Middle East in a nutshell: CRAZY!

Palestinian boys play with their toy guns under a poster of executed Iraqi president Saddam Hussein in the refugee camp of Shatila in the southern suburbs of Beirut on November 16, 2010 during the first day of the Muslim Eid al-Adha, or the Feast of the Sacrifice, which marks the end of the annual hajj pilgrimage to Mecca and commemorates Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Ismail on God's command.

Amazing LIFE pictures of Israel 1948

I already mentioned before the LIFE archives, which you can access through Google. Today, I came across this weblog which shows (some of?) the collection LIFE has of Israel in 1948.

See:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

See also:

Israel in 1960

And I could not help, but notice the following question relating to the post:
Micky Schwarz 09.20.2009 at 10:00 am

Where are the Jewish refugees from Jerusalem today? Have they ever been recognized as refugees by the UN? And their descendants in second, third and fourth generation, are they recognized as refugees?

which got an excellent reply by Sheila Raviv 09.27.2009 at 3:48 am:

Many families still live in Jerusalem, some even returned to their former homes but are considered “settlers” and occupiers for doing so. Jewish refugees have never been recognised as such by any organisation except after WW2; not the refugees from Arab occupation of Jerusalem nor those who fled persecution from Arab countries and found refuge in Israel. At one time we refused to call them refugees since they were considered as coming home but this apparently back fired since neither their refugee status nor their homecoming were recognised!

Photos Dutch National Archives

Found a brilliant collection of old photographs on flickr.com:






MORE PICS

Jewish history in Jerusalem in pictures

Found this terrific old photo of Jews praying at the Western Wall (Wailing Wall) in Jerusalem (dated at 1896) in the LIFE archives.

And searching further I also found these interesting pictures:

"Arabs Sack The Holy City. Terrified young Jewish girl Rachel Levy, 7, fleeing fr. street w. burning bldgs. as the Arabs sack the Holy City after its surrender during Palestinian Civil war." - Israel, May 28, 1948

"Jewish families waiting outside their homes to be evacuated by Arab troops." - Jerusalem, June 1948.

"Rubble lying in the streets after Arab looting of Jewish homes." - Jerusalem, June 1948

You might wonder why they had to leave their homes in (East) Jerusalem in the first place and why their houses got looted and this part of the city sacked and why these pictures are not spread all over the world....
Soooo, for the sake of neutrality, I'll publish them :)

(note the caption stating Palestinain Civil War)