The U.S. recently holding direct talks with Hamas, unprecedented in nature, is yet another example of Westerners making the Israeli-Palestinian conflict worse, not better.
Ego's "I am" is part and parcel with "you are and I am not," otherwise known as envy. Just as Mohammed and his followers have always known that they are late-appearing impostors, and just as Cain envied Abel for his acceptable sacrifice versus his own inadequate one, so the bitter, murderous envy continues.
1. To bandy about phrases like "the Palestinian people" without hesitating even a moment to evaluate whether or not they even meet the minimum criteria for peoplehood;
2. To use such terms as "As a result of Israel’s victory in [the '48] war, Palestinian identity was suppressed by neighboring Arab states"
despite the historical fact that the notion of a national identity did not even exist before 1964 as confirmed by the late senior PLO official Zuheir Mohsen . . . in the Dutch daily Trouw in 1977 when he declared
“The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct “Palestinian people” to oppose Zionism. Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinianhttps://worldisraelnews.com/the-palestinian-people-does-not-exist/ identity exists only for tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.”
— Zuheir Mohsen to James Dorsey, “Wij zijn alleen Palestijn om politieke reden”, Trouw, March 1, 1977.
is confirm a legitimacy where none may be waraented. If we are going down that road, why not declare that not only is there a Palestinian people but that they are indigenous to the land, that every last inch of Israel belongs to them, that Jews are an invented rag tag mob tracing back to the Khazars, that Arab DNA proves Jews are at best mere Palestinians in disguise because ethnicity, religion, and nationality come from DNA.
"in the end, Oslo failed — perhaps because of ego, mainly from the West’s corner of the ring."
Of course the Oslo failure couldn't possibly be due to a Qu'ranic principle of Dar al Harb where any lands once conquered by Muslims thereafter by divine mandate forever belong under Muslim dominion. (Surah 2:191) Of course thisprinciplecouldn't possibly be enshrined in the charters of Hamas, Hezbollah, the PA, and be responsible for the Khartoum Three NOs: No peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel, unless, of course, you can craft a Hudna to lay in wait for the day the sheep stops being vigilant.
"[as] Einat Wilf, a former Left-leaning Israeli politician [observed regarding the Oslo Accords]. 'Instead of building trust and allowing the parties to adjust to the reality of the inevitable compromises which were necessary for peace, it merely allowed each side to persist in its own self-serving interpretation of what the Accords implied and to continue the very behavior which destroyed trust on the other side.' "
Missing is a basic principle in contract law (Treaties are contracts] that violations of terms such that the contract cannot be fulfilled are called Breach of Contract. They effectively render the contract null and void. Arafat's promise to revise the PA charter to remove clauses calling for the elimination of Israel and Jews was never enacted thus enabling continued attacks on Israelis. As if that were not breach enough, Arafat initiated the first Intifada thus not only violating another fundamental clause of the the Accord but further initiating the very violence he had committed to renounce.
"UN Security Council’s approval of Resolution 2334, which stated that Israel’s settlement activity in 'Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem,' constitutes a 'flagrant violation' of international law and has 'no legal validity.' ”
Given that the Security Council applies the principle of international law "Uti possidetis juris," which holds that newly independent states inherit the administrative boundaries of their former colonial territories" but refuses to apply it to Israel reveals a willful selective application of International Law. Only guessing here, but could it be because Jews are involved?
"former Canadian ambassador Paul Heinbecker noted that, Israeli and Palestinian narratives notwithstanding, Resolution 2334 'reflects what the world thinks.'"
The issue is a legal one, not a popularity contest, such as we are being treated to in the General Assembly. Bodies coming to legal decisions based on biases, prejudices, and outright bigotry, where law, evidence, fact, history, should be the standards of procedure is to reveal these bodies as nothing more than Kangaroo Courts.
"no other country in the world that would agree (or be expected) to share its capital with another country. Only egomaniacs would force onto others what they would not accept themselves."
Joshua H, you hit the nail on the head with this observation, only this hypocrisy applies much farther than merely to truncating Jerusalem. Who would appreciate having a stolen possession of theirs gifted to the thief by given to the thief by a third party?
"Aaron David Miller . . .concluded that the [Abraham Accords were] not being driven by a desire for a negotiated settlement so much as to bolster the prospects of Benjamin Netanyahu’s reelection as Israeli prime minister in 2020 — because that would help Trump’s prospects of holding onto the White House."
If one googles Miller, one would find he is a far cry from a friend of Israel. Reducing Netanyahu's involvement in the Abraham Accord to mere self-aggrandizement not to mention also to avoid criminal charges. Miller implies that if Netanyahu could be sufficiently discredited in the public eye he would be turfed from office and replaced by a more conciliatory, more compliant politico amenable to a Pax America at whatever cost Israel might have to pay.
At some point after the YK War, and Jordan's official renunciation of Judea Samaria, this became officially the Israel Palestine conflict. Israel was the stronger party and it was deemed to be ignoring all humanitarian and legal precepts as outlined by the Europeans....and the corrupt antisemitic Soviet block. The "settlements" the alleged denial of equal rights for Arabs, the ultran ethno-religious character that was uniquely criminal Israel's....as if all the Arab states aren't ethno religious. After each Arab refusal, the refrain of "Israel is not yet willing to do what Israel must do"...evacuate to the last inch all territory taken during the 67 War and yes...allow all 5 million "refugees" to resume living in "their eternal homeland" And that's where we are now. All the opprobrium since the Israel war to eliminate Hamas is part of Israel's nefarious plan of genocide. It's what the EU believes, it's what is taught at a thousand universities, it's the continuing barrage of resolutions at the UN. Israel will have to make reality on the ground and live with that. take advantage of what Trump can do before the Newsome or Jeffries administration.
The biggest mistake that all of the negotiations mentioned in this excellent article was the perception that the so called Palestinians were rational actors and willing to recognize Israel as a Jewish state
Not exactly. I remember the Oslo process well. The primary architects were not Norwegian diplomats or the US administration but two men, Simon Peres and Yossi Beilen. They negotiated it almost entirely in secret and presented it to Yitzchak Rabin as a fait accompli that he could hardly reject out of hand. Peres seemed to genuinely believe this idiotic agreement would lead to an end to the conflict. Rabin thought it would empower the PLO to destroy Hamas. We see how well both ideas worked out. This is why the Israeli Labor party for intent and purposes no longer exists. Israeli politicians CANNOT escape the blame for this debacle.
Certainly there were Israelis with good intentions but bad foresight and execution. That is well-known in Israel. I’ve met with Beilin privately. He’s a nice man but I don’t agree with him politically at all.
When studying for my master's in Conflict Analysis and Resolution, I realized that the field is based on this idea: the ego of those in the West who think (know!) they can swoop in and easily solve the problems of those uneducated, unsophisticated poor peoples over there. A true mentality problem which, as you note, causes and exacerbates more problems than it solves.
"It seems to me that the reality of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, at least for now, is the fact that practical, implementable solutions just do not exist. There are only responses and policies (e.g. deterrence, defunding) which seem slightly more, or slightly less, likely to reduce suffering and keep each party at a safe distance." Oh, gosh, Joshua, I hope you are wrong, Israel cannot return to the status quo. I hope that this delicate chess game will soon end (suddenly) and what MUST be done will happen: Launch the damn shock-and-awe Blitz, knock out the nuke-building sites in Iran, put the remains of Hezbollah out of their misery, finish off Hamas. Let America handle the Houthis; they'd love the honor of that one. WIN the war, win BIG, and begin remaking the Middle East, according to "the dream," plan as Netanyahu outlined at the UN. You know you'll have Saudi Arabia and the UAE and reluctantly (at first) Jordan and Egypt on board because they fear another rise of Islamist terror. Oh, and on Day Two of the Blitz? A few more bombs on terrorists in Syria, and on the Iranian leadership. Yeah, I know it sounds "out there," but you KNOW Trump and Bibi want to do this and they are gathering the excuses to do it right now.
I agree with a lot of this, but I differ on the precipitating factor in the Oct. 7 attack. Someone in the Biden administration (perhaps some Obama holdovers) leaked the details of the Saudi-Israeli normalization plan, probably to Iran, and Iran gave Hamas the go-ahead. Hezbollah was meant to follow up with a similar ground incursion on Oct. 8 but restricted itself to missiles — so maybe the Iranians had second thoughts.
After the savagery of Oct. 7, Iran might have realized that Hezbollah would be vulnerable to Israeli airstrikes and the mullahs were reluctant to endanger their most valuable pawn.
When the patient has cancer, there’s little that can be done save cure or death. Whichever side that wins will need a bloodbath to secure it, everything else is window dressing.
The Yasser Arafat claim is bizarre. David Ben-Gurion was born in Poland. Golda Meir was born in the Ukraine. Were they not Israelis?
That comment is bizarre. Arafat led a movement that claimed it was indigenous and had its land stolen by Jews. So his not being one of them demonstrates that he is a fraud. The Israelis you mention were Zionists committed to rebuilding the ancient Jewish homeland on its original site and gathering as many of the world's Jews in exile as possible. It was never claimed that the Zionists were born in the historical homeland.
Arafat’s father was born in Gaza, his mother has roots in Jerusalem. I’m starting to think some of you people will believe anything, no matter how ridiculous, to support your cause, which really needs no such Jesuitry.
I came across this item: “Arafat was born in Cairo, Egypt, on 4 or 24 August 1929. His father, Abdel Raouf al-Qudwa al-Husseini, was a Palestinian from Gaza City, whose mother, Yasser's paternal grandmother, was Egyptian.”
In 1929, there was (just like today) no State of Palestine. Instead, there was a League of Nations Mandate for Palestine administered by the UK. Most of the Arab population in this territory identified as South Syrian.
So-called “Palestinian identity” was at best embryonic among the Arabs then, and it was pushed mostly by the intellectual elite among whom Arab Christians were overrepresented. They saw nationalism as a way to replace religion as the primary social marker in Islamic societies. They hoped to increase their social acceptance and so their mobility.
Of course, they further expressed their loyalty to Arab nationalism by publicly expressing their antisemitism - something that continues to this day among the diminishing Christian communities in Arab countries.
It was Arafat’s uncle, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who engaged in a violent power struggle with the other clans (much Arab blood was shed in the process) to establish himself as the leader of the Arabs in the Mandate territory with the aim of subverting the express purpose of the Mandate (to encourage Jewish immigration and settlement to reestablish Jewish sovereignty) and ultimately turn “Palestine” into his personal fiefdom upon independence. His aim was, in essence, no different than that of any ambitious warlord in history.
The Grand Mufti only failed in his goal because he supported Nazi Germany rather than the British who in 1939 (and sensing an imminent war) offered a future state on all of the Mandate land with a built-in permanent Arab governing majority provided the Arabs waited 10 years for independence.
Of course, the Arabs rejected this plan, placing all their chips on a German victory. Remarkably, Britain still went ahead and published its “White Paper” that effectively doomed millions of European Jews through closing the immigration gates to Zion.
Arafat simply followed in that ignoble zero-sum, theologically grounded game-plan, and we are where we are.
I’m no supporter of Arafat, I think his modern day supporters should be fought vigorously. However, the rhetorical slight of hand the author is trying to do by claiming that Arafat was not a Palestinian (in so far as that is a claimed nationality, not whether it exists as an objective fact), because he was born in Egypt makes as much sense as his latest pronouncement that Golda Meir and David Ben-Gurion were not Israelis. Laughable nonsense.
I think it comes down to the following undisputed facts: Arafat was born in Egypt, Golda Meir and David Ben-Gurion were born in the Russian Empire. The latter two were instrumental in the creation of the State of Israel and, as a consequence, became Israeli citizens even if neither was born an Israeli (since the state did not exist at the time).
The parallel breaks down for Arafat because, among other things, there was and remains no State of Palestine that could offer him citizenship. Of course, anyone is free to claim whatever identity they wish, whether ethnic, gender or anything else, and whether or not there is an evidentiary support for it.
Arafat’s career was boosted primarily by the KGB which played a significant role in transforming the basis of Arab rejectionism from its religious foundation (lands once conquered remain Muslim even if lost, non-Muslims have no right to govern Muslims, Jews are divinely ordained to be a despised minority under Muslim rule etc) to a secular one (anti-colonial, national liberation etc) - the better to appeal to Western intellectual sensibilities. And that fact further complicates the concept of Palestinian identity.
Is it any wonder that the Arabs continue to obsess over its “fragility”, so much so that it is imperative to keep them in a war zone in Gaza and subject to mass deprivation of rights in Arab countries? Such ghettoïsation, to borrow a term, is seen as the only way to maintain and reinforce their identity, while blaming the Jews for their fate. It’s a very sad state of affairs in which Palestinians are deprived of any say - just as no one will ask who wishes to leave Gaza? Best to answer for them, apparently.
No, they were not Israelis. They were Jews working to reclaim our indigenous homeland. Those who followed them became Israelis because, frankly, the tiny Jewish population outpolitiked the massive Arab population back then.
Well written and relevant but ignoring the real problem which is that the radical Islamic culture of Hamas and their followers feel they have a religious obligation to destroy Isreal. that is why they chant from the river to the sea. To destroy Israel. There have been multiple attempts over many decades to create a peace agreement. They won't accept peace.
This was fascinating! How right you are, the West knows nothing about this complicated history. Yet they involve themselves time after time. I feel very concerned that Trumps man is now leading the hostage negotiations! They just never learn and are unable to stop themselves!
Ego's "I am" is part and parcel with "you are and I am not," otherwise known as envy. Just as Mohammed and his followers have always known that they are late-appearing impostors, and just as Cain envied Abel for his acceptable sacrifice versus his own inadequate one, so the bitter, murderous envy continues.
This is a great article that helped me deepen my understanding of the issue, thank you
Allow me to commit a Heresy or two.
1. To bandy about phrases like "the Palestinian people" without hesitating even a moment to evaluate whether or not they even meet the minimum criteria for peoplehood;
2. To use such terms as "As a result of Israel’s victory in [the '48] war, Palestinian identity was suppressed by neighboring Arab states"
despite the historical fact that the notion of a national identity did not even exist before 1964 as confirmed by the late senior PLO official Zuheir Mohsen . . . in the Dutch daily Trouw in 1977 when he declared
“The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct “Palestinian people” to oppose Zionism. Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinianhttps://worldisraelnews.com/the-palestinian-people-does-not-exist/ identity exists only for tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.”
— Zuheir Mohsen to James Dorsey, “Wij zijn alleen Palestijn om politieke reden”, Trouw, March 1, 1977.
is confirm a legitimacy where none may be waraented. If we are going down that road, why not declare that not only is there a Palestinian people but that they are indigenous to the land, that every last inch of Israel belongs to them, that Jews are an invented rag tag mob tracing back to the Khazars, that Arab DNA proves Jews are at best mere Palestinians in disguise because ethnicity, religion, and nationality come from DNA.
"in the end, Oslo failed — perhaps because of ego, mainly from the West’s corner of the ring."
Of course the Oslo failure couldn't possibly be due to a Qu'ranic principle of Dar al Harb where any lands once conquered by Muslims thereafter by divine mandate forever belong under Muslim dominion. (Surah 2:191) Of course thisprinciplecouldn't possibly be enshrined in the charters of Hamas, Hezbollah, the PA, and be responsible for the Khartoum Three NOs: No peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with Israel, unless, of course, you can craft a Hudna to lay in wait for the day the sheep stops being vigilant.
"[as] Einat Wilf, a former Left-leaning Israeli politician [observed regarding the Oslo Accords]. 'Instead of building trust and allowing the parties to adjust to the reality of the inevitable compromises which were necessary for peace, it merely allowed each side to persist in its own self-serving interpretation of what the Accords implied and to continue the very behavior which destroyed trust on the other side.' "
Missing is a basic principle in contract law (Treaties are contracts] that violations of terms such that the contract cannot be fulfilled are called Breach of Contract. They effectively render the contract null and void. Arafat's promise to revise the PA charter to remove clauses calling for the elimination of Israel and Jews was never enacted thus enabling continued attacks on Israelis. As if that were not breach enough, Arafat initiated the first Intifada thus not only violating another fundamental clause of the the Accord but further initiating the very violence he had committed to renounce.
"UN Security Council’s approval of Resolution 2334, which stated that Israel’s settlement activity in 'Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem,' constitutes a 'flagrant violation' of international law and has 'no legal validity.' ”
Given that the Security Council applies the principle of international law "Uti possidetis juris," which holds that newly independent states inherit the administrative boundaries of their former colonial territories" but refuses to apply it to Israel reveals a willful selective application of International Law. Only guessing here, but could it be because Jews are involved?
"former Canadian ambassador Paul Heinbecker noted that, Israeli and Palestinian narratives notwithstanding, Resolution 2334 'reflects what the world thinks.'"
The issue is a legal one, not a popularity contest, such as we are being treated to in the General Assembly. Bodies coming to legal decisions based on biases, prejudices, and outright bigotry, where law, evidence, fact, history, should be the standards of procedure is to reveal these bodies as nothing more than Kangaroo Courts.
"no other country in the world that would agree (or be expected) to share its capital with another country. Only egomaniacs would force onto others what they would not accept themselves."
Joshua H, you hit the nail on the head with this observation, only this hypocrisy applies much farther than merely to truncating Jerusalem. Who would appreciate having a stolen possession of theirs gifted to the thief by given to the thief by a third party?
"Aaron David Miller . . .concluded that the [Abraham Accords were] not being driven by a desire for a negotiated settlement so much as to bolster the prospects of Benjamin Netanyahu’s reelection as Israeli prime minister in 2020 — because that would help Trump’s prospects of holding onto the White House."
If one googles Miller, one would find he is a far cry from a friend of Israel. Reducing Netanyahu's involvement in the Abraham Accord to mere self-aggrandizement not to mention also to avoid criminal charges. Miller implies that if Netanyahu could be sufficiently discredited in the public eye he would be turfed from office and replaced by a more conciliatory, more compliant politico amenable to a Pax America at whatever cost Israel might have to pay.
Who the hell cares about "palestinian" interests. Their only interest is in obliterating Israel.
,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
"Largely absent from the stream of material released into the public domain was any meaningful consideration of Palestinian interests",
At some point after the YK War, and Jordan's official renunciation of Judea Samaria, this became officially the Israel Palestine conflict. Israel was the stronger party and it was deemed to be ignoring all humanitarian and legal precepts as outlined by the Europeans....and the corrupt antisemitic Soviet block. The "settlements" the alleged denial of equal rights for Arabs, the ultran ethno-religious character that was uniquely criminal Israel's....as if all the Arab states aren't ethno religious. After each Arab refusal, the refrain of "Israel is not yet willing to do what Israel must do"...evacuate to the last inch all territory taken during the 67 War and yes...allow all 5 million "refugees" to resume living in "their eternal homeland" And that's where we are now. All the opprobrium since the Israel war to eliminate Hamas is part of Israel's nefarious plan of genocide. It's what the EU believes, it's what is taught at a thousand universities, it's the continuing barrage of resolutions at the UN. Israel will have to make reality on the ground and live with that. take advantage of what Trump can do before the Newsome or Jeffries administration.
The biggest mistake that all of the negotiations mentioned in this excellent article was the perception that the so called Palestinians were rational actors and willing to recognize Israel as a Jewish state
Not exactly. I remember the Oslo process well. The primary architects were not Norwegian diplomats or the US administration but two men, Simon Peres and Yossi Beilen. They negotiated it almost entirely in secret and presented it to Yitzchak Rabin as a fait accompli that he could hardly reject out of hand. Peres seemed to genuinely believe this idiotic agreement would lead to an end to the conflict. Rabin thought it would empower the PLO to destroy Hamas. We see how well both ideas worked out. This is why the Israeli Labor party for intent and purposes no longer exists. Israeli politicians CANNOT escape the blame for this debacle.
Certainly there were Israelis with good intentions but bad foresight and execution. That is well-known in Israel. I’ve met with Beilin privately. He’s a nice man but I don’t agree with him politically at all.
When studying for my master's in Conflict Analysis and Resolution, I realized that the field is based on this idea: the ego of those in the West who think (know!) they can swoop in and easily solve the problems of those uneducated, unsophisticated poor peoples over there. A true mentality problem which, as you note, causes and exacerbates more problems than it solves.
"It seems to me that the reality of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, at least for now, is the fact that practical, implementable solutions just do not exist. There are only responses and policies (e.g. deterrence, defunding) which seem slightly more, or slightly less, likely to reduce suffering and keep each party at a safe distance." Oh, gosh, Joshua, I hope you are wrong, Israel cannot return to the status quo. I hope that this delicate chess game will soon end (suddenly) and what MUST be done will happen: Launch the damn shock-and-awe Blitz, knock out the nuke-building sites in Iran, put the remains of Hezbollah out of their misery, finish off Hamas. Let America handle the Houthis; they'd love the honor of that one. WIN the war, win BIG, and begin remaking the Middle East, according to "the dream," plan as Netanyahu outlined at the UN. You know you'll have Saudi Arabia and the UAE and reluctantly (at first) Jordan and Egypt on board because they fear another rise of Islamist terror. Oh, and on Day Two of the Blitz? A few more bombs on terrorists in Syria, and on the Iranian leadership. Yeah, I know it sounds "out there," but you KNOW Trump and Bibi want to do this and they are gathering the excuses to do it right now.
I would love to see that happen but the geopolitics of it all are not as black and white unfortunately.
Right on, Joshua Hoffman; Comprehensive, articulate, & revealing article - -BRAVO!!!!
I agree with a lot of this, but I differ on the precipitating factor in the Oct. 7 attack. Someone in the Biden administration (perhaps some Obama holdovers) leaked the details of the Saudi-Israeli normalization plan, probably to Iran, and Iran gave Hamas the go-ahead. Hezbollah was meant to follow up with a similar ground incursion on Oct. 8 but restricted itself to missiles — so maybe the Iranians had second thoughts.
After the savagery of Oct. 7, Iran might have realized that Hezbollah would be vulnerable to Israeli airstrikes and the mullahs were reluctant to endanger their most valuable pawn.
When the patient has cancer, there’s little that can be done save cure or death. Whichever side that wins will need a bloodbath to secure it, everything else is window dressing.
The Yasser Arafat claim is bizarre. David Ben-Gurion was born in Poland. Golda Meir was born in the Ukraine. Were they not Israelis?
That comment is bizarre. Arafat led a movement that claimed it was indigenous and had its land stolen by Jews. So his not being one of them demonstrates that he is a fraud. The Israelis you mention were Zionists committed to rebuilding the ancient Jewish homeland on its original site and gathering as many of the world's Jews in exile as possible. It was never claimed that the Zionists were born in the historical homeland.
Arafat’s father was born in Gaza, his mother has roots in Jerusalem. I’m starting to think some of you people will believe anything, no matter how ridiculous, to support your cause, which really needs no such Jesuitry.
I came across this item: “Arafat was born in Cairo, Egypt, on 4 or 24 August 1929. His father, Abdel Raouf al-Qudwa al-Husseini, was a Palestinian from Gaza City, whose mother, Yasser's paternal grandmother, was Egyptian.”
In 1929, there was (just like today) no State of Palestine. Instead, there was a League of Nations Mandate for Palestine administered by the UK. Most of the Arab population in this territory identified as South Syrian.
So-called “Palestinian identity” was at best embryonic among the Arabs then, and it was pushed mostly by the intellectual elite among whom Arab Christians were overrepresented. They saw nationalism as a way to replace religion as the primary social marker in Islamic societies. They hoped to increase their social acceptance and so their mobility.
Of course, they further expressed their loyalty to Arab nationalism by publicly expressing their antisemitism - something that continues to this day among the diminishing Christian communities in Arab countries.
It was Arafat’s uncle, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who engaged in a violent power struggle with the other clans (much Arab blood was shed in the process) to establish himself as the leader of the Arabs in the Mandate territory with the aim of subverting the express purpose of the Mandate (to encourage Jewish immigration and settlement to reestablish Jewish sovereignty) and ultimately turn “Palestine” into his personal fiefdom upon independence. His aim was, in essence, no different than that of any ambitious warlord in history.
The Grand Mufti only failed in his goal because he supported Nazi Germany rather than the British who in 1939 (and sensing an imminent war) offered a future state on all of the Mandate land with a built-in permanent Arab governing majority provided the Arabs waited 10 years for independence.
Of course, the Arabs rejected this plan, placing all their chips on a German victory. Remarkably, Britain still went ahead and published its “White Paper” that effectively doomed millions of European Jews through closing the immigration gates to Zion.
Arafat simply followed in that ignoble zero-sum, theologically grounded game-plan, and we are where we are.
I’m no supporter of Arafat, I think his modern day supporters should be fought vigorously. However, the rhetorical slight of hand the author is trying to do by claiming that Arafat was not a Palestinian (in so far as that is a claimed nationality, not whether it exists as an objective fact), because he was born in Egypt makes as much sense as his latest pronouncement that Golda Meir and David Ben-Gurion were not Israelis. Laughable nonsense.
I think it comes down to the following undisputed facts: Arafat was born in Egypt, Golda Meir and David Ben-Gurion were born in the Russian Empire. The latter two were instrumental in the creation of the State of Israel and, as a consequence, became Israeli citizens even if neither was born an Israeli (since the state did not exist at the time).
The parallel breaks down for Arafat because, among other things, there was and remains no State of Palestine that could offer him citizenship. Of course, anyone is free to claim whatever identity they wish, whether ethnic, gender or anything else, and whether or not there is an evidentiary support for it.
Arafat’s career was boosted primarily by the KGB which played a significant role in transforming the basis of Arab rejectionism from its religious foundation (lands once conquered remain Muslim even if lost, non-Muslims have no right to govern Muslims, Jews are divinely ordained to be a despised minority under Muslim rule etc) to a secular one (anti-colonial, national liberation etc) - the better to appeal to Western intellectual sensibilities. And that fact further complicates the concept of Palestinian identity.
Is it any wonder that the Arabs continue to obsess over its “fragility”, so much so that it is imperative to keep them in a war zone in Gaza and subject to mass deprivation of rights in Arab countries? Such ghettoïsation, to borrow a term, is seen as the only way to maintain and reinforce their identity, while blaming the Jews for their fate. It’s a very sad state of affairs in which Palestinians are deprived of any say - just as no one will ask who wishes to leave Gaza? Best to answer for them, apparently.
No, they were not Israelis. They were Jews working to reclaim our indigenous homeland. Those who followed them became Israelis because, frankly, the tiny Jewish population outpolitiked the massive Arab population back then.
The Prime Minsters of Israel were not Israeli? What?
Well written and relevant but ignoring the real problem which is that the radical Islamic culture of Hamas and their followers feel they have a religious obligation to destroy Isreal. that is why they chant from the river to the sea. To destroy Israel. There have been multiple attempts over many decades to create a peace agreement. They won't accept peace.
That's a whole additional article. Joshua couldn't fit the whole kitchen sink into one article!!
Hamas is only as strong as its sponsors. Let's not forget that and who they are and who in the West is in bed with them.
In my opinion the only reason they say they would consider a two-state solution is to use it as a staging area to continue to attack Israel.
The Israelis desperately want peace and to peacefully co-exist. Hamas won't accept that.
This was fascinating! How right you are, the West knows nothing about this complicated history. Yet they involve themselves time after time. I feel very concerned that Trumps man is now leading the hostage negotiations! They just never learn and are unable to stop themselves!
I shudder to think Israel would be in much worse peril under Kam-Allah, but President Chutzpah has no respect for boundries.