Palestine: the truth

[hugo]

From:

The History and Meaning of "Palestine" and "Palestinians"

[A Time To Speak]

"There is no such thing as a Palestinian Arab nation . . . Palestine is a name the Romans gave to Eretz Yisrael with the express purpose of infuriating the Jews . . . . Why should we use the spiteful name meant to humiliate us?

The British chose to call the land they mandated Palestine, and the Arabs picked it up as their nation's supposed ancient name, though they couldn't even pronounce it correctly and turned it into Falastin a fictional entity." — Golda Meir quoted by Sarah Honig, Jerusalem Post, 25 November 1995

Palestine has never existed . . . as an autonomous entity. There is no language known as Palestinian. There is no distinct Palestinian culture. There has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Jordanians (another recent invention), Syrians, Lebanese, Iraqis, etc.

Keep in mind that the Arabs control 99.9 percent of the Middle East lands. Israel represents one-tenth of one percent of the landmass. But that's too much for the Arabs. They want it all. And that is ultimately what the fighting in Israel is about today . . . No matter how many land concessions the Israelis make, it will never be enough. — from "Myths of the Middle East", Joseph Farah, Arab-American editor and journalist, WorldNetDaily, 11 October 2000

From the end of the Jewish state in antiquity to the beginning of British rule, the area now designated by the name Palestine was not a country and had no frontiers, only administrative boundaries . . . . — Professor Bernard Lewis, Commentary Magazine, January 1975

Talk and writing about Israel and the Middle East feature the nouns "Palestine" and Palestinian", and the phrases "Palestinian territory" and even "Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory". All too often, these terms are used with regard to their historical or geographical meaning, so that the usage creates illusions rather than clarifies reality.

 

What Does "Palestine" Mean?

 

It has never been the name of a nation or state. It is a geographical term, used to designate the region at those times in history when there is no nation or state there.

 

The word itself derives from "Peleshet", a name that appears frequently in the Bible and has come into English as "Philistine". The name began to be used in the Thirteenth Century BCE, for a wave of migrant "Sea Peoples" who came from the area of the Aegean Sea and the Greek Islands and settled on the southern coast of the land of Canaan. There they established five independent city-states (including Gaza) on a narrow strip of land known as Philistia. The Greeks and Romans called it "Palastina".

 

The Philistines were not Arabs, they were not Semites. They had no connection, ethnic, linguistic or historical with Arabia or Arabs. The name "Falastin" that Arabs today use for "Palestine" is not an Arabic name. It is the Arab pronunciation of the Greco-Roman "Palastina" derived from the Peleshet.

 

 

The Jewish National Home

 

Travellers to Palestine from the Western world left records of what they saw there. The theme throughout their reports is dismal: The land was empty, neglected, abandoned, desolate, fallen into ruins

 

Nothing there [Jerusalem] to be seen but a little of the old walls which is yet remaining and all the rest is grass, moss and weeds. — English pilgrim in 1590

The country is in a considerable degree empty of inhabitants and therefore its greatest need is of a body of population — British consul in 1857

There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent [valley of Jezreel] — not for 30 miles in either direction. . . . One may ride 10 miles hereabouts and not see 10 human beings.

 

For the sort of solitude to make one dreary, come to Galilee . . . Nazareth is forlorn . . . Jericho lies a moldering ruin . . . Bethlehem and Bethany, in their poverty and humiliation . . . untenanted by any living creature . . . .

 

A desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds . . a silent, mournful expanse . . . a desolation . . . . We never saw a human being on the whole route . . . . Hardly a tree or shrub anywhere. Even the olive tree and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country . . . .

 

Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes . . . desolate and unlovely . . . . — Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad, 1867

The restoration of the "desolate and unlovely" land began in the latter half of the Nineteenth Century with the first Jewish pioneers. Their labors created newer and better conditions and opportunities, which in turn attracted migrants from many parts of the Middle East, both Arabs and others.

 

The Balfour Declaration of 1917, confirmed by the League of Nations Mandate, commited the British Government to the principle that "His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a Jewish National Home, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object. . . . " It was specified both that this area be open to "close Jewish settlement" and that the rights of all inhabitants already in the country be preserved and protected.

 

Mandate Palestine originally included all of what is now Jordan, as well as all of what is now Israel, and the territories between them. However, when Great Britain's prot

[wez]

Teach, you know that human ownership of land is an illusion.

[RoyalOrleans]

Teach, you know that human ownership of land is an illusion.

 

And you know that talking out of your ass will get you killed or maimed, churl.

[wez]

And you know that talking out of your ass will get you killed or maimed, churl.

 

 

I accept that fact. The fate of truthtellers throughout history prove you correct.

[RoyalOrleans]

I accept that fact. The fate of truthtellers throughout history prove you correct.

 

If I don't own the land that my house is built on, then who owns it? Local government is a better guess than renting it from God.

 

God loves landowners and wants us to have it.

[wez]

Who gives you the authority to own land?

[RoyalOrleans]

Who gives you the authority to own land?

 

The almighty dollar and the deed.

 

What makes you think that we can not own land?

[wez]

Trace it back.... Keep in mind fairness and justice. You'll find that what grants authority to own land, is doomed to fail.

[RoyalOrleans]

Trace it back.... Keep in mind fairness and justice. You'll find that what grants authority to own land, is doomed to fail.

 

I'm not saying that it is a fair trade, money back by gold for land, however I do find solstice in knowing that where I park my giant gas guzzler there once was a mound-builder's tomb.

[wez]

Our children may not have it so well. If not them, then their children perhaps.

[wez]

If we were on the right track as a species, things would be getting better, not worse.

[wez]

Trace it all the way back, you'll find the true original sin that I believe brought us where we are today.

[RoyalOrleans]

If we were on the right track as a species, things would be getting better, not worse.

 

Right track? What are you babbling about? In the air that bad in Denver?

 

There is no "right track for the species", wez. Life is a series of chaotic, uncontrollable events. What we do to prepare for them is existing and what we do to better ourselves is flourishing.

[wez]

Not sure about you, but I got something called intelligence, and free will. The ability to learn, and change.

[RoyalOrleans]

Trace it all the way back, you'll find the true original sin that I believe brought us where we are today.

 

What? Eve bit a chunk out of the fruit of the Tree of Life?

 

Give me a break. I'm not some snot-nosed prepubescent shit-kicking toddler.

[wez]

To examine, and understand....

[RoyalOrleans]

Not sure about you, but I got something called intelligence, and free will. The ability to learn, and change.

 

As do we all, however very few of us are brave enough to use it.

 

I learn, but I never change. I adapt.

[wez]

No, the original event that sent man on the path of rule by fear.

[RoyalOrleans]

To examine, and understand....

 

To have free will is to be responsible for original sin?

[RoyalOrleans]

No, the original event that sent man on the path of rule by fear.

 

So you're saying that an event led to the evil that men do.

[wez]

Yes, I believe so.

[RoyalOrleans]

Yes, I believe so.

 

I believe that the "event" you're referring is the key to understanding Stonehenge.

[wez]

Can you think of what event most likely put us on that path?

[RoyalOrleans]

Can you think of what event most likely put us on that path?

 

Super Bowl XXXIII... Atlanta should've beat them damn Denver Donkeys.

 

In actuality, I believe the event would have been centered around Abraham.

[wez]

It makes the story of Adam and Eve make perfect sense. The original event, was the fruit, so to speak, that Eve ate and convinced Adam to eat as well. The fruit, was acceptance of the event.