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“You mean the time Islamists tried to slaughter all the Jews again and as punishment they had to move about 20 miles to a new location?”
Published
The claim that a Jewish community was relocated 20 miles as "punishment" following an attempted slaughter is mixed. While it accurately reflects the historical reality of the 1929 Hebron massacre, where Arab rioters killed 67 Jews and forced the survivors to flee, the framing of the relocation as a "punishment" and the specific distance of "20 miles" are imprecise or misleading interpretations of the event.
The evidence confirms that a significant and violent event occurred in 1929 in Hebron, Mandatory Palestine, which matches the 'slaughter' described in the claim. According to records from Wikipedia and Haaretz, 67 Jews were killed and dozens more were injured during two days of rioting by Arab residents. This violence brought a centuries-old Jewish presence in Hebron to a temporary end. The survivors, numbering over 400, were initially sheltered by some local Arab families and later by British police in a local station.
Regarding the relocation, the British authorities did indeed evacuate the survivors to Jerusalem. While the claim describes this as a 'punishment,' historical accounts from The Jewish Link and Human Rights Watch indicate the evacuation was a response to the total breakdown of security and was intended to protect the survivors from further violence. The distance between Hebron and Jerusalem is approximately 30 kilometers, which is about 18.6 miles, making the '20 miles' figure geographically accurate.
However, the claim's framing is problematic. Describing the evacuation of massacre survivors as a 'punishment' for the victims is a rhetorical inversion; the 'punishment' usually refers to the loss of their homes and community rather than a legal sentence. Additionally, while many Jews returned to Hebron in 1931, they were evacuated again in 1936, and a permanent Jewish presence was not re-established until after the 1967 Six-Day War. Therefore, while the core physical facts of the massacre and the distance of the move are supported, the characterization of the event as a simple 'punishment' relocation is a subjective interpretation of a complex ethnic conflict.
Source quality: The evidence includes detailed historical accounts from Wikipedia, Haaretz, and Human Rights Watch, which provide consistent data on the death tolls, the 1929 date, the location (Hebron), and the subsequent evacuation to Jerusalem.
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6 reviewed sources behind this verdict.
Provides the primary historical overview of the 1929 Hebron massacre, including death tolls and the role of British authorities.
Used for: Occurrence of the Massacre.
Confirms the distance between Hebron and Jerusalem (30km) and provides context on the long-term tensions in the region.
Details the aftermath of the massacre, specifically the evacuation of survivors to Jerusalem and the subsequent loss of Jewish property.
Used for: Nature of the Relocation.
After the massacre, the remainder of the Hebron yeshiva relocated to Jerusalem. [19]. Jewish re-settlement after 1967. During the 1967 Six-Day