On the evening of August 31, a protest took place outside Sadler’s Wells Theatre in London, calling on the theatre to cut its links with one of its chief sponsors, Barclays Bank.
Sean Sheehan
As part of its business, Barclays Bank is involved with companies that supply weapons and military technology to Israel. Nigel Higgins, Chair of Sadler’s Wells Trust Ltd, is Chairman of Barclays.
A pro-Israel man outside the theatre mocked the protestors, calling out “You started it?” –a reference to the 1948 Arab-Israeli War– suggesting that the whole conflict was caused by Arab armies invading Palestine in May 1948. The claim is nonsense, ignoring the first civil war stage of the conflict and disavowing what Adam Raz makes clear in “Loot: how Israel stole Palestinian property”.
Palestine was not empty land when the first Zionist settlers arrived in the 1880s and by the time of the 1917 Balfour Declaration Jews accounted for 6% of the population and owned 1% of the land. When the United Nations partitioned Palestine into an Arab state and a Jewish state, the Jewish population of 33% was granted over half of the territory but owned only 6.6% of the land. The desire to increase that percentage launched the Nakba and two thirds of the Arab population, over 700,000, were forced into exile following murderous attacks on Palestinian villages. Almost 300,000 had been forced out before the outbreak of the first Arab-Israeli war in 1948. Some 550 Palestinian villages were conquered by the Israeli military during the war and residents fled or were violently expelled
Adam Raz’s book is about the plunder of moveable property of Palestinians (not their land and buildings): the content of their homes, their livestock and vehicles and many other things. Unlike the looting that is common in times of war, the Jewish looters were plundering what belonged to those who lived alongside them: “These were not abstract ‘enemies’… They were yesterday’s neighbours.”
What followed the plunder was a conspiracy of silence although some gave voice to their sense of shame at what happened. Bechor-Shalom Sheetrit, Minister of Minorities in the new state of Israel, wrote of being ‘stained by the taking of plunder and spoils’ and the need to show the world “that we are a cultured people that recognises and is prepared to assume its responsibilities” and maintain “fair relations with those who remain or will want to remain amongst us and those who will want to return to us”.
The bitter hollowness of these words resounds through the pages of Raz’s accounts of what took place in Jerusalem, Jaffa and other cities, in mosques and churches and Palestinian villages.
The second part of his book looks at how leading Jewish politicians at the time responded to the looting and plunder. Important cabinet documents remain classified and a commission of inquiry that was set up remains confidential. Only one Israeli soldier was convicted of an atrocity, murdering fifteen Arabs, and he was pardoned after a year in prison.
“Loot: how Israel stole Palestinian property” is published on September 24 by Verso.
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