More from Camera: The Story’s Been Told Many Many Times
Here’s the story, which we’ve told here at LGF more times than I can count (true, I can’t count very high).
This month the United Nations marks World Refugee Day, a star-studded, multimedia campaign to raise awareness about the plight of refugees. Celebrities like Angelina Jolie have cut video spots that will be broadcast on television and spread on social media. Millions will participate in events spanning five continents, from concerts in London to a film festival in Beirut to a bike race in Ecuador. Yet mention of one group of refugees will be noticeably absent from any of these activities: the 850,000 Jews expelled from Arab countries during the past six decades. Their history remains one of the 20th century’s greatest untold stories.
At the end of World War II, 850,000 Jews lived in Arab countries. Just 8,500 remain today. Their departure was no accident. After Arab leaders failed to annihilate Israel militarily in 1948, they launched a war of terror, incitement, and expulsion to decimate their own ancient Jewish communities.
I’m breaking the quote off at this point, because Mr. Prosor goes into details about the expulsion, followed by the ‘this tragedy must be acknowledged and rectified etc. etc.’ mode. But it has been acknowledged properly, by Israel and Jews the world over, as the exiled Jews were taken in by a young State of Israel, and it’s all good.
The myth that the only refugees in 1948 were Arab, well, for some that will never go away. And there’s nothing, absolutely nothing, that can be done about that. But this would be covered in the almost certain to be upcoming post: Today in Camera: Antisemitism is Rational.