Migrants

By dividing the western part of the Land of Israel into three main areas of Jewish settlement, we can discuss population growth rates:

In areas with a high density of Jewish population, there were at the most 92,300 non-Jewish residents in 1893.
In 1947, the number of non-Jewish residents was already 463,000—a growth rate of 5x.

In the areas with low Jewish development, the growth rate from 1893 to 1947 was lower than 2.5x.

In the areas where Jews were expelled, the growth rate was just over 2x: in 1893 the population was 233,500, compared to 517,000 in 1947.

The obvious conclusion is that growth of the Arab or non-Jewish population was directly proportional to Jewish presence (p.248).

According to research, such a rapid increase in population could not be the result of natural growth, which is slower.
It seems tens of thousands of Arab immigrants were never registered by the authorities (p.249).
We can therefore understand that the number of “natives” claimed by the Arabs is greatly exaggerated—Arabs were not born at a supernatural rate,
the population grew as a result of immigration to the Land of Israel.
This exaggeration of the number of residents led to the erroneous description according to which
“600 thousand Arabs and 50 thousand Jews” inhabited the Land of Israel in 1918 (p.251).

A report by John Hope Simpson determined that the Arab immigrants to the Land of Israel came from Arab territories in the region,
with the purpose of benefiting from Jewish development (p.314).
There was never an accurate count of the number of Arab Muslims who resided in the areas of the Jewish settlement in the Land of Israel;
therefore, the number of Arabs residing in the land before the renewed Jewish settlement could not be checked (p.238).
This enabled two main premises: First, that there was a thousand-year-old Arab population with a Palestinian national identity.
And second, that the population in the areas of Jewish settlement in the western part of the Land of Israel
is equivalent to the population of the entire western part of the Land of Israel.

  • Between the years 1872-1882 the total population of the Land of Israel was 300 to 400 thousand.
    The total Muslim population consisted of 200 thousand inhabitants (p.237).
  • According to research by geographer Vital Cuinet,
    the population of the western part of the Land of Israel in 1895 stood at 450 thousand inhabitants;
    252 thousand were Muslim (according to the same research, the number of Muslim inhabitants in 1882 was 141 thousand).
    The data shows the number of Muslim permanent residents in the Land of Israel doubled—something that is clearly not logical.
  • Dr. Carl hermann Voss, head of the American Christian Palestine Committee, stated in 1953:
    “The Arab population…was limited until Jewish Settlement made the desert bloom, and brought with it Arabs from neighboring lands…
    in the year 1882 there were less than 150 thousand Arabs in the Land of Israel.
    The vast majority of the Arab population in the last decades were all new residents…” (p.240).

During the 19th Century, the authorities and tax collectors exploited the Arab farmers (Falach) and took half of their production.
The few that remained lost their land to lenders who paid low interest.
Most Arabs migrated from place to place in the Arab world. Due to this nomadic life,
there were no orchards, fruit trees or plantations for growing vegetables in the villages.

During the same period, Bedouin tribes continued to infiltrate the region.
Their flow of people surged, and more tribes entered the Land of Israel.
These tribes took “protection fees” from the inhabitants and threatened to burn their fields if they refused.
The onslaught forced many to abandon their towns.
Arab literature describes how until the end of the century, the Land of Israel was far from being “the land of milk and honey”,
but rather was a poor Ottoman province: partially a desert in which “there are more thorns than flowers”
and in which a big portion of the Muslim settlement that remained in the land was temporary (p.172).

The Jews are the ones who created the environment for development and opportunities—
which drew nomadic farmers from different Syrian regions, especially Hauran,
who came and settled near the Jews in order to work on their farms.
In this way, the Arab workers who immigrated to the land established camps next to the Jewish agricultural colonies.
Overall, Arab immigration to the Land of Israel began only after Jewish settlement,
and was therefore dependent on places of employment provided by the Jews (p.173).

The Land of Israel under Ottoman rule was neglected and abandoned,
and its population consisted of numerous nomads. During the 19th Century,
the Turks brought immigrants from various lands and therefore many of the inhabitants were not natives.

  • Historian Ernest Frankenstein wrote: Of the 141 thousand Muslim permanent residents who lived in the entire Land of Israel in 1882,
    at least 25% were new to the land or descendants of those who came after 1831 (p.196).
  • The immigrants were the families of Egyptian Military personnel, Turks, Latin Greeks, Algerians,
    tribes from the Barbary Coast, and Turkmen Bedouins (p196).
  • Immigrants who came for various reasons. Some were encouraged to populate the land by the Turks who wanted to strengthen their control,
    some were against the Turks and took advantage of greedy locals in order to bribe them and take control of the lands,
    and some were workers who were brought by the owners of the farms to work their fields (p.196).
  • American Expedition led by researcher Lynch: “In Yaffo, 8,000 out of 13,000 are Turks” (p.197).
  • Testimony of British consul (1860): “
    There is an increase in the number of Muslims from the Barbary Coast,
    a great number of Algerians moved from Damascus to Zafed; however,
    the land is still desolate and abandoned. In Jerusalem, less than a quarter of the residents are Muslim” (p.197).
  • British Commission of Inquiry (1870): “It is questionable if any of the ones working the fields can prove their possession of the land before 1870” (p.198).

Jewish Immigration and the new settlements drew Arab Immigrants who had recently arrived (p.200).

  • Due to the fact that Jewish workers were few and untrained, Arab workers were brought to the new settlements.
  • Circassian agricultural colonies were established around Sajara.
  • Circassian and Egyptian workers were brought to Hadera.
  • In 1893, there were 21 Jews and 6 Arabs in Zikhron Ya’akov. In 1898, it was 27 Jews and 21 Arabs.
  • There were 40 Jewish Families In Rishon Lezion before 400 poor Arab Families arrived in the town.
  • In 1914 there were 600 permanent Arab workers and another 1,100 temporary workers.
    in Petach Tikva .
  • There was immigration from the outside into the Land of Israel, but also internal migration: from Arab regions to Jewish regions.
  • Malcolm MacDonald, one of the forefathers of “The White Paper”:
    “The Arabs cannot say that the Jews are expelling them from their homeland…for even if not one single Jew had arrived after 1918,
    the Arab population would…still remain in the numbers it was under Ottoman rule” (p.238).

The population count in 1893 included internal migration and previous immigration.
The economic development of the Jewish areas brought the nomadic, poor Falach (Arab peasants) to the Land of Israel.

Burkhard described the years 1810-1816 this way:
“A few…They died in the town where they were born. Families move incessantly from place to place” (p.245).
Many immigrants were brought to the land by the Turks between the 1870’s and 1893, the year the census was carried out.
For example, in Rishon Lezion, a farming colony established in 1882,
there were 40 Jewish families until 400 Arab families rushed to the Colony and surrounded it.
In this way, the establishment of a Jewish farming colony led to a ratio of 10:1 between immigrants and internal Arab migrants, and Jews (p.246).

Another example: Between the years 1890-1893, as a result of an additional 900 Jews who lived in 15 colonies,
9,000 Arabs arrived who decided to move to Jewish areas.
In other words, the population of internal Arab migrants chased after Jewish settlement and progress in the western part of the Land of Israel,
both with the establishment of the farming colonies and after. So the claim that the Arab population was expelled is simply not true (p.247).

The natural growth rate of the Arab population in areas of Jewish settlement was higher than in neighboring Arab countries.
This fact is suspicious, for even if we take into account the improved living conditions Arabs enjoyed thanks to Jewish efforts,
the required time to produce a change in way of life cannot result in such a rapid increase in natural growth as they claimed.

In effect, In cities were the vast majority of residents were Arabs, the Arab population only grew slightly;
in Gaza, the population even decreased. On the other hand, in areas of Jewish settlement,
the Arab population grew at an unprecedented rate (p.253, 254).

In the Hope-Simpson report, there is acknowledgement that it was customary for British officials
to turn a blind eye to illegal Arab immigration, except for extravagant cases. It is also noted in the report,
that such an immigration harms Jews who seek to come to the Land of Israel:
“When the case is extravagant, certainly you must expel. In a case which is not especially extravagant,
and when there is no objection from anyone, it is enough to maintain the existing procedure—
to deduct the immigrant from the workers quota, even if this system is to some extent unjust to the Jewish immigrant outside the land,
since his place is taken by the tourist” (p.288).

Britain formed an Arab legion that controlled the border between Trans-Jordan and the Land of Israel.
Years before, in this same border, Colonel Mackereth struggled to establish a system of identification cards
with the objective of preventing illegal Arab immigration as well as the smuggling of weapons.
Even after the system was implemented, there was still wide-scale Arab immigration from Syria and Trans-Jordan into the Land of Israel (p.357).
As the American-British report determined after the war:
“It was implemented, time after time, not to implement a compelling system of identification” (p.358).
Only in one instance did the British actually expel Arabs: “if he drew the attention of the Police”.
In this case, the immigrant’s fate would be “to be deported”.
It can be understood from British memorandums that another 140 – 406 Arab immigrants were deported between January and March in 1942.
Its worth noting that the Arabs who were deported were taken to the border—
which was guarded by Arab Legion soldiers who ordered them to “go back home”, to their homelands (p.359).