Guess What? Muslims Fight for ISIS But Not Palestine

...The John Kerrys of the world rarely let facts disturb their theories. But for anyone who does care about facts, the foreign fighters flocking to Iraq and Syria offer a good clue as to what issues really inflame the Muslim world. And neither Israel nor the Palestinians are high on the list.

Evelyn Gordon..
Commentary Magazine..
21 October '14..

For anyone who thinks the lack of a Palestinian state is a primary cause of Muslim grievance, the flood of foreign fighters into Syria and Iraq in recent years poses a real problem. After all, none of the jihadi groups in those countries are fighting against Israel or for the Palestinians; indeed, as journalist Khaled Abu Toameh pointed out yesterday, ISIS ranks “liberating Jerusalem” way down on its list of goals and “did not even bother to comment” on this summer’s war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Yet while ISIS and its ilk have attracted thousands of foreign fighters to Syria and Iraq, the number of foreigners who have joined the Palestinian fight against Israel is near zero.

This certainly isn’t a problem of access. The thousands of Western Muslims now fighting in Iraq and Syria could easily and legally have reached the West Bank via either Israel or Jordan; so could those from Turkey, Jordan and Egypt. They simply never cared enough to do so.

And until last year, when Egypt cracked down on the cross-border smuggling tunnels, Gaza was accessible even to nationals of Muslim countries that lack diplomatic relations with Israel: They could enter Egypt legally and cross to Gaza via the tunnels. Hamas would surely have welcomed reinforcements, but they never cared enough to come.

In short, no matter how often Westerners like Secretary of State John Kerry say the Palestinian issue is a major source of the “street anger and agitation … humiliation and denial and absence of dignity” that helps jihadi groups recruit foreign Muslims, Muslims themselves are saying the opposite with their feet: There are causes they are willing to travel across the world to fight and die for, including the dream of an Islamic caliphate and the sectarian Sunni fight against Shi’ite- and Alawite-dominated governments in Iraq and Syria. But “Palestine” isn’t one of them.

The foreign fighters flocking to Iraq and Syria also undermine another common canard: that Israel is a “racist” or “apartheid” state. After all, a “racist, apartheid state” by definition subjects its minorities to far more “humiliation and denial and absence of dignity” than non-racist, non-apartheid Europe does, so if Israel were really such a state, one would expect its Arab citizens to head the pack of foreign recruits to ISIS and company.

And Which Palestine Do Euros Recognize?

...At its most basic level, recognizing Palestinian statehood seems to be an expression of sympathy for those who bore the brunt of Hamas’s decision to launch another war against Israel: the people of Gaza. Pictures of Palestinian civilians who were killed, wounded, or made homeless by Israeli counter-attacks against Hamas missile launches and terror tunnels generated a wave of revulsion against the Jewish state as well as a desire to beat one’s chest on behalf of the cause of “Free Palestine.” But which Palestine are we talking about?

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary Magazine..
13 October '14..

Today the British Parliament voted on a non-binding resolution that recognized Palestine as a state. The 274-12 vote in favor of the symbolic gesture doesn’t affect the actual foreign policy of the United Kingdom but, like the announcement by the new Swedish prime minister earlier this month of his intention to also recognize it as a state, it does constitute more momentum for a Palestinian effort to bypass peace negotiations. This says a lot more about the willingness of Europeans to pressure and even demonize Israel than it does about their supposed support for peace. But as long as they’re talking about recognition, it’s fair to ask which Palestine they are ready to welcome into the family of nations: The weak, corrupt, and undemocratic Palestinian Authority in the West Bank or the terrorist Hamas state in Gaza? Or both?

The vote in London was something of a farce as Prime Minister David Cameron has made it clear that it will not influence his nation’s actions. Pushed by rank-and-file members of the opposition Labor Party it appears to be driven by a desire to embarrass its leader Ed Milliband more than anything else. But the inability of Labor’s leaders to quash the vote and in the absence of a strong stand against it by Cameron, who, along with the rest of his government and its supporters, abstained on the measure rather than risk his government by actively opposing it, it’s fair to say that the measure reflects public sympathy for the Palestinians.

Yet like the “Free Gaza” demonstrations that rocked European cities this past summer while Hamas rockets rained down on Israeli cities, one has to wonder what exactly those advocating the unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state think they are doing?

At its most basic level, recognizing Palestinian statehood seems to be an expression of sympathy for those who bore the brunt of Hamas’s decision to launch another war against Israel: the people of Gaza. Pictures of Palestinian civilians who were killed, wounded, or made homeless by Israeli counter-attacks against Hamas missile launches and terror tunnels generated a wave of revulsion against the Jewish state as well as a desire to beat one’s chest on behalf of the cause of “Free Palestine.”

But which Palestine are we talking about?

FYI - Palestine is a Geographical Area, Not a Nationality

...The artificiality of a Palestinian identity is reflected in the attitudes and actions of neighboring Arab nations who never established a Palestinian state. It also is expressed in the utterances and loyalties of so-called Palestinians. Only twice in Jerusalem’s history has it served as a national capital. The first time was as the capital of the two Jewish Commonwealths during the First and Second Temple periods, as described in the Bible, reinforced by archaeological evidence and numerous ancient documents. The second time is in modern times as the capital of the State of Israel. It has never served as an Arab capital for the simple reason that there has never been a Palestinian Arab state.

Eli E Hertz..
mythsandfacts.org..
21 January '14..

The Arabs invented a special national entity in the 1960s called the Palestinians, specifically for political gain. They brand Israelis as invaders and claim the geographic area called Palestine belongs exclusively to the Arabs.

The word Palestine is not even Arabic. It is a word coined by the Romans around 135 CE from the name of a seagoing Aegean people who settled on the coast of Canaan in antiquity – the Philistines. The name was chosen to replace Judea, as a sign that Jewish sovereignty had been eradicated following the Jewish revolts against Rome.

In the course of time, the Latin name Philistia was further bastardized into Palistina or Palestine. During the next 2,000 years, Palestine was never an independent state belonging to any people, nor did a Palestinian people, distinct from other Arabs, appear during 1,300 years of Muslim hegemony in Palestine under Arab and Ottoman rule.

Palestine was and is solely a geographic name. Therefore, it is not surprising that in modern times the name ‘Palestine’ or ‘Palestinian’ was applied as an adjective to all inhabitants of the area between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River – Palestine Jews and Palestine Arabs alike. In fact, until the 1960s, most Arabs in Palestine preferred to identify themselves merely as part of the great Arab nation or citizens of “southern Syria.”

The term ‘Palestinian’ as a noun was usurped and co-opted by the Arabs in the 1960s as a tactic initiated by Yasser Arafat to brand Jews as intruders on someone else’s turf. He presented Arab residents of Israel and the Territories as indigenous inhabitants since time immemorial. This fabrication of peoplehood allowed Palestinian Arabs to gain parity with the Jewish people as a nation deserving of an independent state.

Historically, Before the Arabs Fabricated the Palestinian People as an Exclusively Arab Phenomenon, No Such Group Existed

Countless official British Mandate-vintage documents speak of ‘the Jews’ and ‘the Arabs’ of Palestine – not ‘Jews and Palestinians.’

Ironically, before local Jews began calling themselves Israelis in 1948 (the name ‘Israel’ was chosen for the newly-established Jewish state), the term ‘Palestine’ applied almost exclusively to Jews and the institutions founded by new Jewish immigrants in the first half of the 20th century, before independence.

Some examples include:

• The Jerusalem Post, founded in 1932, was called the Palestine Post until 1948.
• Bank Leumi L’Israel was called the “Anglo-Palestine Bank, a Jewish Company.”
• The Jewish Agency – an arm of the Zionist movement engaged in Jewish settlement since 1929 – was called the Jewish Agency for Palestine.
• The house organ of American Zionism in the 1930s was called New Palestine.
• Today’s Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, founded in 1936 by German Jewish refugees who fled Nazi Germany, was called the “Palestine Symphony Orchestra, composed of some 70 Palestinian Jews.”
• The United Jewish Appeal (UJA) was established in 1939 as a merger of the United Palestine Appeal and the fundraising arm of the Joint Distribution Committee.

Encouraged by their success at historical revisionism and brainwashing the world with the ‘Big Lie’ of a Palestinian people, Palestinian Arabs have more recently begun to claim they are the descendants of the Philistines and even the Stone Age Canaanites. Based on that myth, they can claim to have been ‘victimized’ twice by the Jews: In the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites and by the Israelis in modern times – a total fabrication.

Archeologists explain that the Philistines were a Mediterranean people who settled along the coast of Canaan in 1100 BCE. They have no connection to the Arab nation, a desert people who emerged from the Arabian Peninsula.

Contradictions abound, Palestinian leaders claim to be descended from the Canaanites, the Philistines, the Jebusites and the first Christians. They also co-opt Jesus and ignore his Jewishness, at the same time claiming the Jews never were a people and never built the Holy Temples in Jerusalem.

Dishonest pieces and noxious fantasies of Israel’s destruction

...Israeli Jews know the fate of non-Muslim minorities in the Arab and Muslim world. If Israel acknowledges that all Jews would be evacuated from a putative Palestinian state it is not because they agree with the Arab vision of a Judenrein entity but because even those on the left know the Jews there would last as long as the greenhouses left behind in Gaza in 2005. Those “Arab Jews” that Lustick thinks will be at home in the Greater Palestine he envisages know exactly what fate awaits them in a world where they are not protected by a Jewish army.

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary Magazine..
15 September '13..

Twenty years after the signing of the Oslo Peace Accords the two-state solution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs that was its premise remains unrealized. Indeed, support for the idea that a century-old struggle can be ended merely by the stroke of a pen and a new round of concessions on the part of the Israelis is smaller than ever in Israel, even if some elsewhere (such as Secretary of State John Kerry) cling to such illusions. As I wrote last week, it is clear that while the majority of Israelis seem to have drawn some appropriate conclusions to twenty years of peace processing, there remains a constituency in Washington that is determined to ignore the costly mistakes that were made in 1993 and since in the name of promoting peace. So long as the Palestinians are unable to re-imagine their national identity outside of an effort to extinguish the Zionist project and to therefore recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state no matter where its borders are drawn, negotiations are doomed to fail.

This is frustrating for the vast majority of Israelis who, despite their political divisions, are united in a longing for peace that made projects like Oslo and other such initiatives possible. It also exasperates foreign onlookers who wrongly believe the Arab-Israeli conflict is the root of all trouble in the Middle East (a myth that has been exploded by the Arab Spring and its battles in Egypt and Syria that have nothing to do with Israel).

But it is welcomed by those in the West whose dreams have never centered so much on schemes of a “New Middle East” in which economic cooperation will make everyone happy as they have on simply ending the Zionist dream. One such dreamer is the University of Pennsylvania’s Ian Lustick, a political science professor and sometime State Department consultant who was given the front page of the New York Times Sunday Review today to explain in 2,300 words why the obsession with two states should give way to the project of simply eliminating Israel and replacing it with an Arab-majority nation. Given the persistent and increasingly obvious anti-Israel bias of the paper (especially its editorial and op-ed pages) it is hardly a surprise that it would give such prominent play to a piece with such a goal. But even by the low standards that currently govern that section, the disingenuous nature of Lustick’s rant is stunning.

The core conceit of Lustick’s piece is to put forward the idea that a radical transformation of the conflict is not only possible but also probable. Thus, he claims that “the disappearance of Israel as a Zionist project through war, cultural exhaustion or demographic momentum” is a plausible outcome. Indeed, though his essay occasionally hedges its bets, his enthusiasm for the prospect of the end of the Jewish state is palpable. Indeed, he compares it to the end of British rule over all of Ireland, the French hold on Algeria, or the collapse of the Soviet Union, historical events that he claims were once thought unthinkable but now are seen as inevitable outcomes. These analogies are transparently specious, but they are telling because they put Israel in the category of imperialist projects rather than as the national liberation movement of a small people struggling for survival. That tells us a lot about Lustick’s mindset but little about the reality of the Middle East. Unlike the Brits’ Protestant ascendancy in Ireland or the French pieds noirs of Algeria or even the Soviet nomenklatura, the Jews of Israel have nowhere to go. That he also compares Israel to apartheid South Africa, the Iran of the shah, or Saddam Hussein’s Iraq shows just how skewed his view of the country has become and how little he understands its strength and resiliency.

"Palestine" is where the dysfunction begins.

Malcolm Lowe..
Gatestone Institute..
28 January '13..

The phenomenon of "Palestine" is becoming a misfortune for any international institution in which it crops up. This is because those institutions are governed by councils whose members are states. Whenever "Palestine" is on the agenda, these states vote according to the policies of their respective governments, regardless of any principles that are supposed to guide the institution in question.

The oldest example is of course UNWRA. Whereas all other refugee problems in the world are dealt with by UNHCR, which seeks to reduce the numbers of refugees, Palestinian refugees are in the hands of UNWRA, whose function is to multiply their numbers.

The most recent example is the recognition of "Palestine" as a non-member state by the General Assembly of the United Nations. In reality, there is an independent state of Hamasistan in Gaza and a semi-independent fiefdom of Abbasistan (aka the Palestinian Authority, PA) in the West Bank. For years they have had nothing in common, apart from the distant aspiration of destroying Israel.

According to Palestinian reports, the latest attempted reconciliation between the respective leaders was also ineffective: "Each side… is happy with the status quo." To call Gaza and the West Bank collectively "Palestine" is an anachronism. This is why "Palestine" will be written here in inverted commas.

Yes, both Gaza and the West Bank contain people who call themselves "Palestinians," but by "Palestine" they mean the whole area, including Israel. So the continuing babble about a "two-state solution," Israel and Palestine, when the three-state solution has already arrived, is simply befuddling minds worldwide.

The peace process. Who killed it?

Fresnozionism.org..
04 December '12..

The so-called ‘peace process’ was based on UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338, and the most serious attempt to implement them on the ground was the Oslo Accords, agreements signed in 1993-95.

Although both sides complained about violations of the Oslo Accords — Israel complained about continued incitement and terrorism, which increased sharply after Arafat’s return from exile in Tunis, and the Palestinians complained that Israel was not withdrawing fast enough — the final nail of Oslo’s coffin was hammered in by Mahmoud Abbas, when he asked the UN to declare ‘Palestine’ a state.

Art. XXXI.7 of the 1995 Interim Agreement says “Neither side shall initiate or take any step that will change the status of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip pending the outcome of the permanent status negotiations”). This is exactly what Abbas did, and he can’t blame it on unaccountable terrorist factions, as Arafat liked to do after his assassins murdered Jews.

Israelis always understood Oslo as a compromise — that neither side would get everything that it wanted. But the PLO always saw it as a surrender agreement, and became ‘frustrated’ (and everyone knows how Palestinians behave when that happens) when Israel didn’t simply withdraw from all of the territories in return for nothing.

The father of all peace processes was UN Security Council Resolution 242, which called for Israel to withdraw from territories conquered in 1967, and for

Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgment of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.

Land for peace and secure borders. At first the Arabs wouldn’t even consider an agreement that promised peace (see the “Three No’s“). But more recently, they proposed the “Arab Initiative,” which calls for complete Israeli withdrawal, assumption of guilt, and right of return for Arab refugees (what a deal!).

The decision of the UN General Assembly to grant Palestine non-member state status in all of the territories conquered in 1967 directly contradicts resolution 242 because it gives all of the territories to Palestine, without guaranteeing Israel secure boundaries or peace.

Israel freed from bonds of Oslo by Palestinian resolution

Fresnozionism.org..
02 December '12..

The UN decision to give ‘Palestine’ non-member observer state status is not likely to have any consequences on the ground. ‘Palestine’ lacks the properties of a state, and words cannot make it one. It is also not surprising that a UN General Assembly vote went against Israel, either. To paraphrase Abba Eban, if Palestine introduced a resolution that the earth is flat and Israel had flattened it, it would get 138 votes. Only 8 countries joined Israel in voting ‘no’, and of those, only the US, Canada and the Czech Republic are important (the others were the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau and Panama).

The Czechs probably remember what it is like to have foreign nations decree that part of their country should be handed over to an evil, racist enemy intent on swallowing the rest; other Europeans, even the Germans (who abstained), seem to have poorer memories.

Some things I noticed:

It is not about ‘Palestine’, it is about Israel.

The greatest misconception..

Fresnozionism.org..
12 August '12..

The single greatest misconception about the conflict between Israel and its neighbors is that it’s about the Palestinians. A corollary to this is the idea that creating a Palestinian state would be a step toward peace.

Focusing on the relations between Israel and the Palestinians turns the conflict inside out. In fact it is driven by the absolute rejection of a Jewish state in the Middle East by all the Muslim nations in the region, which dates back to the beginning of Zionism, before the founding of the state of Israel, before the development of specifically Palestinian nationalism, and long before the 1967 war.

This rejection was founded on religious principles and ethnic hatred, and has been aggressively nurtured over the years by various parties — Muslim leaders, the Nazis, British colonialists and the Soviets — and has developed a mythical history whose consequence is that the honor of the Muslim nations and the purity of the land can only be regained by extirpating Jewish sovereignty.

Fresnozionism - UN: Church of the Nativity not ‘Palestinian’

Fresnozionism.org..
15 June '12..







News item:

The secretariat of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee has come out against a bid by the Palestinian Authority to use an emergency procedure to register Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity under the country of “Palestine” as a World Heritage site.

“At the UN, where the General Assembly each year adopts more resolutions criticizing Israel than on the rest of the world combined, this is a spectacle as rare as Halley’s Comet,” UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer said…

“This is the first time in recent memory that a draft resolution circulated by the United Nations – let alone by UNESCO, which recently elected Assad’s Syria to its human rights committee – openly rejected a Palestinian claim or position,” Neuer said. His Geneva-based nonprofit group monitors UN activity.

Actually, this is not in the least surprising.

The Christian world understands quite well what would be likely to happen to its holy places under Muslim rule. While it is unlikely that the PA would immediately flatten the church and build a mosque on the site — although one wonders how long it would take Hamas to do so — even the relatively moderate Jordanians severely limited access by Christians between 1948 and 1967, and of course totally excluded Christians who were Israeli nationals. Israel, on the other hand, has gone to great lengths to protect and provide access to Christian (and Muslim) sites.

In Egypt, Muslim extremists have attacked and destroyed churches and murdered Christians, who are 12% of the population. If the Muslim Brotherhood should take power, Christians may officially be declared dhimmis and forced to pay a special tax:

When asked what he thought about many Christian Copts coming out to vote for his secular opponent, Ahmed Shafiq, [Muslim Brotherhood presidential candidate Mohammed] Morsi reportedly said, “They need to know that conquest is coming, and Egypt will be Islamic, and that they must pay jizya or emigrate.”

I’m certain that the 2002 invasion of the Church of the Nativity hasn’t been forgotten. I’ll quote at length from an account by David Raab (see link for sources):

…”More than 100 Palestinian gunmen…[including] soldiers and policemen, entered the Church of the Nativity on Tuesday, as Israeli troops swept into Bethlehem in an attempt to quell violence by Palestinian suicide bombers and militias.”34 The actual number of terrorists was between 150 and 180, among them prominent members of the Fatah Tanzim. As the New York Times put it, “Palestinian gunmen have frequently used the area around the church as a refuge, with the expectation that Israel would try to avoid fighting near the shrine” [emphasis added].35

And in fact this was the case. The commander of the Israeli forces in the area asserted that the IDF would not break into the church itself and would not harm this site holy to Christianity. Israel also deployed more mature and more reserved reserve-duty soldiers in this sensitive situation that militarily called for more agile, standing-army soldiers.36

On the other hand, the Palestinians did not treat it the same way. Not only did they take their weapons with them into the Church of the Nativity and fire, on occasion, from the church, but also reportedly booby-trapped the entrance to the church.37

On April 7, “one of the few priests evacuated from the church told Israeli television yesterday that gunmen had shot their way in, and that the priests, monks and nuns were essentially hostages….The priest declined to call the clergy ‘hostages,’ but repeatedly said in fluent English: ‘We have absolutely no choice. They have guns, we do not.’”38

Christians clearly saw the takeover as a violation of the sanctity of the church. In an interview with CWNews, Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, the Vatican’s Undersecretary of State and the top foreign-policy official, asserted that “The Palestinians have entered into bilateral agreements [with the Holy See] in which they undertake to maintain and respect the status quo regarding the Christian holy places and the rights of Christian communities. To explain the gravity of the current situation, let me begin with the fact that the occupation of the holy places by armed men is a violation of a long tradition of law that dates back to the Ottoman era. Never before have they been occupied – for such a lengthy time – by armed men.”39 On April 14, he reiterated his position in an interview on Vatican Radio.40

On April 24, the Jerusalem Post reported on the damage that the PA forces were causing:

Three Armenian monks, who had been held hostage by the Palestinian gunmen inside Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity, managed to flee the church area via a side gate yesterday morning. They immediately thanked the soldiers for rescuing them.

They told army officers the gunmen had stolen gold and other property, including crucifixes and prayer books, and had caused damage….

One of the monks, Narkiss Korasian, later told reporters: “They stole everything, they opened the doors one by one and stole everything….They stole our prayer books and four crosses…they didn’t leave anything. Thank you for your help, we will never forget it.”

Israeli officials said the monks said the gunmen had also begun beating and attacking clergymen.41

When the siege finally ended, the PA soldiers left the church in terrible condition:

The Palestinian gunmen holed up in the Church of the Nativity seized church stockpiles of food and “ate like greedy monsters” until the food ran out, while more than 150 civilians went hungry. They also guzzled beer, wine, and Johnnie Walker scotch that they found in priests’ quarters, undeterred by the Islamic ban on drinking alcohol. The indulgence lasted for about two weeks into the 39-day siege, when the food and drink ran out, according to an account by four Greek Orthodox priests who were trapped inside for the entire ordeal….

The Orthodox priests and a number of civilians have said the gunmen created a regime of fear.

Even in the Roman Catholic areas of the complex there was evidence of disregard for religious norms. Catholic priests said that some Bibles were torn up for toilet paper, and many valuable sacramental objects were removed. “Palestinians took candelabra, icons and anything that looked like gold,” said a Franciscan, the Rev. Nicholas Marquez from Mexico.42

Please explain again why Christians might be nervous about the church being in ‘Palestine’!

Link: http://fresnozionism.org/2012/06/un-church-of-the-nativity-not-palestinian/

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook.
.

Elder - The disappearance and reappearance of Palestinian Arab nationalism, 1949-1968

Elder of Ziyon..
27 December '11..

Palestinian Arab nationalism effectively sprung out of thin air in 1920. Up until then, with very little exception, it was subsumed under the desire to be a part of "Greater Syria" which would include all of Palestine - and leave no room for a Jewish state.

As soon as the ink dried on the San Remo resolution, Palestinian Arab leaders changed their tune, and embraced the idea of an Arab Palestine that would, again, ensure that no Jewish state would ever exist.

After 1948, the desire for a Palestinian Arab state disappeared again. Palestinian Arabs in the west bank of the Jordan became citizens of that country; those in Gaza saw their land occupied by Egypt. Neither of them showed the slightest interest in their own state - the desire just disappeared.

What replaced it was a return to 1919's Syrian-style pan-Arabism, and the person they believed could help them was Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser.

Here is an interesting AP story from 1957:

Yes, Palestinians in Gaza in 1957 wanted to be under the administration of Egypt - not to have their own country!

In fact, Jordan's King Hussein's major problem during that time was the threat from Nasser, who incited Jordanian Palestinians to revolt against him and even to assassinate him, so the entire Arab world could be Nasserist.

What happened to their vaunted nationalism? Where was their desire for an independent state that their leaders spoke about so eloquently during the 1940s?

It is apparent that the desire for a state was far less than the desire to destroy Israel, which was Nasser's selling point to them. "Liberating Palestine" meant liberating it - from Jews.

(Read full "The disappearance and reappearance of Palestinian Arab nationalism")

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

Fresnozionism - More about Palestinian identity

Fresnozionism.org
19 December '11

http://fresnozionism.org/2011/12/more-about-palestinian-identity/

John E. Sununu, a former Republican senator from New Hampshire, took issue with Newt Gingrich’s remark that the Palestinians were a [recently] “invented people.” Here is the main part of his argument:

With one callous statement he dismissed the plight of 4 million people and their desire for self-determination. Questioned about the controversial statement during a debate on Monday, he piled falsehood upon falsehood. The word “Palestinian,’’ he asserted, “did not become a common term until after 1977.’’ In denying the legitimacy of Palestinians’ identity, Gingrich’s only purpose was to deny any justification for a two-state solution for Middle East peace. If Palestinians are invented, the implication goes, so too must be their objection to the status quo.

During the debate, Gingrich claimed to “stand for the truth,’’ but that apparently does not require telling the truth. His statements are a complete fabrication. Documents prepared by the Arab Office in Jerusalem during the 1930s and ’40s refer frequently to “Palestinian Arabs,’’ “Palestinian Citizens,’’ and the potential formation of a “Palestinian State.’’ The 1973 CIA Atlas of Middle East Issues speaks of “Palestinians’’ and “Palestinian Refugees.’’

Contrary to Gingrich’s insinuation, Palestine is a real place found on maps of all kinds, created by people of all races, for hundreds of years; and the people living there have long been identified with it. The Official 1931 Census of Palestine, conducted under British auspices, counted 850,000 Palestinian Arabs – both Muslim and Christian – and 175,000 Jews. Gingrich noted that the Ottomans once ruled the region, as if that justified his statements. But the Ottoman Empire included Syria and much of the Balkans. Are they invented people too?

The name ‘Palestine’ comes from “Syria Palæstina,” a part of the Roman empire which included parts of present-day Syria, Lebanon, and Israel, extending from the Mediterranean to the land east of the Jordan. After the defeat of the Bar-Kochba revolt in 135, many anti-Jewish actions followed. The Romans chose to name the province after the Biblical enemies of the Jews, the Philistines, who were long gone by this time.

Ettinger - What is Palestine?

Yoram Ettinger
Israel Hayom
16 December '11

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=1022



Contrary to conventional wisdom, the geographic term “Palestine” was predominantly associated – from biblical times until the 1948 establishment of Israel - with the Jewish people, Jewish history and Jewish geography. It was the crux of Jewish national aspirations, the Jewish homeland.

In 135 A.D., Judea was renamed “Palestina” by the Roman Emperor Hadrian following the suppression of the Jewish uprising, in order to eradicate Jewish nationhood and to uproot the inherent Jewish attachment to the Land of Israel. Similarly, Jerusalem was renamed “Aelia Capitolina,” in honor of Aelius Hadrian and the Roman Capitol, in an attempt to obliterate Jewish association with the spiritual and physical core of Judaism.

Since 1949, and increasingly since 1967, the term “Palestine” has been employed by Israel’s enemies in order to delegitimize the existence of the Jewish state. In April 1950, Judea and Samaria were renamed “the West Bank” by the Jordanian occupation, in order to assert Jordanian rule and expunge Jewish connection to the cradle of Jewish history. Until 1950, all official Ottoman, British and prior records referred to "Judea and Samaria" and not to the "West Bank.”

"Palestine" is a derivative of the Hebrew term “Plishtim” (invaders), the Biblical name of the Philistines, non-Semites from the Greek islands and from Phoenicia, who migrated in the 12th century B.C.E. to Pleshet, along the Mediterranean. The term "Palestine" was established, in the 5th century B.C., by the Greek historian Herodotus and adopted in 135 A.D. by the Roman Empire in an attempt to erase "Judaea" from human memory.

Ben-David - How much of the Palestinian Refugee saga is a fraud? Here's an example

Nahr el Bared in 2007

Lenny Ben-David
I*Consult
15 December '11

http://lennybendavid.com/2011/12/how-much-of-palestinian-refugee-saga-is.html

There's little question that some of Palestine's Arabs date back a millennium. Indeed, studies show that some, particularly those in the Hebron Hills areas, were Palestinian Jews who were forced to convert to Islam. Some families in places like Yatta still practice Jewish customs in secret like the Spanish conversos.

But many Palestinian Arab families are relatively new to Palestine, some coming in the last century because of economic opportunities that developed as a result of Jewish enterprises. British officials, such as Winston Churchill, described the improved economic conditions that brought them to the area.

A perfect example is evident in the population of the Nahr el Bared ["Cold River] Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon. As recently as three years ago, sources described many of the residents as originally coming from North Africans countries who immigrated to Palestine in the 1930s.

Ben-David - The Arabs of Palestine Saw Themselves as Part of Syria 90 Years Ago

The original link "Britaininpalestine" link
is no longer active*

Lenny Ben-David
israeldailypicture.com
12 December '11













Here is the original caption on this picture we found online a few months ago:

Arab demonstration, Jerusalem, 1919/1920. The banner on the left reads "We resist Jewish immigration", the banner on the right reads "Palestine is part of Syria". (Emphasis added) In the post-WWI Peace Settlement the League of Nations divided Syria and Palestine into French and British mandates. The Balfour Declaration of 1917, which pledged Britain's support for a Jewish National Home in Palestine, was included in the British mandate for Palestine.

The picture reflects the political tensions in Palestine after the British captured the area from the Ottoman Empire. The region was being divided up by the Great Powers with France taking over Syria and Lebanon, and Great Britain assuming the mandate of Palestine (both sides of the Jordan River) and Iraq. And in accordance with the 1917 Balfour Declaration, Palestine was to house the national Jewish home. By 1922, the British had lopped off the eastern bank of the Jordan (some 70 percent of Palestine) to establish the Kingdom of Transjordan for Emir Abdullah.

Some Arabs in Palestine objected, particularly to the division of the single former Ottoman region of Syria and southern Syria (Palestine).

(Read/See  full "The Arabs of Palestine Saw Themselves as Part of Syria 90 Years Ago")

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

CiF Watch - Take the Palestine Quiz today!

A guest post by Geary
CiF Watch
02 December '11




Please take the following quiz on topics regarding Palestinian quality of life, demography and history, and test your knowledge with the answers provided below.

Questions

1.) Rank these countries according to life expectancy (longest first).

Brazil, Turkey, Egypt, Gaza, Russia, & world average

2.) Rank these conflicts (since 1950) in terms of number of casualties.

Burma/Myanmar; Russia-Chechnya; Arab-Israeli conflict; Zimbabwe civil disorders; Iranian Revolution; Repression of Kurds (Turkey,Iraq,Iran); Sudan civil wars

3.) How many Palestinians were treated in Israeli hospitals in 2010?

None; 180; 1,800; 18,000; or 180,000

4.) Which of the following organs of Palestinian society are under “occupying” Israeli control?

Education system; The Judiciary; The Press, Taxation; or None of the above

5.) Rank these countries by rate of economic growth (GDP, 2009 figures)

Australia, Germany, Israel, Egypt, Palestinian Territories, Hong Kong, and Brazil

6.) The UN Human Rights Council has passed more resolutions against Israel over the Palestine question than against all other nations combined.

Which of these countries are not currently serving on the UNHRC?

Sweden, Russia, Pakistan, Canada, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, China

7.) How much of Gaza’s electricity is supplied by Israel?

None, 10%, 33%, 50%, or 70%

8.) Rank these countries in order of family home ownership.

United States, Italy, Palestinian territories, France, Germany, and Switzerland

9.) Since Arafat launched the 2nd Intifada War against Israel, the last decade has been by far the most costly in Palestinian lives in the history of Israel-Palestinian relations. How many Palestinians have died in conflict with Israel since 2000?

Less than 10,000; 10,000 – 20,000; 20,000 – 30,000; 30,000 – 40,000; or more than 40,000

10.) In the Second Intifada War against Israel, how many Palestinians were killed by other Palestinians (the “Intra-fada”)?

70; 170; 370; or 570

****Click here to go to answers****

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

David Meir-Levi - ‘They Stole Our Land’ vs. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem

David Meir-Levi
frontpagemag.com
25 November '11

http://frontpagemag.com/2011/11/25/%E2%80%9Cthey-stole-our-land%E2%80%9D-vs-the-grand-mufti-of-jerusalem/

The cornerstone argument in the Arab narrative against Israel is that the Zionists in the 19th and early 20th centuries came to the Land of Israel and stole Arab land. This is a very simple assertion, easy to visualize, seemingly logical and amenable to a brief presentation: after all, Zionists did come from Europe to what was then Palestine, and the Arabs were already living there. So obviously when the Jews came they took Arab land.

Although there exists voluminous evidence to the contrary in Arab and Turkish and British sources indicating the exact opposite, it is difficult to present this contrary evidence and explain its importance in as brief and simple a manner as is done with the Arab assertion. There are too many variables: Arab demographics, Jewish demographics, Zionist agrarian reclamation technology, land purchases, crown land vs. privately owned land, absentee landlords, etc. This imbalance puts the advocate on behalf of Zionism and Israel at a disadvantage, even though the evidence supporting the Israeli narrative and contradicting the Arab narrative is vast and thoroughly vetted. For an excellent compilation and analysis of this evidence, see Kenneth Stein, The Land Question in Palestine, 1917-1939 (University of North Carolina Press, 1984, reviewed here and here).

However, there is one testimony from an unimpeachable source stating that the Jews stole no land, but rather bought land in vast quantities from willing sellers who were the legal owners of the land that was sold. This unimpeachable source is so unarguably innocent of any pro-Israel or pro-Jewish or pro-Zionist sentiment that there can be no rational question regarding the veracity of his testimony. That source is the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, the Hajj Mohammed Effendi Amin el-Husseini (1895 to 1974).

Elder - The irony of a "Palestine" tourism video

Elder of Ziyon
24 November '11


Here's how the United Nations Development Programme describes its aims in the Palestinian Arab territories:

UNDP’s assistance to the Palestinian people in all sectors, in both the West Bank and Gaza and in times of emergency and of peace, is aimed towards reducing poverty and rebuilding livelihoods. Since 1978, our Programme of Assistance to the Palestinian People has been implementing projects in the occupied Palestinian territory worth over US$600 million, focusing on the areas vital to the Palestinian well-being and socio-economic development, such as water, health and education facilities, social services, infrastructure and rural and agricultural development.

All of these are worthy activities for people who are in desperate need.

Which makes the following video most interesting. Very professionally done, it was released by the PA Ministry of Tourism and it shows a place where you can get anything you want:




There is a bit of a disconnect between how "Palestine" is described in UNDP and other UN literature and how it is presented in this video. From reading the UNDP quote above, for example, you would believe that Palestinian Arabs are poor and in need of a lot of assistance from the outside.

Watching the video, one gets the opposite impression.

(Read full "The irony of a "Palestine" tourism video")

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.

Fresnozionism - Palestine is a State like night is day

Fresnozionism.org
31 October '11



http://fresnozionism.org/2011/10/palestine-is-a-state-like-night-is-day/

Earlier today, I discussed the admission of ‘Palestine’ to the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). I argued that ‘Palestine’ is not actually eligible for membership, because it does not meet the criteria in the UNESCO Constitution.

In particular, ‘Palestine’ is not a State.

Of course, the Palestinian Authority claims that it is. Let’s see what it means to be a State and whether ‘Palestine’ is one. Here are the criteria, according to geographer Matt Rosenberg. I’ve interspersed my comments (italicized).

An independent State:

Has space or territory which has internationally recognized boundaries (boundary disputes are OK).

No. The lack of defined boundaries go beyond a ‘boundary dispute’. In fact, the PA’s application for admission to the UN that it presented to Ban Ki-Moon does not even specify boundaries, except insofar as it refers to the 1947 partition resolution, UNGA 181, which was never implemented. It could be argued that the PA’s continued publication of maps and other materials that show ‘Palestine’ as occupying all of the land between the Jordan and the Mediterranean indicate that its claims to defined boundaries are frivolous at best.

Singer - Palestine - Fixing The Figures, Fudging The Facts

David Singer
canadafreepress.com
03 October '11

http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/print-friendly/40908

As the United Nations Security Council and the General Assembly continue to consider the PLO application for the State of Palestine to be admitted as the 194th member of the UN - there is concern in Jordan that approval of such application could:

1) represent a distinct threat to continued Hashemite rule in Jordan and

2) challenge Jordan’s right to exist as a viable and independent State within secure and recognized boundaries.

Jordan’s King Abdullah had indicated his concern at these possibilities prior to the PLO presenting its application for membership to the UN on 23 September.

Clearly worried by the possible outcome of the current UN hearings - the King had been at pains to stress Jordan’s independence stating on September 12:

“Jordan is Jordan and Palestine is Palestine. We haven’t changed politically and we will not change. The ‘alternative Palestinian homeland’ will never be part of the discussion; it is not an option and is not in the Jordanian lexicon”

Jordan’s foreign minister - Nasser Judeh - reportedly said two days later that whilst his country supported the Palestinian campaign - the best way to attain statehood was by direct negotiations.

Whilst this might well be Jordan’s position - it is certainly not the PLO‘s.

Jordan’s fears appear to be have been well founded after PLO Chairman - Mahmoud Abbas - told the General Assembly on 23 September :

“ Yet, because we believe in peace and because of our conviction in international legitimacy, and because we had the courage to make difficult decisions for our people, and in the absence of absolute justice, we decided to adopt the path of relative justice - justice that is possible and could correct part of the grave historical injustice committed against our people. Thus, we agreed to establish the State of Palestine on only 22% of the territory of historical Palestine - on all the Palestinian Territory occupied by Israel in 1967.

Mr Abbas’s statement followed closely on the heels of a similar one made just four days earlier by Palestinian Ambassador to Australia - Izzat Abdulhadi - who said:

“Palestine would become a State on the Occupied Palestinian Territories or 22% of historic Palestine, while Israel retained 78% of historic Palestine.” (Australian September 19).

The publication of these virtually identical - but misleading and deceptive - statements within days of each other must surely have confirmed King Abdullah‘s worst fears.

Elder - What do Tom Friedman and Hamas have in common?

Elder of Ziyon
18 September '11

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2011/09/what-do-tom-friedman-and-hamas-have-in.html


Both of them believe in a mythical nation!

From Thomas Friedman in the New York Times:

Israel should have either put out its own peace plan or tried to shape the U.N. diplomacy with its own resolution that reaffirmed the right of both the Palestinian and the Jewish people to a state in historic Palestine and reignited negotiations.

From Al Arabiya, quoting Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh:

“We repeat today that we are with the establishment of a Palestinian state on any liberated part of Palestinian land that is agreed upon by the Palestinian people, without recognizing Israel or conceding any inch of historical Palestine."

Like the PLO and others, these people use the phrase "historic[al] Palestine" as if it is identical to the boundaries of British Mandate Palestine after August 1922 when Transjordan was split off from the Mandate.

As I have shown extensively, "historic Palestine" has little in common with British Mandate Palestine. It did not include the Negev but it did include parts of today's Jordan and Lebanon.

The idea that "Historic Palestine" coincides with the areas that are controlled by Jews is of quite recent vintage. But it has been repeated so often that, like many lies, it get accepted as truth by so-called "experts" in prestigious newspapers.

If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.
.