Transfer Committees

The Transfer Committee was set up, unofficially, by non-Cabinet members of the first government of Israel in May 1948, with the aim of overseeing the expulsion of Palestinian Arabs from their towns and villages, and preventing their return. The extent to which the committee acted with the knowledge of the prime minister and the Cabinet is a matter of scholarly debate.

The idea for the committee came from Yosef Weitz, the director of the Land and Afforestation Department of the Jewish National Fund. From the 1930s onwards, Weitz had played a major role in acquiring land for the Yishuv, the Jewish community in Palestine.

The first, unofficial, committee was composed of Weitz; Ezra Danin, head of the Arab section of the SHAI, the intelligence arm of the Haganah; and Eliyahu Sasson, head of the Middle East Affairs Department of the Foreign Ministry. Danin told Weitz that to prevent the return of the refugees who had already left, they must be "confronted with a fait accomplis." He proposed the destruction of Arab homes, settling Jewish immigrants in evacuated areas, and expropriating Arab property.

On May 28, Weitz proposed to Moshe Sharett, then foreign minister, that the committee be made official. On May 30, Weitz met Eliezer Kaplan, the finance minister, and reportedly received his blessing. The Transfer Committee met for its first working session that day, though it was still not authorized by David Ben-Gurion, the prime minister, or the full Cabinet. Nevertheless, Benny Morris writes that the committee set about razing villages.

On June 5, Weitz approached Ben-Gurion with a three-page proposal that involved preventing the Arabs from returning; helping them to be absorbed into other Arab countries; destroying villages as much as possible during military operations; preventing Arabs from cultivating land; settling Jews in empty villages and towns so that no "vacuum" would be created; enacting legislation to prevent the return of the refugees; and creating propaganda aimed at non-return.

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