Alleged Vigilante Attack on Yemeni Jewish Refugees by Kibbutz Members in Post‑War Israel

under siege” would feel like, and what would happen to Giora if it succeeded. Especially after the murder and the mutilation of The 35, I assumed the war would come down to a simple calculus. If there was going to be an Israel — if there was going to be a Mishmar Hasharon — we had to win and the Arabs had to lose. At first, even the fact our kibbutz had been given a share of the land of Wadi Khawaret seemed just another product of the war. After all, Ben-Gurion had accepted the plan for two states. The Arabs had said no, deciding to attack us instead. Someone had to farm the land. Why not us? Yet events after the war did lead me to begin to ask myself questions of basic fairness, and whether we were being faithful to some of the high-sounding ideals I heard spoken about with such pride on the kibbutz. The Palestinians were not the only refugees. More than 600,000 Jews fled into Israel from Arab countries where they had lived for generations. More than 100,000 arrived from Iraq, and several hundred thousand from Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria in north Africa. Immediately after the war, about 50,000 were airlifted out of Yemen, where they had endured violent attacks ever since the UN partition vote. The reality that greeted the Yemenis in Israel was more complex. Most were initially settled in tented transit camps. I’m not sure how several dozen Yemeni families made their way to Wadi Khawaret, but it made sense for them to move into the village’s vacant homes. It was empty except for several deserted buildings which we and other kibbutzim began using for storage and, later, for our transport co-operative. Yet a few nights after the Yemenis moved in, a posse of young men, including some from Mishmar Hasharon, descended on them and, armed with clubs and wooden staves, drove them away. I was shocked. I’d seen the photos in Davar le Yeladim celebrating the airlift, with the Yemenis kissing the airport tarmac in relief, gratitude and joy at finding refuge in the new Israeli state. Now, for the “crime” of moving into a row of empty buildings in search of a decent place to live, they’d been beaten up and chased away. By us. I realized Wadi Khawaret no longer belonged to the Arabs. But, surely, our kibbutz had no more right to the buildings than Jews who had fled from Yemen and needed them a lot more than we did. For days, I tried to discover who had joined the vigilante attack. Though everyone seemed to know what had happened, no one talked about it. In the dining hall, I ran my 31 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_011502