One frequently cited figure of Israel's red (leftist) and green (Islamic) critics is the 0.75 million Palestinian refugees who fled Israel during the Israeli Independence War. A core demand of these groups is that Israel accept the "right of return" for these refugees and their several million descendants, which of course would spell Israel's destruction.
I do consider this a tragic outcome, but anyone with even a modicum of historical knowledge will understand that rather than being an egregious exception, this is the normal and dare I say expected outcome of modern conflicts. And when analyzing the issue of Palestinian refugees we should keep this in mind:
Over 0.8 million Jews were expelled from the Arab world and in a matter of a few years Israel had successfully settled them and focused its energy on building a modern, prosperous and democratic nation.
After years of conflict between Turkey and Greece, both parties as well as most major European powers sanctioned the Treaty of Laussane which organized a population exchange that resulted in the exchange of over 1.5 million Greeks from Turkey and nearly 0.5 million Turks from Greece. In addition tri-lateral population exchanges were undertook between Bulgaria, Greec and Turkey. Within less than a decade all the refugees were settled and territorial disputes between both nations had ceased.
After the second world war, the allie sanctioned the expulsion of an estimated 15.0 million Germans from Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Hungary and Yugoslavia. Within less than a decade all of the refugees were settled. Similar but less dramatic movements of Poles, Ukrainians and Romanians also occurred.
The only group of refugees that have not been settled in the last 60 years are the Palestinians. Rather than humanely settle the Palestinians, their "Arab brothers" let them rot in the camps for political and propaganda purposes. History shows that the first and most painful step to peace is by separating hostile populations and creating clear, rational boundaries.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_exodus_from_Arab_lands
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_exchange_between_Greece_and_Turkey
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsion_of_Germans_after_World_War_II
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