Fake Ben-Gurion Quote Watch

This is from a current opinion piece in Al Ahram entitled "Nabka is Now":

In 1937, David Ben-Gurion -- Israel's "founding father" and first prime minister -- uttered the clearly criminal phrase, "we must expel the Arabs and take their places and if we have to use force [then] we have force at our disposal."

According to Wikiquote the actual quote reads:

We do not wish and do not need to expel Arabs and take their places.

The source given in Wikiquote is "Letter to his son Amos (5 October 1937), as quoted in Fabricating Israeli History: The 'New Historians (2000) by Efraim Karsh." The person responsible, evidently, for disseminating, although not creating, the fake version is Benny Morris. For an account of how this happened and how Efraim Karsh debunked it, see this.

Tags: Ben-Gurion, fake quotes