Qubiya massacre

Source

14th and 15th of October 1953, The Israeli Army's 101st Division, led by Ariel Sharon, carried out the "Qubiya massacre."

Qubiya is a Palestinian village located 11 kilometers north-east of Lod and west of Ramallah
It had a population of 1,635, in addition to about 4,000 people displaced from other towns and villages.

The causes of the massacre

The main reason for the massacre was revenge for an infiltration on October 12, 1953, from Jordan to the Jewish settlement of Yehud.

The infiltrators then threw a bomb inside the settlement, killing two Jews and wounding a third. The infiltrators fled back to Jordan.

The next day, David Ben-Gurion decided with his government to carry out a harsh reprisal against the village of Qubiya, through which the infiltrators passed.

The decision of the massacre stated: "Demolition of houses and maximum blows to the lives, with the aim of displacing the inhabitants of the village from their homes"

The number of martyrs in this massacre of men, women and children about sixty seven citizens of the people of Qubiya, and wounded hundreds of others.

Witness to the massacre

One of the most painful scenes was the sight of a village woman sitting on a pile of rubble. A small hand and legs of her six children appeared from under the rubble, And her husband's body was torn from the many gunshots fired at him and he was lying on the opposite road.

The UN Security Council condemned the massacre, and America temporarily suspended aid to Israel. Britain armed Jordanian forces to prevent infiltration into Palestine. In a naive justification, Ben-Gurion stressed in a speech that the people of the border were the perpetrators, not the army. But General Van Petickhe, the chief UN observer, then confirmed in his report to the UN Security Council on October 27, 1953 that the attack was orchestrated and carried out by regular forces.