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A rare moment of Israeli political honesty came in October 2021 when far-right Israeli parliamentarian Bezalel Smotrich, leader of the Religious Zionist Party and ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said in the Knesset to the Arab members, “You’re only here by mistake, because [founding prime minister David] Ben-Gurion didn’t finish the job, didn’t throw you out in ’48.” It was an acknowledgment that ethnic cleansing took place in 1948, albeit delivered by one of the most racist and homophobic Israeli politicians.
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Antony Loewenstein (The Palestine Laboratory: How Israel Exports the Technology of Occupation Around the World)