Letter: Jewish Truths vs Arab Lies

Dear editor:

I’d like to expand on Bruce Ticker’s refutation of the falsehoods spouted by Marc Lamont Hill in the hopes of helping your readers see through the demagoguery of Hill and other Jew-hater. (“Column: So Many Arab Lies, So Little Time” boulderjewishnews.org September 19, 2024

Most, not all,  Jews were driven from the Holy Land following the destruction of the Second Temple.  The Jews of the Diaspora maintained contact with the communities remaining in Eretz Israel. The exiled Jews also retained Hebrew as a language of prayer and religious study, praying frequently and fervently for a return to Zion. They also contributed to the many communities in which they found themselves temporarily welcomed until they fell out of favor and were forced to move to yet another temporary home where they again contributed until the next expulsion.

In the mid-nineteenth century, modern Zionism posited that Jews could find a permanent home in their ancestral homeland, then a poorly developed and sparsely populated area (Palestine) in the Ottoman Empire. The Zionists bought land, improved its productivity, established civil defense units, built schools and hospitals, and lobbied world leaders for their cause. Many people who today call themselves “Palestinians” descend from Arab families which entered the area only after Zionist activity had raised its living standards.

The Ottoman Empire collapsed after entering World War I on the losing side. The League of Nations gave its members “mandates” over various portions of the defunct empire, with the intention that modern states would come into being there. Great Britain was given the Mandate for Palestine. Although the British government had announced it “looked favorably” on the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, it eventually used 78% of the mandated land to establish the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan.

https://www.britannica.com/event/Balfour-Declaration

As the successor to the League of Nations, the United Nations subsequently proposed dividing the remaining 22% of the Palestine Mandate into a Jewish state and a second Arab state. The Zionist community accepted the proposal but Arab states went to war against the Jews. Although Israel declared independence in 1948, Transjordan captured eastern Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria (dubbing these areas “The West Bank” and changing its name to “Jordan”) and Egypt captured Gaza. Jordan ethnically cleansed Jews from the areas under its illegal occupation. Both Jordan and Egypt permitted terrorists to stage raids into Israel from land they controlled until 1967. The 1964 founding charter of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) specified that the group made no claims on lands then held by Jordan and Egypt. The PLO’s intended purpose was “liberating” Israel from the Jews!

Arab-initiated aggression against Jews and Israel resulted in two refugee populations. Between 400,000 and 700,000 Arabs left Palestine in the 1940’s as living conditions deteriorated in the run-up to anti-Jewish hostilities. Later, Arab shame at having failed to defeat the Zionists resulted in 1,000,000 Jews being driven from their homes in the Muslim countries of the Middle East and North Africa. Israel absorbed 800,000 of these Mizrachi Jews, whose descendants comprise the majority of Israel’s current Jewish population. In contrast, Arab countries refused to take in the Arabs who’d left Palestine and their descendants. Although no more than 30,000 of the original refugees are still alive, UNRWA (the UN agency responsible for their care) now lists 6,000,000 Palestine Refugees on its rolls. The UN abets Arab (and Palestinian) leaders in insisting that Israel grant the “refugees” a Right of Return, despite the fact that the “refugees” have been taught that killing Jews is a Muslim’s ticket to Heaven. No Jew would be safe in the Muslim-majority Israel that Palestinian leaders envision in a “Two State solution,” the other state being a Jew-free Palestinian state.

https://docs.house.gov/meetings/FA/FA17/20240130/116769/HMTG-118-FA17-Wstate-NeuerH-20240130.pdf

In 1967, while defending Israelis from the genocidal intentions of Egypt, Syria, and Jordan, Israel liberated the lands held by those Arab states. Shortly after the Six Day War ended, the Arab League rejected Israel’s offer to withdraw from newly liberated land in exchange for recognition and peace. There is no record of any Palestinian leader urging the League to accept the deal so that a Palestinian state could be established.

https://www.sixdaywar.org/immediate-aftermath/the-3-nos-of-khartoum/

Thanks to the Oslo Accords, all Palestinians in Gaza and 95% of the Palestinians in Judea and Samaria have been living under the administration of leaders of their own choosing for nearly two decades. But neither the Palestinian Authority nor Hamas has made any effort to develop the economies of the areas under their control. The Palestinian Authority says that its chief financial obligation is maintaining its “Martyrs’ Fund” which pays lifelong stipends to Palestinians (and/or their families) who answer the Authorities’ call to attack and kill Jews. Hamas says an Israeli blockade prevented the development of Gaza’s economy. Yet, it managed to spend $1,000,000,000 to build the extensive network of terror tunnels which has turned all of Gaza into an armed camp.

Toby F. Block
Atlanta, Georgia