Friday 21 May 2021, by Roland Rance The Palestinian Nakba of 1947-9 was the defining feature of a process which began in the 1880s and continues to this day. It determines the daily lives of Palestinians in the state of Israel, Palestinians under military occupation in the rest of Palestine, and Palestinians in exile from their homeland. This is the injustice that must be addressed in any attempt to resolve 140 years of conflict and dispossession. On 15 May 1948, the State of Israel was established on the ruins of Palestine. For Israeli Jews, the date is a celebration, marked annually as Independence Day. For Palestinians, the date symbolises the Nakba, or Catastrophe.