The Jews accepted the UN partition, although some did hope to adjust the borders. The Palestinians rejected it and chose war instead. The surrounding Arab states were preparing for war the whole time, intending to take land for their countries.
The United States indirectly helped the Arabs by suspending the importation of arms into the region The UK helped by selling arms to Arab militias and blocking additional Jewish migration. Although, the US was the first to recognize Israel when they declared independence.
The different countries and groups against the Jews had different interests and different levels of commitment.
Many of the villages that the Jews forced to evacuate, were supporting Arab militias attacking Jews, so having them evacuate was a defensive strategy to not leave a population of enemy combatants scattered around the area. The combatants blended back into their villages, so it’s not like just the combatants could be arrested. Some of these combatants didn’t just fight Jewish armed forces, but attacked civilians.
Overtime, ideas of expelling all Arabs had been advocated for, but the actual expulsions were defensive military operations. Such ideas were often driven by the determination of the Arabs to expel and kill the Jews, so, the thinking was: if you can’t be peaceful and accept us here, then we will kick you out. Nevertheless, the actual expulsions were focused on villages supporting violent militias in the midst of war.
We really don’t know how many expulsions were completely unjustified and how many were battlefield necessities.
Jewish refugees, many from the holocaust, moved into the abandoned settlements.
Many Arabs fled on their own, encouraged to do so by some Arab leaders.
There was two steps to the war. First, the civil war between the Jews and local Arab militias, then, the Jews against the invading Arab states.
Israeli settlers in the West Bank have been stealing people’s homes and harassing those who try to stay. The IDF tends to protect settlers and not sufficiently punish settler crime against Palestinians. Leaders will condemn settler violence, but not actually enforce the law against them.
Palestinians have agency and many of them have used it to commit themselves to terrorist tactics in order to target civilians and destroy Israel and then hide amongst their own population so that if Israel wants to aggressively defend themselves, they have to kill many many civilians. The mass death in Gaza is primarily the fault of Gazan terrorists who chose to prove their commitment to the destruction of Israel on October 7th.
Israel is a bad actor and its founding was unjust. But, it’s a country now that has existed and developed for multiple generations. I understand why Palestinians would refuse to accept Israel and commit themselves to its destruction, but, if they are going to do that, then they are choosing to get their own people slaughtered when they use them as human shields.
There will be no peace in Palestine if the Palestinians don’t give up on terror and give up on ending Israel. It’s hard to seriously push Israel to stop its own bad actions when they are honestly in an endless struggle with terrorists determined to slaughter Israelis and end their country.
The Trump administration has been ordering US military men and women to commit, or be involved in, war crimes and other illegal activity. It’s difficult for a regular military person to say no to an illegal order. They are expected to follow orders, and it’s hard for them to know if an order is illegal.
DHS said they needed airplanes immediately to deport people, so they bought used planes from a Trump administration donor in a no-bid contract. The planes have hardly been used, but that Trump administration donor made some profit.
When it comes to all things politics and religious, but especially Israel-Palestine…people are prone to black and white thinking, as well as horrible evidence cherry picking, as well as blowing up evidence to be bigger than it is, and even citing evidence