There was a Jewish community in Palestine (mostly centered around Jerusalem) but they did not come up with the Zionist project. Actually, many were opposed and some of their descendants still do so to this day.
> The ethnic cleansing/settler-colonialist paradigm is easy for outsiders to project on the region
The (European) architects of the Zionist project literally called it colonialism.
"You are being invited to help make history. It doesn’t involve Africa, but a piece of Asia Minor; not Englishmen but Jews … How, then, do I happen to turn to you since this is an out-of-the-way matter for you? How indeed? Because it is something colonial." -Theodor Herzl
Ze'ev Jabotinsky literally compared the Zionist project to other colonial projects when arguing the people living there would fight back against their colonizers and the need for numbers and strength to counter them.
> Facts is that most of the palestinians fled in the earlier phases of the war, and the very little instances of forced evacuation of the population where within the borders of Israel/Palestine, not out of the country.
People don't leave their homes voluntarily. They leave because of violence or fear of violence. The fact is there were Palestinians living all over the map at the "before" stage. Settlers came to form an ethno-state. The orders given to the Zionist militia commanders were literally "cleanse" this or that village. In the "after" stage, all these people are gone from most of the map and the ones trying to return to their homes are shot dead.
That is ethnic cleansing period. The goal was to create an ethno-state in a place where people already lived. These people have been getting confined to smaller and smaller areas ever since. And the oppression continues to this day.
> Regarding the "State founded on ethnic cleaning", in recent times this includes entire South America, parts of Africa, United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand.
It's a state founded on ethnic cleansing. People were already living there when settlers came to create an ethno-state for themselves.
In late 1947, their militias begun a campaign of massacring and expelling Palestinians from mostly defenseless villages. These refuges pouring into neighboring Arab countries is what prompted the 1948 war. When the war ended, they murdered any civilians trying to return to their homes.
Gaza was originally a refugee camp created for receiving these expelled people.
The ethnic cleansing and denial of rights has continued ever since. The current Gaza war is not when the crimes against humanity started. Israel has been commiting crimes against humanity throughout its entire existence.
Have the Palestinians been ethnically cleansed? Yes or no? Have they been oppressed for almost 80 years? Yes or no?