It is a little more complex. The reason for maintaining the tension in the mid-east was an integral part of the cold war. In 48.as a real fear in the US that Israel may become another Cuba (why, I don't know, possibly because the Israeli leadership was heavily weighed with "Kibbutzniks", people from communal villages that actually practised communism in their daily lives). In 48, Russia recognised Israel "de Jure" while we only recognised Israel "de facto", same reason. The fact is that the State department successfully imposed an arm embargo on Israel, knowing fully well that without arms, the Israeli had little chance, but the Russians, through Chechoslovakia, opened the gate of armaments (for a price of course), and that (and Israeli ingenuity in producing their own weapons, like the Uzi, which was born in 46 or so) coupled with Arab complete incompetence and internal strifes, allowed the Israeli to win the first conflict in 48. The Russians wanted instability in the region to keep the west's oil resources under "pressure". They were quite successful at the beginning, they managed to get Iran under Moussadeg (which in 53, I believe, the CIA forcefully removed to reinstate the Pahlawi Shah), but in 1952/3, the aging Stalin paranoia brought about "Jewish Doctors" trial in Moscow and the arrest and execution (if memory serves) of Oren in Chechoslovakia, together with the maturing Israeli democracy brought about the complete decoupling of Israel from Russia, and the change in Russian politics to support revolutions in the Arab world and become the arm supplier to Egypt, then Syria and later Iraq. These of course leading to the 1956 conflict.
The fact of the matter, The US, Britain and France on one side and the Soviet Union on the other side are responsible for the conflict being alive for 50 years. These nations should bear the moral and financial responsibilities to resolving the conflict. The refugee problem itself was a simple exchange of populations 700,000 "Palestinians refugees" exchanged for 700,000 Jewish refugees from all the Arab nations. The Israeli solved their refugee problems within about 25 years, why is not the UN demanding the Arab nations, with the help of the imperial forces supporting the conflict (US, Britain, France and Russia) settle the Palestinian refugee problem?
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