On Wed, 14 Jan 2004, Colin Brace wrote:
> I haven't read his "The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem" (only
> Finkestein's rebuttal of it) but my understanding, through Finkelstein,
> is that Morris argued the expulsion of the Palestinians wasn't
> premeditated but was "born of war, not design" -- it kinda emerged in
> the heat of the moment.
"Born of war, not by design" is exactly the phrase he uses in the first sentence of his conclusion to the book in the first edition.
> In this interview he is now saying that there was a strategy behind it
> -- atrocities and all -- and B-G knew of it and covered it up.
>
> My question is: has Morris's position changed bcause he discovered new
> sources
That's exactly what he's saying. The massacres that were news to him were part of an operation that was news to him called Operation Hiram. He says all this is contained in "documents that were not available to me when I wrote the original book, most of them from the Israel Defense Force Archives." He says this is the main revelation of the book -- the reason for coming out with a new edition.
Michael