The main points of the anonymous correspondent (Letters, August 20) - the empty land of Palestine and a denial of the expulsion of the Palestinians - would be laughed out of court by any serious Israeli historian.

Space prevents me from quoting from Simha Flapan, founder of the Mapam Party (lsrael's second-largest in its first Knesset elections), in his book The Birth Of Israel: Myths And Realities.

However, no less a person than Moshe Dayan was quoted in Ha'aretz, the Israeli equivalent of The Times (April 4, 1968), in an address to students, as saying: "Not one place in this country was built where there hadn't formerly been an Arab population."

The late Professor Israel Shahak, founder of the Israeli League for Civil and Human Rights and a childhood survivor of Belsen, uncovered more than 250 Arab villages which had been demolished.

Likewise, what actually happened in the Arab countries to the Arab Jews has been documented by, among others, Guardian journalist David Hirst in his book The Gun And The Olive Branch.

The anonymous correspondent's assertions are largely based on a now discredited book, From Time Immemorial by Joan Peters, which was printed about 15 years ago in the US, where it was rapturously received and went into at least eight hardback editions.

In the UK and Israel, it was savaged by commentators such as Ian and David Gilmour and, when it was show large parts of it had been plagiarised, it was quickly forgotten.

If history is distorted in such a fashion, any solution to problems such as those in the Middle East become impossible.

-Tony Greenstein, Crestway Parade, Brighton