from Palestine and caused the outbreak of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. The Israeli military systematically destroyed hundreds of Palestinian villages during the war, as one of six measures included in a “Retroactive Transfer” plan approved in June 1948 by the Israeli Finance Minister and Prime Minister to prevent Palestinian refugees from returning to their homes.37 The choice of villages was not random; there often existed a clear relationship between the timing of a massacre in an outlying village and the assault on a major nearby town or city.38 From the outbreak of the clashes in 1947, Palestinians fled their homes as a result of attacks on civilians by Israeli forces, massacres, looting, destruction of property and other atrocities.39 Palestinians fleeing their villages in search of temporary refuge were fired upon to ensure their departure. Incidents like these occurred in major cities throughout the country, including Haifa, Jaffa, Akka (Acre), al-Ramla (Ramle), al-Lydd and Jerusalem, as well as in many villages.40 Many sought temporary refuge elsewhere after hearing news of atrocities against the civilian population,41 which included a spate of nine reported massacres in October 1948, in which Palestinian Arab villagers were raped, bound, executed and thrown into mass graves. In what is known as the Nakba, “The Catastrophe,” hundreds of Palestinian villages were destroyed and at least 70 massacres took place at the hands of the Zionist militias and subsequent Israeli military forces.42 Between 750,000 and 900,000 Palestinians (making up 55 to 65 percent of the total Palestinian population at the time) were forcibly displaced between the end of 1947 and early 1949, half of which were displaced before the unilateral declaration of the state of Israel which triggered the 1948 ArabIsraeli War. Ultimately, 85 percent of the population living in Palestine at the time were displaced from the territory that became the state of Israel, most of whom fled to what became known as the West Bank and Gaza Strip (22 percent of Mandatory Palestine) or to neighboring Arab countries.43 37 Ibid. Ibid. 39 Ibid, 32, 50, 52, 54, 62–3, 88, 101–2, 106, 112–13, 116, 119, 125, 128, 215, 221, 230; see also Tom Segev, 1949: The First Israelis (The Free Press 1986) [hereinafter Segev, The First Israelis]. 40 Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem (n 36), 136; see also Dr. Saleh Abdel Jawad, ‘Zionist Massacres: The Creation of the Palestinian Refugee Problem in the 1948 War’ in Eyal Benvenisti, Chaim Gans, and Sara Hanafi (eds), Israel and the Palestinian Refugees (Springer 2007), 60. 41 This included massacres in Mansurat al-Khayt (18 January 1948), Dayr Yassin (9 April 1948), Khirbat Nasir al-Din (12 April 1948), Hawsha (15 April 1948), KhirbehWa’ra al-Sawda (18 April 1948), al-Husayniyya (21 April 1948), Balad ash-Sheikh (25 April 1948), ‘Ayn al-Zaytun (2 May 1948), Burayr (12 May 1948), Khubbayza (12 May 1948), Abu Shusha (14 May 1948), al-Tantura (21 May 1948), al-Khisas (25 May 1948), al-Lydd (10 July 1948), al-Tira (16 July 1948), Ijzim (24 July 1948), Beersheba (21 October 1948), Safsaf (29 October 1948), al-Dawayima (29 October 1948), ‘Arab al-Samniyya (30 October 1948), Saliha (30 October 1948), Sa’sa’ (30 October 1948), Eilaboun (29 October 1948), Jish (29 October 1948), and Majd al-Kurum (29 October 1948). For accounts of these massacres, see Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem (n 36), 136. 42 Abdel Jawad (n 40), 60. 43 Segev, The First Israelis (n 39). 38 8