The Palestinians have rejected a state of their own more times than any national movement in modern history. 1937 — Peel: a Jewish state on a sliver of the coast. Arab leadership said no and turned back to violence. 1947 — UN partition plan: an Arab state beside a Jewish state. The Arab Higher Committee said no, started a civil war, and then five Arab armies invaded. 2000 — Camp David: a Palestinian state with a capital in eastern Jerusalem. Arafat walked, proposed no counteroffer, and launched the Second Intifada. 2001 — Clinton Parameters: a Palestinian state with a capital in eastern Jerusalem, 96% of the "West Bank" plus 4% of Israel, all of Gaza and a connecting corridor. Arafat said no as the Second Intifada raged. 2008 — Olmert: 94% of the “West Bank” plus land swaps to make up for the other 6%, a capital in East Jerusalem, and the Old City under an international committee. The PA, this time under Abbas, never even bothered to answer. 2020 — Trump’s plan: a Palestinian state, a capital in a part of East Jerusalem, and $50 billion in economic aid to build their country. Abbas called it the “slap of the century” in 2018, two years before the text existed. On the day it was released, he said “a thousand times no.” He refused Trump’s call and refused to even take a copy. They do not keep saying no because the borders were wrong. They keep saying no because the real demand is not a state beside Israel. It is a state instead of Israel.

The “Nakba” story dies on this primary source leaflet dated April 28, 1948. The Haifa Workers Council and the Histadrut printed it and told the city’s Arabs not to leave. “Do not destroy your homes with your own hands ... The gates are open for work, for life, and for peace, for you and your families.” That week, British police in Haifa had reported the same thing. Jews were trying to keep shops open and to guarantee Arab lives and property. Ben-Gurion sent Golda Meir to say it to Haifa’s Arab residents face-to-face. Tens of thousands of them left anyway. “Nakba” first named the Arab failure to destroy the Jewish state. Later it was rebranded as a Jewish expulsion order. Look to Haifa and test that theory. There was no order to get out. There was a printed appeal to stay in multiple languages. The Arab Higher Committee called anyone who remained under Jewish protection a “renegade.” Its chairman, Jamal Husseini, told the Security Council the Arabs “preferred to abandon their homes, their belongings, and everything they possessed in the world and leave the town.” Most of Haifa’s 62,000 Arab residents walked out. A few thousand stayed. They became citizens of the new state, and today their grandchildren vote in Israel. The expulsion story requires this page not to exist.