[Protostome]

I contest the use of the word "native" in that regard.

People have immigrated constantly throughout history from place to place. Many palestinians bare the names of their 19th-18th century origins. Last names such as "Al-Masri" (The Egyptian), "Halabi" (Of the city of Haleb in Syria) are very common, to name a few.

The tragedy here, is the continued refusal of the palestinian leadership during the 1940s to accept any partition of the land, which led to a catastrophic result on their part. Had they accepted the 1947 partition plan, Israel and Palestine could have been a free, peaceful countries.

[stormdennis]

Aah, the Palestinians never existed argument, the successor to the long discredited land without people for a people with land one and just as derisory. The actual tragedy here is that Western Powers facilitated settler colonisation to create a Jewish State which by definition required the expulsion of the people already living there. Further, the Zionists never had any intention of sticking to the share of Palestine "gifted" to them by the the UN. They had prepared detailed plans for the ethnic cleansing of all of Palestine. The only reason they didn't take the West Bank in 1948 was that there, they were up against the British-trained Arab Legion.

[Protostome]

Would love to see evidence for such a "plan" for ethnic cleansing.

It would be a rather absurd plan to cleanse a territory in which you are not only a minority, but also surrounded by Arab countries which were pretty adamant about refusing to accept the jewish state.

In practice, what had happened is that the jews accepted the partition plan. The reason the arabs didn't accept it, is because they simply wanted it all to themselves, not because they feared ethnic cleansing.

Using the term "settler" or "Colonializm" to characterize jewish immigration to Israel is racist and antisemite. As I mentioned, Arabs immigrated en-masse to the land of Israel throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, yet you refer to them as natives.

[stormdennis]

The antisemite slur now, is it? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_Dalet

[Protostome]

Did you actually read the article? " ... The issue is subject to much controversy, with some historians asserting that it was defensive, while other historians assert that the plan aimed at the expulsion, sometimes called an ethnic cleansing, on the grounds that this was an integral part of a planned strategy."

"Other historians assert... " is hardly an evidence. More like an opinion. In truth, Israel today has more than 2 million Arab citizens.

[stormdennis]

I've read books on it. The 2 million Arabs are the descendants of the 20% of Palestinians who were internally rather than externally displaced, ie the ethnic cleansing was only 80% effective.