Deir Yassin Remembered

On 9 April 1948, 254 people, half of them women and children, were butchered in the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin. On 8 April 1970, Israeli war planes destroyed the Egyptian primary school of Bahr al-Baqr. Nineteen children were killed, many more were severely injured. On 18 April 1996, Israeli gunners shelled a UN camp in South Lebanon. Of the 400 villagers who had sought shelter in the Qana camp, 100 men, women and children were killed. On 8 April 1997, two Israeli settlers opened fire on unarmed Palestinian protesters in Hebron, killing 24-year-old Asem Arafeh. On the same day, the Israeli army, joined by armed settlers, killed two others, and wounded 103, as Palestinian residents of Hebron protested Arafeh's murder. Next year 50 years have been passed after the Deir Yassin Massacre, this year was the first anniversary of the Qana Massacre.

The Deir Yassin massacre was neither the first nor the last in a series of massacres carried out by zionists in Palestine. It remains a highly potent symbol, however. While the Palestinians still mark the anniversary of the Deir Yassin massacre, many know that the village no longer exists. The village's original houses were demolished, the plots of land replaced by 'public' gardens on which a new settlement was built. This settlement, together with others implanted after the inhabitants of occupied villages were evicted, and their homes destroyed, were administratively annexed to Jerusalem. All that is left of Deir Yassin is the memory of the massacre, still commemorated by Palestinians and Arabs today.

See also:

Remember Deir Yassin | September 1996 Memorial Web Site

Trail of Bloodshed: An Inexhaustive List

Yehida
13 December 1947: Men sitting at the coffee house of this Arab village saw what they thought was an approaching British Army patrol. Four patrol cars pulled up in front of the coffee house and men dressed in khaki uniforms and steel helmets stepped out. They were not British soldiers. The disguised jewish attackers sprayed the coffee shop with machine-gun fire and lobbed grenades at Arab homes. Fortunately, a real British patrol arrived at the scene soon afterward and stopped the killing. Otherwise, the death toll of seven Arabs could have been higher.

Khisas
18 December 1947: Two carloads of Haganah terrorists drove through the village of Khisas (on the Lebanese-Syrian border) firing machine-guns and throwing grenades. Ten Arab civilians were killed.

Qazaza
19 December 1947: Five Arab children were murdered when Jewish terrorists blew up the house of the village mayor, or mukhtar.

al-Sheikh village
1 January 1948: Two hundred zionists armed with hand grenades and machine-guns sneaked into the tiny village (situated 5km southeast of Haifa). The attackers came across the southern hills, attacking the houses on the edge of the village, killing some 40 Palestinians.

Deir Yassin
9-10 April 1948: Hoping to avert a zionist attack on his village, the mukhtar, or village mayor, struck a deal with the zionists. He would provide them with information on the movement of strangers in the area and his village, in return, he would be spared. The zionists, however, did not keep their side of the deal. Operation Unity, as the jewish attackers called it, lasted two days. Death toll: 254.

Naser al-Din
13-14 April 1948: a contingent of Lehi and Irgun entered this village (near Tiberias), dressed as Arab fighters. When the villagers came out to great them, the zionists opened fire. Only 40 villagers survived. All houses in the village were razed to the ground.

Beit Daras
21 May 1948: After a number of unsuccessful attempts to occupy this village, the zionists mobilised a large contingent and surrounded it. The inhabitants tried to send their women and children away to escape the fighting, but they were spotted and massacred by the zionist force.

The Dahmash Mosque
11 July 1948: After the Israeli 89th Commando Battalion, led by Moshe Dayan, occupied Lydda, the zionists told the inhabitants that they would be sage if they took sanctuary in the mosque. Several jewish soldiers were later killed in a grenade attack. The zionists retaliated by killing between 80 and 100 Palestinians in the mosque

Dawayma
29 October 1948: Another atrocity by the 89th Battalion, perpetuator of the above Lydda Massacre. According to one soldier who participated in the occupation of that village (situated in the Haifa sub-district), up to 100 Arabs were massacred. Eyewitness accounts speak of rape, killing of children, and blowing-up of homes with the inhabitants inside.

Sharafat Massacre
7 February 1951: Israeli soldiers crossed the armistice line to this village (5 km from Jerusalem) and blew up the houses of the mukhtar and his neighbours: Ten killed, eight wounded.

Kafr Qassem
29 October 1956: Israeli border guards went out on a patrol to tell the mukhtars, or mayors, of several villages that the curfew already in place will be extended so as to begin at 5pm instead of 6pm. They reached Kafr Qassem around 16.45 and told the mukhtar. He protested that there are about 400 villagers working outside the village and that there was no time to inform them of the change. An officer assured him that they will be taken care of. Forty-three Kafr Qassem inhabitants were massacred as they headed back home from work.

al-Sammou'
13 November 1966: Israeli forces raided this village, destroyed 125 houses as well as the village clinic and school: Eighteen killed, 54 wounded.

Sabra and Shitala
15-18 September 1982: After the 1982 Israeli invasion in Lebanon, the Israeli-backed Phalangist militia, a right-wing Lebanese outfit, attacked Palestinian civilians in the Sabra and Shatila camps. According to one estimate: 2,750 were killd.

Oyon Qara (Rishon Lezion)
20 May 1990: An Israeli line up Palestinian workers and murdered seven of them with a machine-gun. Thirteen Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces in subsequent protests.

Al-Aqsa Mosque
8 October 1990: Israeli police opened fire on worshippers in al-Aqsa Mosque, killing 22 Palestinians.

al-Ibrahimi Mosque
25 February 1994: A jewish settler from Keryat Arba' massacred 60 worshippers in al-Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron. Later, 23 Palestinians were killed in related protests.

Jabalia Massacre
28 March 1994: Israeli undercover police opened fire on Palestinian protesters, killing six and injuring 49. Some of the Palestinian protesters were pulled out of their cars and shot in the head.

Qana
18 April 1996: Southern Lebanese civilians leave their villages in compliance with warnings issued by Israeli forces, as they launch their 'Grapes of Wrath' onslaught on Southern Lebanon. Some 400 seek refugee at a UN camp in Qana. Israeli gunners shell the camp, killing over 100 women, men and children.

(Source: Palestine Times - March 1993 and al-Ahram Weekly 17-23 April 1997)