Jews saw their opportunity. Men of the army of Zion attacked Deir Yassin at 10 a.m. that day.
They easily overcame the opposition. They killed 20 Arab defenders, and entered the village, tossing grenades into houses.
They killed old men, women, and children with bayonets. For three hours the slaughter went on.
Babies were killed in front of their mothers. Mothers’ throats were slit. Some were beheaded.
A group of men and women—some of the women obviously pregnant—were lined up and shot. The bloodlusting Jewish soldiery desecrated the bodies of pregnant mothers with knives.
When they had murdered 264 villagers, the Jews called a halt. They rounded up four truckloads of survivors of all ages and both sexes, tossed the bodies of the dead into the village well, and drove off with the survivors.
The victorious Jews drove the survivors through Jewish areas as exhibits of victory while Jews spat upon them. The parade continued, with breaks, for two days.
For the first time since the 1967 occupation, Israel is expelling an entire Palestinian neighborhood in Jerusalem.
The Silwan area, located near the "Holy Basin," the Temple Mount, and Al-Aqsa Mosque, is rich in archaeological and historical sites of special importance.
As of April 2026, approximately 1,800 residents in Silwan are under threat of expulsion, after hundreds were already displaced in the past two years and left homeless. In Wadi al-Hawz alone, 33 families have already been expelled, and 53 additional families, including 130 children, face a similar fate. In al-Bustan, Israel has already demolished 48 homes and plans to demolish the homes of 123 more families, which would lead to the expulsion of about 1,450 people.
The expulsion in Silwan is part of a policy of ethnic cleansing across the entire West Bank.