Plan Dalet was put into effect during the Civil War that broke out in 1947 after the UN's partition plan, which, in itself was a violation of the League of Nations' Mandate for the region which the UN was obligated to uphold. There were armed attacks by Arabs on Jewish communities in this timeframe and the Yishuv had to develop a means of protecting itself by depopulating only those Arab settlements that were being used as a platform to attack Jews. By the way, your comparison to dividing Palestine in 1947 to dividing Israel in 2008 is completely off-base. Israel is a sovereign nation-state, something Palestine never was. From the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Britain had de facto sovereignty over the region, but no nation held de jure sovereignty over the region. From the perspective of international law, it was terra nullus, which is exactly what the West Bank and the Gaza Strip are today- unclaimed de jure by any sovereign nation-state. As for Ben-Gurion declaring a state on May 14 regardless of the threat of war, maybe it had to do with the various resolutions passed by the League of Nations and the UN that were dispossessing Jews of their right to dwell in their historical homeland, and effectively cutting the lands promised to them for their prospective state down to nothing? Maybe we just got sick of the international community futzing around with our lives and livelihoods and realized that statehood was the only possible decision that would help us to protect our community and property? By the way, my relatives arrived here in January 1948, BEFORE Israel was created. Also, if the Jews from Europe were "Europeans", then, by that same stretch of the imagination, that must make you a European as well.

Having the "Palestinians" emmigrate to Jordan would be the true embracement of a 2 state solution. Under their own self rule they'd decide if to keep the name Jordan or to change it to "Palistine" I read interesting articles about this on http://www.hayozma.org/