Google Earth Community: Nakba- The Palestinian Catastrophe

Dear barryannarbor

This layer is not about politics.

The scope of this layer is very well defined. This layer is about the arabic twons and villages and beduin localities that were destroyed after the 1948 war.

Although I'm not willing to talk politics here, but I like to respond to your points that you raised:

1. I did not mark jewish settlements, because tghis is not the subject of this layer, and they are include by default in GE. If you zoom close enough you can see any existing town or localities in Israel.

If you mean to include the Jewish settlements in the wake of the 1948 war. I think that is a brilliant idea. Lets make a layer of the Jewish communities in the 1948 and add it to this layer. That will be brilliant. Plz do it.

If you are interested in Jewish localities afected by the 1948 war, or other aspects of that era, why not make a layer that adds to the richness of GE?

2. I did not include any information about the war per se. It is outside the scope of this layer. I just put the placemarks of the destroyed localities. GE is not a history book, It is a dynamic map. Any one interested in history can go back to history books.

3. Al Nakba does not refer to the 1948 war. This war is called 'The 48 War", or the "war of independence". But the term Nakba refers to breakdown of the palestinian comunity that resulted from this war and the plight of the refugees that resulted from this. This layer simply showes the places of the villages and twons where these refugees came from. So in the context of the plight of the refugees, Al nakba is a suitable term.

4. This layer does not mention the cause of the displacement of the refugees. I was careful in writing the introduction not to poin fingures. This is a complex subject that needs long articles to analyse. It is outside GE context.

The displacement of Jews from Arab countries is another subject that warrants another project by itself.

Why do not you work on this project, it will be a great addition to GE. I'll try do it when I have time if no one does it. But needs lots of preparation.

I think it would be more constructive if we try build more comprehensive projects and not only give passive cretisizm. Collective additions is what makes GE great.

I suggest that we need to work on two projects:
1. The Jewish localities in 1948.
2. The Jewish Localities in the Arab countried pre 1967.
3. The 1948 war events.

All the best,

Thameen

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