Talk:1948 Arab–Israeli War

Regarding the Anglo-Israeli air battles

Twice, I added in the section that there have been allegations that some RAF pilots took their revenge by shooting down any Israeli aircraft they encountered, including a few transports, and that this was subsequently covered up. I noticed that it was eventually removed in both cases. Can anyone tell me why? It seems like it would be appropriate to put in there.--RM (Be my friend) 16:44, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

I am not aware of this event but that is not enough for it to be deleted. If it is not well-known, it may justify anyway to remove this per WP:Undue

In any case, what is the source for this information ?

Pluto2012 (talk) 16:10, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

The Spyflight article, which is the main source for that section. I'm not sure if it would fall under the realm of "not well-known", as the article itself states that there were "persistent rumors".--RM (Be my friend) 02:25, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Hi Reenem,

I am rather very open on the question of sources. From my point of view, a source is good until a better source is found. Anyway, for most contributors, a website cannot be considered as a reliable source, even if it is of quality...

By "well-known", I meant that I have the latest books about the 1948 war, I have read them, some several times but I have never heard about this. But of course, I don't know everything.

It seems it is in the RAF mythology (rumors). Mythology is a dangerous source. Don't you know if there are official historical records of the events by British historians who could give some weight to this information ?

Pluto2012 (talk) 05:50, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

We don't have to use it as a 100% confirmed source. I just want to mention that there have been rumors that the RAF pilots attacked IAF planes in revenge. I'm sure a lot of Wikipedia articles say that there were rumors of this or that happening and that it has never been confirmed. I would think that the possibility that RAF pilots attacked IAF planes would be significant enough to mention.--RM (Be my friend) 17:17, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Very sincerely, I don't think so. On the contrary.

Even if a reliable source would say there were such rumors, I would prefer not adding this information in an article per WP:DUE WEIGHT.

At least, we need a reliable source stating such events occured.

Pluto2012 (talk) 17:57, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Design flaw

This is cast as a face-off between established armies, between Israel and other neighbouring nation's armies. We have an Egyptian, Iraqi, Jordanian etc. section, and the development of set battles under Israeli operational names. The problem is, that a large part of the fighting took place without set battles between Israel and elements of those armies: in the several hundred Palestinian villages that were beseiged and attacked, there were, if you will, clashes between units of the Israeli army and local villagers, and one occasional explains that there were 'Arab irregulars' here and there. But this is almost ignored in our view of the fighting which, editors should be reminded, is written mostly from Israeli books, which blur these boundaries. For that reason, I think, in order for NPOV to be maintained, that some corrective attention be given to the ground assaults which concern Israeli forces and Palestinian villages. The latter were, after all, the major casualties of the conflict. I have edited in David Tal and Neumann's memories of the southern front for July as one example of what is required. If you deal with the south in a subsection that preempts neutrality by designating the clash as one between Israeli and Egyptian forces, you automatically cancel what was going in irrespective of the Egyptian army, i.e. the Palestinian narrative.Nishidani (talk) 14:25, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

I agree with you.

In that case, focus should be given to Al-Dawayima massacre.

Note I think that Neumann is a primary source quoted by a journalist (Gideon Levy), who is well-known and reliable but who is not notorious enough on the topic to be used as a wp:rs source in this article...

Pluto2012 (talk) 17:53, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

(Gideon Levy), who is ... reliable ??? A reporter who claims that Israel is always wrong?? can he be reliable? Ykantor (talk) 13:15, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Nishidani: you inserted a POV sentence: Israeli forces had already been engaged in attacking and expelling

Nishidani: you inserted a POV sentence: At the same time Israeli forces had already been engaged in attacking and expelling residents from Arab villages, . In fact, it was a by product only, of Haganah preparation for the Arab states invasion, and it was limited to important military territories only (both within and outside of the U.N. partition boundaries).Ykantor (talk) 10:59, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

As usual, you don't know what you are talking about with regard to wiki policy. The sentence I introduced is directly taken from a noted Israeli historian of that period, who makes it quite clear that several of the Arab Palestinian villages taken by assault at that time were outside of the area designated as the territorial boundaries of the Partition Plan for Israel. Your second remark is incomprehensible, if the introductory 'in fact' is being used in the controvertive sense.Nishidani (talk) 12:24, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Nishidani, please stop personal attacks e.g. As usual, you don't know what you are talking about....

• It is not the first time that you respond to whatever you wish and irrelenat points (e.g. out of the area, direct quote), but not to the wp:npov mentioned points:

1. it was a by product only, of Haganah preparation for the Arab states invasion
2. it was limited to important military territories only (both within and outside of the U.N. partition boundaries).

• Will you please respond to the POV mentioned points? Ykantor (talk) 13:08, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

It's a fact that you have only the vaguest understanding of wikipedia policy. To state that is not to engage in a personal attack

Go and read WP:NPOV.

Editing from a neutral point of view (NPOV) means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.

You are so unfamiliar with policy that you called my use of a balancing source POV ('Wikipedia aims to describe disputes, but not engage in them' (b) 'As a general rule, do not remove sourced information from the encyclopedia solely on the grounds that it seems biased. Instead, try to rewrite the passage or section to achieve a more neutral tone. Biased information can usually be balanced with material cited to other sources to produce a more neutral perspective, so such problems should be fixed when possible through the normal editing process.'), when you edited in a point of view, and then implied above that the point of view you hold is a fact. Indeed it is only comprehensible if one remembers that you edit 'to the truth' which, in many cases, happens to coincide with more or less the old Zionist narrativ. You will either have to read policy correctly, or learn to understand English with more sophistication than you have shown so far. Nishidani (talk) 13:17, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

• So many words, but no reply to those 2 mentioned wp:pov points.
• yours:"learn to understand English with more sophistication". you are right but toward yourself. You have not inserted a balancing text, and there is no connection between the Arab invasion and between Haganah attacking Arabs. You added a new (and a POV) point (Haganah attacking Arabs).
• The Arab invasion is indeed a fact, unless you come with an wp:rs who says it is not an invasion, and then (and then only), it will balance my writing.
• I suggest you ask other people if your added text is a balancing text or a new point.
• Please reply to to those 2 POV problems. Ykantor (talk) 15:57, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Where did I say that the Arab Invasion on the 15 May was not a fact?

Why is there no connection between 'the Arab invasion and because Haganah attacking Arabs'(that's ungrammatical, by the way).

p.s. You don't 'write the text'. We write the text.Nishidani (talk) 16:42, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Latest revision as of 09:18, 23 October 2013 (edit) (undo)

I do not know what the reference has, but I think it should be "proposed Jewish state"" rather than" future state of Israel". Trahelliven (talk) 09:32, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Quite correct. By all means feel free to change that.

Has Ykantor broken the 1r rule today?

(1)the text is concised (Actually disembowelled)

(2)also here? I'm no expert on this area, but that is two consecutive removals of disputed material, the one removing David Tal particularly serious since it is a specialist RS authority, and the edit summary has nothing to do with the removal.Nishidani (talk) 15:09, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

Two consecutive reverts count as one revert. I don't have time to go through the second diff right now. The justification for the first diff makes no sense at all. Our neutrality policy says that we accurately represent sources. Yankor deletes a high quality academic source citing his own opinion about the topic and then claims "POV". From a Wikipedia perspective it is totally incoherent - Our neutrality policy tells us to represent reliable sources not our own views on topics. Dlv999 (talk) 18:41, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

With regard to Zionist forces attacking and clearing villages and towns in the Arab-projected part of Palestine prior to the end of the mandate, the activities of the Irgun seem to have been forgotten (see the Arab-Israeli War section of the Irgun article).
The Lead currently says, "An alliance of Arab states invaded Israel and the zone proposed for the Arab state, on behalf of the Palestinian Arab side," which is interesting because, of course, neither now or when it was created, Israel doesn't and didn't have specified borders, which begs the question of what the article means when it says Israel was invaded. By the time the war started, Zionist forces were in control of the territory of the Jewish-projected part of Palestine and only a fraction of the fighting took place there.
    ←   ZScarpia   03:23, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

• the activities of the Irgun. Yes, you are right. Dier Yassin Massacre is extremely important and should be mentioned (perhaps together with Kfar Etzion massacre)
• Israel doesn't and didn't have specified borders. There should be a date from which we should use "israel" instead of Palestine. What should be this date? I thought that the 15.5.48 was an appropriate date (the end of the Mandate and the Israeli declaration of independance.) Would you suggest another date?
• By the time the war started, Zionist forces were in control of the territory of the Jewish-projected part. The borders question is complicated. The Arabs did not recognized any partition borders. U.K did not recognize Israel, nor its borders. ( I read that The U.K mailed to "The jewish authorities, Tel Aviv", which was returned to the sender). At the invasion date, the Negev was not yet under Israeli control.
• only a fraction of the fighting took place there..
  • At the invasion first day, the Egyptians attacked Kibutz Nirim (within the partition border) and bombarded Tel Aviv.
  • At the invasion first day, the Iraqi's attacked Kibutz Gesher (within the partition border) BTW The Arab Legion attacked Gesher too, but 3 weeks earlier.
  • At the invasion second day, just after midnight of the first day, the syrian bombarded Kibutz Ein-Gev (within the partition border).

It seems that the Arab states has attacked Israel from the invasion begining. Ykantor (talk) 11:13, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

I realize that the term "Invasion" is not accepted well here. In my opinion it is a definition only. e.g. During the ww2, the Allies invaded Normandy and the locals welcomed the invasion. Ykantor (talk)

The main part of the article describes what happened on 15 May 1948 in these terms - neighboring Arab states Egypt, Jordan (Transjordan) and Syria, invaded the territory of the former British Mandate on the night of 14–15 May 1948. For consistency, the lead should be in the same terms.

Even if Ytantor were justified in making the edit of 20:46, 23 October 2013, it would have been helpful to have given reasons in the edit summary on such an important detail. Of course an explanation in the Talk page would have been even better. Trahelliven (talk) 04:16, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

We must accept that the majority of RS (esp. from distinguished Israeli historians like Gelber and Morris, but the problem is broader than that) espouse the idea that in writing of the outbreak of hostilities, the form 'Israel was invaded (by 5 Arab countries)' thesis/meme. And we are obliged to respect those authorities. It is however self-evident that this is a systemic bias POV leg-in to one side, and indeed Laurens offers a clearly different version, which ought to be taken as a balance to the Morris/Gelber version.

The simplest way to phrase this neutrality is: 'With the declaration of the State of Israel with Mandatory Palestine, concurrently, the Arab states undertook a military intervention. Ben-Gurion opposed any mention of frontiers in the Declaration on two grounds: no precedent existed for this in the Declaration of Independence by the United States and secondly, depending of the outcome of the conflict, it was possible for Israel to extend its territorial reach into the Galilee and the Jerusalem corridor.' This is how Laurens puts it, adding:-

'The entry of the Arab countries into the war posed a complex legal problem.Crossing (affranchissement) the borders can amount to an act of aggression or a threat to peace which would justify both a condemnation and an intervention by ther United Nations; but if the armed forces penetrate only in the Arab part of the Partition Plan, they can be considered as (having been) elicited by the population and at this stage would their intervention would not be by itself a threat to peace. This (then) would only begin with an attack (loaunched) by the Jewish side. But, at certain points, the Arab armies directly threaten Jewish territory and in others the Jews have already established themselves broadly in Arab territory' (Laurens vol.2 p.104) 'The military operations (at that date) are launched simultaneously' p.105

As to the 5 armies. On the Lebanese border, Laurens says that 800 soldiers only made a slight penetration into Palestinian territory to strengthen its defensive position. p-107. a poorly prepared small Syrian force entered the Galilee and was repulse; Iraq's army after two brief sallies to the north, entered the Arab section via the Allenby bridge along with Glubb's forces, which aspired to annex the greatest part of Arab Palestine' without engaging in a confrontation with the Israelis' p.109 and was under specific instructions not to overstep the Partition Plan lines.

So, Laurens has a very nuanced, POV-sensitive analysis of the outbreak of the war. He nowhere in these pages speaks of 'invasion'.

His description of the battle for Jerusalem shows similar care, though his perspective balances the dramatic account we have of a beseiged Jewish community with a version where the Arab irregularls desperately and valiantly defend themselves against a Jewish attempt to conquer the city.pp.111ff.Nishidani (talk) 13:10, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

a poorly prepared small Syrian force entered the Galilee. This poorly prepared small Syrian force invaded with artillery, tanks, armed armored cars, and air force with Harvard armed aircraft, while Israel had none. While the royal navy successfully blocked Jewish arms shipping (and new immigrants as well) up to the Mandate last day, Arab armed forces (Arab Liberation Army, Army of the Holy War , Egyptian irregulars) easily entered Palestine. Those 4 weeks (between 15.5 invasion and the first truce) were the most horrible period to the Jews, who were defending themselves with light arms, against relatively well equipped armies with heavy arms.

If Laurens writes "a poorly prepared small Syrian force entered the Galilee", then he is biased against the Jewish side. Ykantor (talk) 20:00, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Nonsense. The Syrian army committed 1,500 men. They were wholly unprepared for the war, having received notice that they were to fight just a few days before the 15th of May. Their logistics were poor - they had handed over a part of their munition reserves to the Arab Salvation Army, and given its scarcity of war matériel had to husband what was left. Its knowledge of the theatre of war where it was to conduct operations was minimal. It took then almost a week to get their tanks over the Jordan. Their first advance was roundly defeated, with heavy losses. On the 18th under Husni Zaim they attacked and took Samakh, south of Tiberias, only to lose it in three days after an Israeli-kibbutznik counter attack. This massive army 'with artillary, tanks, (armed?)armoured cars and airforce stocked with Harvards, (not Harvard-armed aircraft!!, which is a brilliantly comical image)' took 4 days, involving almost all that the Syrian army could muster, to capture a little moshava like Mishmar HaYarden, with its 20 local guards (Tal p.261) which had to fight on its own, without IDF assistance.

Secondly, you really should stop this nonsense about RS bias. Morris is biased against the Palestinian/Arab side, anyone can see that, but he is eminently good on the facts. Laurens is perhaps the most neutral of all, but he gives the Arab version a much more intelligent coverage than others. Morris, Tal, Gelber, Laurens are all RS, and that's all that counts. One cannot challenge one of them, as if the others were somehow engaged in 'neutral' coverage.Nishidani (talk) 20:52, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

I repeat: if Laurence wrote that (a poorly prepared small Syrian force entered the Galilee), he is biased against Israel. The Syrians attacked Israel, having a big advantage of both weapons and the amount of soldiers in the region. With all their drawbacks, they were much superior relative to Israel. The Israelis defended themselves with some success, because of their motivation: they realized that if they loose, they will be slaughtered by the Syrians. Ykantor (talk) 07:37, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

an armored car, used for transport:
an armed armored car, with a built in weapon, might be used for fighting ( see Otter Light Reconnaissance Car) Ykantor (talk) 13:39, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Incorrect links

Hello helpers, I'm brand new to editing Wikipedia officially so I may not be using correct protocol, but I have found a problem. Under section 6.2, "Casualties", when referencing Henry James, it directs you to an American Revolutionary Statesman, not the French Historian which the work is attributed to. I am unable to edit as I only just created an account (for this reason) so could somebody do that please? The correct link should be: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Laurens_(scholar) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bschippers (talk • contribs) 14:16, 5 November 2013 (UTC)

the article has POV and "dubious" problems

The beginning of the Civil War

Citation needed- probably incorrect sentences

The following sentences does not seem correct. I have put a template - Citation needed

• "This situation caused the US to withdraw their support for the Partition plan, thus encouraging the Arab League to believe that the Palestinian Arabs, reinforced by the Arab Liberation Army, could put an end to the plan for partition." . It does not seem correct. I have put a template - Citation needed
• "Although a certain level of doubt took hold among Yishuv supporters, their apparent defeats were due more to their wait-and-see policy than to weakness.

The Haganah offensive was not a part of Plan Dalet

The article incorrectly say:"The result of his analysis was Plan Dalet, which was put in place from the start of April onwards[dubious – discuss]. The adoption of Plan Dalet marked the second stage of the civil war[dubious – discuss], in which Haganah passed from the defensive to the offensive.". The Haganah offensive was not a part of Plan Dalet. see Morris 2008, p. 116-119. Ykantor (talk) 16:13, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

'Plan Dalet (Plan D) practically realized the Zionist idea of transfer. Plan D was finalized by the Haganah on 10 March 1948 and implemented in the same month, though it only officially went into effect on 14 May 1948 the day Israel declared independence.' Sean F. McMahon (ed) The Discourse of Palestinian-Israeli Relations: Persistent Analytics and Practices,Routledge/Taylor & Francis ‎2010 p.27

'Plan Dalet was issued in March, but it was only carried out during the second part of April.'David Tal, War in Palestine, 1948: Israeli and Arab Strategy and Diplomacy, Routledge 2004 p.89.

:Your chronic confusion stems from the use of one or two sources, ignoring the fact that these are historians' points of view, in this case by literalists. That Plan D, an offensive, was to take place after the British withdrawal in May is one thing. That elements of Plan D were changed operationally after the Palestinian successes of March, leading other historians to regard operations that were technically not foreseen in the plan, as 'offensive' and therefore retrospectively heirs to the Plan D analysis and its battle aims, is something you ignore. As Laurens remarks, Nachshon in cleansing the route to Jerusalem according to the principles of Plan D, absorbed and anticipated the strategies of that Plan (vol.2 p.73)Nishidani (talk) 18:20, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

The Haganah on the offensive

Last minute truce - incorrect, and based on a non wp:rs

These sentences: "By late April, the U.S. State department, concerned to avoid a foreseeable conflagration after the British withdrawal, proposed a truce, managing to get the Arab states, that wished to avoid war, to accept informally proposals by Ben-Gurion they had previously rejected, including a Jewish immigration rate of 48,000 per annum. Likewise they promised the Jews assistance were Arab armies to invade subsequent to the truce. Aware that arm shipments from both Czechoslovakia and France were flowing in, and that local Palestinian forces were demoralized, the Jewish authorities turned down the proposal." are incorrect, and based on a non wp:Rs (a psycholgist, Baylis Thomas).

According to Morris 2008, p. 74-75 : "that required the Jews to curb immigration severely .334 Article 6 of the proposals of 29 April read: “During the period of the truce, no steps shall be taken by Arab or Jewish authorities to proclaim a sovereign state in a part or all of Palestine.”335 Israel consistently rejected the linkage and the deferment of statehood,336 but the proposals— against the backdrop of intense fighting in Palestine and Arab threats to invade— triggered a painful debate in the Zionist leadership about whether to postpone statehood"

Morris is not the bible, and in any case what he writes is not incompatible with what Thomas wrote. Nishidani (talk) 19:00, 15 November 2013 (UTC)

Dubious. incorrect. The Arabs in Haifa were asked to remain

The section: Haganah on the offensive. The article falsely claims that the Haifa Arabs fled because Haifa fell. But the Arabs in Haifa were asked to remain, by the Jewish mayor and by the British.(Morris 2008 p. 146). Concerning Acre: "The locals wanted a ceasefire but the AHC refused to permit it" (Morris 2008 p. 166).

This is nosense. They fled the city after it fell. It is not because it is claimed that they would have been asked to stay (other talks about intimidation by Haganah soldiers) that the reason of their flight is not the fall of the city. Pluto2012 (talk) 14:09, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Did the Arab citizens, choosing not to stay around and see if a Deir Yassin happened, not start fleeing when hostilities started?     ←   ZScarpia   14:21, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Indeed. And as Morris points out, there were many causes to the exodus of the Palestinian Arab population. The fear of what could happen was one of them if they fell in the hands of the Yishuv militia and some started to flight when the attack started but the general view that the fall of the mixed cities led to the exodus of 250,000 Arabs is still true and sourced. Pluto2012 (talk) 14:27, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

neutrality is disputed- were the Arab Armies prepared for the invasion

The article sentence: "The situation pushed the leaders of the neighbouring Arab states to intervene, but their preparation was not finalized, and they did not assemble sufficient forces to turn the tide of the war". But according to Morris 2008 p. 174, the American consensus was that the Arabs would win, lthought it might take 2 years.

"A parade without any risks” and Tel Aviv “in two weeks,” was how the Egyptian army chiefs in May presented the coming adventure to their political bosses" (Morris 2008 p. 185) Ykantor (talk) 16:49, 16 November 2013 (UTC) Ykantor (talk) 15:54, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Once more, you are failing to read for sense. Preparing for war is one thing, making loud declarations of intentions all knew were merely sops to the Arab street was another. Laurens says that after the UN vote, Israel stayed silent but prepared for war, while leaders in Arab countries made huge threats and did nothing in terms of preparation for war. All of your edits emphasize the Arab rhetoric, and the Israeli fears ostensibly based on hearing those threats: wars are won by cool thinking, logistics and planning, not by shooting off one's mouth, and describing the realities rather than the rhetoric is how these sorts of articles should be done. Nishidani (talk) 17:02, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

If you're trying to suggest there is a contradiction here you would be wrong. So what is it you are trying to suggest in this section? Sepsis II (talk) 16:59, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

The Arab League as a whole

undue: The threats are minimized

The article sentence:"Some unofficial statements before the war had been more aggressive. Arab League Secretary Azzam Pasha, according to an interview in an 11 October 1947 article of Akhbar al-Yom, said: "I personally wish that the Jews do not drive us to this war, as this will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades"

The threats are minimized by saying "unofficial" and by using one quote only, while there are plenty of closer date threats. e.g.

• Benny Morris (2008).
  • p. 50,"The Arab reaction was just as predictable: “The blood will flow like rivers in the Middle East,” promised Jamal Husseini.
  • p. 187 ." Azzam told Kirkbride:...we will sweep them[the Jews] into the sea" . Al Quwwatli [ the Syrian president] told his people:"…we shall eradicate Zionism" ;
  • p. 409 "Al Husseini…In March 1948 he told an interviewer in a Jaffa daily Al Sarih that the Arabs did not intend merely to prevent partition but "would continue fighting until the Zionist were Annihilated"
  • p. 412 "Already before the war, Iraq’s prime minister had warned British diplomats that if the United Nations decided on a solution to the Palestine problem that was not “satisfactory” to the Arabs, “severe measures should [would?] be taken against all Jews in Arab countries.”38 A few weeks later, the head of the Egyptian delegation to the United Nations, Muhammad Hussein Heykal, announced that “the lives of 1,000,000 Jews in Moslem countries would be jeopardized by the establishment of a Jewish State.” "
• Nimr el Hawari, the Commander of the Palestine Arab Youth Organization, in his book Sir Am Nakbah (The Secret Behind the Disaster, published in Nazareth in 1955), quoted the Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Said (http://www.cfoic.com/learn-more/articles-of-interest/the-arab-refugees/)... Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Said, who declared: “We will smash the country with our guns and obliterate every place the Jews seek shelter in. The Arabs should conduct their wives and children to safe areas until the fighting has died down.” (http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/refugees.html)
• U.N Ad Hoc comitee on palestine ,press release GS/PAL/83, 24 November 1947,debate on alternative plan for partition of Palestine, p. 3, "if the U.N decide to amputate a part of Palestine in order to establish a Jewish state, no force on earth could prevent blood from flowing there…Moreover…no force on earth can confine it to the borders of Palestine itself…Jewish blood will necessarily be shed elsewhere in the Arab world… to place in certain and serious danger a million jews…Mahmud Bey Fawzi (Egypt) …imposed partition was sure to result in bloodshed in Palestine and in the rest of the Arab world".

Question

Should this article be called "Israel's war of Independence" or may be have a page which redirects to this page.-sarvajna (talk) 03:46, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

On the second point, you can see the many redirects that point to this article here, including several war of Independence variants. Sean.hoyland - talk 05:18, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Got it, Thanks. A redirect would be enough I guess.-sarvajna (talk) 06:51, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

In fact, the "[1948] [Israeli] War of Independence" is the 1948 Palestine War. Pluto2012 (talk) 07:32, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Israeli War of Independence

That may be a little WP:OR but I think the "Israeli War of Independence" lasted from 1944 to 1948. The Jewish Insurgency in Palestine, to which Haganah and Palmach participated at some time is part of it as well as the diplomatic actions undertaken by the Jewish Agency to get the Partition vote at UNO. But I never found a scholar who had that approach... Pluto2012 (talk) 07:42, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

I agree, and it had its preparatory phase in two stages, with the use of Jewish paramilitary forces trained by Orde Wingate against the Arab Uprising 36-9 (it broke the back of the most able Palestinian fighters and disarmed them), which was their attempt at asserting an independent state, and the training throughout the Mediterranean theatre in WW2. Still, we must follow the paradigm which is still Israelocentric, until a new set of perspectives emerge. die Eule der Minerva beginnt erst mit der einbrechenden Dämmerung ihren Flug:)Nishidani (talk) 11:40, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

But why, then, exclude the anti-British activities of the Irgun in 1939-1940 and those of the Lehi from its creation in 1940? I suppose that 1948 is chosen because that's when Israel was actually established. Of course, the difficulty is to answer the question, if it was a war of independence, who or what was independence being won from, but, of course, just because something is called something doesn't mean the name has to make sense. Perhaps we should stick with the title '1948 Arab-Israeli War'. I've noticed that sources tend to divide into two camps: those who count the war as beginning immediately after the UN Partition Resolution was passed and those who count it from when the Arab armies intervened on 15 May, the day after the Mandate ended.     ←   ZScarpia   14:11, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

From my point of view, a reason not to take account the events before 1944 is that they were the fact of a fringe minority. It is only after 1944 that the Jewish Agency joined the fight with its paramilitary forces.

The sources that make the war of independence start on 15 May are not reliable ;-) Pluto2012 (talk) 14:15, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Didn't the Jewish Resistance Movement, in which the Haganah and Palmach were involved, last only a matter of months in 1945-1946 until, in the aftermath of the King David Hotel bombing, the Jewish Agency restricted itself to running in 'illegal immigrants'?     ←   ZScarpia   14:27, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

After checking, it was 1945 but it doesn't change anything. It could also be argued that Biltmore Conference was the turning point. Pluto2012 (talk) 14:32, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

Before the Jewish Resistance Movement, of course, was The Season.

The Biltmore Conference was certainly a turning point, but was it decided there to start a war (for independence or otherwise)?     ←   ZScarpia   14:38, 16 November 2013 (UTC)

It was decided there would be a war when the Balfour Letter was written. That, I could source... Several scholars estimate war was not avoidable. Many British realize this as soon as 1920. Pluto2012 (talk) 18:27, 16 November 2013 (UTC)