The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine

Written by Ilan Pappé

Narrated by Paul Boehmer

Renowned Israeli historian Ilan Pappe's groundbreaking book revisits the formation of the State of Israel. Between 1947 and 1949, over 400 Palestinian villages were deliberately destroyed, civilians were massacred, and around a million men, women, and children were expelled from their homes at gunpoint.



Denied for almost six decades, had it happened today it could only have been called "ethnic cleansing." Decisively debunking the myth that the Palestinian population left of their own accord in the course of this war, Ilan Pappe offers impressive archival evidence to demonstrate that, from its very inception, a central plank in Israel's founding ideology was the forcible removal of the indigenous population. This is an indispensable book for anyone interested in the current crisis in the Middle East.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Dec 14, 2017
• ISBN: 9781541488458

Ilan Pappé

Ilan Pappe is an Israeli historian and socialist activist. He is a professor of history at the College of Social Sciences and International Studies at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, director of the university's European Centre for Palestine Studies, and co-director of the Exeter Centre for Ethno-Political Studies. He is also the author of the bestselling The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (Oneworld), A History of Modern Palestine (Cambridge), The Modern Middle East (Routledge), The Israel/Palestine Question (Routledge), The Forgotten Palestinians: A History of the Palestinians in Israel (Yale), The Idea of Israel: A History of Power and Knowledge (Verso) and with Noam Chomsky, Gaza in Crisis: Reflections on Israel's War Against the Palestinians (Penguin). He writes for, among others, the Guardian and the London Review of Books.

Reviews for The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine

[Anna Benchimol · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A fundamental read for those who truly want to know the history

[Simone Person · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Incredible and devastating. A thorough history of settler colonialism, genocide, and white supremacy. An absolute must read for everyone.

[Andrew Barnard · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ilan Pappe's work cannot be overestimated. This is a must read/listen.

[Defiant Laboratories · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The only way to change the course of history is to understand it. This book serves as a solid foundation on which to regard the unfolding humanitarian crisis in occupied Palestine.

[Donald Buchanan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An excellent unbiased, succinct and relevant historical account. Gives the reader a greater level of understanding to what is playing out before the global societies and eyes of us all currently - 2024.

[Anthony Matthews · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An in depth, harrowing, account of Israel's efforts to cleanse Palestine of Palestinians since 1948. This scholarly account of the depredations, including massacres, committed against the Palestinian people is both eye-opening and shocking. At times British troops stood by and watched the cleansing happen. As if the history wasn't enough, the Nakba (literally, "catastrophe" or "disaster") has never really stopped since 1948. Ilan Pappé has written an important book that is required reading for all those who wish to cut through the bluster and propaganda surrounding the Palestinian/Israeli "conflict."

[A M · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A very pleasant voice to listen and informative book.

[Thor · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

very comprehensive, puts current events into better perspective. from the river to the sea

[hayet zenati · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Amazing chronicles of the Zionist colonial and apartheid project in Palestine , I learnt a lot

[Khadijah Nicole Bouaich · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The straight forward recollection of facts. Laid out in an indisputable timeline.

[Amal Amra Tutuianu · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A very important book that more people should consider reading or listening to.

[ggthefunny1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very informative and organized in an understandable way for those unfamiliar with this history.

[millicenti-852953 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

«Under the watchful eyes of UN observers who were patrolling the skies of the Galilee, the final stage of the ethnic cleansing operation, begun in October 1948, continued until the summer of 1949. Whether from the sky or on the ground, no one could fail to spot the hordes of men, women and children streaming north every day. Ragged women and children were conspicuously dominant in these human convoys: the young men were gone - executed, arrested or missing. By this time UN observers from above and Jewish eyewitnesses on the ground must have become desensitised towards the plight of the people passing by in front of them: how else to explain the silent acquiescence in the face of the massive deportation unfolding before their eyes?
UN observers did draw some conclusions in October, writing to the Secretary General - who did not publish their report - that Israeli policy was that of ‘uprooting Arabs from their native villages in Palestine by force or threat’.»
The Secretary General was Trygve Lie, a politician in Norway’s Labour Party, who was called the Godfather of Israel. It is also suggested that he used his position in the UN to spy for the Israeli state.

[sophir · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Interesting fiction. Much of this relies on completely fictional sources

[Rachael · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

My review is not going to be based on the merit or truth of the work. There are plenty of others on that around the net.
However I found the narrator's voice and tone difficult to listen too. I found the Authors writting to be extremely repetative. The use of the term "ethnic cleansing" over and over in every chapter got to feeling like a brainwashing campaign. Any reader with half a brain cell got the message the first 50 times in chapter 1. While this sort of work requires minute and pedantic detail to facts, the sheer amount of them makes this hard work to process in the audio format.
I would be likely to recommend getting this in paper format unless that is not a reasonable option for you.
Trying to follow this on audio will frustrate with it's tedium and repetitiveness. Unless perhaps you are inclined to enjoy particularly dry, long, challenging academic works.
This book did have very interesting insights and I did learn a lot. But it was not an enjoyable process. Not recommended for the layman who has no previous understanding of the Palestine and Israel dynamic.

[Tony kettan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Israel is a racist supremacist hole and should be removed from existence. Ilan Pappes book is yet more documentation that the master race as a whole cannot be trusted to peacefully co-exist in a global community

[rose · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

lies and propaganda that’s blatantly anti semtic and racist , clearly the work of a neo nazi in the pay of terrorists

[miss · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

The racist author is very good at creating this made book, he equals other novelists like I.k Rowling or Barbara Cartland with his imagination, creating such wild tales that can for a brief moment seem believable like flying carpets and unicorns

[larryerick · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

There is a bloc of humanity that will never read this book based on the title alone, and there is another bloc, that if they did read it, would immediately find great fault with it, assuming they didn't just write it all off as pure fictional propaganda. I read a lot of non-fiction and histories in particular, and this did not come across to me at any level as inflated hype, but rather as extremely well-researched journalism based on documents from "both sides" of the issues discussed, including the personal diaries of the main architect of what occurred. In short, I find it much easier to believe the bulk of what it reports than to discount it. Is the author biased at some level about his subject? Perhaps, but a ton of facts often lead to bias toward what those facts reveal. The premise of this book is really quite simple. The nation of Israel did not come to being around 1948, because a bunch of Palestinians in the territory decided to just nicely move out of the area. The author reports how the Jews in the area systemically "cleansed" hundreds of villages and hundreds of thousands of non-Jewish residents often in deadly and almost always ruthless fashion. In fact, I had to knock a point off my rating because the author insisted on somewhat tediously reporting nearly each and every "cleansing" drip by drip to avoid any criticisms of cherry-picking a couple "mistakes" in an attempt to obscure how peacefully the Israelis claim this massive vacating of Arabs in what is now Israel and the occupied territories. Perhaps more importantly, the book provides a solid basis for understanding why the Israeli-Palestinian issue may never become peaceful because of Israel's actions rather than that of any Arabs. Is there more that could have been reported in the book. Yes, how did the Israelis, not yet even a nation, obtain and get trained in advanced military weaponry that allowed them to so easily achieve this cleansing, including the blocking of any significant outside Arab intervention. Why were the united "nations" so specific about being "fair" to the Palestinians with UN resolutions and the like, but did so very little to make sure their wishes were followed? Or perhaps, an entirely different book: why is the Jewish holocaust regarded as so much more terrible than the genocide in Rwanda or the massive deaths from the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, or any other despicable crime against humanity...such as those mentioned in this book? Finally, it should be noted that the purpose of this book was not to be balanced in what it reported but to use what it reported to balance what others have reported.

[mmmorsi · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book doesn't need a review. It's a piece of living history, it should be school material instead of the lies and rubbish TV churns out on a daily basis. So well documented, so much empathy. So much respect for this man having the courage to write the truth.

[snash_44 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book is a revelation, though not one that totally surprises. The book documents in relentless detail the treatment of the Palestinian people from the 1920's through to today with a focus on 1947 to 8. It describes the ethnic cleansing that went on along with the successful burying of that fact. It sadly reveals that populations are no different from people. Those who are abused are likely to abuse once in power. To do differently takes a self awareness and understanding which is unusual.
It is obvious that any solution will have to involve addressing the acts of 1948. If it is not done the prognosis for peace in the area (or the world) is low. Given the Western, particularly US, present demonization of Muslims, this scenario seem unlikely. Admittedly, any solution which treats Palestinians justly, will create a different Israel.