Panic Arab Refugee Flight from Palestine, 1947-48

The failure to place the blame and  responsibility for the Palestinian refugee problem where it correctly belongs, on the Arab panic and during 1947-48, squarely on the divided and corrupt Arab leadership is easy to ascertain from eye witness accounts reporting internal intimidation, blackmail, arson, looting, and mass flight were and remain the norm in inter-Arab conflicts.

The Arab civilian population of Haifa and Jaffa realized long before April 1948 that their lives and property were in jeopardy from the poorly disciplined, irregular, and corrupt invading Arab forces as much as from the prospect of a Jewish military victory.

Dr. Herbert Pritzke was an escaped German prisoner of war who served as Chief Medical Officer for the Arab forces in Jaffa. His eyewitness account, Bedouin Doctor (Dutton, 1957) is the objective reporting of a foreign volunteer: The author describes his years of adventures and survival in the Middle East, serving as a medical officer in Rommel’s Afrika Korps. He was taken prisoner. In 1946 and managed to escape from a British P.O.W. camp near the Suez Canal. He was  subsequently picked up by Bedouins who welcomed him as a member of the tribe and taught him Arabic. He shared their lifestyle and continued to practice medicine but his sojourn required participation in the Arab invasion of Palestine to prevent the emergence of a Jewish state as well as involvement in shady arms deals with the British and hashish smuggling into Sinai.

After a year he went to Cairo, where he was forced to sign on with the Moslem Brotherhood and ‘volunteer’ with the Arab ‘Liberation Army’ (ALA) in Palestine. He later escaped to Lebanon where he would eventually spend three years managing a remote hospital in Saudi Arabia but succeeded in becoming the confidant of King Saud’s loyal staff.

In his autobiography, he describes the collapse of the local Palestinian guerilla forces.

There was no discipline, no military police. no muster rolls, no list of personnel. No one ever knew who belonged to which unit or where the different units were. This incurable disorder was shamelessly exploited. Things happened as they were bound to happen under such leadership. By the end of April, the Jaffa front was completely disintegrated. The town was almost deserted. Less than a tenth of the 80,000 inhabitants remained in their homes, and even this remnant was trying by all means possible to get out of the town. Fear of their own bullying and cruel compatriots spurred them to leave home and property, not less than the imminent occupation of the town by the Jewish besiegers. Moreover, bandits, more dangerous than the occupying force, were roaming through the town singly and in groups robbing and murdering.

It was clear that the depopulated and demoralized town must soon be overrun by the Jews. We Germans, who met almost daily in my room in the hospital, found ourselves in a very precarious situation. As representatives of law and order, we could to some extent check the depredations of the bandits and looters, which did not make us popular with them. At the same time, we felt that we were hated by the embittered citizens because we could not save their town. If we managed to survive the final chaos, we could look forward to no prospect of future but captivity. The Arabs themselves no longer showed any keenness to fight for their country.