Welcome to:

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www.lehrhaus.org
Welcome to Understanding Israel A
Lehrhaus-To-Go Course Learn Anywhere, Anytime
Course Topics (1) 1800s-1919 Birth of the
Zionist Movement (2) 1919-1950s British
Mandate, the War of Independence and Its
Consequences (90 minutes) (3) 1950-Present
Challenges of the Emerging State (4) 1966-1972
The Six Day War and Its Aftermath (5) 1973-1983
The Yom Kippur War and the Begin Era (6)
1980s-2000 Intifada I and the Oslo Peace Process
(7) 2000-Present Intifada II, Ariel Sharon, and
the Future
Jehon Grist
Fred Rosenbaum
Click the speaker icon for narration
Instructor Fred Rosenbaum Narrator/Producer
Jehon Grist, Ph.D.
Questions? jehon_at_lehrhaus.org
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Donors Who Made This Program Possible
CD-ROM Production Tillie and Rene Molho
Endowment for Holocaust Remembrance of the Jewish
Community Foundation of the Greater East
Bay Research and Text Development Dr. Barbara
and Richard Rosenberg Technology
Development The Ruth and Marco Goodman
Philanthropic Fund of the Jewish Community
Foundation of the Greater East Bay
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The British Mandate, War of Independence and Its
Consequences Discussion Outline

• Jewish Population Growth, Arab Resistance
• Zionist Leaders and Their Conflicting Views
• Arab-Jewish Violence Accelerates Toward War
• Israel Declares Independence and Fights for
  Survival
• The Triumph of a Dream Israel Wins its Life,
  1949
• American Jews and the Struggle for Israel
• Israel and the Soviet Union Promising Start
  Fizzles
• Consequence of War the Palestinian Refugee
  Problem

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Post War Realities The New Middle East, 1918-1939
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Judah Magnes
Jewish Community Growth in Mandate
Palestine 1919-1939
Hebrew University Opens, 1925
Tel Aviv Bauhaus Style, 1930s
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Arab Opposition To Zionist Settlement, 1920s-1930s
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Rationales Behind the Arab Response, 1930s
Sheik Izz al-din al-Qassam
Al Husseini meets with Hitler, 1941
Date Jews Total
Jews as Population of Total 1882
24,000 ?
? 1922 census 83,790 752, 048 11 1931
census 174,610 1,033,314 17 1939 450,000
1,400,000 33 1949 758,708
914,100 83 in the new State of Israel, 77
of former Palestine
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From Section I of the White Paper His Majesty's
Government believe that the framers of the
Mandate in which the Balfour Declaration was
embodied could not have intended that Palestine
should be converted into a Jewish State against
the will of the Arab population of the country.
... His Majesty's Government therefore now
declare unequivocally that it is not part of
their policy that Palestine should become a
Jewish State. From Section II Taking into
account the expected natural increase of the Arab
and Jewish populations, and the number of illegal
Jewish immigrants now in the country, this would
allow of the admission, as from the beginning of
April this year, of some 75,000 immigrants over
the next five years.
British Capitulation to Arab Pressure The White
Paper of 1939
To view the front page of the Palestine Post from
May 18, 1939, just click on the I information
icon to the right.
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Weizmann, Jabotinsky, Ben-Gurion Conflicts Among
Zionist Leaders in the 1930s
Chaim Weizmann
Zeev Jabotinsky
David Ben-Gurion
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World War II Ben Gurion Navigates Between the
British and Jewish Extremists
Lord Moyne
Avraham Stern
Menahem Begin
Well fight the White Paper as if there is no
Hitler, and fight Hitler as if there is no White
Paper.
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King David Hotel Bombing, 1946
British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin
President Harry Truman
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Ben Gurions Gamble a Jewish State without the
complete land, rather than the complete land
without a Jewish State.
To see the front page of the Nov. 30, 1947
Palestine Post, click on the I icon to the right
Source Heritage Civilization and the Jews (1983)
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Civil War in the Last Months of British Mandate
Palestine, 1948
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Atrocities of the Civil War, Spring 1948
Deir Yassin after Irgun/Stern Gang Attack
Survivors of Kfar Etzion Massacre in Custody
Jerusalems Ben Yehuda St. after Arab Bombing
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An Act of Supreme Courage Ben Gurion Proclaims
the State, May 14, 1948
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The Day After Independence Facing Five Arab
Armies, May 15, 1948
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Five Flags Against Israel
Lebanon
Syria
Iraq
Egypt
Egyptian Tank at Battle of Yad Mordechai
King Abdullah I of Jordan
Jordan
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The Battle for Jerusalem, Summer 1948
Taggart Fort, Latrun
Arabs Fire at Israelis, Jewish Quarter
Jewish Quarter Rabbis Discuss Surrender with Arabs
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Jew Vs. Jew, Jew Vs. the United Nations The
Bernadotte Assassination and Altalena Incident
Count Folke Bernadotte, United Nations
Watching the Altalena Sink in Tel Aviv Harbor,
1948
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Ending in Victory From Summer 1948 to the Rhodes
Armistice Agreement, 1949
Israel Chief of Staff Yigael Yadin signs Rhodes
Armistice, 1949
Source Heritage, Civilization and the Jews (PBS)
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President Truman, American Politics, and the
Striped Pants Boys
Truman and Chaim Weizmann
Truman and Eddie Jacobson
Source Israel A Nation is Born (PBS)
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Americans Who Made a Difference in Creating the
State of Israel
Hank Greenspun
US Colonel Mickey Marcus
Justice Louis Brandeis
Henrietta Szold
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Never Again The Holocaust, Israel and American
Jewish Public Opinion
Liberation of Lager Nordhausen Concentration
Camp, 1945
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Stalin and Israel A Promising Start Fizzles
Golda Meir, Israels First Ambassador to Moscow
Soviet Dictator Josef Stalin
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Palestinian Refugees How Did It All Begin?
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Palestinian Divisions Husseinis vs. Nashashibis
Raghib al-Nashashibi
Haj Amin al-Husseini
Jewish bus protected with wire screening
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• Arab Flight From Palestine
• Phase 1 Dec. 1947-March 1948
• Phase 2 April-June 1948
• Phase 3 July 1948
• Phase 4 Oct.-Nov. 1948

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A merchant did not leave only because months of
sniping and bombing, or only because business was
getting bad, or because he saw his neighbors
flee, or because of extortion by Arab irregulars,
or because of the collapse of law and order and
the gradual withdrawal of the British, or because
of a Haganah attack, or because he feared to live
under Jewish rule. He left because of an
accumulation of these factors. In the
countryside, too, many factors often combined
isolation among a cluster of Jewish settlements,
a feeling of being cut off from Arab centers, a
lack of direction by national leaders and a
feeling of abandonment by the Arab world, fear of
Jewish assault, reports and rumors about
massacres by the Jews, and actual attacks and
massacres. Benny Morris, Righteous Victims (New
York, 2001), 257-258
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The Other Refugee Problem Jewish Exodus from
Arab Lands
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Dig Deeper Web Search The story of the Jewish
refugees from Arab lands who came into Israel
beginning in 1948 is not as well knowneither by
Jew or non-Jewas is the story of the Palestinian
refugees. Find out as many facts as you can about
this mass migration. Just click on the boxes
below to learn more. While youre reading, keep
this question in mind What common patterns
emerge about what happened to Jews in the Arab
world?
Jewish Exodus from Arab Lands Wikipedia
The Forgotten Refugees
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Click on the I for information icon at right to
read chapter
Read All About It! Recommended Reading for This
Session