I think its a bit disengenous to refer in such a way that ALL Egyptians and Jordanians are calling for anti-peace rallies. There might be extreme protesters but the Nakhba Day - meaning catastrophe - is a commeration day when Palestinians were forced out of their land in 1948. Its estimated to be around 700,000 Palestinians back then and most of these people continue to live in refugee camps even today. Naturally it evicts intese emotions for people there.
Infact, there are many Israelis that recognise this and feel that this commeration should be made by Israelis as well to build bridges. Its another story that Israel has banned commeration of Al Nakhba.
For those who don't know, readup on Nakhba Day -commerated on May 15 pretty much around the world on wikipedia here
Nakba Day - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Here is an opinion piece by a Jewish author on this.
Israel should remember Nakba day | Rachel Shabi | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
Life for Palestinian citizens of Israel, always a testing experience, seems to be getting more precarious of late. This is a section of society that, since Israel's creation, spent 20-odd years under direct military rule and thereafter continued to be treated as second rate and a potential fifth column. Recently, Arab-Israelis, the identity-blurring label for this 20% sector of the population, have had to contend with threats that they must swear loyalty to a Jewish and Zionist state as a precondition of citizenship. Now, Israel's ministerial committee has approved a draft law that would ban the commemoration of Nakba day in Israel. The day marks the dispossession of some 700,000 to 800,000 Palestinians who fled or were forced out of their homes in 1948. Arab-Israelis remember Nakba day with demonstrations in Israel – but if the proposed law goes through parliament, such action would result in a three-year prison sentence.
Fortunately, many voices within Israel have slammed the proposed bill as absurd and dangerous. Campaigners, rights groups, leftwing politicians and organisations such as the New Israeli Fund have swiftly issued condemnation, counter-argument and petitions. Some Israelis have used the words "Nuremburg laws" and "thought crime" to describe the Nakba bill. And commentators in the Israeli press have pointed out the unconstitutional hazards of such a law.
All of which is encouraging. But it is countered by an absolutist current within Israel, predicated on an "us or them" rationale and finding its spiritual home with foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman's party Israel Beiteinu – proponents of the Nakba bill. By definition, this style of thought does not tolerate the idea that history might be of totally different import to two different peoples. Ha'aretz writers are not necessarily proponents of such logic (in fact a Ha'aretz editorial condemned the proposed Nakba bill), but there is a taste of it in the paper's headline for an article on the subject: "Israel moves closer to banning mourning of its independence."
This seems like an unnecessarily loaded way in which to define commemoration of Nakba day. Palestinians aren't mourning Israeli independence, but rather Palestinian dispossession and displacement. The tears aren't triggered by the idea of a Jewish state or by Jewish self-determination, but rather by the suffering and turmoil caused when historical events forced Palestinians out of their homes, off their lands and into refugee-status limbo. That might sound to some like a gratuitous distinction, but it's one that ensures both people's narratives get the space to speak, neither one threatened by the other.
"Give an inch and they'll take a mile," is a common Israeli take on the Palestinian issue – applied to negotiation, de-occupation and the necessity of overpowering the perceived enemy with military force. It's virtually an embedded thought process: question certain historical points and the response is all too often knee-jerk: if we hadn't done that, we wouldn't have a state. It's a rapid acceleration, from discussion to absolute decree; a conversation culture that seems practically totalitarian in the lack of space it leaves for divergent voices. And it is precisely such rigidity that propels the quest to negate the Nakba – the worry being that admitting to any part of this story would cause the Jewish state to suddenly collapse.
But it won't. It can't. Accommodating another people's history – not resolutely rejecting it – is the real show of strength and security. Israelis don't have to subscribe to every syllable of the Palestinian side of the story, but they do need to respect the Palestinian right to have a history and a narrative. That's the cornerstone of reconciliation: acknowledge the other person's experience, apologise and find a mutually acceptable form of recompense. Doing the opposite – blocking your ears, shouting "Liar! Liar!" and using the law to impose silence – only causes anger, hatred, violence and, inevitably, more suppression and more solutions premised on force and the dissolution of democratic rights. Or, to put it another way: as long as Israel keeps trying to erase Palestinian history, it is Israelis, not Palestinians, who are jeopardising the Jewish state.
