According to Wikipedia the UN plan was to split Mandatory Palestine into 3 parts; an Arab state, a Jewish state, and an international regime to administer Jerusalem. Also according to Wikipedia, this would have resulted in a Jewish state with 45% Arab population. This seems like a not-so-stable situation for a democracy; however, there was an expectation of further Jewish immigration.
What actually happened was a civil war, during which over 80% of Palestinians fled or were expelled from the land that became Israel. Suppose there had been no war, and non-violent resistance was the most that happened; Arabs living in the land assigned to Israel stayed and became citizens according to the UN plan, and the Palestinian part became a country on a par with others in the region.
Would Israel have been workable and remained a Jewish state in this hypothetical? I think arguments in favour are that there would be a lot less hostility in this scenario compared to real life, there would still have been substantial Jewish immigration resulting in a larger demographic majority, and some Palestinians would have left and moved to the Palestinian state once it was established. Arguments against are that there would still have been a lot of resentment over the partition, resulting in tension, and that without a war and consequent hostility throughout the Middle East, there wouldn’t have been nearly as much Jewish migration to Israel.
I’m not particularly knowledgeable about this subject, so I’m interested to hear opinions.
I think the Jewish migration would have happened regardless, but I don’t see how it would have been a workable solution for the Jews, or an acceptable one for the Palestinians. Israel would still have become a “Jewish state”, but one with a fairly large non-Jewish population, which would have been problematic for both sides. Note that there are Arabs living in Israel today, but they make up only ~20% of the population, which is manageable for the majority Jewish population.
Going with the hypothetical, although I’m honestly in @Chronos’ camp…
I think much of the hostility would have been transferred to the UN and whomever was providing the forces to maintain Jerusalem. Not all, perhaps not even the majority but the control of Jerusalem would have been a horrible sticking point. And as there has been a large number of incidents with UN Peacekeeping forces, I think there would have been plenty of escalation.
I also don’t think the UN would have been able to stay on task in the face of such resistance, and would eventually (given the time frames) pulled out making it just as much of a hotspot as it is now.
That’s as far as I think I can take the hypothetical - remember, a LOT of the ongoing tensions are being funded, supported and whipped up by outside actors, which I strongly suspect would have been critical no matter how peaceful and non-violent the origin could have been in the hypo.
More seriously, the problem with most plans that outsiders come up with, is that they involve the locals trusting a benevolent and engaged international guarantor. If we try to flesh that out a bit, it typically involves the United States and the big European powers, let’s say France, Germany and Britain, providing some sort of “security” for the region.
That Western citizens (apart from those with Jewish or Arab roots) don’t see a problem with that, is the problem. From the locals’ point of view, those four western powers are the main cause of the current round of savagery. We are the problem, not the solution. The only way to make a plan more ridiculous would be to proudly announce that Turkey had also agreed to act as a guarantor.
Of course, this analysis is a bit simplistic and naive. Of course, that’s my point: I’m just another concerned westerner without a clue who is sure their hot take is a valuable contribution to the search for peace in the middle east.
This is kinda what I was wondering. There would still have been a pull factor for immigration as Israel became richer than neighbouring countries (assuming that still happened), but that wouldn’t ensure the near total fleeing of the Jewish population from the rest of the Middle East that happened in reality.
AFAIK most people believe Israel could not cope with a much larger Arab minority today, but that is due to the extreme level of hostility as a result of historical and ongoing events. Are countries with large minorities considered generally unworkable?
Without a civil war in Palestine, was it inevitable that other Arab states would get involved? And would there be so much support and funding from those countries without all the Palestinian refugees serving to create ongoing resentment against Israel?
Even if there was no chance the Palestinians would ever accept the UN plan, it’s still a reasonable question to ask if them fighting against it aided Israel, no?
Because as I said in the post you quoted, it would have likely just pushed the conflict about who had control of Jerusalem. And that I see no way that hot potato can be fielded, nor that the UN would continuously support the expense and political energy to keep it as neutral for the last three quarters of a Century. And everyone with a claim or concern about the city would of course be involved, whether it be by money, troops, or influence.
Again, this is all navel gazing, it’s (per the forum) entirely IMHO. So, again, IMHO there was always going to be conflict, the difference could be that it was against the UN or whomever was maintaining the UN administered city. And if the UN pulled out, then there would be conflict over who WOULD then control the city, whether Israel, another state, or Semi-Benevolent Flying Space Bats.
Granted, I could imagine a scenario where the UN pulls out, and hands control over the city to Jordan, and Israel using military force to claim the city, but I can also imagine any other number of equally unproven hypothesis about what would happen if any non-local power assigned control.
I just find the scenario where the Jerusalem is a self-managed, successful city-state on it’s own without any outside support or local regional support unlikely in the extreme.
The other Arab states got involved because their leaders had ambitions to rule a massive Pan Arab kingdom, not because of the plight of the Palestinians. (The fact that each of the big powers thought they should be the ones leading this Pan Arab state is the reason they never achieved their goal, including their goal of wiping out Israel).
For your hypothetical to work, they would need to have never had that goal. Otherwise, there’d have been war regardless of the local Palestinians’ wishes.
I really think you are overestimating the importance of Jerusalem to the conflict. This is and always has been first and foremost a national conflict, not a religious one.
Fair enough, how about this, Jerusalem would always have been one of the key pretexts behind any regional conflict, that would have been a socio-political conflict.
If we posit that the Palestinians somehow agree to a two state solution but Pan Arabism is still prevalent in the surrounding states, sure, it might very well be the pretext used when they invade (and they may very well invade the Palestinian state, not just Israel). But I don’t see the Palestinians being able to accept the two state proposal under those circumstances.
The most likely scenario, I think, is not dissimilar to what happened in our own history. There’s no fighting in 1947 because the Israelis and Palestinians both agree on splitting the land; in 1948 both countries are declared; immediately the Arab League invades, sending troops into both Israel and Palestine.
Without neighboring Arab support, I don’t know how well set up to resist such an invasion the Palestinians would be. My guess would be “not very”, and that Jordan easily conquers the West Bank while Egypt easily conquers Gaza, leaving us in basically the same position as in our timeline. Israel might be in a slightly better position, if the Palestinian resistance slows down the Jordanians and Egyptians. But I still think we end up with a Jordan controlled West Bank and an Egypt controlled Gaza.
On the other hand, if we posit no Pan Arabism, then I don’t see why a regional conflict is necessary. Israel and Palestine are split up, none of the neighbors have delusions of grandeur so none of the neighbors invade, and literally everyone involved is far better off.
Sounds ideal, but, again, not fighting the hypo - we’ve had more than enough secular warlords, religious extremists, inter and intra-faith fighting and everything else even leaving out Israel as a lightning rod, so I think it’s fair to be extremely skeptical such a perfect world would have happened.
Darn it, why do we get to live in the time fork with the crazies (don’t answer that, it’s too depressing)?
Belgium has a king; no idea if that makes all their problems better or worse or whether it be simply irrelevant. Or are you thinking of Singapore with its “soft authoritarian” model (strong leadership to dictate what’s what… this can go in any direction as long as we’re dealing with hypotheticals)
I don’t know as much about Egypt, but I don’t think Jordan invaded because of pan-Arabism, but rather ordinary empire-building - the desire for more territory, population, and influence. It was opportunism due to the chaos and lack of a unified Palestinian state.
AFAIK Israel could have handed the West Bank back to Jordan after the Six-Day War and avoided the headache, but they wanted that land and chose to continue occupying it. And neither Egypt nor Jordan would take on the responsibility today.
I hadn’t realised that even after losing the West Bank over half the population of Jordan is of Palestinian origin, and most have citizenship. Obviously not the same situation, but the country is still functional (at least compared to its neighbours).
Thanks. I’d never heard about that. Still sounds more like empire building than any genuine desire for Arab unity. How did Egypt fit into this?
That just reinforces my point: there wouldn’t have been a total migration without these expulsions and attacks. A whole community doesn’t uproot itself unless forced.
I think probably if the two states had been established, Israel would have tried to force Palestinians in their part of the territory to move to the new Palestinian state. Either directly or by turning to blind eye to the actions of militias etc. Since in this hypothetical the Palestinians would have had somewhere to go, Israel would likely have succeeded.
Egypt had their own plans for domination of the Arab world.
That was the problem. There were very different ideas for what a pan Arab state would look like. Abdullah wanted to be king while Nasser had in mind a more modern, nationalist approach.
Why do you think they wouldn’t have been driven out if it wasn’t for Israel?
My dad’s side came to Israel from Morocco. They left because they were tired of pogroms and of being second class citizens, as had been the case for hundreds of years, since they fled Spain after the Expulsion.
My grandparents had both dreamed of going to Israel for their whole lives, since before the nation’s founding.
Their community had never been allowed to fully root into Moroccan soil. The locals made damn sure of that. So it wasn’t much of an “uprooting”, and they didn’t view leaving as some terrible tragedy. They viewed it as their chance to finally put down roots, for the first time in many generations.
Is Egypt even Arab? I guess that’s not the point. I’m unsurprised it didn’t work out, but I’ve gotta say it’s pretty ballsy the Jordanian monarchy thought they could rule the whole Arab world. In many ways it’s a pity it didn’t succeed, because now we have Islamism, and that’s much, much worse.
Because there was a Jewish community in Morocco for over 1000 years, and they weren’t driven out before? And because the US had more-or-less open immigration for decades and a couple of million Jewish people emigrated there from Eastern Europe, but more remained behind . And because there are still a large amount of Jewish people in Russia today, despite suffering discrimination at least until relatively recently, and all being eligible to emigrate to Israel. Whereas Google says there are all of 3,000 Jewish people left in Morocco, and 4(!) in Syria.
. And because there are still a large amount of Jewish people in Russia today, despite suffering discrimination at least until relatively recently, and all being eligible to emigrate to Israel. Whereas Google says there are all of 3,000 Jewish people left in Morocco, and 4(!) in Syria.