateral or multilateral agreements, (i.e., UN Resolution 242, The Road Map, The Madrid Conference, etc.), the reference to “refugees” is generic, allowing for the recognition and inclusion of all Middle East refugees - Jews, Christians, and other minorities.
This Legal Report is intended to document, and assert, the rights of Jews displaced from Arab countries. Justice for Jewish refugees from Arab countries must assume its rightful place on the international political agenda, as a matter of law and equity.
It is important to underscore that:
1) The legitimate call to secure rights and redress for Jews displaced from Arab countries is not a campaign against Palestinian refugees. In any Middle East peace proposals, Palestinian refugees will be up for discussion. The history and truth about the plight of former Jewish refugees from Arab countries must be also be acknowledged and returned to the narrative of the Middle East from which it has been expunged;
2) This Report should not be misconstrued as ‘anti-Arab’. This Report provides an accurate historical narrative about the plight and flight of Jews from Arab countries that has never been recognized by the international community nor acknowledged by Arab countries.
Compelling evidence supports the call for justice to redress the victimization of Jews who lived in Arab countries and the mass violations of human rights that they were victims of;
and
3) This initiative is not about money, nor about launching legal proceedings to seek
compensation. This Report provides legal facts and evidence to assist all parties in any future negotiations on rights and redress for all Middle East refugees. In the absence of truth and justice, there can be no reconciliation, without which there can be no just, lasting peace between and among all peoples of the region.
The first injustice was the mass violations of rights of Jews in Arab countries. To-day, we must not allow a second injustice – for the international community to recognize rights for one victim population - Palestinian refugees - without recognizing equal rights for other victims of that very same Middle East conflict - former Jewish, Christian and other refugees from Arab countries.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY................................................................P. 6
I) WHY NOW? ........................................................................P. 13
II) ARAB LEAGUE CONSPIRACY AGAINST THEIR
JEWISH POPULATIONS......................................................P. 22
III) THE HISTORICAL NARRATIVE............................................P. 34
IV) THE RESPONSE OF THE UNITED NATIONS
TO THE PLIGHT OF REFUGEES, ARISING
OUT OF THE ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT ………........….......P. 38
V) COUNTRY REPORTS ...........................................................P. 45
VI) JEWISH REFUGEES FROM ARAB COUNTRIES:
THE CASE FOR RIGHTS AND REDRESS ……........…………..P. 58
VII) CONCLUSIONS……………………………….……….…………..…P. 69
VIII) BIOS OF CO-AUTHORS........................................................P. 70
IX) JUSTICE FOR JEWS FROM ARAB COUNTRIES.....................P. 71
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
A) Why Now?
Why has justice for Jewish refugees not only been delayed, but why has it been denied all these years?
Why has the issue been absent, not only from the international justice agenda, but why has it also been absent all these years from the Middle East peace agenda?
Why is it that the U.N. is preparing, yet again, to commemorate the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – on the 60th anniversary of the U.N. Partition Resolution of 1947 – but will ignore, yet again, the plight of Jewish refugees on that commemorative
occasion? Let there be no doubt about it: where there is no remembrance, there is no truth; where there is no truth, there will be no justice; where there is no justice, there will be no reconciliation; and where there is no reconciliation, there will be no peace.
There are a number of compelling, indeed urgent, moral and juridical considerations whose convergence warrants the publication of this Report.
First, there is the importance of rectifying the distorted historical narrative of Middle East refugees, and repressing the painful and pernicious delay and denial of justice for Jewish refugees these past sixty years. In particular, Jewish refugees from Arab countries must be restored to the Middle East narrative from which they have been expunged and eclipsed.
Second, there is the importance of the right to memory and the duty of remembrance of Jewish refugees; the importance for the refugees themselves of bearing witness; and the importance of hearing and documenting this witness testimony.
Third, there is the need to lay bare the truth, to counter the Middle East revisionism and distortion, to expose the cover-up of the historical narrative; and to combat the corruption of truth that inhibits understanding and prevents validation of a victim population, their history,
their experience, and their pain.
Fourth, this Report not only details this pattern of state-sanctioned repression of Jews throughout Arab countries, but uncovers, for the first time, evidence of an international criminal conspiracy by the League of Arab States to persecute its own Jewish populations, as set forth more fully in Chapter 2 of this report.
Fifth, there are important developments in international human rights and humanitarian law, where more has happened in the last 15 years than in the previous sixty, which now underpin a right of redress for victim populations, and which apply specifically to the case of Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
Sixth, there is now a panoply of remedies to implement the right of redress in international law.
These are not limited to compensation or indemnification of a victim population, but include such components as the right of memory, the duty of remembrance, the search for truth, access to justice, state-responsibility for wrongs inflicted, and the like.
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Seventh, the whole question of refugees – and refugee claims – has now emerged at the
forefront of the peace process, be it as a subject matter of the bilateral Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, or as a subject of the forthcoming Middle East peace conference in Annapolis, or as in every narrative of discussions on the Israeli-Palestinian and Middle East peace process. Yet in each and all instances, the reference is only to Palestinian refugees, thereby cleansing Jewish refugees from the Middle East peace process narrative.
Eighth, there is the particular pernicious and prejudicial role of the United Nations, which has systemically excluded the narrative of Jewish refugees from Arab countries from any U.N. narrative on the Middle East, either by exclusively identifying only Palestinian refugees as the sole victim population of the Middle East conflict, or by asserting only Palestinian rights of redress while ignoring those of Jewish refugees.
International law now obliges us to recognize and respect the narrative of victims of human rights violations, and therefore also obliges us to respect justice for Jewish refugees from Arab countries and their case for rights and redress. Only in this fashion can there be movement from remembrance to truth, from truth to justice, from justice to reconciliation, and from reconciliation to peace - between and among all peoples and states in the region.
B) The Historical Narrative Historically, Jews and Jewish communities have existed in the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf region for more than 2,500 years.
Fully one thousand years before the advent of Islam, Jews in substantial numbers resided in what are to-day Arab countries. Following the Moslem conquest of the region, for centuries under Islamic rule, Jews were considered second class citizens but were nonetheless permitted limited religious, educational, professional, and business opportunities.
Upon the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948, the status of Jews in Arab countries changed dramatically as virtually all Arab countries declared war, or backed the war against Israel. This rejection by the Arab world of a Jewish state in their ancient homeland was the event that triggered a dramatic surge in a longstanding, pattern of abuse and state-legislated discrimination initiated by Arab regimes and their peoples to make life for Jews in Arab countries simply untenable. Jews were either uprooted from their countries of residence or became subjugated, political hostages of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Little is heard about these Jewish refugees because they did not remain refugees for long. Of the hundreds of thousands of Jewish refugees between 1948 and 1972, some two–thirds were resettled in Israel at great expense – others emigrated elsewhere – all without any compensation provided by the Arab governments who confiscated their possessions.
Securing rights and redress for Jews displaced from Arab countries is an issue that has not yet been adequately addressed by the international community. In fact, there were more former Jewish refugees uprooted from Arab countries (over 850,000) than there were Palestinians (UN estimate: 726,000) who became refugees as a result of the 1948 war when numerous Arab nations attacked the newly established State of Israel.
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C) The Mass Violations of Human Rights
The uprooting of ancient Jewish communities from some 10 Muslim countries did not occur by happenstance. State-sanctioned repressive measures, coupled often with violence and repression, precipitated a mass displacement of Jews and caused the Jewish refugee problem in the Middle East. There is evidence that points to a shared pattern of conduct amongst a number of Arab regimes, that appear intended to coerce Jews to leave and go elsewhere, or to retain them as virtual political hostages. These are evidenced from: (a) statements made by delegates of Arab countries at the U.N. during the debate on the partition resolution representing a pattern of ominously similar threats made against Jews in Arab countries; (b) Recently discovered Draft Law of the Political Committee of the Arab League detailing a
coordinated strategy of repressive measures against Jews; (c) newspaper reports from that period; and (d) strikingly similar legislation and discriminatory decrees, enacted by numerous Arab governments, that violated the fundamental rights and freedoms of Jews resident in Arab countries.
From the sheer volume of such state-sanctioned discriminatory measures, replicated in so many Arab countries and instituted in such a parallel fashion, one is drawn to the conclusion that such evidence suggests a common pattern of repressive measures – indeed collusion - against Jews by Arab governments.
The Report contains country reports that describe these unmistakable trends. The situations in Egypt, Iraq and Libya are described in greater detail. General ‘snapshot” profiles are provided on 7 other countries, including Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Yemen, Aden, Syria and Lebanon.
D) The Discriminatory Response of the United Nations to the Plight of Jewish Refugees
From 1948 onward, the response of the international community to assist Palestinian refugees arising out of the Arab-Israeli conflict was immediate and definitive. During that same period, there was no concomitant United Nations’ response, nor any comparable international action, to alleviate the plight of Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
The sole comparison that can be made between Palestinian and Jewish refugees is that both were determined to be bona fide refugees under international law, albeit each according to different internationally accepted definitions and statutes – the former covered by UNRWA and the latter by the UNHCR.
As far as the response of the United Nations is concerned, the similarity ends there. The contrasts, however, are stark:
a) Since 1947, there have been 1063 UN General Assembly resolutions dealing with
virtually every aspect of the Middle East and the Arab Israeli conflict.
b) Fully 167 of these UN resolutions refer directly and specifically to the ‘plight’ of Palestinian refugees.
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c) In none of these 1063 UN resolutions on the Middle East is there a specific reference to, nor any expression of concern for, the estimated 1,000,000 Jews living in, or being displaced from Arab countries during the twentieth century.
d) Numerous UN agencies and organizations were involved in a variety of efforts, or
others were specifically created (e.g. UNRWA) to provide protection, relief, and
assistance to Palestinian refugees. No such attention and assistance was forthcoming
from these UN agencies for Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
e) Since 1948, billions of dollars have been spent by the international community - by the UN, its affiliated entities and member states - to provide relief and assistance to Palestinian refugees. During that same period, no such international financial support was ever provided to ameliorate the plight of Jewish refugees.
UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, was established by United Nations General Assembly resolution 302 (IV) of 8 December 1949 to carry out urgent, direct relief and works programs for Palestine refugees. However, Arab governments, supported by Palestinian leaders, have consistently rejected any proposal or initiative designed to provide more permanent resettlement and housing for the Palestinian refugees, preferring to utilize Palestinian refugees’ continuing plight for political purposes.
E) The Legal Case for Rights and Redress
In the context of the Middle East, it would be an injustice to ignore the rights of Jews from Arab countries. As a matter of law and equity, it would not be appropriate to recognize the claim of Palestinian refugees to redress without recognizing a right to redress for former Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
The international definition of a refugee clearly applies to Jews displaced from
Arab countries:
A refugee is a person who "owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for
reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or
political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality, and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country...”
The 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees
On two occasions, in 1957 and again in 1967, the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) determined that Jews fleeing from Arab countries were refugees who fell within the mandate of the UNHCR.
“Another emergency problem is now arising: that of refugees from Egypt. There is no
doubt in my mind that those refugees from Egypt who are not able, or not willing to avail themselves of the protection of the Government of their nationality fall under the mandate of my office.”
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Mr. Auguste Lindt, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Report of the
UNREF Executive Committee, Fourth Session – Geneva 29 January to 4 February,
1957.
“I refer to our recent discussion concerning Jews from Middle Eastern and North African countries in consequence of recent events. I am now able to inform you that such persons may be considered prima facie within the mandate of this Office.”
Dr. E. Jahn, Office of the UN High Commissioner, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Document No. 7/2/3/Libya, July 6, 1967.
At the United Nations, on November 22nd, 1967, the Security Council unanimously adopted, Resolution 242, laying down the principles for a peaceful settlement in the Middle East Still considered the primary vehicle for resolving the Arab-Israel conflict, Resolution 242,
stipulates that a comprehensive peace settlement should necessarily include “a just
settlement of the refugee problem”. No distinction is made between Arab refugees and Jewish refugees.
On Thursday, November 16, 1967 the United Kingdom submitted their draft of Resolution 242 [S/8247] to the UN Security Council. The UK version of 242 was not exclusive, and called for a just settlement of “the refugee problem.” Just four days after the United Kingdom submission, the Soviet Union’s U.N. delegation submitted their own draft Resolution 242 to the Security Council [S/8253] restricting the “just settlement” only to “Palestinian refugees” [Para. 3 (c)].
On Wednesday, November 22, 1967, the Security Council gathered for its 1382nd meeting in New York at which time, the United Kingdom’s draft of Resolution 242 was voted on and unanimously approved.2 Immediately after the UK’s version of 242 was adopted, the Soviet delegation advised the Security Council, that “it will not insist, at the present stage of our consideration of the situation in the Near East, on a vote on the draft Resolution submitted by the Soviet Union” which would have limited 242 to Palestinian refugees only.3
Thus the attempt by the Soviets to restrict the “just settlement of the refugee problem” merely to “Palestinian refugees” was not successful. The international community adoption of the UK’s inclusive version signaled a desire for 242 to seek a just solution for all – including Jewish refugees - arising from the Middle East conflict.
Moreover, Justice Arthur J. Goldberg, the US Ambassador to the United Nations who was
seminally involved in drafting4 the unanimously adopted Resolution, told The Chicago Tribune that the Soviet version of Resolution 242 was “not even-handed.”5 He later pointed out that:
“The Resolution addresses the objective of ‘achieving a just settlement of the refugee problem.’ This language presumably refers both to Arab and Jewish refugees, for about an equal number of each abandoned their homes as a result of the several wars…” 6
2 Security Council Official Records - November 22, 1967 - S/PV.1382 - Paragraph 67
3 Security Council Official Records - November 22, 1967 - S/PV.1382 - Paragraph 117
4 Transcript, Arthur J. Goldberg Oral History Interview I, 3/23/83, by Ted Gittinger; Lyndon B. Johnson Library. March 23, 1983; Pg I-10
5 “Russia stalls UN Action on Middle East.” The Chicago Tribune. November 21, 1967 pg. B9 11
With respect to Multilateral Initiatives, the Madrid Conference, first convened in October 1991, launched historic, direct negotiations between Israel and many of her Arab neighbors.
In his opening remarks at a conference convened to launch the multilateral process held in Moscow in January 1992, then-U.S. secretary of state James Baker made no distinction between Palestinian refugees and Jewish refugees in articulating the mandate of the Refugee Working Group as follows: “The refugee group will consider practical ways of improving the lot of people throughout the region who have been displaced from their homes.” 7
Similarly, the Roadmap to Middle East peace currently being advanced by the Quartet (the U.N., EU, U.S., and Russia also refers in Phase III to an “agreed, just, fair and realistic solution to the refugee issue”, language applicable both to Palestinian and Jewish refugees.
All Bilateral Arab-Israeli Agreements allow for a case to be made that Egypt, Jordan and the Palestinians have affirmed that a comprehensive solution to the Middle East conflict will require a “just settlement” of the “refugee problem” that will include recognition of the rights and claims of all Middle East refugees:
• Israel – Egypt Agreements
The Camp David Framework for Peace in the Middle East of 1978 (the “Camp David Accords”) includes, in paragraph A(1)(f), a commitment by Egypt and Israel to “work with each other and with other interested parties to establish agreed procedures for a prompt, just and permanent resolution of the implementation of the refugee problem.”
Article 8 of the Israel – Egypt Peace Treaty of 1979 provides that the “Parties agree to establish a claims commission for the mutual settlement of all financial claims.” Those claims include those of former Jewish refugees displaced from Egypt.
• Israel – Jordan Peace Treaty, 1994
Article 8 of the Israel – Jordan Peace Treaty, entitled “Refugees and Displaced Persons” recognizes, in paragraph 1, “the massive human problems caused to both Parties by the conflict in the Middle East”. Reference to massive human problems in a broad manner suggests that the plight of all refugees of “the conflict in the Middle East” includes Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
• Israeli-Palestinian Agreements, 1993-
Almost every reference to the refugee issue in Israeli-Palestinian agreements, talks about “refugees”, without qualifying which refugee community is at issue, including the Declaration of Principles of 13 September 1993 {Article V (3)}, and the Interim Agreement
6 Goldberg, Arthur J., “Resolution 242: After 20 Years.” The Middle East: Islamic Law and Peace (U.S. Resolution 242: Origin,
Meaning and Significance.) National Committee on American Foreign Policy; April 2002. (Originally written by Arthur J. Goldberg for the American Foreign Policy Interests on the occasion of its twentieth anniversary in 1988.)
7 Remarks by Secretary of State James A. Baker, III before the Organizational Meeting for Multilateral Negotiations on the Middle East, House of Unions, Moscow, January 28, 1992.
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of September 1995 {Articles XXXI (5)}, both of which refer to “refugees” as a subject for permanent status negotiations, without qualifications.
Recognition by Political Leaders of the rights of Jewish refugees from Arab countries
include:
• After ‘Camp David II’, U.S. President Bill Clinton recognized the rights of Jews
displaced from Arab countries in a July 27th, 2000 interview on Israeli Television when he stated:8
Israel is full of people, Jewish people, who lived in predominantly Arab countries
who came to Israel because they were made refugees in their own land”.
• Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, after successfully brokering the Camp David
Accords and the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty, stated in a press conference on Oct. 27, 1977:
“Palestinians have rights… obviously there are Jewish refugees…they have
the same rights as others do.”
• Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin stated, in a June 3rd, 2005 interview with the
Canadian Jewish News which he later reaffirmed in a July 14, 2005 letter:
“A refugee is a refugee and that the situation of Jewish refugees from Arab lands
must be recognized. All refugees deserve our consideration as they have lost
both physical property and historical connections.”
The Report argues for redress as a matter of international law. Jews from Arab countries are entitled to invoke the right to redress because of the injustices inflicted upon them that caused their displacement.
The report refers to the remedies available to assert the right to redress. The remedies considered include the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees, the United Nations Convention on the Status of Refugees, a compensation fund established under an Arab-Israeli comprehensive settlement, and possibly, litigation in the courts of the countries where Jews displaced from Arab countries are now found.
8 Transcript released by The White House Office of the Press Secretary, “Interview of the President by Israeli Television”; The Roosevelt Room; July 27, 2000; 5:42 P.M. EDT
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I) WHY NOW?
A) From UN Partition Plan (1947) to Annapolis Peace Summit (2007): Rectifying an Historical Injustice 60 years Later By the Honorable Irwin Cotler
In 1987, I co-chaired with the late Justice Arthur Goldberg of the Supreme Court of the United States, then U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., a tribunal on Justice for Jewish Refugees from Arab countries. One of the witnesses that came before our Tribunal lamented, “why now?” “Why was this happening forty years later?”
Today, twenty years after that Tribunal, on the eve of the 60th anniversary of the United Nations Partition Resolution of November 29, 1947, and the Annapolis Peace Conference, this lament is even more pronounced.
Indeed, the question is not so much why are we talking about justice for Jewish refugees from Arab countries sixty years later, but why has this concern not been on the international justice agenda at all?
Why has justice for Jewish refugees not only been delayed, but why has it been denied all these years?
Why has the issue been absent, not only from the international justice agenda, but why has it also been absent all these years from the Middle East peace agenda?
Why is it that as we approach the Annapolis peace conference on the Middle East – now scheduled for Nov. 29 2007 – there is mention only of Palestinian refugees, but no mention of Jewish refugees, though there are two victim populations arising from this conflict?
Why is it that the U.N. is preparing, yet again, to commemorate the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People – on the 60th anniversary of the U.N. Partition Resolution of 1947 – but will ignore, yet again, the plight of Jewish refugees on that commemorative occasion?
Why have Jewish refugees from Arab countries been expunged from the Middle East narrative?
Indeed, why is this narrative so distorted – and inverted – such that the original 1947 U.N. Partition Resolution is held out as one where Palestinian-Arab refugees are identified as the victim population – and they were – but no reference is made to the fact that Jewish refugees were also a victim population; and that Arab governments - and the League of Arab States - were responsible for both Palestinian and Jewish victim refugee populations as set forth in this Report?
What does it take, then, to rectify this historical injustice, this exercise in historical Middle East revisionism?
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Let there be no doubt about it: where there is no remembrance, there is no truth; where there is no truth, there will be no justice; where there is no justice, there will be no reconciliation; and where there is no reconciliation, there will be no peace.
Accordingly, this chapter will be organized around two themes. First, ‘why now?’ What factors have mandated the publication of this report; and second, what are the principles that underpin the pursuit of justice for Jewish refugees from Arab countries, and what is the case for rights and redress?
B) Why Now? What Factors Motivate the Publication of this Report?
There are a number of compelling, indeed urgent, moral and juridical considerations whose convergence warrants the publication of this Report.
First, there is the importance of rectifying the distorted historical narrative of Middle East refugees, and redressing the painful and pernicious delay and denial of justice for Jewish refugees these past sixty years. In particular, Jewish refugees from Arab countries must be restored to the Middle East narrative from which they have been expunged and eclipsed.
Indeed, this exclusion is not only historical but also contemporary; there is an ongoing failure to include the plight of Jewish refugees in any narrative of the Middle East conflict, in any discussion of the Middle East peace process, and in any decision-making at the multi-lateral level, such as in the United Nations.
Second, there is the importance of the right to memory and the duty of remembrance of Jewish refugees; the importance for the refugees themselves of bearing witness; and the importance of hearing and documenting this witness testimony and ongoing narrative, particularly given the increasing willingness of witnesses to come forward some sixty years later to recount the experiences that they themselves have sometimes repressed.
Indeed, the raison d’être for the establishment of this group – Justice for Jewish Refugees from Arab Counties – and the publication of this report on “The Case for Rights and Redress” is the principle of zachor – of remembrance – of having peoples’ stories and testimonies both acknowledged and respected, and their experiences validated and understood.
Third, there is the need to lay bare the truth, to counter the Middle East revisionism and distortion, to expose the cover-up of the historical narrative; and to combat the corruption of truth that inhibits understanding and prevents validation of a victim population, their history, their experience, and their pain.
Indeed, this report exposes not only the massive human rights violations that Jewish refugees from Arab countries have experienced, but documents - for the first time - the state-sanctioned character of these violations, including Nuremberg-like laws that resulted in denationalization, forced expulsions, illegal sequestration of property, and the like, the whole as set forth more fully in Chapter 5 of this report.
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Fourth, this Report not only details this pattern of state-sanctioned repression of Jews throughout Arab countries, but uncovers, for the first time, evidence of an international criminal conspiracy by the League of Arab States to persecute its own Jewish populations, as set forth more fully in Chapter 2 of this report.
Fifth, there are important developments in international human rights and humanitarian law, where more has happened in the last 15 years than in the previous sixty, which now underpin a right of redress for victim populations, and which apply specifically to the case of Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
Sixth, there is now a panoply of remedies to implement the right of redress in international law.
These are not limited to compensation or indemnification of a victim population, but include such components as the right of memory, the duty of remembrance, the search for truth, access to justice, state-responsibility for wrongs inflicted, and the like.
Seventh, the whole question of refugees – and refugee claims – has now emerged at the
forefront of the peace process, be it as a subject matter of the bilateral Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, or as a subject of the forthcoming Middle East peace conference in Annapolis, or as in every narrative of discussions on the Israeli-Palestinian and Middle East peace process. Yet in each and all instances, the reference is only to Palestinian refugees, thereby cleansing Jewish refugees from the Middle East peace process narrative.
Eighth, there is the particular pernicious and prejudicial role of the United Nations, which has systemically excluded the narrative of Jewish refugees from Arab countries from any U.N. narrative on the Middle East, either by exclusively identifying only Palestinian refugees as the sole victim population of the Middle East conflict, or by asserting only Palestinian rights of redress while ignoring those of Jewish refugees.
C) Foundational Principles for Rights and Redress Each of the foundational principles for rights and redress correspond to – and respond to – the above exigencies that mandated this report.
The first principle is fidelity to justice and the rule of law, to correct the historical record and redress misrepresentations of fact and law.
Second, there is the important principle of the right of memory and the duty of remembrance – of remembering and respecting the narrative and experience of the victim population. In this instance, it is remembering the victim population of the “forgotten exodus” of 856,000 Jews from ten Arab countries, of which only some 8,000 remain today, an astonishing statistic.
Yet, this is not just a matter of abstract principles or statistics. Behind each statistic is a name, an identity, a family, a member of a community. Each person is a universe; each person deserves to be remembered; each deserves to have his or her voice acknowledged and affirmed; each deserves to have his or her voice – his or her testimony – his or her truth – be part of the historical narrative.
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There is a third, and related, principle – an important and integral component of memory and remembrance – and that is the search for truth, the antidote to Middle East historical revisionism in the matter of refugees.
The expunging of the “forgotten exodus” from the Middle East narrative is bad enough, but it ignores – or covers up – that it was a forced exodus, indeed, a forced expulsion of these Jews from Arab countries. Moreover, this forced expulsion - as documented in this Report – did not happen par hazard; rather, it was the result of state-orchestrated, state-sanctioned patterns of oppression, including threats, harassments, beatings, and pogroms targeting the Jewish population as described more fully in this report.
More importantly, yet rarely addressed and appreciated – if indeed even known – is the enactment in the Arab countries of Nuremberg-type laws against their Jewish population, and which, for example, decreed that: Jews were the enemies of the state in which they lived; Jews were to be denied or to forfeit their citizenship; Jewish property was to be sequestered; assets belonging to Jews were to be seized and their bank accounts blocked – the whole with a view to make their lives and those of their communities untenable. These Nuremberg-like laws therefore constituted not only a legal system of state-sanctioned discrimination, but they served as the basis for state-sanctioned expulsion.
Fourth, there is a dramatic and hitherto unknown evidentiary finding, namely, that these massive human rights violations were not events that occurred coincidently or haphazardly; nor were they the result only of state-sanctioned patterns of repression in each of the Arab countries, though this would be bad enough; rather, as the evidence discloses, they were the result of an international criminal conspiracy by the League of Arab States to target and persecute the Jewish populations in their respective countries.
In a word, there is clear evidence that points to a shared pattern of criminal conduct amongst a number of Arab regimes to coerce Jews to leave or to treat them as non-Jews if they remained.
The evidence included, as set forth more fully in the report: (a) Statements made by delegates of Arab countries at the U.N. during the debate on the Partition Resolution, representing a pattern of ominously similar threats made against Jews in Arab countries; (b) newspaper reports from that period; and (c) strikingly similar legislation and discriminatory decrees, enacted by numerous Arab governments in violation of the fundamental rights and freedoms of Jewish residents in Arab countries.
The sheer volume of such state-sanctioned discriminatory measures, replicated in so many Arab countries and instituted in such a parallel fashion, reveals a common pattern of repressive measures – indeed collusion - against Jews by Arab governments.
Moreover, lest there be any doubt about it, this Report reproduces a recently discovered document – the Draft Law of the Political Committee of the Arab League - where the plan to persecute Jews in Arab countries is set out in chilling detail. Indeed, in light of this Report, it is not possible to argue that Arab states, when enacting legislation against their Jewish minorities, simply acted in coincidental parallel fashion.
The Draft Law has seven simple provisions. The first requires registration of Jews and classifies them all as "members of the Jewish minority state of Palestine," i.e. that they are citizens of an 17 enemy state, Israel. The second requires freezing of Jewish bank accounts and use of the funds from those accounts to finance the wars of Arab states against the Jewish state.
The third states "only Jews who are subjects of foreign countries will be considered as neutrals." That is to say, Jews who are subjects of an Arab country are to be considered as hostile enemies.
The fifth clause provides for internment of active Zionists, those who support the right of Israel to exist. Their financial resources will be confiscated.
The fourth and sixth provisions state that any Jewish person who meets certain criteria is "free to act as he likes." Subject to two qualifications: that each Jewish person must prove that their activities are anti-Zionist and in active opposition to the right of self-determination of the Jewish people; and they must declare their readiness to join Arab armies, which were at war with Israel. In other words, only a Jew willing to kill other Jews is "free to act as he likes."
The final clause says that even if Jews meet these “criteria” they still have to register as Jews and will have their bank accounts frozen. These provisions make a mockery of the alleged exception that some Jews would have freedom of action. In reality, under the Draft Law, no Jew is free to act as he or she likes.
D) An Ominous Discovery: The Comparison between the State-Sanctioned Patterns of Repression in Arab Countries and the Draft Law of the League of Arab States
The pattern of repressive behavior against Jews in each of the Arab countries is disturbing enough, but what makes the repressive behavior so ominous, and the conspiracy so evident, is the comparison between the repressive measures adopted in early 1948 in each of the Arab League member states, and the corresponding blueprint of the Draft Law.
First, the Draft Law imposes denationalization - "all Jewish citizens of (name of country) will be considered as members of the Jewish minority State of Palestine." Shortly thereafter, as this Report documents, a massive denationalization began in each of the member states.
Second, the Draft Law requires the freezing of Jewish bank accounts, and Jewish bank accounts subsequently frozen by law.
Third, the Draft Law calls for the diversion of the funds of frozen Jewish bank accounts, in order to finance the Arab wars against Israel. This is exactly what happened, as enshrined in law, in country after country in the region.
Fourth, the Draft Law requires internment and confiscation of property of "active Zionists."
What follows is that “Zionism” then became a criminal offence throughout the region - in some cases even punishable by death - while the reports of Jewish property confiscation became widespread in country after country.
In brief, the Draft Law was a prediction of what was to happen to Jews in the Arab countries.
It became a blueprint, in country after country, for the laws that were eventually to be enacted 18 in these countries against Jews, for the actions that devastated the Jewish communities in Arab lands; and for the forced exodus that was to follow.
I have elaborated more on this fourth principle because of its particular ominous character; that these massive human rights violations in Arab countries against the Jewish populations were not only the result of state-sanctioned patterns of oppression – including Nuremberg-type laws – which occurred par hazard, in parallel fashion, in each of the Arab countries; but as the above evidence discloses, they were the result of a collusion between Arab states – a blue-print embodied in the Draft Law of the League of Arab States – to persecute its Jewish nationals. I will now continue with the recitation of the foundational principles underlying the case for rights and redress, and the imperative, for rectifying this historical injustice.
The fifth principle, then, is that of the right to justice and corresponding right to redress. Simply put, victims of such massive human rights violations – particularly such as the Jewish victims of such state-sanctioned patterns of repression – have a right to justice and redress for those human rights violations, as sanctioned in international human rights and humanitarian law.
Indeed, the remedies developed under international human rights and humanitarian law for victim populations – and therefore for the Jews from Arab countries – include, but are not limited to: the right to memory and the duty of remembrance; access to justice including the right to know the truth about these violations; and the right to reparations, which should be proportionate to the gravity of the violations and the harm suffered by the victim group.
The Sixth principle, also anchored in basic principles of international humanitarian law, is that of State Responsibility for such massive human rights violations. Simply put, the states responsible for these violations have a duty to make redress. Evidence of such state-sanctioned wrongs not only creates rights of redress, but establishes a duty on the part of the violating states to make redress. Moreover, as this Report demonstrates, these wrongs against Jewish victim groups were not only committed by individual states for which each bears responsibility, but the wrong
was inflicted by the League of Arab States as a whole, resulting from their international criminal conspiracy as above demonstrated in the comparison of the Draft Law with the laws of the individual Arab countries.
Accordingly, the Arab League as a distinct entity, as well as each of its individual members separately, must commit to access to justice for Jewish refugees, to reparations for the harms suffered by the victim populations, and to access to the factual information required concerning the violations of the wrongs so inflicted against them.
Seventh, there is the related principle of unjust enrichment. Not only was property forcibly sequestered, not only were assets seized, not only were bank accounts blocked, but in effect, the Arab countries have had the benefit from this type of illegal action for all these years. There is a case to be made of continuing unjust enrichment, as the law puts it, which needs to be redressed.
Eighth is the importance of the principle of reconciliation. In the case studies of major conflicts in which state-sanctioned violations have been perpetrated against victim populations, the basic principles of victim rights – the right to memory, the duty of remembrance, the pursuit of truth, the right to justice and redress, the duty of accountability, and the duty of State Responsibility - 19 have all been demonstrated to be prerequisites to reconciliations between peoples as well as
between states.
Accordingly, the integrity of the Middle East peace process requires an acknowledgement of the
truth and justice that underpin the conflict – particularly as it pertains to the Jewish refugee population. Not only has this been ignored in terms of the Jewish victim population, but it has been utterly excluded from any narrative of justice, accountability, and peace.
None of this is intended to argue against the Palestinian right of redress nor intended to diminish the suffering of the Palestinian population, nor their plight, nor their victimization.
Rather, the point is that the rights to redress of Jewish refugees from Arab countries are at least as compelling as those of the Palestinians; yet, Jewish rights have been historically ignored and excluded from any consideration, and continuing this distorted policy and practice would be to perpetuate a historic injustice.
The time has come, therefore, to rectify this historical injustice by restoring the plight and truth and justice of Jewish refugees from Arab countries to the Middle East narrative from which they have been expunged and eclipsed.
Simply put, any narrative on the Middle East that does not include justice for Jewish refugees is a case study in Middle East revisionism. It is an assault on truth, memory and justice. Rights for Jewish refugees from Arab countries have to be part of any narrative – any peace process – any decision-making - if that narrative or peace process or decision-making is going to have integrity, credibility, and legitimacy.
In particular, the United Nations must bear express responsibility for this distorted narrative. Indeed, the U.N. is a case study in Middle East revisionism. Since 1947, there have been 842 resolutions adopted by the U.N. General Assembly that have dealt with the Arab-Israeli conflict.
There have been 126 resolutions that have specifically dealt with the Palestinian refugee plight.
In none of these U.N. Resolutions on the Middle East is there any reference to, nor any expression of concern for, the plight of the 856,000 Jews living in, or having been displaced from, Arab countries.
As well, numerous U.N. agencies and organizations were involved in a variety of efforts, or others were specifically created, to provide protection, relief, and assistance to Palestinian refugees. Again, no such attention and assistance were forthcoming from these U.N. agencies for Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
Moreover, since 1947, billions of dollars have been spent by the international community - by the U.N. and its affiliated entities and member states - to provide relief and assistance to Palestinian refugees. During that same period, notwithstanding requests by international Jewish relief organizations, no such international financial support was ever provided to ameliorate the plight of Jewish refugees.
Finally, on this point and principle, dozens of resolutions were passed by the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in relation to the Middle East, including resolutions specifically concerning Palestinian refugees. Not one resolution ever dealt with Jewish refugees from Arab countries.
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In perhaps the most egregious demonstration of U.N. injustice, the U.N. Council on Human Rights – the successor to the U.N. Commission on Human Rights – adopted 11 resolutions of condemnation in 2006-7, its first year of operation; all 11 resolutions of condemnation were passed against one member-state of the international community, namely Israel. Not one resolution of condemnation was adopted against any of the other 191 member states of the international community.
Moreover, while Israel was being singled out for differential and discriminatory treatment, the major human rights violators – such as Iran and Sudan - were enjoying exculpatory immunity.
Indeed, this report is not arguing that the UN should not have dealt with the issue of Palestinian refugees. That is part of the issue of truth, justice and reconciliation. But for the U.N. to deal only with the issue of Palestinian refugees - and not to have addressed at all - in any of its resolutions or deliberations, the issue of Jewish refugees from Arab countries, is not only a matter of a distorted narrative, but is a fundamental injustice in and of itself.
If one looks at UN involvement in the matter of “a just resolution of the refugee problem,” the exclusion of Jewish refugees raises serious questions about the integrity of the United Nations role in the Quartet, or the peace process as a whole. For it is inconceivable and unjust for a U.N. narrative of the Middle East not to make any reference to the plight of Jewish refugees from Arab countries and their rights to redress.
E) Proposals to Rectify the Historical Injustice In the matter of the United Nations, and in the interests of justice and equity, U.N. General Assembly resolutions must include reference to Jewish refugees as well as to Palestinian and Arab refugees. Further, the forthcoming International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People should acknowledge the reality of Jewish refugees. The U.N. Security Council, acting on principle and precedent, should establish an international compensation fund to indemnify Jewish, as well as Palestinian Arab refugees. The U.N. Human Rights Council should address the matter of Jewish
refugees from Arab countries as part of its deliberations.
Indeed, there are other parallel initiatives that need to be taken to rectify this historical injustice which has expunged and eclipsed Jewish refugees from any narrative or decision-making on the Middle East. First, the United States – in concert with the Quartet – should include the issue of Jewish refugees from Arab countries on the agenda of the forthcoming Annapolis Peace Conference, together with that of Palestinian Arab refugees.
Second, the bilateral Israeli-Palestinian negotiations – which one hopes will presage a just and lasting peace – should include Jewish refugees as well as Palestinian refugees in a joiner of discussion.
Third, each of the Arab states – and this is particularly important for an authentic process of reconciliation – would have to acknowledge their role and responsibility in the perpetration of human rights violations against their respective Jewish nationals.
Fourth, the Arab League, the successor body to the League of Arab States, should also
acknowledge its role and responsibility in the drafting and endorsement of its blueprint for the 21 perpetration of human rights violations against Jewish nationals, and the consequent expulsion of Jewish refugees, effectively the “forced exodus”.
Fifth, the Arab League initiative should incorporate the question of Jewish refugees from Arab countries as part of its narrative for an Israeli-Arab peace, just as the Israeli narrative now incorporates the issue of Palestinian refugees in its vision of an Israeli-Arab peace.
And finally, the whole question of the plight of Palestinian refugees – and their just treatment – might better be served by bringing them within the general United Nations refugee system, rather than the separate system for Palestinian refugees, which has nurtured their plight rather than facilitated its resolution.
F) Conclusion
As we approach the 60th anniversary of the United Nations Partition Resolution of 1947, a fairminded Middle East narrative, founded on the principles of truth and justice - and one that would lead to reconciliation and peace - would have to acknowledge a basic truth: that both Palestinian-Arab refugees and Jewish refugees from Arab countries were the joint victims of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and in particular, the joint victims of the Arab war against Israel in 1947 and 1948.
Indeed, the historical pattern of the Israeli-Palestinian-Arab conflict can be summed up under the rubric of “double rejectionism”. Both the Arab leadership and the Palestinian leadership in 1947 were prepared to forgo the establishment of a Palestinian state if that meant countenancing a Jewish state in any borders. Simply put, if the Arab leadership had accepted the U.N. Partition Resolution of 1947, there would have been no refugees - either Arab or Jewish. Fast forward to
Camp David and the Taba negotiations in the year 2000, and the same “double rejectionism” remains.
Moreover, if one looks at the historical narrative in terms of remembrance, of truth, of justice, and of reconciliation, one cannot ignore the fact that not only is there this “double rejectionism,” but that this is also related to a double aggression. Not only was there a rejection of a Palestinian state if that meant countenancing an Israeli state in any borders in 1947, but a war was launched
by the Arab states against Israel to eclipse the nascent state in 1947.
Similarly, on a second front, and at the same time, a state-sanctioned repression campaign against the Jews was launched in Arab countries as part of this pattern of state-sanctioned human rights violations and aggression both internationally and domestically.
Accordingly, what we are addressing here are foundational principles of memory and
remembrance, of truth and justice, of reconciliation and peace, not only on a normative level, but as foundational principles now enshrined in international human rights and humanitarian law.
International law now obliges us to recognize and respect the narrative of victims of human rights violations, and therefore also obliges us to respect justice for Jewish refugees from Arab countries and their case for rights and redress. Only in this fashion can there be movement from remembrance to truth, from truth to justice, from justice to reconciliation, and from reconciliation to peace - between and among all peoples and states in the region.