The passage you have quoted from Wikipedia does not address the direct cause for the displacement of the Palestinians from the (then) newly declared Jewish state of Israel. The link you indicated does, however (albeit in a somewhat superficial manner):
[quote name='Wikipedia entry']Large numbers of the Arab population fled the newly-created Jewish State during the
Palestinian exodus, which is referred to by many Palestinian groups and individuals as the
Nakba (
Arabic: النكبة), meaning "disaster" or "cataclysm". Some Israeli historians suggest that the Palestinians fled because of orders from Arab generals. Many Palestinians left under the belief that the Arab armies would prevail and they would return.
[14] Moreover, "
Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel" were offered "
full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its provisional and permanent institutions" in the
Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel; many, however, refused.
Estimates of the final refugee count range from 400,000 to 900,000 with the official United Nations count at 711,000.
[15][/quote]
If I have the story straight, a rough sequence of events would sound like:
1. (Nov 1947) the United Nations voted to partition Palestine into Jewish & Arab sectors. Violence erupted all over the area.
2. (May 1948) the British Mandate over Palestine ended and the state of Israel was declared. Violence continued to erupt (to this day, no less)
3. (June 1949) Over half a million Palestinians had fled the region
Now, THAT's brevity, for you. And, this highlights the (relatively small) point in question: the half million to a million Palestinians who fled their homes did so, in my opinion, because any sane person flees from a warzone.
At one point, there was Palestine, full of Palestinians. Over time, there was a large influx of Jewish people. One day, the state of Israel was declared, sitting on top of (but not exactly covering 100% of) what had been Palestine, up till that moment. War erupts (well, actually, it hadn't waited for the formal declaration to erupt.) Civilians flee. Stating that the civilians fled because neighboring countries ordered them to..??
Well...Lord knows I'm no student of history (I'm looking up this crap on the Internet, for crying out loud,) but as an outside observer, I find your account of these historical events to be unplausible. (I had wondered how Israelis taught their children of this history. Interesting.)