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Palestinian exodus - Absentee property

Palestinian exodus - Absentee property: Encyclopedia II - Palestinian exodus - Absentee property

In 1950, the Absentee Property Law was passed in Israel. It provided for confiscation of the property and land left behind by departing Palestinians, the so-called "absentees". Even Arabs who never left Israel, and received citizenship after the war, but stayed for a few days in a nearby village had their property confiscated. About 32,000 Palestinians became "present absentees" - persons that were present at the time but considered absent. How much of Israel's territory consists of land confiscated with the Absentee Property Law is u ...

Palestinian exodus: Encyclopedia II - Palestinian exodus - Absentee property

Palestinian exodus - Absentee property

How much of Israel's territory consists of land confiscated with the Absentee Property Law is uncertain. According to the Israeli Custodian of Absentee Property, it could amount to 70% of the territory:

The Custodian of Absentee Property does not choose to discuss politics. But when asked how much of the land of the state of Israel might potentially have two claimants - an Arab and a Jew holding respectively a British Mandate and an Israeli deed to the same property - Mr. Manor [the Custodian in 1980] believes that 'about 70 percent' might fall into that category (Robert Fisk, The Land of Palestine, Part Eight: The Custodian of Absentee Property, The Times, December 24, 1980

The Jewish National Fund's estimate is considerably higher at 88%:

Of the entire area of the state of Israel only about 300,000-400,000 dunums ... are state domain which the Israeli government took over from the mandatory regime [2 percent]. The JNF and private Jewish owners possess under two million dunum [10 percent]. Almost all the rest [i.e 88 percent of the 20,225,000 dunums within the 1949 armistice lines] belongs at law to Arab owners, many of whom have left the country. (Jewish National Fund, Jewish Villages in Israel, p.xxi, quoted in Lehn and Davis, The Jewish National Fund)

The absentee property played an enormous role in making Israel a viable state. In 1954 about one third of Israel's population lived on absentee property. Of 370 new Jewish settlements established between 1948 and 1953, 350 were on absentee property. As Moshe Dayan put it in an often quoted speech before students at the Israeli Institute of Technology in 1969:

We came here to a country that was populated by Arabs, and we are building a Hebrew, Jewish state. In a considerable portion of localities we purchased the land from the Arabs. Instead of Arab villages Jewish villages were established. You even do not know the name of the villages and I do not blame you, because those geography books no longer exist. Not only the books, but the villages no longer exist. Nahalal was established in the place of Mahalul, Gevat in the place of Jibta, Sarid in the place of Hanifas and Kefar Yehoshu'a in the place of Tel Shaham. There is not a single settlement that was not established in the place of a former Arab village. (Dayan, March 19, 1969; as quoted in Haaretz, April 4, 1969)