May 15 marks Nakba Day or ‘exodus’ in Arabic for millions of Palestinians and their supporters around the world.

Palestinians reaffirm their right to return to their homes and villages in historic Palestine at Nakba day.

This year 73rd anniversary of Nakba when Zionist Jews declared Israeli independence to have their own state.

For this year, Palestinians commemorate Nakba Day amid deadly Israeli airstrikes, Jewish mob attacks and other forms of violent tactics imposed by the Zionist forces. 

On May 15, 1948, some 750,000 Palestinians were expelled into refugee camps that still exist in the West Bank, Gaza, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon following the creation of the State of Israel in 1948. 

Seventy-three years ago, roughly 600 people were attacked by Zionist militias in the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin. More than 100 Palestinians were killed. The massacre was pivotal in pushing Palestinians to leave their homes. 

For hundreds of years, Jews and Arabs lived in Palestine as citizens of the Ottoman Empire but that status quo ended in the aftermath of World War I and the establishment of the British Mandate of Palestine.

The 1917 Balfour declaration by the UK promised Palestine to the Zionist movement despite the large Arab majority in the region.

The Palestinians were to suffer further when the West Bank and Gaza fell to the Israelis during the 1967 war.

Millions of Palestinians, including those displaced with the establishment of Israel, now found themselves having to live under military occupation, as well as further Israeli expansionism in their lands.

As of 2010, 42 percent of territory in the West Bank was under the jurisdiction of Israeli settlements or directly controlled by the Israeli military.

In April of 2020, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced his intention to annex the West Bank with the support of the US.

For many Palestinians, this is the latest chapter in a process that began with the initial loss of their land in 1948.

According to Palestinian figures, roughly 640,000 Jewish settlers now live on 196 settlements (built with the Israeli government's approval) and more than 200 settler outposts (built without its approval) across the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.

International law regards both the West Bank and East Jerusalem as "occupied territories" and considers all Jewish settlement-building activity there as illegal.