In this post we comment upon how the Norwegian edition of Le Monde Diplomatique manages, in a “fact box” on Israel’s history, to omit mention of the 1948 war. As is well known this war was initiated by Israel’s neighbors immediately upon the establishment of Israel, and cost Israel 1% of her population. Seeing as how the war of 1948 among other issues is central to our perception of Israel’s responsibility for the Naqba, it is not really something you would want to omit.
Yet when we visit the background fact-pages of Verdens Gang (Norway’s largest daily) we find the very same omission – the war of 1948 is obfuscated.
The last bullet point on the right side of the image says: “Jews declared the state of Israel. Battles between jews and Palestinians drove 2/3 of the Palestinian population into flight”.
No mention of how jews were forced to flee from the Palestinian areas, or indeed the rest of North Africa. No mention of how the war of 1948 was an arab war of aggression against the jews.
One might wonder whether there is a pattern to all of this.
