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Israel to drop 'ethnic cleansing' from schoolbooks
Mon, 26 Oct 2009 00:48:23 GMT

A file photo of Palestinian civilians being forcefully evicted.
The Israeli Education Ministry plans to omit a passage in their history
books that tells the story of the expulsion of Palestinians in 1948,
describing it as 'ethnic cleansing.'

The ministry announced that it has decided to reissue the history
textbook taught to secondary classes after relevant changes are made,
local media outlets reported on Sunday.

The media outlets quoted the passage in question as saying: "The
Palestinians and the Arab countries contended that most of the refugees
were civilians who were attacked and expelled from their homes by armed
Jewish forces, which instituted a policy of ethnic cleansing."

Israel has always claimed that the Palestinians were not forcefully
removed.

On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made racist remarks
similar to the slogans of the original Zionists who expelled over
750,000 indigenous Palestinian Arabs from their homeland in 1948.
"Israel is not a bi-national state," he stated and added, "It's the
homeland of any Jew."

Although most Israelis refuse to admit that the Zionist regime was
established through ethnic cleansing, not all of them are in denial.

Israeli historian Ilan Pappe has written a book entitled "The Ethnic
Cleansing of Palestine." His book, which has been harshly criticized by
Zionists, is based on documents he retrieved from the archives of the
Israeli Defense Ministry.

The book says the Zionists planned to establish Israel on the land
inhabited by a Palestinian population and provides details of plans
drawn up by Zionist leaders on how to get rid of the existing
Palestinian population.

FTP/SS/HGL

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