Jewish emigration to Palestine

·       Emigration before the establishment of Israel

Palestine that sacred and pure land is distinguished by its importance and its high reverence in the eyes of Muslims, owing to its embracement of Al-Aqsa Masjid, the first of the two Qiblah in Islam [Direction faced in prayer], towards which the Muslims used to direct their faces during praying before the Ka’bah in Makkah became their Qiblah. No Muslim anywhere would accept or consent to the Jews’ control over the sanctities of Muslims, and over such sacred land, how about if such an enemy was implanted by force and ruse inside the Arabic Palestinian land? This would constitute a provocation, before which no Muslim can stand still and acquiesce. Today we witness how Jewish extremists groups threaten to demolish Al-Aqsa Masjid, which would bring about a real catastrophe. The organized Jewish emigration from all over the world towards Palestine constituted a main pillar to the success of the Zionist project in Palestine, for the Zionist organizations and institutions that came to the scene of events following the first Zionist conference worked with all their might to finance the Jewish sneaking into the Palestinian lands, by preparing circumstances and exploiting them to drive the Jews out of their native countries around the world, and attract them to Palestine, which was the destination of establishing the Hebrew state over its soil.

In the year 1869, as a result of pressures exerted by the European countries over the Ottoman State, due to its piled up debts and its weakness, the latter issued a law, that allowed the foreigners, whether they were individuals, institutions, or companies to have properties, and in all lands of the State, whether inside cities or outside them. Thus such permission to the foreigners to possess lands in Palestine was a source of anxiety to the peasants and the people of the country, because it was the offset to the Jewish infiltration and the buying of lands under the foreign protection and prerogatives. The Zionist greed in buying lands started, where they began to tempt the peasants and big feudal lords from the foreigners to sell their lands, the peasants began to feel worried about the fate of their lands and lives. The Palestinian National Information Center states that in the year 1837 the first Jewish settlement was established in Palestine by the help of the wealthy British Jew Montfort, where the number of inhabitants was then 1500 Jews, then the number of immigrants increased to reach 10 thousands  in the year 1840, and then mounted to 15 thousands in the year 1860, and by the year 1881 the number of Jews reached 22 thousands. In the year 1882, throngs of Russian Jewish immigrants started to flock to Palestine, despite the issuance of the Ottoman authorities to a law that restricted emigration, the first Jewish group that arrived at Palestine was 2000, then this number increased till it reached 25 thousands Jews in the year 1903.

The Jewish settlements in Palestine constituted the core of the Zionist infiltration into the country, and that through the selling of the foreign owners and non-Palestinian Arabs to their lands to the Jewish immigrants, hence the number of Jewish settlements that were built at the end of the Ottoman Rule since 1882 till 1913 reached 24 settlements in Palestine, which Doctor Mostafa Al Dabbagh mentioned in the book (Biladona Falastin) “Palestine Our Country “ – the first part, first section, Al-taliaa publishing house, Beirut 1965, he dealt with such point exhaustively, and mentioned the date of building of each settlement and the number of its population. As for the British Mandate period, the British founded 253 settlements between the years 1920 till 1948, also Doctor Hind Amin Al-Badiry has given full details about the date each settlement was established and the number of its inhabitants in her research “Palestinian lands” Arab League publications, 1981, she clarified in the same research how the Jews had taken over the Palestinian lands till 1947, and that through the following table:

The way of possession	Its percentage from the total Area of Palestine	(Land area seized by the Jews) in Dunnum
Ottoman period and the outset of the British Military Regime	1.55%	420.00
Palestine Government rented it to the Jews	0.64%	175.000
Government granted it to the Jewish Agency	1.20%	325.000
Sold by big non-Palestinian Absent owners	2.31%	625.000
Sold by big  Palestinian owners	0.96%	261.400
Total	6.6%	7.000

This table reveals the very small percentage of the lands that the Jewish immigrants  took hold of since their entrance to Palestine till the year 1947, and that compared to those lands that were still under the Palestinians’ possession, this is attributed to the fact that the Jews were newcomers to Palestine, and hence had few properties there. Consequently, they couldn’t take hold of no more than 6.6% of the lands.

By the end of World War One, and the defeat of the Ottoman state, which marked the downfall of an empire that extended for several centuries,  Palestine fell under the British Mandate, where it appointed High Commissioners there to manage the affairs of Palestine. Doctor Hind Amin Al-Badiry, the researcher, and member in Palestinian Writers and Journalists Union, holder of B.A., History department, Damascus University in Syria, and holder of M.A. and Ph.D from Ain Shams university, Cairo, affirms in the historical magazine “Al-Fustat” that in the period of the rule of the British High Commissioner Herbert Samuel, who was Jewish, new laws were issued, while other Ottoman laws were changed in such a way as to facilitate the transfer of ownership of lands to the Jews. The doctor affirms this by saying: “In the year 1920, the administration of Samuel worked persistently and actively to carry out the plans of the Zionist Committee, thus the first step it took was to inaugurate departments to record lands, and appointed the Zionist Norman Bentwich in charge of them. In the same year the dangerous area law was passed, which Bentwich worked on immediately putting it into practice, in order to confiscate lands. As a consequence to this, the Ottoman Bank closed its doors (which was the sole bank that lent the peasants at small interests). He then imposed high taxes on people, to the extent that even the peasants, whose revenues were lower than any other class, used to pay the highest tax rates. In addition to this, authorities changed laws, in a way that turned things upside down, all this with the aim of cloaking the process of usurping lands under the pretenses of legitimacy and in the name of law, thus many unjust laws were passed to serve this aim. When the authorities imported products similar to what the people cultivate, they faced a deadlock, and many of them were ruined, owing to their continuous bankruptcy and the piling up of debts, the percentage of inability to pay taxes among them reached 75%, not to mention the harassment, persecution, imprisonment, public fees, and the collective punishment that were practiced against them. Moreover the Jewish Usurers (the only lending body that remained after the closing of the Ottoman bank) played a role in driving the peasants to bankruptcy, where the rate of interests over the debts reached 200%, which led to the forfeiture of the mortgaged lands in payment of the debts, as they were sold in a public auctions. These lands in specific are what Zionism  exploited to propagate that the Arabs sold their lands, in addition to lands sold by the big Arab landlords, which is extremely small, and doesn’t exceed 1%).” All the succeeding High Commissioners followed in the footsteps of Herbert Samuel. Yediot Ahronot press had published in its issue dated 14/7/1972 an article entitled “Blunder, Naivety, and Coloring” written by the ex-Knesset member “Yash’yho Ben-Fort”, where he  justified this racial and vicious way of stealing lands from its owners by saying: “The truth is that there can never be Zionism without settlement, and there can never be a Zionist state without expelling the Arabs, confiscating their lands, and fencing it.”

As a result of all these circumstances, the process of Jews’ immigration to the Palestinian lands was facilitated, and their number increased, owing to the preservation of the emigration flow since 1850, namely at the end of the Ottoman period as shown in the following table:

The Period	Total of Jewish immigrants in thousands	Annuel average of Jewish immigration in thousands
1850-1880	25	0.8
1881-1903	25	1
1904-1910	20	2.9
1911-1914	14	3.5
Total	83	1.3

The table shows clearly the continuity of the immigration flow, without any interruption, which reveals that this immigration was organized and had specific purposes, we know and touch its repercussions today represented in the domination of the land of Palestine and the establishment of an extraneous state that is known as Israel. The Palestinian National Information Center cites this table that is found on its site, where it states that the Palestinian lands subject to five consecutive Jewish immigration flows, following the successive crises that occurred since the late 19th century till World War II in the areas where the Jews existed. The center has divided the immigration process into the following phases:

1.      The First Immigration 1882 – 1903: It occurred in two groups, where around 25 thousands Jews came to Palestine, most of them coming from Romania and Russia. The immigration was financed by Lovers of Zion societies and BILU movement, in addition to some of the colonizing figures and British organizations.

2.     The Second Immigration 1904 – 1918: This immigration occurred following the establishment of the Zionism movement. The number of immigrants reached around 40 thousands most of them coming from Russia and Romania, they were mainly from adventurous youngsters, who were recruited by the Zionist and colonizing organizations. By the end of the Second immigration flow, and due to the breaking out of World War One in 1914, the number of immigrants reached around 85 thousands Jews, and the number of lands they possessed reached 418 thousands dunnum, and around 44 agricultural settlements.

3.     The Third Immigration 1919 – 1923:  During this phase the number of immigrants reached 35 thousand Jews, at the rate of 8 thousands immigrants annually, most of them coming from Russia, Romania, and Poland, in addition to small numbers from Germany and America.

4.     The Fourth Immigration 1924 – 1932: This phase started during the British Mandate, where 80 thousands immigrants had flocked to Palestine most of them from the middle class, especially from Poland, they exploited the small sum of money they brought with them in making small projects of their own.

The Zionist immigration reached its peak in 1925, where around 33 thousands Jews had arrived at Palestine, compared to 13 thousands in 1924. Afterwards, the number started to decrease once more till it reached 13 thousands in 1926. The number of immigrants continued to recede in 1927, owing to the economic hardships that the country was then facing, thus their number decreased to three thousands and then to only two thousands in 1928. Hence by the end of this phase, the total number of Jews, who arrived at Palestine reached around 175 thousands, of which 136 thousands among them settled in 19 civil settlements, as for the rest, they spread in 110 agricultural settlements.

The Fifth Immigration 1933 – 1939:The number of immigrants flocking to Palestine reached during that phase around 215 thousands, most of them coming from Mid-Europe, which was affected by the Nazi Seizure of Power, thus during that period about 45 thousands Jewish immigrants set towards Palestine from Mid-Europe alone. In the year 1928 the percentage of Jews immigrating from Germany to Palestine reached 52% of the total immigrating Jews. In the year 1933, “The White Book” was issued, because of it, Britain limited the Jewish immigration to 75 thousands within the coming five years; thus minimizing as much as possible the huge number of immigrants traveling through official means, while it opened the doors to unofficial immigration, thus the number of immigrants reached its peak in 1935, where they reached a total of 62 thousands, then it started to decline owing to the eruption of revolution in Palestine in the year 1936, as the Palestinians could no more tolerate, and stand still in the face of the waves of immigrations that their lands were subjected to.

Doctor Muhammad Salamah Al-Nahal, expatiates on this subject in his book “The Policy of British Mandate in The Arabic Palestinian Lands” – Occupied Palestine publications, second edition-Beirut, page 74, 75, 76, where he clarifies the number of Jews immigrating to Palestine through the following tables, which carry the numbers: 1, 2, 3, 4, the following table shows details about such exodus during the years (1920-1936):

Table 1

Year	Number of Immigrants	Percentage
1920	5514	1.95
1921	9149	3.24
1922	7844	2.77
1923	7421	2.63
1924	12856	4.55
1925	33801	11.96
1926	13081	4.63
1927	2713	0.96
1928	2178	0.77
1929	5249	1.86
1930	4944	1.75
1931	4075	1.44
1932	9553	3.38
1933	30327	10.73
1934	42359	14.98
1935	61854	21.88
1936	29727	10.52
Total	282.645	100%

Doctor Riyad Al-A’ylah mentioned in his research entitled “The Development of the Palestinian Issue” (Historically, socially, and politically)second edition-May 1998, that during World War II, around 55 thousands Jews arrived to Palestine through illegal ways, where the British fleet was charged with guiding the ships carrying on board the immigrating Jews, in addition to supplying them with water, provision, and fuel till they reached the Palestinian shores. Moreover, between the years 1940-1948 around 120 thousands Jews entered the country, and with the winding up of the British Mandate period the number of Jews reached 625 thousands, in other word their number was equal to third the country’s population.

The following table, which is quoted from the same source as the pervious table, shows the percentage of the Arabs and Jews population in Palestine during the years 1918-1948.

Table 2

Percentage of Jews	Percentage of Arab Citizens	Year
7.20%	92.80%	1918
14.67	85.33	1925
16.90	83.10	1931
20.90	79.41	1933
27.15	72.85	1935
30.1	69.99	1940
31.40	68.60	1946
31.48	68.52	1948

This table clearly shows the increase in the number of Jews from 7,20% in the year 1918 to 31,48% in the year 1948. Such huge increase in the number of Jews flocking to Palestine from all over the world in a period of 30 years only, would certainly result in a gradual shifting of the balance of power in favor of those intruders, who were new to this place, coming from all over the world, after their hesitation in choosing the country on whose lands they would erect their alien and occupying entity, as Argentina constituted a choice to them, for it constituted at the beginning a target of their greedy goals, but they finally chose Palestine, whose people drained by wars, were aspiring to freedom, peace, and security, but they were instead faced with depression, subjugation, pain and rage, from which the Palestinians and the Arabs suffer till this very day.

The following table clarifies the countries from where those intruders had come, from the years 1919 till 1936:

Table 3

Country	Number of Immigrants	Percentage
Poland	124.010	42.80
Russia	30.429	10.50
Germany	28.629	9.89
Romania	14.754	5.10
Lithuania	9.305	3.22
Yemen and Eden	8.529	2.95
USA	7.674	2.65
Greece	6.516	2.25
Iraq	6.122	2.11
Latvia	4.546	1.57
Turkey	4.016	1.39
Czechoslovakia	3.748	1.29
Austria	3.690	1.27
Iran	3.047	1.05
Other countries	34.583	11.96
Total	289.616	100%

Immigration after the Creation of Israel 1948-1967:

By usurping Palestine and by declaring the creation of Israel in 1948 and the expulsion of the Palestinian Arabs from their own land and country, Zionism started to exert mighty efforts in facilitating the immigration of the Jews to Palestine and it issued what is known as the law of “Return” that was ratified in 1950 and dictated that every Jew has the right to return to the country as a returning Jew. Immigration was carried through an immigrant visa. Also the law of Israeli nationality was issued in 1952 whereby every Jewish citizen, who immigrated to Israel, has the right to obtain the Israeli identity once he enters the country, all this besides boosting the immigration by the Jewish agency and organizing it and the attention paid to the immigrants  affairs upon their arrival in the country which increased immigration. The following table discusses the Jewish immigration to Palestine during the years 1948-1967, obtained from the same source of the three previous tables, i.e. from a study conducted by Muhammad Salamah Al-Nahal:

Table 4

Year	Immigrants Number
1948	101.828
1949	239.576
1950	170.249
1951	175.095
1952	24.369
1953	11.326
1954	18.370
1955	37.478
1956	56.234
1957	71.224
1958	27.082
1959	23.895
1960	24.510
1961	47.638
1962	61.328
1963	64.364
1964	54.716
1965	30.736
1966	15.730
1967	14.327

The following points are noticed from the previous table:

First: the increase of the number of the immigrating Jews to Palestine during the first four years of the establishment of the state of the Zionist entity; about 700 000 immigrants entered during this period, whereas the number of the Jews in Palestine amounted to 650 000 person approximately in 1948. The reasons that caused this increase in the Jewish immigration are as follows:

1-The Zionist Organizations transfer of the Jews who remained in the refugee camps in Western Europe to Palestine after the Second World War.

2-The negotiations that the Israeli government has conducted with the Romanian government in 1948 and led to the arrival of about 118 000 Romanian immigrants during the four years 1948-1951.

3-Zionist exploitation of twisted and terrorist schemes to realize its targets of immigration and especially in the countries of the Middle East, particularly in Yemen, Iraq and Libya where the Jews carried out bombings in Jewish districts to arouse terror, and hence demand from them to immigrate to Palestine to rid themselves of terrorism, which shapes an understanding of the roots of Zionist terrorism since the first of the last century where they killed their fellow countrymen to force them to go to Palestine.

Second: the decrease of the number of immigrants during the next three years 1952-1945 because of the economic crisis that erupted in the country, caused by the increase of the number of immigrants and the outbreak of unemployment.

Third: continuity of immigration redoubled, compared with the previous period during the three years (1955-1957) and its connection with Hungarian events and the economic status in the country because of the tripartite attack on Egypt and Gaza Strip.

Fourth: the obvious decrease of the number of immigrants after 1957 as a result of the cessation of immigration from north Africa and Egypt, where the Arab governments in Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt encouraged the Jews to stay in the country through providing favorable living conditions and security, especially after the Anglo-French Attack on the Suez Canal, which has put an end to the Zionist agents and the terrorist acts they executed.

Fifth: the increase of the number of immigrants from 1961 until their rate reached 50 000 immigrants annually, which happened during the years from 1961 to 1965.

Based on an Israeli source, namely the statistical Abstract of Israel, No.45(1994),p.43,  the following table clarifies the numbers and the percent of immigrants to Palestine depending on the continent of birth, 1882-1993 (percentages):

Immigration Period	Immigrants Number	%	From Asia and Africa	From Europe and America
1882-1914	55.000-70.000	100
1919-1948	482.857	100	10.4	89.6
15May 1948-1993	2.363.481	100	35.3	64.7
15May 1948-1951	687.624	100	49.9	50.1
1952-1954	54.676	100	76.4	23.6
1955-1957	166.492	100	68.3	31.7
1958-1960	75.970	100	36.0	64.0
1961-1964	228.793	100	59.4	40.6
1965-1968	82.244	100	49.7	50.3
1969-1971	116.791	100	27.3	72.7
1972-1974	142.755	100	9.2	90.8
1975-1979	124.827	100	14.3	85.7
1980-1984	83.637	100	27.1	72.9
1985-1989	70.196	100	20.4	79.6
1990	199.516	100	2.7	97.3
1991	176.100	100	11.9	88.1
1992	77.057	100	6.5	93.5
1993	76.805	100	4.1	95.9

This table illustrates the continuation of the surge of the Jewish immigration from different continents and demonstrates the gradual rise of the number of immigrants since the beginning of the twentieth century, where the number of immigrants did not exceed 55000 immigrants then we find it escalating in 1955 to 166000 immigrants, then in 1990 to 199000 immigrants. This rising wave of the Jewish immigration to Palestine had toppled the balance of power and deepened the disparities in Palestine between the intruders and the genuine landowners, where it had imposed a Jewish prevalence and consequently their mastery over Palestine.

The following table, taken from the general Israeli guide – Palestinian Studies institute, Mahmmoud Miaary, population composition p. 37-89 – shows that the Jews who were born outside Palestine formed the majority of the Jews of Israel until the beginning of the seventies. Then the percent of the Jews born in Israel or Palestine before 1948 began to increase, thus composing the majority of the Jewish population of Israel (60.9% in 1993).

The inhabitants of Israel based on the

country of origin

Country of Origin	Absolute No.	%
Total No.	4.335.2	100.0
Asia – Total	736.300	17.0
Turkey	86.300	2.0
Iraq	256.500	5.9
Yemen	158.00	3.6
Iran	134.7	3.1
Other countries (including India and Pakistan)	100.2	2.3
Africa – Total	837.6	19.3
Morocco	502.8	11.6
Algeria and Tunisia	126.5	2.9
Libya	74.7	1.7
Egypt	63.0	1.4
Other countries (including Ethiopia)	70.6	1.6
Europe, America and Ukraine – Total	1.730.5	39.9
Soviet Union	712.1	16.4
Poland	262.5	6.0
Romania	258.0	5.9
Bulgaria and Greece	59.9	1.4
Germany and Austria	85.0	2.0
Czechoslovakia (formerly) Hungary and other European countries	191.8	4.4
North America, South America and Ocean Islands	161.2	3.7
PalestineIsrael-born, father also	1.030.8	23.8

In this study ascribed to the previously stated source, it becomes evident that the Israeli community is a community of immigrants or settlers, where 39.1% from the Jewish inhabitants are still born in places outside the country and 37.1% are born inside the country (Palestine or Israel) but their fathers are born outside. And that 23.8% only from the Jewish inhabitants and their fathers are born inside the country. The Jewish population has grown fast, thus it has multiplied six-fold since the establishment of Israel on 15th May 1948 until the end of the year 1993. The scale of immigration, has generally contributed to half of the population growth and the natural growth in the other half. The Palestinians in Israel, excepting the inhabitants of Al-Qods, constitute 15.4% from the total population. The Arab population has succeeded to preserve their proportion in spite of the intensified Jewish immigration, through natural population growth whose percent amounts to approximately double the percent of the natural growth of the Jews. According to “the country of origin”, defined by the Israeli statistics, i.e. based on the birthplace of the person or the birthplace of his father, the Jewish inhabitants in Israel are divided into three main ethnic groups:

1-Western Jews (or from western origins), born in Europe – America.

2-Native-born Jews, of foreign-born fathers in Europe – America.

3-Eastern Jews (or from eastern origins): born in Asia – Africa – and native-born Jews, descendants of foreign-born fathers in Asia – Africa.

In addition to all these figures related to immigration to Palestine, the immigration of the Russian Jews from the former Soviet Union is remarkable, for these immigrants to the occupied Palestinian territories make up 10% from the total inhabitants therein, and their influence and power steadily increase in the political life since the big immigration, that carried the biggest number of them to Israel at the late eighties and the earliest nineties. During four years (1990-1993), more than half a million citizens immigrated from the former Soviet Union to Israel, which led to 10% increase of its population. The majority among the adult immigrants were Soviet university or technological academies graduates, also the major class among them were engineers and architects. Many sources document this immigration like, American Sephardi Federation, Jewish Agency for Israel and Center Bureau of Statistics; also, Ahmad Khalifah – “The Russian immigrants in Israel”, Palestinian studies magazine, issue 38, spring 1999, p. 80 & 124. The following table summarizes the details certified by these sources:

Immigration to Israel from the former Soviet Union

Year	Immigrants Total	Immigrants from former Soviet Union In thousands
1986	9505	202
1987	12.965	2096
1988	13.034	2283
1989	24.000	12.932
1990	199.516	185.227
1991	176.100	147.839
1992	77.057	65.093
1993	76.805	66.196
1994	79.844	67.771
1995	76.361	64.489
1996	70.605	58.447
1997	65.962	54.521
1998	56.700	45.400
Total	938.454	772.496

After viewing all these figures, statistics and facts, it is now crystal-clear that the Israelis were never the owners of the Palestinian land, they are only colonizers who were backed by some subjugating forces to control the destines of the Palestinian people and turn their life into the hell we see today. It is noteworthy that the memory of the Muslim Arab populations needs none of these figures or data to realize that the Zionists are intruders, because the history of all Arab countries is common since ancient times. The sad reality is that the true landowners live under the pressure of the mightiest power in the world, to the extent that anyone who defends his country – Palestine – is labeled as a “Terrorist”. They paradoxically regard the daily slaughtering from which the Palestinians suffer as a defense of Israel when in reality is only an imperialist power. Values and standards are reversed to the extent that some people in the world defend the colonizers and usurpers against their victims whose lands are usurped forcibly and coercively by the power of arms. This biggest immigration in the history of humanity towards Palestine has clearly shown that the inhabitants of what is known today as Israel are aliens to the Arabic Palestine. Huge numbers of Jews have occupied the small lands of Palestine, so where did the remaining surviving Palestinians go after this extensive immigration to Palestine? Where did the true owners of the lands seek refuge after the foreign usurpers have occupied their land?