>Did he displace the local population there? I guess. Did he have other options? No. What was he supposed to do, drown himself?
Those were not the only two options. You mentioned the Syrian refugees. They did come here where I live but unlike in Palestine they don't displace anyone but became part of the populace. No-one is or were forcing anyone to displace Palestinians. You are turning a sad story into a propaganda piece which helps no-one. Just like my Syrian friend, who now owns a restaurant he started with local help, one could become part of israel without being part of the forced displacement programs.
> You mentioned the Syrian refugees. They did come here where I live but unlike in Palestine they don't displace anyone but became part of the populace. No-one is or were forcing anyone to displace Palestinians.
The displacement of Palestinian Arabs occurred as the result of a civil war that took place between them an Palestinian Jews in 1948. Prior to that, there was no displacement, at least nothing like what happened in 1948. Yes, the dynamic with Syrians in Europe is different, because they can't possibly engage in a civil war with the local population. But the Civil War between Jews and Arabs in Palestine occurred, and the result was mass displacement of Arabs as the Jews won. Had the Civil War not occurred, Arabs would have been part of the Jewish state as partitioned by the United Nations in 1947. Many Arabs are, in fact, Israeli Citizens (with a Covid vaccination rate roughly as high as Ultra Orthodox Jews).*
What I am saying is: Yes, there were aggressive Zionists who came to Palestine to fight fight fight**. But the majority of refugees who came to Palestine just wanted to be left alone, and were forced into a fight by their ethnic alignment that was decided for them at birth, the same ethnic alignment that forced them to Palestine in the first place.
[*] And why are these Arabs citizens of Israel? More often than not, because their ancestors who were alive in 1948 had a history of peaceful enough co-existence with Jews, or their village was ___location geographically such that they did not pose a perceived threat during the civil war. As bad as population displacement is, the Jews by and large did not arbitrarily displace people in 1948. The perspective was at the time that either a strategic foothold is established, or the opposing Arab armies will finish Hitler's job, which would have certainly been the case.
Why do you say that the Arabs would have finished Hitlers job? Jews had been living for centuries in the Middle East alongside Arabs. Even today Morrocan Jews in Israel talk warmly of their past lives as Morrocans.
I once met a Lebanese whose friend growing up was Jewish. Later he grew up and moved to Israel only to come back to Lebanon as a military commander. He saw him at a military checkpoint in the city they grew up in.
Those were not the only two options. You mentioned the Syrian refugees. They did come here where I live but unlike in Palestine they don't displace anyone but became part of the populace. No-one is or were forcing anyone to displace Palestinians. You are turning a sad story into a propaganda piece which helps no-one. Just like my Syrian friend, who now owns a restaurant he started with local help, one could become part of israel without being part of the forced displacement programs.