But the war didn't start in May 1948. It started in November 1947 hours after the UN Partition vote.
For months before the vote, Arab terrorists held their fire, hoping that the UN would not recommend a truncated Jewish state along with an Arab state in the area of the British Mandate. But within hours of the UN partition resolution, the gloves were off.
7 Jews were murdered that first day.
Arabs threw grenades at an Egged bus traveling from Netanya to Jerusalem, and one exploded inside.
Devora Yaari was injured, and her husband Shalom Yaari rushed to her aid. He was shot dead in cold blood.
Shoshana Mizrahi Farhi, 22, was on her way to Jerusalem to get married. She was killed.
The other victims were Hirsh Starer, Mrs. Hanna Weiss, and Haya Yisraeli.
Another Egged bus was attacked a half hour later, and Nechama Hacohen, a pathologist at Hadassah Hospital, was killed.
Moshe Goldman was killed with a gunshot in the chest.
Palestinian Arabs started the war that resulted in their abandoning their supposed homeland to let their Arab brethren finish off what they started. Some of them wanted peace but their leaders did not even consider it,
The refusal of Arab leaders to accept Jews as human beings who deserve rights - the decision to oppose the Jews "by all means" - was the beginning of the Nakba.
