Dhimmi Watch: Fitzgerald: Judea, Samaria, and "occupation"

November 9, 2005

Fitzgerald: Judea, Samaria, and "occupation"

Jihad Watch Board Vice President Hugh Fitzgerald discusses the dhimmitude and carelessness of the international media when it comes to words like "occupation."

Lebanon’s Daily Star carries an article today with the headline: “Jordan's king to visit Occupied Territories, Israel.”
The word "occupied" needs to be carefully examined. It is ordinarily used when the country deemed to be the occupier has no claim to the land it occupies, and is only there temporarily, following a conflict, with no intention or right to remain.

Thus "Occupied Paris" or "Occupied France." Thus "Occupied Germany" or "Occupied Japan" after the war. But to use the word "occupied lands" for lands which are part of the Mandate for Palestine is another matter. These lands were part of the two Ottoman vilayets that were deliberately set aside by the League of Nations, after the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, for the establishment of the Jewish National Home. This was done on the perfectly reasonable and indeed irreproachable theory that like the Arabs (who were promised one Arab State), the Kurds (who ultimately never got any state), and the Armenians (ditto, except for a Soviet republic, only recently made independent), the Jews could be given a state of their own. The moral, legal, and historic claim of the Jews -- some of whom had left the Middle East after the Jihad-conquest by the Arabs in the 7th century, and some of whom had remained to live as dhimmis in Iraq, Syria, Judea itself, Yemen, and North Africa -- would be seen by fair-minded person who had bothered to investigate the matter as an overwhelming claim.

Indeed, when the British, who had made solemn commitments under their power as mandatory authority, simply closed off all of Eastern Palestine (which went to form present-day Jordan) in 1921, the Mandates Commission of the League of Nations was horrified. Arab propagandists --Rami Khouri, Rashid Khalidi, Saeb Erekat, and so on -- like to refer rather quickly, and self-assuredly, to "occupied Arab lands" (or variants on the phrase) knowing that their interviewer or interlocutor will never stop to question them, about the long history of the word "Palestine" (and what it was defined as in Western Christendom) and the brief history of the phrase "Palestinian people," about the real understandings, and weighings of claims, and equities, that lay behind the League of Nations' decision to create, as it created other mandates in the Middle East and elsewhere, the Mandate for Palestine. Nor is much attention given by the BBC, or "The Guardian," or RF1 or "Le Monde," or NPR or any number of newspaper reporters, to another matter: the precise data on demography and land ownership (cadastral records) in what the Western world, but never the Islamic one until the last century, always referred to as "Palestine" or the Holy Land.
How many people discussing "Palestine" realize that in the Ottoman Empire, nearly 90% of the land in the vilayets (and a separate sanjak for Jerusalem) which formed "Palestine" was owned by the Ottoman state? How many know that until the 1948 war, what land the Jews could buy from Arab landlords was bought at exorbitant prices, and at what prices? How many know that the State of Israel is the legitimate and intended successor of the Mandatory authority, Great Britain, which in its turn had inherited the land owned by the Ottoman state? How many know that the entire settled population (i.e., exclusive of the Bedouin who wandered from Egypt to the Arabian desert) of the land that then went to form the "Palestine Mandate" could not, in 1850, have been more than 100,000 in all? How many have bothered to read the accounts of travellers, from Volney to Chateaubriand, to Melville and Mark Twain, who all described the fantastic desolation and ruination of the Holy Land in the 19th century -- until the revival of economic opportunities as the Jews began to come back? Arab in-migration, mostly illegal, exceeded Jewish migration into the very mandatory territory during the entire pre-World War II life of the Mandate.

And, of course, there is always the little matter of that absurd phrase, and more absurd concept, the "Palestinian people" -- a phrase which, if you care to look for it, you will find employed not once prior to the 1967 war by any Arab spokesman or leader anywhere, not in the world's press, not in the Arab press, not in any speech or piece of paper offered up, among the hundreds of thousands of speeches and pieces of paper, offered up on the Arab side, including all those at the United Nations.

Look through the entire U.N. records and try, in 1948, or 1953, or 1956, or 1959, or 1966, to find a single mention of the "Palestinian people."

And you won't find one.

Here's an example of how to use the word "occupied" properly. But before reading the setnence below, first, banish all use of that post-1948 phrase "West Bank" and instead use, unembarrassedly and repeatedly, until it becomes second nature, and until you have forced others to use the terms as well (for it is all by dint of repetition that one succeeds in having right, or wrong, language employed) "Judea and Samaria." These toponyms are not some invention of "Biblical settlers" deliberately changing history by making up terms. They appeared on all the maps throughout the Western world for nearly 2000 years. In the Bible, of course, these placenames came naturally to, among others, Jesus.

And why should you use those terms if they make you at this point just a little bit embarrassed and self-conscious, as if to use them is to identify yourself as some Bible-belt holy-roller, some o Jewish "settler" fanatic? The answer is that you have become a victim of incessant Arab propaganda, and have internalized what that propaganda has so successfully encouraged the world to believe about the venerable Biblical placenames "Judea" and "Samaria." [They never got around to doing the same, amusingly, with the word "Gaza," which is just as Biblical and just as identified with the Jewish history retold in the Old Testament, which is primarily a chronicle, a history, as are "Judea" and "Samaria" -- apparently the Egyptians, still under inattentive King Farouk, never thought it necessary to rename it -- after all, they had seized Gaza and never thought they might lose it again -- as the "Northeastern Bank (of the Nile)"].

But "Judea" and "Samaria" were used by the Jews for more than a thousand years before Jesus began to use those words, and so did all Christians for another nearly 2000 years, until the Arab Muslims came along in 1948 and began to make everyone forget those terms, be embarrassed by those placenames, and instead adopt, for two of the most important, though tiny places, in world history, the absurd phrase "the West Bank" -- a phrase which, of course, has meaning mainly for the Jordanians, and is not even geographically accurate, describing as it does a kind of ear-shaped area, and not a "bank" of land, of similar width along its entire length, parallel to the river in question -- the Jordan -- at all.

If the Arabs ever get their wish, following upon the next "Palestinian" equivalent of the Treaty of al-Hudaibiyya, and go in for the kill, and seize Jerusalem, and then begin calling it Al-Quds (just as the Umayyads seized Christian monuments and claimed them for Islam, not least in Jerusalem), how long would it be before the remaining Christians and Jews in the world would be dutifully calling it "Al-Quds" and looking a bit embarrassed about using that old word "Jerusalem"?

In any case, if you are reading, and still with me, and prepared to use the terms "Judea" and "Samaria" as you should, you are then ready to pronounce the sentence below, which uses the word "occupied" with historical accuracy, and with due attention to the legal rights, under the Mandate, of the various parties. In other words, this sentence does NOT do what the BBC and much of the European press does, when they repeatedly inform us -- quite inaccurately, I'm afraid, that the "Palestinian people" are "struggling" to "get back" their "occupied lands."

The sentence is as follows:

"In Judea and Samaria, lands that were part of the original Mandate for Palestine, and hence intended by that Mandate for the express purpose of establishing the Jewish National Home, and now occupied in large part by Arabs, the Israelis should work to give those local Arabs a degree of autonomy that would be superior to that which the Arabs give to all the non-Arab minorities -- Sudanese blacks, Berbers, Kurds, and so on -- living under their rule, but should be discouraged from yielding up control of any of the territories they now possess, for in order to prevent war in the future, the Muslim Arab forces will be inhibited only where the doctine of "darura," or necessity, can be invoked."

A long sentence but worth the wait, or perhaps one should say it is worth its weight.

Posted by Robert at November 9, 2005 11:26 AM
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Comments
(Note: The Comments section is provided in the interests of free speech only. It is mostly unmoderated, but comments that are off-topic, offensive, slanderous, or otherwise annoying stand a chance of being deleted. The fact that any comment remains on the site IN NO WAY constitutes an endorsement by Jihad Watch or Dhimmi Watch, or by Robert Spencer or any other Jihad Watch or Dhimmi Watch writer, of any view expressed, fact alleged, or link provided in that comment.)

Spencer and Co must really benefit from their relationship with hardline Jews. Otherwise I cannot understand the dogged insistence with which the Israeli position is supported on this site.

I believe this association with Zionism is unnecessary. It taints this site and lessens its appeal to a wider readership.

To respond to Hugh, Zionism was and is immoral; a Zionsist state wasn't feasible without forcibly evacuating the native Palestinian Arab population; such a forced removal did occur and the evidence for it is far too strong to ignore or intellectually adhere to the "flight myth" in the face of; Israel desired "Judea and Samaria" and provoked the 1967 war - a war it new it was never in danger of losing - in order seize those territories; it is now occupying those territories and oppressing severly the native Palestinian population of those territories, and the current Likud government has no intention of handing those territories back to their rightful owners nor any intention of restituting the Palestinian refugees that Zionism created.

And all of this has absolutely nothing to do with why WE should be concerned about Jihad and Sharia, because WE are not immigrating to Muslim countries, they are immigrating to OURS.

Posted by: spect8or

at November 9, 2005 11:51 AM

The only "hardline" is the Islam that has hardlined against non-Muslims since it beginning with the escapades of the brigand that slashed and burned across the Middle East during his lifetime and mandated that his successors do the same throughout the earth.

Posted by: epg

at November 9, 2005 12:07 PM

spect8or

I can't speak for Robert & Co, & I have no faith in any God or Religion.

I support Israel because I believe in democracy & democratic states.

Israel is far from perfect, which democracy is?, but democracy is better than alternative forms of Government, in my opinion.

To allow Israel to be "wiped off the face of the map" & replaced by an Islamic State would have terrible consequences.

Can you imagine the boost that destroying just one democracy would give to the Islamofascists?

Regards
Albion

Posted by: albion

at November 9, 2005 12:09 PM

Spect8or knows how to push all of the anti-Semitic, anti-Israeli buttons and regurgitate the banal, ahistorical propaganda and canards, doesn't he?

Spencer and Co must really benefit from their relationship with hardline Jews

Yes, Robert is one of the many sycophants in the media and government who slant their views to support Israel against the relentless Arab-Muslim campaign of war and terrorism against the Jews... and I'm certain money has something to do with it.

a Zionsist state wasn't feasible without forcibly evacuating the native Palestinian Arab population

Israel includes the full citizenship of over 1 million Arabs and their descendants who did not flee in response to the very real, very well-documented calls by Arab leaders to clear out so the Jews could be slaughtered. Today, those Arabs vote, get elected to the Knesset, appointed to the Courts, and live better, healthier, and more free lives than in any Arab state in the world.

it is now occupying those territories and oppressing severly the native Palestinian population of those territories

If the Palestinian Arabs want to free themselves from Israeli "oppression", they need only do one thing -- that which they and their genocidal leaders have been unwilling to do for 58 years: sue for peace.

Israel desired "Judea and Samaria" and provoked the 1967 war

This is such bullsh*t, replying would require disinfection.

Posted by: Charles Martel

at November 9, 2005 1:14 PM

I think "disputed territories" will do for me. But the minute we start implying that these territories are in fact Israeli, we are on our way to validating the "apathied state" slander that the enemies of Israel are always using. How could we otherwise explain that the Arab/Muslim inhabitants of 'Judea and Sumaria' are denied the rights of citizenship.

It brings us back to the original question: what to do with the 3 million souls living in the territories? A few have been bold enough to advocate such an extreme solution as mass expulsion. Others remain mute on the question.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 9, 2005 1:19 PM

spect8or,

Robert and Hugh have on numerous ocassions published articles on why Israel is so important to the western world. I invite you to research the archives before you so carelessly disregard their stance. You speak with ingorance in this regards and by looking at what you believe as the truth on the subject matter, your bias is as large as your ignorance.

The truth is probably somewhere in the middle of each of your positions, but without exploring Hugh's position, we can never reach the magical middle ground that could end this festering quarrel that endangers all of mankind.

Posted by: William The Crusader

at November 9, 2005 1:21 PM

And, Hugh, remember. They don't just call it an "occupation", it's always "BRUUUUTAL Occupation" and "HUMILIATING Occupation."

It's all a bunch of bullshit designed to keep the Israeli War 1948 alive, to keep it an "unsettled matter."

I attended a festival recently with a bunch of liberal, new-agey stuff... they were selling arts and crafts, looking for support for various causes, etc. Of course there was a bunch of phony hippies with there "Free Palestine" propaganda booth. I really handed them their hats. I made them look like complete idiots. (I'm sure they would disagree.)

The fact is, the lies they tell about Israel can't even compare to the TRUTH about other countries. They just kept going and going... I asked them, "what is the one thing that bothers you more than anything else about Israel?"

"Israel is occupying Palestine by holding onto the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights."

"So Golan is part of Palestine now? I thought Israel took it from them when they invaded Israel, so they couldn't rain down artillery shells on over half of Israel? You may get the Strip, you may get the Bank, but Syria will NEVER get the Heights back. Ever."

"That doesn't excuse the brutal occupation of Palestinians."

"Brutal occupation? Compared to whom? Compared to the Pakistani occupation of Kashmir? Less than 10,000 people have been killed in Israel since 1990, and 70,000 have been killed in Kashmir."

"Well, that is a matter of dispute. Pakistan claims that Kashmir is theirs and India claims that it's theirs."

"But the partition treaty says that it's India's."

"But it's a majority Muslim population. They should be allowed to vote on it."

"Why? All sides signed the treaty, why don't we just hold Pakistan accountable for what they signed?"

"It's still worse for the Palestinians."

"But more people have been killed in Kashmir, I'm pretty sure that most people would rather lose anything before losing their lives. It's clear that there is far more suffering in Kashmir, but you don't seem to care about human suffering or occupation, so what really drives you to complain about Israel and ignore worse situations?"

"You want to know what it is, man? Let me tell you what it is. We give Israel more money is foreign aid than any other country, they get 1/3 of our budget on foreign aid."

"That's bullshit. Israel gets about five billion dollars, South Korean gets 60 billion dollars and NATO gets 80 billion dollars. The last time I checked, the USSR wasn't threatening to invade France or Italy."

"Man, South Korea doesn't get that much."

"Oh? There's forty-thousand US Soldiers there. They all need health care. They all take their wives and kids, and all the wives and kids need health care. And their own schools. And apartments. Do you know how many Stealth Bombers they have there? Those are a billion dollars EACH. They have battleships and nuclear submarines, dude. Do the math; it's 60 Billion a year."

"Well, that's military aid, not foreign aid."

"What the hell's the difference? I thought that you were bothered because we give them money? So what's your REAL reason for hating Israel?"

"They're building A WALL! They're building A WALL to keep the Palestinians off their own land."

"Who says it's their land?"

"They took it in 1967."

"From who? The King of Palestine? That land was taken from Egypt, Jordan, and Syria, not from "palestine." They declared war on Israel, and Israel won a defensive war. History shows that when you start a war and lose it, you lose land."

"Yeah, but the Geneva Convention of 1949 says that land can't be taken."

"Well, that didn’t stop Jordan from taking the West Bank, and it didn’t stop Turkey from taking Cyprus, and it didn’t stop Saddam from taking Kuwait, now did it?”

AND! the UN charter adopted the League of Nations rules, and THAT says that land seized during a defensive war is "subject to negotiation." Well, they negotiated with Jordan and Egypt, and guess what? They didn't want the Gaza Strip and West Bank back.

Furthermore, I'm pretty sure that the Geneva Convention says something about murdering non-combatants, and hiding among civilians; these are SOP for the PLO, so don't pretend that this is about the enshrining the lofty ideals of the Geneva Convention. AND: are Jordan, Syria, and Egypt signatories to the Geneva Convention?"

"I don't know, dude."

"You know, you should be ashamed for detracting from legitimate tragedies with your lies about Israel. Less than 10,000 have been killed in Israel since 1990, meanwhile 2 MILLION black native Africans have been slaughtered in the Sudan by invading Caucasian Arabs. Why don't you care?"

"Man, that's an internal issue."

"I thought you cared about human suffering? Don't you give a damn about all those innocent people in Sudan being killed?"

"Yes, but there's nothing I can do about that; my tax money isn't paying for that, but it is paying for the brutal occupation in Palestine. I think that you just have a religious motivation or something."

"Oh? I have a religious motivation? So I'm a Jewish or Christian Zionist, is that it?"

"Yeah, most likely."

"Man, I'm a secular, liberal democrat. I'm not a Christian or a Jew, but I am a Zionist, and proud to be one. I support the only place in the Middle East that lets homosexuals live, that gives rights to women, the only liberal democracy in the Middle East. The Arab Muslims living in Israel have more freedom and liberties than they would even in a Muslim nation. Give me a break."

"No, I think that you are a conservative republican christian."

(This went on for a while; I finally had to show my P.E.T.A. membership card and my N.O.W. membership card to convince him.)

"So what do you think we should do?"

"Knock the lies about Israel and start telling the truth about REAL, BRUTAL occupations... like the Chinese occupation of Tibet, the Pakistani occupation of Kashmir, the Morrocan occupation of Western Sahara, the Syria occupation of Lebanon, the Turkish occupation of Kurdistan and Cyprus."

"Dude, I have my cause and you have your cause. You're wearing a shirt trying to get people to give blood... why don't you wear a shirt that informs people about Tibet or Sudan?"

"I don't care so much about you working to help the people of "palestine." What bothers me is the constant lies about Israel. You know, the areas you claim Israel took from palestine were part of Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon until 1967... why didn't the palestinians want them before that?"

"Israel didn't have a right to start to begin with. It wasn't their land before they moved there."

"No, and it wasn't the "palestinians" land either. It belonged to King George of England. We also own some land that isn't part of a state. If we wanted to, we could give the Virgin Islands to the Dali Lama. We bought the Virgin Islands from Holland in 1917; the locals didn't get to vote on it. They became part of America... we could have made everyone leave if we'd wanted to. Likewise with "palestine"... the King George decided to give it to the Jews, end of story. Why do you try to make it so confusing?"

"Well, how did King George get it?"

"It was give to him by the rulers of the Ottoman Empire at the Treaty of Versailles, the treaty that ended WW One. The former rulers of the region called "palestine" started a war against England, America, and France... they lost the war. When you lose a war, you lose land. That's why Strahsbourg sounds German but is in France."

"It wasn't the fault of the palestinians that their leaders gave away their homeland."

"I agree. But in the first several years after WW Two, sixty-MILLION people "got" a new government. It wasn't their fault, it was the fault of their crazy leaders. And you know what? Within three or four years, they were all peacefully resettled except in two places: Kashmir and "palestine." Can you guess what those two places have in common?"

(Then the "discussion" turns to me being a racist. I point out my two part black, part white, part Mexican daughters and ask him is he's sure that he thinks I'm a racist.)

At one point, three of them were standing around me asking questions. While trying to answer one, another would interject... one guy came up, said something stupid and started to walk away... I said, "hey, aren't you going to give me a chance to answer?" He said "I'm not intereth-ted in debating you." I detected a slight lilt in his voice, so I said "Whatsamatter, sweetheart? Don't you like straight men?"

Well, that really pith-ed him off. Now the discussion becomes why would I say something so mean. I told him I'm all for gay rights, gay marriage, letting gay people adopt children, just shut the f**k up, okay? Do you want to lose a debate about "palestine" or do you want to try to convince me that I hate homosexuals?

Anyway, the whole thing was like trying to argue with King Tolerance, Cornelius, and David Horowitz at the same time. When it comes to proving points, I say the score was: Me 60, Dummies, 0. BUT you know what I always say, "It's easy to win an argument with a fool; the hard thing is convincing the fool that he's lost."

With idiots like the "Free Palestine" crowd, it's always lie, change the subject, and dissemble. Israel is to the (FRINGE) Left as Hillary is to the (central) Right. "Hillary is HELL-BENT to take over as President!" "Israel is trying to take over land and become Greater Israel!"

Eventually a middle-aged couple, presumable Jews from Israel, came in and really started giving the douchey Israel bashers a piece of their minds. And they weren't so polite and calm as I was. I figured that Zionism was in good hands and took my girls on down the aisle to the Rastafarian booth.

Posted by: kj

at November 9, 2005 1:37 PM

Judea was the Greek and Roman name for what the Jews traditionally have called the Land of Israel, which means that for Greece and Rome, Judea included Samaria! Now, the New Testament uses Judea in that sense, as well as in the narrower Jewish sense of only the former kingdom of Judah, basically the southern part of the country, which is obvious when the term "Judea & Samaria" is used. Tacitus in the Annals, Strabo, and Ptolemy use Judea in the broad Greco-Latin sense.

Eusebios writes that the Romans expelled the Jews from the area of Jerusalem, not from the whole country. The polis of Aelia Capitolina, set up after defeating the Bar Kokhba revolt of the Jews, included the city of Jerusalem and its surroundings and was "judenrein" according to Eusebios [in Church History]. At this same time, 135 CE Rome changed the name of Judea [IVDAEA] to Palaestina as a punishment for the Jews. The bulk of Jewish emigration from the country came after the Arab-Muslim conquest, growing towards the end of the Umayyad period when oppression of dhimmis grew worse, and continuing through the usual Arab-Muslim turmoil, exploitation, and misrule, until the horror of the Crusades.

Hugh makes the right points about the use of the term "occupied territory."

Posted by: Eliyahu

at November 9, 2005 1:38 PM

kj--You're my kind of card-carrying PETA/NOW member. You GO girl!

Posted by: scaramouoche

at November 9, 2005 3:57 PM

For the sake of true history

Thanks to Hugh for putting the history of Palestine into relevant perspective after it has been rewritten and distorted by Arabic propagandists and absorbed by the uncritical Western media as the holy truth. The year 1967 was indeed a remarkable one in many respects. A brand new nation was born overnight as Transjordanian Arabs with a twist of words became Palestinians fighting for their homeland against Israeli occupation. A remarkable propagandistic achievement, even by the standard of Göbbels.

And I really enjoyed reading the encounter between kj and a ‘bunch of phony hippies with there "Free Palestine" propaganda booth’, who received a well earned lesson in history. Yes, kj, you really handed them their hats.

But you were confused about the history of the Virgin Islands, but with so many states who can blame you:

‘We bought the Virgin Islands from Holland in 1917; the locals didn't get to vote on it. They became part of America..’

Actually the Virgin Islands belonged to Denmark and a referendum was held in December 1916 about the sales among all with Danish citizenship and the islands were handed over to the US on April 1st 1917, just five days before US declared war on Germany.

In this referendum women and poor for the very first time had the right to wote, in accordance with the new Danish constitution of 1915.
Actually the islands were purchased by the Danish West Indian Company in 1733 from the French. A July 2, 1848 rebellion on St. Croix, where some 5,000 blacks were free while another 17,000 remained enslaved, prompted liberal governor Peter von Scholten to declare what he had long pressed for, that all unfree in the Danish West Indies were from that day free. While his proclamation was in direct contradiction of the King's orders and while plantation owners refused to accept the proclamation, slavery was abolished on July 3rd, 1848.

Being a Dane I just felt it would be appropriate to offer some historical facts about the Virgin Islands. Many Danish today think that USD 25 millions in gold was a barging price for the virgins, but they are unaware of the fact that the US in secret, as part of the deal, promised Denmark to support its claim that all Greenland belonged to Denmark - a claim disputed by Norway.

Posted by: IpsoFacto

at November 9, 2005 4:20 PM

"I believe this association with Zionism is unnecessary. It taints this site and lessens its appeal to a wider readership."

Even if I am not a Zionist, it doesn't mean that I
don't think Israel is just a better country than all of the crappy mohammadan countries, and more deserving of support than any of them.

Despite all of the slander here about how Christianity would be like Islam if it only had the
"Old Testament", I've found most of the practicing Jews I've met to be peaceful folk with whom Gentiles
(Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, Atheists) may live side by side. While people can dissect every
law of Israel and hold it under a microscope, when I
was in Israel I didn't notice any persecution of Hindus or Bahai's or even mohammadans, beyond the
necessary crap you need to do when the target of jihad. They are freer there than in any mohammadan
hell hole, just not free to kill all the Jews!

Posted by: American

at November 9, 2005 5:01 PM

It brings us back to the original question: what to do with the 3 million souls living in the territories? A few have been bold enough to advocate such an extreme solution as mass expulsion.

Bold enough to advocate such an extreme solution as mass expulsion?

Are you serious?

You mean like the forced expulsion of 10,000 Jews from Gush Katif last August 16, 2005? The expulsion of Jews who were living in Gaza with the governments blessing for the last 30 years -- the very same Jews who redeemed barren sand dunes that Arabs let sit fallow for generations?

If it's good enough for the Jews baby, it's good enough for the "palestinians."

Kahane was right!

Now, if you'll excuse me, you irritate my gag reflex...

Posted by: Kemaste

at November 9, 2005 6:03 PM

If it's good enough for the Jews baby, it's good enough for the "palestinians."
Yesss!

Posted by: Carolyn2

at November 9, 2005 6:36 PM

Kemaste,

I wouldn't expect you to grasp the issue on anything other than a visceral level, but

1) there is an ever-so-slight difference in proportionality between the expulsion of 10,000 Jews from the Gaza strip and 3,000,000 Arabs from Gaza and the West Bank.

2) one can expect an ever-so-slight difference in the violence necessary for such an operation. Not a single Jew was killed in the expulsion from Gaza. I could be wrong, but I would expect thousands of Palestinians to be killed resisting a mass expulsion from the territories.

3) the decision of Israel to expel its settlers from the Gaza has won it diplomatic openings among several Muslim countries and support from the international community. I would agree that this is of ephemeral value given the fickleness of world opinion, but it does contrast rather starkely with the probable reaction of the world to an Israeli undertaking of mass expulsion killing thousands. One could expect Israel to become a pahria state that would make its current isolation look absolutely benign in comparison. There is the possibility if not probability that the USA would end its close relationship with Israel and terminate its generous aid programs.

In all fairness, one must always be conscious of transformational events that could completely alter the strategic landscape of the region and the world. For example, if Palestinian terrorists struck Israel with WMDs, killing thousands of Israelis, then all bets are off and a policy of mass expulsion might gain a plausibility and moral currency that it doesn't have today.

But absent such transformational events, the policy you advocate would probably damage Israel in ways that would negate whatever advantages it would accrue. The loss of American aid and patronage, the diplomatic, political and most importantly, economic isolation imposed from outside, and the justifiable abhorrance of many Jews to such an extreme course of action would create conditions that might just fuel enough emigration to undermine the foundations of the Jewish State.

PS - Hope after reading this you lost your dinner all over your keyboard.

Scaramouche, you're hilarious.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 9, 2005 7:19 PM

The Jews made the desert bloom. Turned their Gaza villages into some of the most productive agricultural land in the region. Now the arabs are applying their famous reverse Midas touch and turning it not back to a mere desert, but a place of aggression, lawlessness, and filth. To shite, in other words.

Posted by: Infidel33

at November 9, 2005 7:23 PM

Are Western values fundamentally at odds with islamic ones - a poll at the Global Mail

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Do vote, if for no other reason then to cause discomfiture to the editors.

Posted by: DP111

at November 9, 2005 7:32 PM

"Spencer and Co must really benefit from their relationship with hardline Jews. Otherwise I cannot understand the dogged insistence with which the Israeli position is supported on this site.

I believe this association with Zionism is unnecessary. It taints this site and lessens its appeal to a wider readership."
-- from a posting above

Would that there were some such material benefit from this site. My hand is in eleemosynary position #1, shyly extended To Whom It May Concern (feel free to contact me). The fact that the poster simply "cannot understand" that anyone of sense, such as himself, might exhibit "dogged insistence" in supporting the "Israeli position" (whatever that is -- it keeps changing) is telling -- about him. Surely he is aware that many people are deeply sympathetic to Israel, and support it for reasons having nothing to do with ethnic identification or religious belief or, for that matter, some kind of "benefit." The failure of successive Israeli political leaders to educate themselves about the basis for the implacable Arab and Muslim opposition to the Infidel nation-state of Israel, is deplorable. It is deplorable not only for Israel, but for Western Europe. Had the Israelis understood and properly presented the reasons for their situation, it is possible that Western European leaders, and the Western press, which were not always so unsympathetic to Israel, might have been made more aware of Islam's tenets, and the attitudes to which those tenets give rise, far earlier. But the Israelis were so busy just trying to create a country, settling large numbers of impoverished refugees (chiefly from Arab countries), fending off military and economic and diplomatic attacks, that they couldn't be bothered to study Islam, or make sense of it. And the Europeans, with far less excuse, didn't either.

The poster seems to believe that at JW it is legitimate to discuss the Greater Jihad (against everyone) but illegitimate to discuss the Lesser Jihad that was the cynosure of all eyes until the camp of Islam obtained the wherewithal to take on larger goals.

Prior to the receipt of the OPEC oil trillions, which began to arrive mostly since October 1973, and then the contemporaneous, and seemingly unrelated event, the permitting of large-scale immigration to, and then settlement in, various countries of Western Europe, of millions of Muslim migrants --predominantly Algerians in France, later joined by other maghrebins, with Pakistanis being the main Muslim group in England, and Turks in West Germany, and Moroccans in Spain, and Moroccans and Turks in Holland and Belgium, and Libyans, Somalis, Egyptians in Italy. Of course each of these countries has had additional admixtures beyond the main Musllim group, and in any case, the country of origin does not matter very much in the final scheme of things -- but rather, the fact of those who are adherents of Islam who are now in territory which, to a Muslim, is considered the Dar al-Harb, that is to say, the part of the globe where Muslims do not yet prevail, do not yet dominate, but in which ultimately, of course, they will.

Only when the wherewithal of OPEC oil money arrived, and the Muslim migrants had settled in numbers throughout the Bilad al-kufr, did the Lesser Jihad openly metamorphose into the Greater Jihad. Those millions of Muslims had settled, not to submit to Western laws, manners, customs, but to not only retain their own, but to demand changes in the laws, customs, manners of the local Infidels, to accommodate Muslim demands: in other words, not to fit into, but to change the places they live in, especially through Da'wa and demographic conquest.

For someone to suggest that it is okay to throw Israel to the wolves shows a misunderstanding of the psychology of Islam. It assumes that giving in on something so important would not be taken as a sign that the struggle is being won, but that it would somehow sate, rather than whet, Muslim appetites. There is no evidence for that. Compromises by Infidels, if history is a guide (and is there another and better guide -- is wishing and hoping and feeling a better guide, as so many seem to think?), do not lead to compromises by Muslims, but quite the opposite. It would be unwise to feed Muslim triumphalism.

Whether or not the poster has bothered to take in what I wrote is unclear. I was discussing how words matter, and how carefully, even with toponyms, the Muslim Arabs have managed to convince the world that the oldest and most venerable of those toponyms, used by Jesus, found in the Bible, and in continuous use in Western Christendom for 2000 years, are somehow a preposterous creation or fabrication, or unearthing of something that had not been heard of since the days practically of Noah, of either those Israeli "settlers" we hear so much about, or of those equally nefarious -- so we are incessantly told -- Christian Bible-Belt evangelists, every man jack of them an Elmer Gantry. Nonsense.

Perhaps you do not see the connection between refusing to throw Israel to the wolves -- i.e. letting the Muslims win that Lesser Jihad -- and the possible success of the Greater Jihad to spread Islam. Or perhaps you deliberately do not want to see that connection, for reasons other than logic and evidence. That in turn might be explained in a number of ways. The charitable way would be to assume that you have not studied the matter sufficiently, and have relied, as so many have, on the superficial, and tendentious coverage, in the popular press and mass media, over the last 30 years, when Arab propaganda has had such success in so many ways, and when many of the journalists reporting on the area had no knowledge of the historical and legal context, not to mention not the slightest understanding of Islam or of the phenomenon of a dhimmitude so powerful, on top of a strong ethnic identification, that even Christian Arabs would often hold the same views, and promote the same Muslim agenda, as Muslim Arabs.

If ignorance is not the explanation for your evident lack of sympathy for Israel and its permanent plight (it must be disturbing for Israelis to realize that they cannot possibly assuage their enemies, no matter what they do, and whatever surrender of their own legal and historical rights they agree to, will not be met by any lessening of hostility, but will instead be taken as a sure sign of weakness, and of Israel's ultimate defeat.

There is another conceivable explanation. I shall refrain even from alluding to that unpleasant possibility. Praeteritio has always been my favorite figure.

Posted by: Hugh

at November 9, 2005 9:09 PM

"I wouldn't expect you to grasp the issue on anything other than a visceral level, but ..."

It may be difficult for you to understand me waaay up there in your ivory tower but let me try try to make my point.

Not a single Jew was killed in the expulsion from Gaza. I could be wrong, but I would expect thousands of Palestinians to be killed resisting a mass expulsion from the territories.

Plenty of Palestinians would leave voluntarily if offered the right deal. You think that the average Palestinian wants to live in fear of armed lunatics? Sure, some will fight but so what? Do you really think we should continue to handle those who want to kill us with kid gloves? Are you French?

But to get to the heart of the matter the transfer policy or Rabbi Meir Kahane was this:

Palestinians(Jordanians, Syrians et al) who agree to live peacefully with Israelis can stay. Those who want to continue to murder their Israeli neighbors have got to go.

Too much latitude has been given to "Palestinians." No more special treatment, status, money or weapons. They need to live up to their agreements just like everyone else does or pay the price. They've been clinging to their victimhood like a drowning man clings to a life perserver. It's time for them to start swimming..

By-the-way, there was plenty of force used by soldiers and Israeli police against the citizens of Gush Katif. I know because I was there. "Because no-one died," is not the yardstick for measuring violence. Why don't you use that same liberal measuring stick for the benefit of the Israelis?

Posted by: Kemaste

at November 9, 2005 9:40 PM

KAMASTE: "Palestinians(Jordanians, Syrians et al) who agree to live peacefully with Israelis can stay. Those who want to continue to murder their Israeli neighbors have got to go."

Is Israel to pass a survey and all those Palestinians determined to fight will check the box on the right so they can be deported? Come on man.

If it was a matter of just identifying the bad guys, Israel would have arrested, deported and/or killed them all by now.

Don't go half ass on me Kamaste. Either you support mass expulsion or you don't.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 9, 2005 10:19 PM

PS - Are the "peaceful" Palestinians who are allowed to stay to be granted the rights of citizenship like their counter-parts inside Israel-proper, or are they to remain stateless non-citizens in legal limbo?

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 9, 2005 10:24 PM

Hugh, you're right, nomenclature is important. That's why it's important to refer to the West Bank as "occupied", because it most assuredly is occupied, in every sense of the word. To do otherwise is to permit that there is nothing wrong in invading another people and occupying their land.

Understandably we don't wish to see ourselves invaded - neither militarily, nor swamped by sheer numbers - by hostile Muslim populations, and either displaced and evicted from our homes or made to submit to a law alien to our own. Is it not hypocritical then to allow Israel precisely that?

We should allow it, you argue, because it helps us fight the "Greater Jihad". How exactly? By placing us on a higher moral plane? It certainly doesn't do that. By discouraging - to whatever degree - new Muslim entrants to the "Greater Jihad"? Rather the opposite.. By helping tame our domestic Muslims? Nope.

The only reason you can come up with is that victory in the "Lesser Jihad" would whet Muslim appetites for the "Greater". Even if I accept this - and I don't - how exactly is our ability to fight the "Greater" compromised by throwing Israel to the "Lesser"? Details please.

Ultimately, I am more concerned with what is *right*. Israel, my friend, is decidedly *wrong*. This isn't a position I have adopted from reading the popular press. It comes from reading history, and comparing Zionist history with that of the "New Historians" (Morris, Segev, Pappe et al). There is no comparison. It's like comparing history with mythology. Muslims in this case, much to the annoyance of some, seem to have a legitimate grievance.

*******

To the poster who asked 'what benefits'? Benefits like being allowed to write for Frontpagemag. A pro Zionist rag where Zionist promoters like Efraim Karsh and Alyssa Lappin (who gave the discredited piece of trash "From Time Immemorial" a five star Amazon review) ply their trade.

Posted by: spect8or

at November 9, 2005 10:41 PM

Victory in one Jihad will encourage triumphalism. Furthermore, what would Muslim control of Jerusalem mean for free access -- with no jizyah, or its equivalent -- to the Christians and Jews of this world, not to mention those who are not believers in either Christianity or Judaism but for cultural reasons wish free access to Jerusalem? Are you aware of what happened in the Old City between 1948 and 1967? Are you aware of what has been happening in Bethlehem to the Christians, and how the Church of the Nativity was used by the "Palestinians"? For that matter, are you aware what the Franciscan monk, an Italian, has recently said about the Muslim persecution and harrying of Christians throughout the territories where the writ of the Muslim-dominated "Palestinian" Authority, such as it is, runs?

I dealt above with both the demographic question -- pointing out that one need only go to the considerable literature left by late 18th century and 19th century Western travellers testifying to the ruin and desolation. That you find this of no interest, and apparently accept as your authorities people as deeply discredited as the Israeli "revisionist" historian -- some historian -- Ilan Pappe -- disturbs. Have you read the records of land ownership under the Ottomans -- not merely in those vilayets, but all over the Ottoman Domains? What about the fact that the Jews bought land, paid for every last inch or dunam, right up until the Arab attack of May 15, 1948? In some cases, indeed, they paid for desert prices ten times what was in the same year being paid for Iowa farmland. This is no different from any other buying and selling of land. What was different is that first the mandatory authority inherited the state land that had formerly been in possession of the Ottomans, and that in turn Israel, as the intended political beneficiary (remember the express terms of the Mandate itself, which said that there should be no prejudice to the "civil and religious rights" of other communities, whcih carefully did not define, because it would have been inaccurate to do so, the "other communities" as being either Arab or Muslm, when the place was, like Alexandria in 1920 or Constaninople in 1920, a place with dozens of religious and ethnic group represented.

Read the texts. All of them. I certainly wouldn't take Ilan Pappe as an authority on anything. As for this business of a review by somebody of someone's book -- what's that got to do with the price of eggs? Go to the sources. Go to the material assembled by the Mandates Commission. What did they know about the minorities in the MIddle East? Why, for example, did they also call for a Kurdish state along with a Jewish state, and an Armenian state and an Arab state? And why did the Armenians not get that state, carved partly out of the Ottoman Domains, but have to make do with a "republic" within the Soviet Empire, and one necessarily unfree until a decade ago, and why did the Kurds never get their promised state, and why did the Arabs, who have managed to convince the world that the vast area from Morocco to the Gulf is called "the Arab world" (so much for the Kurds, the Jews, the Berbers, the Copts, the blacks in the Sudan, the Assyrians, the Chaldeans, the -- well, you get the picture) end up, once everything had settled, and the French left North Africa, with 22 states.

What's wrong with this picture?

If after more thorough investigation, you still prate about the Israelis "invading" and "occupying" someone else's country -- have you forgotten not only the Mandate, but the 19,000 attacks by Egyptian fellahin from 1948 to 1967, or Nasser's crazed Cairene crowds that shouted their death threats from mid-May 1967 on, or the famouse taped phone call by which Nasser inveigled hapless King Hussein to join in the attack? How much of this have you studied, and how much have you chosen to completely ignore?

One must reluctantly conclude that the alternative explanation, the one alluded to but not spelled out above, has turned out to be the correct one.

Did I mention that I'm fond of that Roman belle Praeteritio? Well, I like her Greek twin sister, Paraleipsis, just as much.

Posted by: Hugh

at November 9, 2005 11:12 PM

Come on man..."

Indeed.

KAMASTE: "Palestinians(Jordanians, Syrians et al) who agree to live peacefully with Israelis can stay. Those who want to continue to murder their Israeli neighbors have got to go."

Cornmealious; Okay, you're right. Let the Israelis figure out who's who after the next suicide bombing or the next time Israeli youngsters get picked off on a street corner by a "poor Palestinian" wielding a kalashnikov.
G-d forbid they protect themselves or their children against people determined to kill them. I use the word "people" loosely...

Are the "peaceful" Palestinians who are allowed to stay to be granted the rights of citizenship like their counter-parts inside Israel-proper, or are they to remain stateless non-citizens in legal limbo?

Why should they live in Israel proper? Just because they want to or because you think they should be allowed to? You think it is good common sense to allow people to live amongst you who up until yesterday vowed to cut your throat?

Contrary to your hope and the hopes of all those who want to see Jews get what's coming to them -- We aren't going to commit suicide to satisfy you or anybody else..

Posted by: Kemaste

at November 10, 2005 12:25 AM

Hugh:

Here is an interesting piece for you:

Anti-Zionism and Antisemitism in the Contemporary Islamic Milieu

by Shaykh Abdul Hadi Palazzi

1) A cry of alarm

Looking at some contemporary news is enough for generating a spontaneous feeling of preoccupation and alarm in all those who believe in God and the world to come, and are sincerely interested in working for the good and progress of humanity. For instance, we read, "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion are translated into Arabic and Persian, with prefaces that describe them as ‘a reliable proof of the Jewish plot’"; (1) "The PLO-appointed ‘muftî’ Ikrâmah Sabrî preaches hate against the Jews and their religion from the pulpit of Masjid al-Aqsâ", (2) "Roger Garaudy writes antisemitic pamphlets wherein he renews the worst common senses of holocaust deniers". Even more preoccupying is the fact that, instead of condemning this shameful degeneration of senile speculation, some Arab governments express support for him and even try to introduce him as a "victim of a Jewish persecution".

As a Muslim and a man of religion, I am really disappointed in realizing that people who claim to be my co-religionists are involved in supporting this kind of criminal ideology, and trying to appropriate those guidelines of European antisemitic thought that prepared the ground for the Shoah. On the contrary, I hereby remind that the Islamic territory has been for many century a land of refuge for those Jews that were discriminated and persecuted in Europe; I am proud of the fact that ‘Omar Ibn al-Khattâb ended the ban preventing Jews to live in Jerusalem, while Salâh al-Dîn, after liberating Jerusalem from the hands of the Crusades, wrote to Jewish leaders, "Your exile is over, and whoever wants to come back is welcome". This paper of mine wants to be both a theoretical and a moral witnessing, notwithstanding the fact that practical solutions to the present situation do no seem to be easily at reach. May Allah relief us in our shortcomings.

In the same moment when, after a fatiguing work of dialogue and clarification, the Catholic Church is able to revise many of its historical prefigurations about the Jewish question, some exponent of pseudo-Islamic fundamentalism (3) are now trying to separate Christian antisemitism of old and to transplant its functions in the repertoire of their propagandistic tools. In front of a similar situation, I really feel that "silence is complicity", and cannot but exhort other Muslim scholars to overcome fear and to take a clear and unquestionable stand against this subcultural option. Apart from representing a barrier against other similar forms of racial discrimination, a refutation of antisemitism from an Islamic point of view could also be one of the most relevant contribute to interfaith dialogue and to cooperation between the different branches of the Abrahamitic family.

As a basic point of my paper, I firstly want to look at classical Islamic sources with the objective to show that that they do not support the so-called "Islamic anti-Zionism", preached by radical groups in Middle East and abroad. While reflecting on the historical development of this attitude and the dangers it represents for the contemporary world, it is necessary to underline that the idea of considering Jewish ‘Aliyah to Eretz Israel as a Western invasion and Zionists as new colonizers is quite recent, and has no connection with basic features of Islamic faith. According to the Holy Qur’ân no person, people or religious community can claim a permanent right of possession over a certain territory, since the earth belongs exclusively to Allah, and He is free to entrust rights of sovereignty to everyone He likes and for the time He likes:

Say: "O God, King of the kingdom, (4) Thou givest the kingdom to whom Thou pleasest, and Thou strippest off the kingdom from whom Thou pleasest; Thou enduest with honour whom Thou pleasest, and Thou bringest low whom Thou pleasest: all the best is in Thy hand. Verily, Thou hast power over all things." (5)

From this verse it is possible to deduce a basic principle of Monotheistic philosophy of history: God can choose as He likes in the relationship between peoples and countries; sometimes He entrusts a land to a certain people, and sometimes He takes His possession back and gives it to another people. In general terms, we can say that He gives as a premium for obedience and takes back as a punishment for wickedness, but this rule does not permit us to say that God’s ways are always plain and clear under our eyes, since His secrets are far from being integrally accessible to human intellect.

The idea of making Islam a factor that prevents Arabs from recognizing any sovereign right of Jews over Palestine is – on the contrary – an artificial apparatus that has no precedent in Islamic classical sources. Reading anti-Zionism as a direct consequence of Islam is a form of explicit anti-historical misunderstanding, that implies uprooting Islam from its original religious contents and changing it into a mundane ideology. This deviation was systematically perpetrated by the late British-appointed "muftî" of Jerusalem, Amîn al-Husseynî, the one who - being morally and materially responsible for most of Arab defeats - hardly persecuted all Arabs who understood cooperation with Jews as a precious opportunity for the development of Palestine, and was so rooted in his hate for Jews to accept to put his religious position at the disposal of the anti-religious and anti-humanitarian ideology of National Socialism. After him, Jamâl al-Dîn ‘Abd al-Nassêr based his policy on Pan-Arabism, hate and contempt for Jews and line-up with Soviet Union. All these options were a determinant factor in causing Arab backwardness, but fortunately most of Nassêr’s mistakes were afterwards corrected by the martyr Anwâr Sadât. After the defeat of Nasserianism, the fundamentalist movements made anti-Zionism an outstanding part of their propaganda, trying to describe the negation of any right of Israelis over Palestine as rooted in Islamic tradition and derived from religious principles.

After being involved in wars against Israel, Sadât started understanding that hostility between Arabs and Israelis was damaging both peoples, and courageously chose to move a step toward peace, but was firstly ostracized by other Arab leaders, and then martyred by a group of fanatics. It is not well-known to the great public, but this option in favor of peace is not only the result of a political evolution, but was influenced by the fact that Sadât returned to be a practicing Muslim, and also became a disciple of a great Sufi master and Islamic scholar, Shaykh Muhammad al-Mutawalî al-Sha‘râwî al-Azharî. This Shaykh, recently disappeared, – may Allah be pleased with him – was regarded as the most important Islamic scholar of this century, and was openly preaching peace and cooperation between Muslims and Jews as the best option for the future. Notwithstanding his bad health, he decided to be a member of the Egyptian delegation that was going to visit Jerusalem, and raised his cry of pacification between the children of Ishmael and the children of Jacob from the pulpit of Masjid al-Aqsâ. (6) The fame of his scholarship was able, for a moment, to silence all those fundamentalists who used to say: "Peace with Israel is against Islam." After that, the General Assembly of the United Nations could hear the voice of the Egyptian President saying: "No more wars between Arabs and Israelis".

2) The Land of Israel in Qur’anic exegesis

This plan for ideologization of Islam as an instrument of political fight finds nevertheless a relevant obstacle on its way, since a comparative analysis of Qur’anic and Torah sources reveal an agreement on the point that the link existing between Children of Israel and Land of Canaan is not depending on any kind of project of colonization, usurpation of the territory or abuse of human beings, but directly on God Almighty’s will, toward which we are asked to submit. As we learn form Jewish and Islamic Scriptures God, through His chosen servant Moses, decided to free the offspring of Jacob from slavery in Egypt and to constitute them as heirs of the Promised Land. This is described in the in the Glorious Qur’ân as

We favoured you over other living beings. (7)

Whoever should claim that Jewish sovereignty over Palestine is something recent and depending on political plots would actually be denying the history of revelation and prophecy, as well as the clear teaching of the Holy Books. Unfortunately, ideological fundamentalism and political inexperience led some inadequate leader to inspire an attitude of walls against walls and chauvinistic rivalries. From King Feysâl of Iraq up to King Abdullâh I of Transjordan, Islamic voices orientated toward inter-Abrahamitic brotherhood were silenced, and irrational hostility toward Zionism was introduced as supposed necessary ingredient of both Arab nationalism and pseudo-Islamic radicalism.

The Qur’ân relates and confirms the words by which Moses ordered the Israelites to conquer the Land that was in the hand of the seven Canaanite nations:

And [remember] when Moses said to his people: "O my people, call in remembrance the favour of God unto you, when he produced prophets among you, made you kings, and gave to you what He had not given to any other among the peoples. O my people, enter the Holy Land which God has assigned unto you, and turn not back ignominiously, for then will ye be overthrown, to your own ruin." (8)

Moreover – and those who try to appropriate Islam as a weapon against Israel always forget to take this point in due account – the Holy Qur’ân does not hint to exile as a permanent condition for the Jewish people, but on the contrary announces a re-establishment of the House of Israel in the Land before the last judgment, where it says:

And thereafter We said to the Children of Israel: "Dwell securely in the Promised Land." And when the last warning will come to pass, we will gather you together in a mingled crowd. (9)

3) Jerusalem in the Qur’ân

Liberation of Jerusalem is used as a powerful propagandistic tool by those recent revivalists that look at immigration in Western countries as a mean to prepare as supposed military restoration of a new Islamic Caliphate over territories that were included in the Ottoman Sultanate. Contemporary radical movements that are tolerated in the United Kingdom are critical against the "moderate deviation" of historical groups of fundamentalism, like Ikhwâns or Tahrîr. (10) The Muslim Brotherhood is attached because of its "compromise with the system of unbelief", a definition that hints at its acceptance of a role of legal opposition in both Egypt and Jordan. The more those unreflective people get drowned in irrational utopia, the more they are rooted in the conviction that their own sect is the only rightly guided branch of believers.

Those who are interested in developing the spiritual, ethic and gnostic dimension of the Islamic faith are put under accusation as "deviated sufis", and intolerance and revanshism in the Arab-Israeli conflict are wrongly identified as parameters of purity of belief. As a consequence of this pseudo-conceptual apparatus, PLO’s secular supporters are ready to admit that Jerusalem is a holy city for Muslim and Christians only, while Islamists are incline to describe even the Christian presence as a "fruit of Crusades". In both cases, the Jewish heritage is ignored as a whole, with the clear attempt even to remove it from historical memory. When al-Quds and Hayât al-Jadîdah newspapers quoted the PLO-appointed "muftî" Ikrâmah Sabrî as saying "There is no evidence that Solomon’s Temple was in Jerusalem; probably it was in Bethlehem or in some other place" one cannot but reflect on a single point: a relevant section of local unlearn population is really inclined to take these words for granted, notwithstanding the fact that they contradict both historical evidence and Islamic sources.

The most common argument against Islamic acknowledgment of Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem is that, since al-Quds (11) is a Holy Place for Muslims, they cannot accept it to be ruled by non-Muslims, because this kind of acceptance would amount to a betrayal of Islam. Before expressing our point of view about this question, we must reflect upon the reason for which Jerusalem and Masjid al-Aqsâ hold such a sacred position in Islamic faith. As Muslims and non-Muslims know, the rating of Jerusalem among Islamic Holy Places mainly depends on al-Isrâ’ (the night journey from Mecca to Jerusalem) and al-Mi‘râj (the Ascension of the Prophet Muhammad, S, to heaven). Islamic sources agree on the point that this ascension started from the Rock, mostly identified with the Stone of Foundation dealt with in Jewish sources. Shaykhs of Islamic esotericism (tasawwuf) (12) claim that this Rock is a living being, who bears witnessing for those who visit it. This is proved by the fact that, after al-Isrâ’ and before al-Mi’râj, the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) greeted it by saying,

Peace be upon you, o Rock of Allah.

To remember the historical milieu compels every sincere observer to admit that there is no necessary connection between al-Mi‘râj and sovereign rights over Jerusalem since, in the time when the Prophet (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) consecrated the place with his footprints on the Stone, the City was not a part of the Islamic State – whose borders were then limited to the Arabian Peninsula – but under Byzantine administration. Moreover, although radical preachers try to remove this from exegesis, the Glorious Qur’ân expressly recognizes that Jerusalem plays for the Jewish people the same role that Mecca has for Muslims. We read in Sûrah al-Baqarah:

...They would not follow thy direction of prayer (qiblah), nor art thou to follow their direction of prayer; nor indeed will they follow each other’s direction of prayer... (13)

All Qur’anic annotators explain that "thy qiblah" is obviously the Ka‘bah of Mecca, while "their qiblah" refers to the Temple Site in Jerusalem. To quote just one of the most important of them, we read in Qâdî Baydâwî’s Commentary:

Verily, in their prayers Jews orientate themselves toward the Rock (sakhrah), while Christians orientate themselves eastwards... (14)

As opposed to what sectarian radicals continuously claim, the Book that is a guide for those who abide by Islam - as we have just now shown - recognizes Jerusalem as Jewish direction of prayer; some Muslim exegetes also quote the Book of Daniel (15) as a further proof. After a deep reflection about the implications of this approach, it is not difficult to understand that separation in directions of prayer is a mean to decrease possible rivalries in management of Holy Places. For those who receive from Allah the gift of equilibrium and the attitude to reconciliation, it should not be difficult to conclude that, as no one is willing to deny Muslims a complete sovereignty over Mecca, from an Islamic point of view - notwithstanding opposite, groundless propagandistic claims - there is not any sound theological reason to deny an equal right of Jews over Jerusalem.

4) The land of Israel in early history of Islam

The first century of Islamic era was characterized by a sudden expansion of the State centered in Medina outside the borders of the Arabian Peninsula. The first Caliph and successor of the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam), Abû Bakr as-Siddîq, whose government lasted two years only, from 632 to 634 CE, was able to win the so-called War of apostasy (16) and to firmly unite all Arabia under a stable administration. The second Caliph, ‘Omar Ibn al-Khattâb, engaged himself in defensive wars against the two most important powers of that time, the Byzantine Empire and the Persian Empire of Sassanids. The influence of Byzantium started to withdraw in front of the Islamic expansion, but survived till the conquest of Constantinople by the Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II Fathi, in 1453 CE. On the contrary, the Persian Empire collapsed and disappeared during ‘Omar’s Caliphate: in 637 CE the last Sassanid Shah was defeated in the battle of Qadisiyyah, while the conquest of the whole Empire will be complete soon after, with the victory of Nihavând (641 CE). Some years before, in 638 CE, ‘Omar had entered Aelia Capitolina and annexed the former province of Judea to the Territory of Islam. From that time on, with the exclusion of the period of the Crusades and the Latin Kingdom, the City will constantly be under the nominal sovereignty of a Caliph, until the end of World War I and the beginning of the British mandate.

It is necessary to remark that Jerusalem’s inclusion in Islamic dominion was not an armed conquest, but the result of a peace agreement between ‘Omar and Sophronius, the Christian Bishop of Jerusalem. It could seem strange that a Christian clergyman, whose authority includes local administration of the City, should decide to separate his position from a Christian empire and choose the leader of a new religion as protector. Looking for a possible explanation of his behavior, it can be said that, since Sophronius understood in advance the results of Islamic-Byzantine conflict, he decided to side with the winning part and to avoid to be involved in defeat. From another perspective, we must recall what kind of theology of the kingdom was incorporated in Byzantine Weltanschauung: as a successor of Constantine the Great, the Emperor of Byzantium was regarded as a leader whose authority over the Church derived directly from God; according to this approach, the Patriarch of Constantinople was no more than the supreme imperial chaplain, and the honorific primacy that all Byzantine bishops recognized to him was more a pledge of submission to the Emperor than a sign of independence of the religious hierarchy from the temporal power.

Considering Jerusalem as a part of the Empire meant both admitting a sovereign authority of the Emperor and a prevalence of the Patriarch of Constantinople over local bishops. Of course, because of the role of Jerusalem in the beginnings of Christianity, its bishops have always been dissatisfied in accepting a prevalence of Rome or Constantinople since, from their own point of view, that implied admitting that the Mother of all Christian Churches must be submitted to Churches that were not even existing during Jesus Christ’s life. Apart from this, Byzantine taxation system was quite unbearable for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and for that reason the Empire was not at all popular. After getting informed about the main features of Islamic doctrine, Sophronius realized that surrender to ‘Omar, while being less onerous from a fiscal point of view, would have permitted, for the first time, a complete autonomy of the Church of Jerusalem and his own independence from more authoritative bishops.

Unfortunately, all historical documents dealing with this period are late and based on oral sources; (17) the same document called ‘Omar’s Decree (18) is probably not the original text of the agreement between the Caliph and the Bishop, but an edict issued about eighty years later by the Ommayyad Caliph ‘Omar Ibn ‘Abd al-‘Azîz. What can be stated as certain is that, during negotiations, Sophronius was in vain trying to obtain the subscription of two conditions, that is to say, the preservation of the Roman act that prevented Jews from living in Jerusalem and the maintenance of Mount Moriah as a waste area of ruins, deprived of any kind of religious buildings.

‘Omar’s reaction was clear in denying opportunities for the transfer of the theology of the "rejected people" from a Christian repertoire to an Islamic milieu and, in our humble opinion, the analysis of his attitude should be a powerful admonition for those deviated antizionist propagandists who have nothing better to do than translating the protocols of the Elders of Zion into Eastern languages and introducing them as reliable documents. Had the learnt at least a bit from ‘Omar Ibn al-Khattâb, their attitude toward their brothers in Abraham would have never been so blameworthy.

5) Theological antisemitic behind Sophronius’s requests

The attitude manifested by Sophronius can be fully understood by looking at Christian theology of replacement, as it devolved after the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus (70 CE), and by comparing it to what can be reconstructed of Jesus’ sincere attitude toward the Israelite dispensation. It is now commonly accepted that the real beginning of systematic Christian theology can be identified with the preaching of Paul of Tarsus and with his innovative doctrine of a new and eternal covenant, sealed with the supposed blood of Jesus and abrogating the Covenant of Mount Sinai and the commandments of the Torah. In this perspective, the Church becomes the "new Israel of God", while Jews were only understood as relics of the past, as descendent of the "old Israel" who have refused to recognize the Messiah; their existence must be preserved as a sign of God’s rejection, until the time of their final conversion to Christianity. This was the basic eschatological reading of the role of Judaism after Jesus, and no relevant change of orientation can be noticed inside Christian Churches until the Council Vatican II. The cooperation between the late Card. Bea, Anti-Defamation League and Prof. Maria Vingiani paved the way for overstepping centuries of misunderstanding, and we are praying to see an analogous Jewish-Muslim dialogue to grow and increase.

Of course, while recognizing the fundamental value of the renovation introduced by the Declaration "Nostra aetate", it seems quite difficult to subscribe the affirmation according to which "the Church has never thought antisemitism". Apart from the unambiguous tone of St. John Chrysostom’s sermons and from a similar attitude present in most of the Father of the Church, the same New Testament is a clear witness of how the old theology of replacement was firstly elaborated. In Paul’s First Letter to Thessalonians we read:

For you, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus which are in Judea; for you suffered the same things from your own countrymen as they did from the Jews, who killed both the Lord Jesus Christ and the prophets, and drove us out, and displease God and oppose all men... (19)

The logical passage is: opposition to our confession means both that He is not please with them, and that all humanity must take step to prevent "Judaization". After having been cleaned from its original ground, this syndrome " difference = perversion" is against prepared for transplant, as a mean of deculturization for neo-integrism in Poland, for Farrakhanists in the United States and for extremist groups of the Mediterranean area. While intellectuals can do their best to analyze this migration and the risks it implies, men of religion are bound, in front of God and their co-religionists, to show that its fundament does not fit the faith in monoanthropogenesis, and opposes the truth expressed by the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) with the words:

Every human being comes from Adam, and Adam comes from dust.

From all documents and sources today disposable for scholars, it is possible to rediscover that the original attitude Jesus son of Mary and his disciples where having toward Judaism, toward the Law and the Prophets, was quite opposite; we have no extensive written sources dealing with the Judeo-Christian Church before Pauline reformation but, by taking into consideration different elements, it is possible to declare that Jesus was regarding himself as a pious and orthodox Israelite, and not as a founder of a new religion or an incarnated divine person. According to the liberal school of Protestant theology it is even doubtful that Jesus was regarding himself as the Messiah of Israel before the last year of his life. Likewise, before Paul the community of Jesus’ disciples was composed of Jews who differentiate themselves from the rest of their co-religionists because of their Messianic understanding of their Master’s mission. Obviously, a claim to be the Messiah is not enough to eradicate the claimant or his followers from the Community of Israel. As it is know to almost all the Jews, Rabbi Akiva proclaimed Bar Kokheba as the Messiah during his revolt against the Romans. The Rabbis regarded this claim of his as wrong but, notwithstanding this, they are yet considering Rabbi Akiva as an eminent representative of orthodox Judaism.

It must not be forgotten that the order of the books that form the New Testament is not chronological; Christian scholars generally admit that the four canonical Gospels where fixed in their present Greek form after Paul’s preaching. No complete document is able to tell us what Christian doctrine was in the period when Paul was yet a Pharisee but, nevertheless, by relying on wisdom and reading between the lines of post-Pauline sources, it is possible to find some declarations attributed to Jesus which fully reveal his integral submission to the Holy One, and for this reason are not easily reconcilable with Pauline doctrine concerning the abrogation of the Torah.

While dealing with the permanent value of Torah, Jesus is quoted by Matthew as saying,

Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets ; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfil them. For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, nor a dot, will pass from the law until all is accomplished. Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. (20)

In the same spirit, while discussing with a Samaritan woman by Jacob’s well, according to John, Jesus used words that can only be understood a vindication of Davidic messianism:

You [Samaritans] worship what you do not know, while we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. (21)

After the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, and the rebuilding of the new Roman-style City called Aelia Capitolina ordered by the Emperor Hadrian (76-138 CE), Jews were forbidden to live inside its walls by imperial decree. This provision involved all those who can be catalogued as belonging to the Jewish people, that is to say, also the members of the newly-formed Jewish-Christian Community leaded by James, Jesus’ brother and first Bishop of Jerusalem. Hadrian’s banishment of Jews has, among its relevant consequences, the complete disappearance of Jewish-Christians from the history of the Church and the election – as James’s successor – of Makarios, a Bishop of Jerusalem having pagan origins. (22)

The order that prevented Jews to enter Zion was also retained after the declaration of Christian faith as the official religion of Roman Empire by the Emperor Theodosius I (346-395 CE) but,by its insertion among the elements of Christian understanding of the role of Jerusalem, this ban acquired a new theological significance, since it was read as a historical confirmation of the abrogation of Sinaitic covenant and of the permanent dignity of the Church as the only instrument of salvation for all peoples.

The Gospels attributes to Jesus a prophecy according to which the Second Temple would have soon be destroyed, so that no stone will remain in its place; the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans was immediately read as a direct realization of Jesus’ words. According to Christian tradition, the Shekinah let the Temple in the exact moment of Jesus’ claimed death on the cross, while Titus’s conquest was seen as a direct consequence of God’s anger against those who refused the Messiah. By denying to recognize Jesus as the Emmanuel announced by the Prophet Isaiah, (23) according to Pauline theology, Jews had lost the right to be regarded as heirs of the promise made to Abraham, and their heritage had been transferred to "the new Israel". We can easily realize that, while sharing this outlook, a Christian bishop like Sophronius should think that, having lost their rights as heirs of the Kingdom, Jews should be prevented to live inside the boundaries of the Messianic Capital. In the same perspective, any attempt to rebuild the Temple or to reopen its Area as a Center of worship would cancel the visible traces of the collapse announced by Jesus and happened about seventy years after his birth..

From historical sources, we know that ‘Omar refused both of the proposed condition; as for Temple Mount, his first desire in entering Aelia was to find the place of al-Mi‘râj, whose features he had learned directly from Prophet Muhammad’s telling, and to build a mosque there; as for the anti-Jewish ban, he thought that Islamic Sharî‘ah could never permit to allow Christians what was denied to Jews. This was understood as defiance from the principle of equanimity toward the People of the Book. Without taking into account Sophronius’s vehement remonstrance, ‘Omar supported the development of a proto-Zionist migration in the first century of hijrah, and permitted seventy Jewish families from Tyberiades to settle in the quarter situated to the south-west of Temple Mount, in the same area that is presently called Jewish Quarter. Apart from is clear intention to show that Muslims were not disposed to support, to assimilate or to reproduce Christian anti-Judaism, the end of the banishment can also be read as a sign of gratitude for the contribute the Jewish Community has given in helping him to identify the Place of Muhammad’s Ascension.

When Sophronius was requested to show ‘Omar the collocation of Mount Moriah, he clearly understood the sanctity Muslims were attributing to that Place and, maybe supposing that ‘Omar would reopen it as an Islamic sanctuary, maybe fearing his reaction in learning that such a Holy Place has been used by Christian as a deposit for garbage, he repeatedly lied, inducing ‘Omar to make confusion between Moriah and Golgotha, and telling him that the Temple Site was exactly under the Holy Sepulcher’s Church. ‘Omar could not believe such a thing, because he had learned directly from the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) that Mount Moriah was towering over the whole City. The exact identification of the Mount became possible when a Jewess showed ‘Omar the direction toward which her co-religionists used to pray from time immemorial.

According to Islamic sources, ‘Omar visited Temple Mount together with Ka‘b al-Ashraf, a Rabbi converted to Islam that, because of his learning in Judaica, was regarded as the Caliph’s special counselor for all matters connected to the history of Israel. While discussing about the position of the new Mosque, Ka‘b suggested that, since Jerusalem is to north of Mecca, by building the Mosque in the northern side of the Esplanade, Muslims could pray facing both their former and their new qiblah, (24) but ‘Omar decided not to unite what the Allah Ta‘alâ had separated, and ordered the Mosque to be built in southern side, the result being that, as everyone can presently see, while praying in Masjid al-Aqsâ, Muslims direct their face toward Mecca and their backs toward the Rock.

Without entering the specific theological approaches behind these differences in judgment, we can simplify and say that ‘Omar’s and Ka‘b’s points of view reflect two attitudes to emphasize – respectively – hiatus or continuity between Islam and the message of the Prophets before Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam). In their respective collocation, both of them are rooted in reality, and have more or less influenced the development of Islamic canonical expertise.

6) The Wahhabi movement as the kernel of contemporary integrism

The beginning of the eighteenth century CE saw the emergence in the Arabian Peninsula of a movement that was going to change in a relevant way the equilibrium of the Islamic world, and contribute to the birth of other anti-intellectual and spontaneistic tendencies.

Arabia was among the most desolate part of the Ottoman Empire, and its only interest was in the fact that its territory included the two Holy City of Mecca and Medina. Ottoman Sultans were satisfied with a simple nominal sovereignty over this area, while the power was effectively in the hand of local emirs and chiefs of tribes, whose loyalty toward the Caliph was sea-roving and conditioned by criteria like exemption from taxation, share in governmental incoming and the like. The City of Mecca, was a sort of separate body, under the authority of the Sharîf, the elder representative of the Hashemite family. As a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam), the Sharîf of Mecca was among the first ones to pledge alliance when a new Caliph was elected. His support was regarded as one of the most important forms of legitimization of the Ottoman government.

The man whose destiny was to create a break in the continuity of the transmission of Islamic sciences was Muhammad Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhâb, a descendent of the Banî Tamîm tribe who was born in the Uyaynah village (Najd) in 1111 of hijrah (1699 CE). His father was a learnt Hanbali scholar, and sent him to study tafsîr, (25) fiqh (26) and tasawwuf (27) in Mecca, Medina, Baghdad, Basrah and Damascus, as well as in Iran and India. His attitude, from the beginning, was very much polemic, and he took active part in scholarly debates. During this period, he received the surname "the shaykh from Najd". He contacted many Murshids of tasawwuf, and tried his best to be appointed as a khalîfah. (28) This request of his, however, was not accepted, since the Shaykhs realized he was too much influenced by pride and by his mundane desire for leadership.

At the age of thirty-two, he came back to Najd and started working as a teacher for Bedouins; he showed his proficiency in academic debates and his independence in judgment. He was by no means disposed to accept to abide by the principles of one of the four Sunni schools of Islamic jurisprudence, but was fond of independent reasoning and incline to criticize even those authorities that were regarded by all Muslim scholars as indisputable. Step by step, he became convict of the fact that the Islamic society was degenerated, and that a reform was necessary. According to his point of view, traditional veneration of Muslim saints should be identified with idol-worship, and those who were involved in it must be regarded as apostate from Islam. In his analysis of supposed "deviations" and "degenerations" he became more and more extremist, and for this reason was refuted and excommunicated by his former teachers and even by scholars of his own family.

In 1730 CE he met a leader of a gang of savage marauders called Muhammad Ibn Sa‘ûd, whose main activity was plundering pilgrims and travelers in the desert of Najd. Since most of those Bedouins living in Dar’iyyah were completely unlearnt, Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhâb could easily convict them of his theories; Ibn Sa‘ûd and him made an agreement, according to which the former was appointed as the political leader (amîr), and the latter as the religious authority (shaykh). The "shaykh" declared he was ready to publish a "fatwa" where non-Wahhabi Muslims were described as apostates and idol-worshippers; this point of view obviously represented a sort of "religious justification" for Ibn Sa‘ûd’s mob. They were not, anymore, robbers and criminals, but "fighters of jihâd", authorized to kill "unbelievers", to plunder their properties and to rape their women.

The "shaykh" also appointed some representatives (wakîls) and send them to preach his cult in Mecca, but scholars living in the Holy City were ready in understanding how dangerous this doctrine was. Sayyid Ahmad ibn Zaynî Dahlân, was the Chief Muftî of Mecca. He wrote in the book Al-Futûhât al-Islâmiyyah,

To deceive the ‘ulemâ’ in Mecca and Medina, those people sent emissaries in al-Haramayn, but these missionaries were not able to answer questions asked by Sunni scholars. It became evident that they were ignorant heretics. Muftîs of the four schools wrote a fatwa that declared them renegades, and this document was distributed in the whole Arabian Peninsula. The Amîr of Mecca, Sharîf Mas‘ûd ibn Sa‘id, ordered that the Wahhabis should be imprisoned. Some Wahhabis fled to Dar‘iyyah and informed their leader of what was happening. (29)

Muhammad Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhâb’s brother, Sulaymân Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhâb, studied his works and tried his best to invite him to repentance. At least, when he realized verbal admonitions had no effect, decided to write a book called As-Sawâ’iq al-Ilâhiyyah fî Raddi ‘alâ al-Wahhâbiyyah. It contains a detailed refutation of his brother’s heresies, and states:

One of the proofs showing that your path is heretic is the hadîth narrated by ‘Uqbah Ibn Amir and collected in the Sahîhayn: (30) "The Messenger of Allah (sall-Allâhu ‘alayhi wa sallam) (31) ascended the minbar, and it was the last time I saw him on the minbar. He said: ‘I do not fear that you will become polytheists after me, but I fear that, because of worldly interests, you will fight each others, and thus be destroyed like the peoples of old’." The Messenger of Allah foretold all that would happen to his Ummah until the end of the world. This hadîth shows that he was certain of the fact that this Ummah will never worship idols. By saying so, he destroys Wahhabism from its roots, since Wahhabi books say that Ummah al-Muhammadiyyah (32) is involved in polytheism, that Muslim countries are full of idols, and that Muslim graves are houses of polytheism. They also claim that whoever does not accept to consider polytheists those who ask for intercession by the graves is himself an unbeliever. On the contrary, Muslims have been visiting graves and asking for the intercession of saints for centuries. No Islamic scholar has even called such Muslims polytheists.

My brother asks: "Another hadîth says: ‘Of all that will befall you, polytheism is what I fear more.’ Is not this a legal proof (dalîl) of the fact that a part of this Ummah will be engaged in polytheism?"

I say, It is inferred by many other hadîths that this hadîth refers to shirk al-asghar. (33) There are similar hadîths, narrated by Shaddâd Ibn ‘Aws, Abu Hurayrah and Mahmûd Ibn Labîd (may Allah be pleased with all of them), according to which the Prophet (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) feared that shirk al-asghar would be committed by his Ummah. It has exactly happened as it was foretold in the hadîth, and many Muslims are guilty of shirk al-asghar. But you, in your ignorance, confuse shirk al-asghar with shirk al-akbar, and the tragic consequence of this mistake of yours is that you regard as ‘unbelievers’ those Muslims that do not accept to call other Muslims ‘unbelievers’. (34)

Another contemporary scholar, Muhammad Ibn Sulaymân Effendi wrote:

O Muhammad Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhâb, do not slander Muslims! I admonish you for Allah’s sake! Does anyone of them say that there is a creator besides Allah? If you have anything to argue against Muslims, please, show them authoritative proofs. It is more correct to call you, a single person, "unbeliever", than calling millions of Muslims "unbelievers". Allah Ta‘âlâ says, "If anyone contends with the Messenger after guidance has been plainly conveyed to him, and follows a path other than the one followed by Believers, we shall leave him in the path he has chosen, and land him in Jahannam, quite an evil refuge!" (35) This verse (ayah) points to the situation of those who have departed from Ahl as-Sunnah wa al-Jama‘ah. (36)

When the order from the Amîr of Mecca reached the Khalîfah in Istanbul, he ordered Muhammad ‘Alî Pashah, governor of Egypt to move to Najd and to stop the Wahhabi sediction. Among Sunni ‘ulemâ’ who refuted Wahhabism we can also mention Sayyid Dawud Ibn Sulaymân, Mawlânâ Khalid al-Baghdâdî, Sun‘ Allâh al-Halabî al-Makkî al-Hanafî, Muhammad Ma‘sûm as-Sarhindî, Muhammad Ibn Sulaymân al-Madanî ash-Shâf‘î. The latter was the Shâf‘î Muftî of Medina, and was asked to write a fatwa against Muhammad Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhâb. This fatwa is quoted in the book Ashadd al-Jihâd and declares,

This man is leading the ignoramuses of the present age to a heretical path. He is trying to extinguish Allah’s light, but Allah will not permit His light to be extinguished, in spite of the opposition of polytheists, and will enlighten every place with the light of Ahl as-Sunnah.

As-Sayyid ‘Abd ar-Rahmân al-Ahdâl wrote,

...in refuting them [the Wahhabis], it is sufficient to mention the hadîth of the Prophet (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam): ‘Their sign is shaving the sides of their faces, since no other innovator had ever done it.

Although thousands of Muslims were exterminated by Wahhabis, the scholars of Ahl as-Sunnah continued to refute them in their books. An example is what the Muftî of Mecca, Ahmad Zayni al-Makkî ash-Shâf‘î wrote in a work titled Fitnah al-Wahhâbiyyah, stating,

In 1217 of hijrah they [the Wahhabis] marched with big armies to the area of at-Tayf. In Dhû al-Qa‘dah of the same year, they lay siege to the area occupied by Muslims, subdued them, and killed the people: men, women, and children. They also looted the Muslims’ belongings and possessions. Only a few people escaped their barbarism.

They even plundered gifts in the Noble Room of the Prophet (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam), took all the patrimony that was there, and did similar acts of profanation.

In 1220 of hijrah they lay siege to Mecca the Blessed and then surrounded it from all directions to tighten its siege. They blocked the routes to the City and prevented supplies from reaching there. It was a great hardship on the people of Mecca. Food became exorbitantly expensive and then unavailable. They resorted to eating dogs.

7) The scapegoat as a fulcrum of self-justification

These happenings we have shortly described were able to change the exterior face of the Islamic world. Mecca and Medina, the two Sanctuaries from which Islam spread to the rest of the world, were not anymore centers of transmission of the Sunni heritage of Islamic sciences, but places where some aspects of the worship according the four school of Islamic law was hardly persecuted, while a primitive and literalist cult was propagated through violence and coercion. The creation of a world center of Wahhabi propaganda (the World Islamic League) (37) in Mecca was the final result of a project whose goal was replacing orthodox Islam with the heretic "Salafi school". (38)

From the second half of the nineteenth century CE, Salafis identified the opponent to be silenced with the University of al-Azhar al-Sharîf in Egypt and with other traditional center of diffusion of Sunni teaching, always alert concerning new theories and individual theological interpretations. The main instrument for a "Wahhabisation of the Arab milieu" was the organization called Ikhwân al-Muslimûn (The Muslim Brotherhood), whose founder was Hasan al-Bannah, an elementary master from Ismailiyyah who became one of the leaders of pro-British Masonry (United Lodge of England, Mother of the World) in Egypt. From a religious point, of view he was a "reformer" (but no so advanced in Islamic sciences), and from a political point of view he was radically anti-Ottoman. By creating his own sect, his goal was to select a new ruling class, whose ideology was a form of "modernized and westernized Islam". From that time on, leadership inside the movement is hereditary, and only members of certain families can hope to get important positions.

After World War II, Nasser tried his best to outlaw the sect, but he only contributed to increase its secretness. Assad bombed Hama’, a Syrian city that was the central of their intelligence. Even more than before, members of the Brotherhood learn to deny connection to their organization, and even to refuse that the sect simply exists. From this point of view, there are similarities between their struggle for leadership and some behaviors of organized criminality. These kind of pseudo-radical leaders are extremely arrogant in imposing their hegemony over Muslim organizations and communities.; in most of cases, these so called "basic militants of Islamism " are – from a religious point of view – laypersons who generally miss the basic of Islamic sciences, but they are appointed as "imâms" of important mosques, especially in democratic countries, were there is no "Ministry of Awqâf and Religious Affairs" to check their orientation and where imâms having a regular ijâzah shar’î area rare exception. (39)

In most of Western countries, Ikhwans immigrated as University students and start creating legal organizations in different sectors. Palestinian Hamâs is one of the important Ikhwans-controlled organizations in Middle East, but the problem is that their heads are not among the original families of founders; on a worldwide level, the leadership is – as before – in the hand of Syrians and Egyptians. For a radical militant who is poor, unlearn and fanatized, the only goal is being involved in throwing stones, terrorism or suicide bombing but, for those who are a bit cleverer and sharp-minded, the main opportunity is going abroad as a student, and than became a fulltime professional propagandist. He will spent his life visiting mosques in US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, etc., and go on speaking (and it is nothing more than a speech) about "jihâd for Palestine", "fighting against the Zionist enemy" and the like. By implementing this plan, he will get a regular, generous salary, will receive funds for his activities, and probably will also learnt how to collect donations, not only from sponsors, but even from local followers. Their doctrine is that "People working in charity can be paid for their work by the money they collect". They start collecting money for poor children in Palestine, for refugees in Kosovo, for Bosnia, and after a week their leaders have new luxury items, that obviously are not declared as a private property. The Egyptian branch controls a charitable institution called "Islamic Relief", while the Palestinian branch is supported by Emirates through Human Appeal International.

From a theological point of view, Ikhwani beliefs were refuted by Sunni scholars of the Ottoman period but, after World War II, King Faysal of Saudi Arabia was in need of allies against secular Nasserianism, and the Egyptian leader of the Brotherhood, Sayyed Qutb, received an unaspected and worldwide financial support. From that time on, the vast majority of Ikhwans adopted the Wahhabi belief, and only an insignificant minority of them is Sunni. Qutb’s heir is Yûsuf al-Qardâwî, an Egyptian professor that controls Ministry of Awqâf in Qatar.

The game of fundraising is based on conflicts between the Egyptian, the Syrian and the Palestinian branches; as soon as - for instance - Saudi Arabia starts increasing its support for one branch, Kuwait and Emirates are interested in financing their opponents. Real local leaders have never official positions inside depending organizations, and their legal representatives are usually employed as figureheads only.

The Council for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is an organization that was created and is controlled by the Brotherhood; it works in the United States as a lobby against journalists, media operators, movie producers, etc. who dares to write things that do not fit their limited interpretation. Their level of intolerance is quite extreme, and their attitude is non-dialectic, not pondered and aggressive. Another Ikhwans-depending organization is The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), whose goal is controlling local mosques as soon as they are opened. The leader of the Haqqani-Kabbani cult, Mr. Hishâm Kabbânî, has recently declared in an Open Forum with the US State Department:

We would like to advise our Government, our congressmen that there is something big going on and people are not understanding it. You have many mosques around the United States. It’s not an organized government policy to look over the mosques like in Muslim countries. In Muslim countries, you cannot open a mosque by yourself; that’s why you see in the Muslim countries, you cannot find extremist ideology. As soon as you find extremist ideology, they kick them out and they bring the traditional Islamic scholars. So the most dangerous things that are going on in these mosques, that has been self-appointed mosques around the United States. The extremist ideology makes them very active. It was by election, they took over the mosques, and we can say they took over eighty percent of the mosques in the United States, and there is more than 3,000 mosques in the United States. So it means that the ideology of extremism has been spread to eighty percent of the Muslim population, mostly the youth and the new generation. (40)

Although we cannot accept to recognize Mr. Kabbânî as an authoritative scholar, and also share the point of view of those who consider him a former-Muslim and the founder of a new American syncretistic cult, (41) nevertheless we have no difficulty in admitting that he is describing a real situation; the percentage of over eighty percent of mosques controlled by extremists is a matter of fact, not only in North America, but also in most of Western Europe. Since the link between Hamâs and CAIR is their dependence from a common secret central, and since that organization is applying strict secrecy, it is impossible to have written proofs of all these connections. You will never find even a single piece of paper signed as "The Muslim Brotherhood".

As about Italy, here there are two Ikhwans-controlled organizations: the Unione delle Comunità e Organizzazioni Islamiche in Italia (UCOII) and the Unione degli Studenti Musulmani (USMI). Although their members do not exceed the total number of hundred persons, they are able to control a certain number of mosques that exist in the Italian territory. During last years, two of their leaders, ‘Omar Tariq and Abu Ja’far have been expelled by a decree of the Minister of Interior, since their presence in the country was regarded as dangerous for the national security. (42) Our Institute is cooperating with the Presidency and the Direction of the Centro Islamico Culturale d’Italia, with the Italian Branch of Râbitah and with the Net of the Italian Islamic Organizations to reduce their influence, to limit their intrusiveness and to refute their claim to represent the Community in front of the Italian Republic.

The "theory of the plot" was developed, inside the Catholic milieu, as an attempt to avoid rational implications in the analysis of the process of modernization induced by industrialization. The theocratic absolutism was defeated by the logic of liberal democracy, and the alliance between the throne and the altar replaced by the power of the Third State. Theoreticians of Catholic integralism were not able to explain such development from an historical point of view, and – from Abbè Barruel on – their hermeneutic approach started assuming the narrative time of a "metaphysics of evil". Behind any social and cultural change, it is identified the activity of the Demo-Pluto-Jewish-Masonic intrigue, and secularization is read as the consequence of a worldwide conspiracy.

This "ideology of the complot" is an integral part of extreme-wing European thought, and is common among the followers of Msgr. Lefebvre and other opponents of the spirit of the Council Vatican II. Radical pseudo-Islamic movements are absorbing it as a valid tool for another pseudo-historical justification. The establishment of the State of Israel is again described as a fruit of a "Zionist intrigue", and the so-called "political anti-Zionism" reveals its true face as a mask beyond which antisemitism and anti-Judaism are disguised. This is the pseudo-religious ideology that – insha Allah Ta‘alâ – we are interest in analyzing, describing and refuting. We hope that Allah will help with His everlasting blessing those scholars and imâms who understand how urgent is to clean the Islamic milieu from similar unworthy tendencies.

Notes

1) While In Arab countries the Protocols are distributed by private editors like Dâr al-Fikr and Maktaba al-Wataniyyah, after the advent of the Khomeinist regime in Iran, an English and a French translation were realized and distributed by Sazmân Tablîghât-e Islâm, a publishing house depending on the Ministry of Ershâd. From 1984 CE, these booklets, including a map with a representation of the "Zionist serpent", where distributed by Iranian Embassies and Consulates in Europe.

2) On September 12, 1998 the Majlis al-‘Ulemâ’ of the Italian Muslim Association (AMI) took an official stand about the election of a supposed new "muftî of Jerusalem and of the Holy Land", appointed within PLO’s entourage. The main objection – put by Shaykh ‘Ali Hussen and confirmed by Shaykh Muhammad Shawky – is depending "on the fact that the consensus of Sunni Muslims is to admit protection of Masjid al-Aqsâ for none but Mâlik Husseyn Ibn Talâl al-Hashemi al-Urdunî." The Assembly declared "to renew of his recognition of Shaykh ‘Abd al-Azîm Salhun as the only legitimate Muftî of Jerusalem, while inviting Mr. Sabrî to ask for Allah’s forgiveness and to desist from his groundless claim.

While I was writing these, pages, I was reach by the new that the Hashemite King Hussein of Jordan was accepted in the mercy of Allah. We immediately stopped our activities, and arranged congregations for burial service, asking Allah to forgive this brother of ours, a worthy descendant of purified forefathers. May Muslims learn from his sincere example the habit to self-criticism and the inclination for reconciliation. May Allah be pleased with him as He is pleased with his family.

3) This definition depends of the fact that, according to our point of view, radicalism is not even a degenerated and extreme form of the Islamic belief, but a secular ideology that repeatedly abuses the name of Islam as a mean of searching consensus among illiterate laypersons who are sincere in their religious feeling, but lacking of elementary religious training.

4) The original Arabic word we translated as "kingdom" is mulk, from a Semitic root m-l-k, that is common to both Arabic and Hebrew. According to Islamic theological terminology, the three synonymous for "kingdom" are mulk, malakût and jabarût. They respectively refer to physical, psychical and spiritual level of existence. Of course, God can be called King of all of them; if here only mulk is quoted, it depends on the fact that this verse directly concerns the earthly domain. To denote a kingdom in secular and political sense, the Arabic language commonly uses another derived form, that is mamlakah.

5) Qur’ân III. 26. Because of typographic reasons, it is not possible to reproduce here the original Arabic text of the Book, which must nevertheless be understood as quoted. As well here as in other Qur’anic quotations, the English translation of the meaning of Qur’anic words from Arabic is my own, but based on the most authoritative English commentaries, like M. Marmaduke Pickthall, The Meaning of The Glorious Qur’ân (Beirut 1973), ‘A. Yûsuf ‘Alî, The Holy Qur’ân - Text, Translation and Commentary (Maryland 1983).

6) The "remote Mosque", on the southern side of Temple area. According to the most authoritative Islamic sources, it is built on the place where the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) completed al-Isrâ’. Cf. Qur’ân XVII. 1.

7)Qur’ân II. 47, 140; VII.140.

8) Qur’ân V. 20-21 (emphasis added).

9) Qur’ân XVII. 104 (emphasis added).

10) As about Ikhwân al-Muslimûn (The Muslim Brotherhood) see ultra, par. 7). Hizb al-Tahrîr (The Party of Liberation) is one of the most important radical movements from West Bank, and is illegal in Jordan. It supports the "restoration of the Islamic Caliphate" and accuses Ikhwâns of "compromise with the forces of unbelief".

11) Arabic name of Jerusalem, from the root q-d-s, meaning "holiness". It is an abridged form of Bayt al-maqdis, "the sanctified House" or "the House of the Sanctuary", an exact equivalent of Hebrew Beth ha-mikdash. The name originally referred only to the Temple Mount, and was afterward extended to the City as a whole. This extension of meaning became common among Arab from the tenth century CE. Earlier Islamic sources use the name Iliyâ’, an adaptation to Arabic pronunciation of the Roman name Aelia.

12) About the link between Islamic esotericism and the cosmic cycle cf. R. Guénon, Les Mystères de la lettre Nûn, in "Études Traditionelles", August-September 1938, reproduced in Symboles fondamentaux de la Science sacrée, Gallimard (Paris 1962). Cf. also T. Burckhardt, Introduction aux doctrines èsotèriques de l’Islam, Dervy-Libres (Paris 1969); S. H. Nasr, The Sufism, Allen & Unwin (London 1964).

13) Qur’ân II. 145.

14) M. Shaykh Zâdeh, Hâshiyyah ‘alâ Tafsîr al-Qâdî al-Baydâwî , Hakîkat Kitabevi (Istanbul 1979), Vol. 1, p. 456.

15) Dan VI.10.

16) See Elias S. Shoufani, Al-Riddah and the Muslim Conquest of Arabia, University of Toronto Press - The Arab Institute for Research and Publishing (Beirut 1972), p. 150-164.

17) Cf. Muhammad Ibn Jarîr at-Tabarî, Akhbâr ar-Rusul wa al-Mulûk (History of Messengers and Kings), especially the chapter dealing with al-Mi‘râj of "Bâb Sayyidnâ Muhammad" and "Bâb ‘Omar". A complete, scientific English translation of this work has been started by Oxford University Press, but until now only three volumes have been published. See also Jalâl ad-din as-Suyûtî, Târîkh al-Khulafâ’ (History of the Caliphs) and Mujîr al-‘Ayn al-Muqaddasî, Al-ums al-jalîl fî târîkh al-Quds wa al-Khalîl (The Noble Society in the History of Jerusalem and Hebron, manuscript, al-Azhar Library).

18) See A. Eder, Peace Is Possible between Ishmael and Israel according to the Qur’ân, with a Preface by A. H. Palazzi (Jerusalem 1997), p. 18.

19) 1 Thess II. 14-15 (emphasis added). The English translation of the Books of the New Testament, as well as their abbreviations, are quoted according to the Revised Standard Version, American Bible Society (New York 1971).

20) Mt V. 17-19.

21) Jn IV. 22.

22) Cf.A. Chouraqui, Jérusalem, une ville sanctuaire, Éditions du Rocher (Paris 1996),pp. 116-122.

23) Is VII. 14-17. Jewish traditional understanding of this text is obviously quite different from the Christian one.

24) As it is generally known, Muslims used to pray orientating themselves toward Jerusalem, when a Qur’anic revelation ordered Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) to change the qiblah and to move toward Mecca. In that moment Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) was leading the congregational prayer in a Mosque in Medina, and completed his prayer by turning toward the new qiblah. See Qur’ân II. 144. Presently that Mosque is called Masjid al-qiblatayn (Mosque of the two qiblahs) and – differing from all other mosques – it has two indicators of qiblah (mihrâbs), one toward Jerusalem and the other toward Mecca.

25) The science of Qur’anic exegesis.

26) Islamic jurisprudence, based on four authoritative schools (madhhabs ).

27) The esoteric aspect of the Islamic faith. See note 12.

28) The literal meaning of this word is "vice-regent". The successor of the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam)as a head of the Islamic State is called Khalîfah. Inside orders of tasawwuf, the khalîfah is the representative of the Shaykh in a certain area.

29) Quoted by Shaykh Husseyn Hilmî ‘Ishîq in Advice for the Muslim, Hakîkat Kitabevi (Istanbul 1989), p. 256. The main source for this compilation is Ayyûb Sabrî Pashah’s work Mir’ât al-Haramayn, 5 Voll., Matb’a-e Bahriye (Istanbul 1301-1306 AH).

30) It means "the two authoritative ones". It is a technical expression to refer to the most important Collections of hadîths, edited by Imâm Bukhârî and Imâm Muslim.

31) The traditional eulogy for the Prophet Muhammad (sall-Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam), meaning "May Allah bless him and give him peace". It must be understood as implicit in all other passages of this paper where the Prophet is quoted.

32) The Community of those who abide by the prophetic magisterium. It is equivalent to the Muslim Community.

33) The sin of shirk (attributing partners to Allah) has two levels: minor (asghar) and major (akbar). Except saints, ordinary believers cannot reach the domain of complete sincerity in worship, since their intention is tainted by hidden or evident forms of minor shirk. Major shirk, on the contrary, is the sin of those who practice polytheism and idol-worship.

34) Advice for the Muslim, cit., p. 255.

35) Qur’ân. IV.114.

36) Literally "Followers of Tradition and Consensus". It is the legal definition of Sunni Muslims.

37) Râbitah al-‘alamî al-Islamî in Arabic. Strange to say, but the recently founded "Italian section" of the Râbitah has changed the official translation of is name in "World Muslim League". Its Director is H. E. Dr. Mario Scialoja, former Ambassador of Italy in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

38) Wahhabis do not like to be identified as such, and refer to themselves as "Salafis", a neologism that should mean "follower of the first generations".

39) A document that authorizes to teach Islamic sciences. It is the equivalent of smicha in orthodox Judaism.

40) Extract from the media Alert forwarded to newsgroup by Mateen Siddique, official Webmaster of the so-called "Islamic Supreme Council of America" (February 19, 1999).

41) Cf. "Studi Romani", Quarterly of the National Institute for Roman Studies, Vol. XLVI, n. 3-4, chronicle of religious life of the Islamic Community. As about the history of the Haqqani-Kabbani sect and its refutation by Sunni scholars see the Web pages of the Association for Islamic Charitable Project and our answers reproduced at

42) Cf."Il musulmano", Vol. I, n. 1, (May 1993), pp. 2-3.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selections from the Islamic Institute:

A Letter by al-Hafiz Imam ad-Dhahabi
The Sunni Articles A refutation of Ibn Taymiyyah
In Defense of Tawassul About deviations in 'Aqidah
Fitnatu-l-Wahhabiyyah by Shaykh Dahlan Mufti al-Haramayn
A Warning against Muhammad Ibn 'Abdi-l-Wahhab and his Bid'ahs
Bayan: a Refutation of the Wahhabi Cult Text of the basic ahadith
A Refutation of Bilal Philips and his Slanders against Ahlu-s-Sunnah
Nazim al-Qubrusi and his Deviation from the Naqshbandi Tariqah
Khutoot Al Areedah An exposition and refutation of the sources of Shi'sm
Ask Ahlu-d-Dhikr if you Don't Know Answers covering various subjects
Fatwa on the Deviated "Nation of Islam"
Questions and Answers concerning Mawlid
History of The Italian Muslim Assembly and the Cultural Institute

Posted by: Thomas

at November 10, 2005 4:06 AM

sheik yer'mami:

"I support the expulsion of Arabs from all of Israel wholeheartedly. Just as I support mass deportations and the total reversal of Islamic infiltration in Europe."

I agree 100%.

Posted by: Kim Hartveld

at November 10, 2005 4:24 AM

KAMASTE: Cornmealious; Okay, you're right. Let the Israelis figure out who's who after the next suicide bombing or the next time Israeli youngsters get picked off on a street corner by a "poor Palestinian" wielding a kalashnikov.
G-d forbid they protect themselves or their children against people determined to kill them. I use the word "people" loosely...

CORNELIUS: You didn't answer the question? How is Israel to determine who wants to live peaceably and who wants to fight?...you know, the Kahane system? Are Palestinians to answer a questionaire?

KAMASTE: Why should they live in Israel proper? Just because they want to or because you think they should be allowed to? You think it is good common sense to allow people to live amongst you who up until yesterday vowed to cut your throat?

CORNELIUS: Once again, you don't answer the question. I didn't ask if the Palestinians should be allowed to live in Israel-proper. I asked if those in the West Bank and Gaza who are allowed to stay should be granted citizenship like their COUNTERPARTS (Israeli Arabs) in Israel proper, or should they remain stateless, without citizenship? I think it is a completely legitimate question.

KAMASTE: Contrary to your hope and the hopes of all those who want to see Jews get what's coming to them -- We aren't going to commit suicide to satisfy you or anybody else..

CORNELIUS: At least Kim and Shiek are man enough to come out as extremists and openly advocate mass expulsion. You seem to want to have it both ways.

As for me wanting to "see Jews get what's coming to them," I can only laugh with contempt at such an accusation. I support Israel's right to exist wholeheartedly. I have a deep-rooted moral sympathy for the Jews as a people and find deplorable the vilification of Israel and Jews in Europe, the Middle East, and in our universities and larger culture.

But because I don't support the expulsion of 3 million Palestinians from the territories, you accuse me essentially of being a Jew-hater. Shows you how narrow-minded people have become...and how constricted the parameters of discourse have become...that if a person disagrees with another on tactics and strategy, they are automatically accused of being the enemy.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 10, 2005 7:32 AM

Hugh:"One must reluctantly conclude that the alternative explanation, the one alluded to but not spelled out above, has turned out to be the correct one."

Phew, you call this reaching a "reluctant" conclusion? I'd hate to what one of your "hasty" conclusions looks like.

There's a reason, Hugh, that the vast majority of academia looks with sympathy on the Palestinians. That reason is that the facts of history CLEARLY - no obfuscation, no apologetic, no ifs, no buts, no what-if scenarios - find Israel at fault. NOT, as you and your gang love to pretend, because the whole wide world of dispassionate academia are nothing but Saudi-funded, seething anti-semites.

I am no anti-Semite, but then neither do I have any reason to put the Jews on any kind of pedestal and makes excuses for them that I would never dream of making for anyone else. It's truly that simple. If this was any other country, you wouldn't hesitate to call a spade a spade. For me, I have no trouble at all calling Israel out.

What have Jews ever done for me that I should look so kindly on the state that they immorally carved out for themselves? Nothing. Indeed they have, through their fanatical devotion to their immoral state, and their lying and distorting of history, aggravated vast portions of the Islamic world and heightened that world's aggression towards ME. For this I must stand in solidarity with Israel? For this I must engage in wilful ignorance, distortion of fact and outright falsehood? No, thank you.

PS - they are not "Revisionist" historians, because they are not revising "history". They are *writing* the history of Israel. They are not the "new" historians, they are the *first* historians. All that was there before was feel-good mythology designed to allow the Zionists to sleep easy at night - *not* fact based *history*.

Anyway, we'll never convince each other of anything, certainly not if we continue in this vein. I share your desire to end, or at least limit, the influence and infiltration of the Muslim world into our Western countries. I don't think a defence of Israel is necessary for this effort, indeed, I find it counterproductive (and immoral). Nevertheless, you're entitled to your opinion. I hope we can prevail in the struggle that unites us.

Posted by: spect8or

at November 10, 2005 8:19 AM

spect8or:

Who "discredited" From Time Immemorial? That honourable former chair of middle east studies at Columbia, Ed Said, who claimed that the reason Justus Reid Weiner couldn't find records to verify Said's claims to have attended a school in Jerusalem during certain critical years was because the school didn't keep records? A school operated anywhere in the world by the Anglican Church that doesn't keep records of students' attendance and academic achievement? C'mon. Give me a break.

Posted by: waterdragon52

at November 10, 2005 8:56 AM

kj:

Of course it's HUMILIATING. How many Arab armies with how much Soviet help got their @sses kicked how many times by the Israeli army?

I know you have little use for frontpagemag.com, but they posted an article yesterday by David Meir-Levi on the "roots of terror" that talks about, among other things, the fact that the US has actually been pretty balanced in its treatment of Arabs vs Israelis, noting the number of times US administrations compelled the victorious Israelis to cede lands captured after being attacked, from Eisenhauer onward. I know you can type frontpagemag.com so I won't bother providing you with the URL.

Hope all is well with you and your family since you had to evacuate in advance of one of the hurricanes and kudos to you for the way you excoriated one of ia's more foolish posts a week ago or so. One of your better efforts.

Posted by: waterdragon52

at November 10, 2005 9:03 AM

I see spect8or is a fan of Ilan Pappe. Need anything more be said about what he/she thinks?

Posted by: waterdragon52

at November 10, 2005 9:11 AM

I am no anti-Semite, but .....

I'm not one to make generalisations, but people who use this phrase are nearly always exactly what they claim not to be.

what have Jews ever done for me that I should look so kindly on the state that they immorally carved out for themselves? Nothing. Indeed they have, through their fanatical devotion to their immoral state, and their lying and distorting of history, aggravated vast portions of the Islamic world and heightened that world's aggression towards ME

There is so much that is wrong and offensive in this that it is hard to know where to begin. The least offensive mistake is the use of the word 'aggravate' to mean 'inflame' or something similar. Then it gets much, much worse.

Posted by: Interested

at November 10, 2005 9:15 AM

spect8or,

You claim that the facts of history clearly support your assertions concerning Israel. So: lay a few of them out, without merely referring to some other historians, who, I should point out, are not entirely "dispassionate" nor credible. Show us you know what you're talking about, and not merely parrotting ideologues and propagandists and the academic herd. In particular, please demonstrate by your own verifiable references: when did the "palestinian people" begin (and please clearly define your meaning of the phrase "palestinian people", or any similar phrasing which you choose). But please remember that I'm not very bright, so keep it short and to-the-point. Thank you.

Cornelius,

No one, including yourself, ever responded to my previous comment questions: What does "the world", "owe" new identity groups (e.g. the "palestinians")? And all sorts of related questions: How are those groups defined? Who defines them? Is there a basic difference between nationality groups and other groups? Why or Why not? What does one mean by "nationality"? If a new identity group were to appear in some sovereign country, and demand a state of their own, should they have a basic right to that? Is the legitimacy of any such right (if it exists) affected by the tactics they choose to press their claim? Does any legitimacy depend upon which country and which group are involved? Is any legitimacy dependent upon the truth of their historical claim, or not? Is the legitimacy of the claim affected by outside issues(e.g. how resolving some conflict fits into a larger strategy in some larger conflict)? Should the answers to any of the above questions be universal, or should they be dependent on whatever conflict is being considered?

Imagine if a group decides that say, California, is theirs by asserting a (purported) historical claim. (Oops...) What are appropriate responses by the sovereign state?. Based on the behavior of the group, or of individuals who assert membership in the group, does the appropriate-ness of the responses change?

Don't answer all of the questions, but pick one, preferably most relevant to JW/DW, and think it through, please. Thanks, Cornelius.

del

Posted by: del

at November 10, 2005 9:31 AM

Q.E.D.

Posted by: Hugh

at November 10, 2005 9:59 AM

spect8or

Why does the UN have 2 definitions of refugees, one for "Palestinian" refugees, and one for the refugees of the rest of the world? Why does the first definition stipulate that the supposed refugee only had to reside in mandate Palestine 2 years prior to the creation of Israel? Also interestingly, why were Jewish refugees from Gaza, Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem who numbered a few thousand, not afforded this refugee status?

Why is one of the most common Palestinian surnames "al Masri?" Do you even know what that means? How come so many Palestinian "heroes" were not even born in mandate Palestine, such as Arafat and and Izzedine al-Qassam.

Where do you think the Druze were from? Where do you think the Bedouin were from?

Why did Emily Finn, in her book "A Home in the Holy Land" published in 1866 quote on page 90:

"The effendies [upper class/landowners] are Arabs, and descendents of those who came in the country at the invasion of Caliph Omar. Most of them say they can trace their genealogies all the way down in direct descent, and are intensely proud of it; but they are poorer than they used to be, or they would not let their homes."

It uesd to be the Arabs were proud (intensely) to be considered the conquerers and colonizers. And these had black slaves from Africa (African [and also European by the way] features are quite common among Palestinians)that also now claim to have lived in "Palestine" for 1000's of years. From ibid page 94 "Oh yes, among the Moslems, every family has several [black slaves]. The richer they are, the more they have."

And why were the effendies "poorer than they used to be?" Because the peasantry, whom they taxed mercilessly, were disappearing. From ibid page 139: "The sight of this village [the Christian village of Beit Jala, which by the way, according to another author, was partly inhabited by recent immigrants from Greece] gave us a very new idea of what Palestine might become, if once more the hills were planted. 'But then,' added Mr. Anderson, 'there is no population to undertake such a work. The Arabs are dwindling away. Look around and see how few villages there are; and the men of these do not cultivate a tithe of their lands.'"

I have a book called "The Jewish Frontier Anthology" published in 1945 that includes an article with the following on page 19:

"It is no accident that in the very midst of the present tragic occurances in Palestine the grand Mufti's party has come out for a mass immigration of Arabs from other Arab countries..."

I could go on and on and on. I collect books written before '48 and they all support the same conclusions and contain other evidence devastating to the current Arab propaganda.

Despite the overwhelming evidence that there was massive immigration and emigration to and from, the truth is that anyone living in the Palestine mandate in '48 THAT WAS NOT JEWISH, was and is now considered to have been an alboriginal Palestinian. That is racist.

Posted by: MrsEener

at November 10, 2005 11:30 AM

Del,

Instead of digressing into land claims, the legitimacy of what constitutes a 'people' or 'nation,' and other facets of the equation that have such ideological overtones, I prefer to concentrate on the practical.

Whatever one wants to call the 3 million Arab-Muslim inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza, they exist. If Israel intends to keep the land these people live on, the Arab-Muslims ought to be granted the same citizenship that Arab-Muslims inside Israel proper and the Jewish settlers in the disputed territories have. To deny these people as much by virtue of their ethnic and religious identity would be every bit the system of aparthied and racism that Israel's enemies accuse her of.

Herein lies the reason Israel has never formally annexed these territories even though they have been in her possession for almost 40 years...because the Israelis do not want to absorb 3 million Arab-Muslims into their country. Doing so would dramatically excellerate the demographic time-bomb that Israel already faces vis-a-vis its own Israeli-Arab minority. How would the 'Jewish state' retain its identity if Jews become a minority within it? It is precisely because Israel is NOT a racist state that they have never formally occupied the territories.

So Israel's options remain:

1) Annex the territories, grant the Palestinians Israeli citizenship...and watch the Jewish identity of Israel disappear over the next 25 years

2) Annex the territories, refuse the Palestinians Israeli citizenship based on ethnic and religious exclusion...and suffer the sanction of the world for an aparthied system and deal with the continuing violence associated with a disaffected and unenfranchised populace

3) Annex the territories and expel the Palestinians en mass, resulting in probably thousands if not tens of thousands of deaths and earning the censure of the world, an end to American patronage, and economic and political isolation

4) Continue in the present circumstance where the status of the territories remain unresolved and the problems of terrorism and statelessness persist

5) Negotiate a settlement establishing an independent Palestinian state.

Number 5 is problematic for many reasons, the two most important of which are...

a) how to reach an agreement with a dysfunctional PA government unable or unwilling to disarm terrorist groups

b) how to prevent a future Palestinian State from becoming a militarized threat to Israeli cities along the coastal plain

I personally believe that number 5, for all its problems, is the most realistic of the four options. It will necessitate mutual concessions by both sides and it provides the greatest promise for peace.

Israelis are today unfairly burdened with the 'Palestinian problem,' and I believe the international community needs to step in, take responsibility and impose some order on the festering pathologies that define Palestinian society. Otherwise, the terror of Hamas and IJ will continue to act as a veto on any progress in the search for peace.

For the record, I think spect8tor IS - consciously or not - an anti-Semite for declaring Israel an "immoral" state. I find the assertion laughable when one compares Israeli behavior and morals to that of its Arab/Muslim neighbors.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 10, 2005 11:43 AM

Should read: "It is precisely that Israel is NOT a racist state that they have never formally ANNEXED the territories."

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 10, 2005 11:48 AM

ExSpector8er:

"I am no anti-Semite..."

Yes, you are. And a particularly stupid one, too, as evidenced by your inability to imagine that the readers here don't understand the filth you spew. Hell, boy, we don't even have to read between the lines.

Posted by: The Dread Pirate Gryphon

at November 10, 2005 11:48 AM

they are not "Revisionist" historians, because they are not revising "history". They are *writing* the history of Israel

Indeed, they are writing history, as in fabricating it to suit their own agenda.

Spect8or's understanding of ME history is grounded in the machinations of Ilan Pappe, the "historian" who -- by his own admission -- believes that there are no independent facts, no objective reality, only different points of view.

There's a reason, Hugh, that the vast majority of academia looks with sympathy on the Palestinians

The vast majority of academia are also apologists for the 1,350 years of Islamic jihad and the violence we see today. Yet ostensibly, Spect8or sees through this chicanery. So, why the blind spot on Israel?

I'd like to see Spect8or take up del's challenge and provide a cogent reply to MrsEener's questions. Not too much to ask for someone well-versed in the history of the Middle East.

Posted by: Charles Martel

at November 10, 2005 12:02 PM

kj,

"Dude!" Nice.

Geoff

Posted by: Geoff

at November 10, 2005 12:19 PM

Geoff

I suspect that kj is a "dudette". But then, that could be my sexism showing.

Posted by: Charles Martel

at November 10, 2005 12:33 PM

What's the purpose of having a conversation if you refuse to listen to what I say? If Palestinians want peace with Israel they can honor (bwhahahaaa) their commitments and show through their actions they want to live in peace. Otherwise, those who instigate through, mosque, media, books, actions or affiliation CAN GO..

But because I don't support the expulsion of 3 million Palestinians from the territories,

You keep saying this. I never said it. you've attempted to direct the conversation by speaking for both of us.

Shows you how narrow-minded people have become.

Posted by: Kemaste

at November 10, 2005 12:34 PM

But because I don't support the expulsion of 3 million Palestinians from the territories,

You keep saying this. I never said it. you've attempted to direct the conversation by speaking for both of us.

Shows you how narrow-minded people have become.

And childish by refusing to spell my name correctly...

Posted by: Kemaste

at November 10, 2005 12:37 PM

Cornelius,

You are very right on many points. I mostly only disagree with your indication that discussing land claims and what consititues a people to be a digression.

If the people of the world are misinformed about the history of this conflict and believe all the Arab propaganda, they will lay the complete blame, and consequently the complete solution, for current problems squarely on Israel.

For example, most people don't see Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza as a painful concession but simply the natural and right thing to do. The facts as they see them are that the land unquestionably belongs to the Arabs. The Arabs don't want the Jews there, and they have every right to ethnically cleanse them from the area. When you mention what should be sticky issues like Kfar Darom, which was bought and paid for and settled by Jews even before '48, things get more interesting. How can people call for the expulsion of Jews from places they inhabited in '48 and in the same breath call for the return of Arabs to places they inhabited in '48 unless they are uninformed and/or antisemitic?

Israel cannot unilaterally solve a problem that was created in large part by the rest of the world. The fact that the original Palestinian refugees constituted less than half of a percent of the worlds refugees in the last century and yet today consitute 25% of the world refugees has nothing to do with anything Israel did. It has neither the resources nor the moral obligation to unilaterally fix this horrible and intentional and international effort to exploit the Palestinians.

Your call that "the international community needs to step in" will go unheeded unless people are informed of the role the international community played in creating the problem. People will continue to look to Israel to make unilateral concession after unilateral concession with no help or reciprocity from anyone.

Posted by: MrsEener

at November 10, 2005 12:43 PM

spect8or

you wrote:
But because I don't support the expulsion of 3 million Palestinians from the territories,

Just curious. Did you support the expulsion of 10,000 Jews from "the territories?" If so, would you support the expulsion of hundreds of thousands more Jews from "the territories?"

Posted by: MrsEener

at November 10, 2005 12:55 PM

ll excellent points you've made Mrs Eener.

I personally feel both parties have a legitimate claim to the land. Attempts by either side to delegitimize the other are revisionist and counter-productive.

Unfortunately, Israel hasn't been nearly as effective in articulating its argument to the world as the Palestinians have. Some of this can be attributed to the fact that Israel has largely triumphed in its struggles against its enemies, while the Palestinians have effecrively transformed their political and military defeats into a victimization campaign.

I have no doubt that another facet to the sympathies of the world towards the Palestinian cause is a manifestation of anti-Semitism, overt or sublime. How can one otherwise explain the rabid hostility of so many to Zionism, which is nothing but the embodiment of Jewish nationalism...while the national aspirations of other groups and peoples are legitimated and celebrated?

Kemaste,

I'm still not sure what you're trying to say, but I will readily conceed that the Palestinians refuse to live up to their commitments on a consistent basis. This is why peace needs to be imposed from outside...because the Palestinians are by now much too dysfunctional to deliver whatever concessions they may agree to.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 10, 2005 1:06 PM

Cornelieus:

The simple fact that spec8or thinks that all Arab/Muslim hostility arises from the West's rather palid support of the State of Israel says it all. That he/she has no comprehension whatsoever as to what a useful tool the "Arab refugees" have been to Arab/Muslim despots the world over as a means to deflect from truly egregious human rights and corruption and the sheer hypocracy of the "Arab Street" on so many levels it boggles the mind. Jews have been a continual presence in "Judea" for milenia with only a brief interruption during the Crusades. Muslims have been considerably more transient and the Muslim population in the 1920s was highly bolstered by immigrants who came there for a variety of reasons, including the better economy. Then, there's the matter of the half-million or more Sephardic and Yemenite Jews who arrived shortly after statehood was declared, who were mainly driven from their ancient homes in various middle eastern/Muslim countries. If the animosity was really only about the Palestinians, and not a deeply cultivated hatred for Jews, there would be no need to promote Mein Kampf or the Protocols of the Elders of Zion either. They'd just stay on point, but they don't.

Posted by: waterdragon52

at November 10, 2005 1:19 PM

Waterdragon,

The quote of spact8or posted by 'Interested' says it all. He/she apparently feels that Israel's 'immorality' is derived from its very existence.

Otherwise, how could Israel possibly be more of an "immoral" nation than Sudan for example, which openly pratices genocide.

Anti-Semitism, pure and simple.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 10, 2005 1:31 PM

You already what is thought of you (simply because of what you are) and so the ball is in your court - you have to make the decision as to what you want to be:

1) A Kafir

2) A weak Kafir

I've made my decision . . .

Posted by: Razorskarr

at November 10, 2005 3:17 PM

Cornelius:

you wrote:
I personally feel both parties have a legitimate claim to the land.

From a secular perspective, "claim to the land" is not well-defined. Even if land is "legally" purchased, how did the previous owners come into possession of it? Did they purchase, did they steal it, did they conquer it and kill the former owners, or did they just find uninhabited or abandoned land and squat on it? Does being an "alborignee" (i.e. the original squatter on a piece of land) automatically give a person "claim to the land."

The way things have always worked in the past is that the legitimate owners of land were the ones with the mightiest army. Suddenly the rules change with the creation of the League of nations and the UN and other world "governing" bodies.

Keep in mind that Israel was not the only nation created with pieces of paper. All of the middle eastern countries were carved out of the Ottoman Empire and created in the last century. But only Israel's legitimacy is questioned.

Really the whole conflict is the result of the disgusting, duplicitous, dangerous, stupid, self-serving, and antisemetic behaviour of the Brits and the effendies that were in charge of the Palestine mandate. One needs only read the book "Rape of Palestine" by Ziff or practically any other book written before '48 on the political situation at the time to realize that.

It's hard to say how things would be today if Britain hadn't betrayed the mandate, but all else being equal, a huge portion of the people now called Palestinians would probably be living as oppressed peasants in the countries where their families had lived for generations. The majority of non-Jews in Israel would not define themselves as Israeli-Arabs or as Palestinians, but as Turkish-Israeli, Druse-Israeli, Bedouin-Israeli, Egyptian-Israeli, Greek-Israeli, Latin-Israeli, Armenian-Israeli, Algerian-Israeli, Bulgarian-Israeli etc etc etc or maybe simply as Israeli of all things. It was the Brits and the effendies that lumped all non-Jews in the mandate as indiginous Arabs, even though they didn't label themselves that way, in order to set them against the Jews to prevent the creation of a Jewish state.

I don't see why this or the fact that the world has aggravated and perpetuated the Palestinian problem for over 50 years should impact Israel's legitimate claim to the land.

That being said, if giving the land to the Palestinians and helping them establish a peaceful state on that land would bring peace, I'm all for it. I just don't believe it can happen. Not in my lifetime at least. The Palestinians don't act like they are either deserving or capable of a being given and running a country of their own. Arafat ruined them for anything like that for a few generations at least. The present Palestinian leadership seems to be following in Arafat's footsteps.

I mean, look at what's happened in Gaza. Not only did the Palestinian Authority allow looters to destroy greenhouses purchased and given as gifts to the Palestinian people to help build their economy and provide much-needed jobs. Now people with power and/or big guns are "stealing" the land that was stolen from Jews just a few months ago. After all those heart-warming reports of the Palestinians planning low-income high-rises (not intended, BTW, to ease the overcrowding in the refugee camps), now the land is being grabbed and fenced off by squatters, many on the Palestinian Authority payroll. Does anyone seriously think giving the Arabs a Judeinrein Judea and Samaria will produce different results?

Posted by: MrsEener

at November 10, 2005 3:41 PM

Mrs Eener,

I got a good history lesson from Hugh about the League Mandate. It certainly gives historic legitimacy to the establishment of a Jewish State, albeit with guarantees for the rights of Arabs.

I would point out that some Palestinian families have Ottoman-era land deeds dating back a century or more. Are these any less valid than those purchased by Jews in the late 19th/early 20th century?

My point is, if we expend our energies trying to delegitimize the presence of the Palestinians living in the territories - the overwhelming majority of whom were born there, we are playing the same game as the other side, who use their vile propaganda to de-legitimize and demonize the Jewish State.

I agree completely with your characterization of Palestinian society as being neither "deserving or capable" of having their own state. That is why the strategy of the post-Camp David peace process - direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians - is simply no longer viable. It hasn't worked. And over the last 20 years, Palestinian society has metastesized into something grotesquely deformed.

It is time for the world to get involved. The stakes are too high.

Jerusalem is the epicenter of jihad. Muslims around the world use the Palestinian issue to justify their grievance pathology and their vile terrorism. Lancing this inflamed boil on the buttocks of the world won't change the doctrine of jihad that is so embedded in Islamic theology, but it will burst the biggest bubble in the Muslim grievance machine.

However much we may despise Islamic theology, we have to acknowledge - if we are fair - that some Muslim grievances have merit. And the existence of 3 million Palestinians living in the territories without the right of citizenship is one of them.

Israelis are victimized by Palestinian terror and vilified by the world for their response to it. It's time to alleviate them of the burden.

It's time to impose a settlement, declare the West Bank and Gaza a UN Trust Territory in preparation for independence, establish an international military presence there, physically liquidate the terrorist groups, create from scratch new governing institutions that will have UN oversight for a number of years to prevent their slide into corruption and inneffectuality, maintain a military presence for some years after independence to ensure Palestinian compliance with the accords, particularly provisions on non-militarization, and so forth.

There is to be NO right-of-return for Palestinian refugees into Israel proper. There could be a program to re-settle the descendents of refugee families - giving precedence to those in possession of old property deeds - into the vacated homes of Jewish settlers who decide to be bought out in a UN repatriation program...(which is one reason why it is a mistake for Israel to make unilateral withdrawals in the absence of an over-all settlement; they are giving away bargaining chips).

These are my own thoughts on the possible direction of an invigorated peace process. They are certainly not perfect and are not etched in stone.

But I'm searching for solutions...and am at least offering ideas on how to end this interminable conflict.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 10, 2005 4:36 PM

Cornelius

you wrote:
I would point out that some Palestinian families have Ottoman-era land deeds dating back a century or more. Are these any less valid than those purchased by Jews in the late 19th/early 20th century?

No, absolutely not. I agreed with you on the land ownership thing. From a secular point of view, it is not possible to determine who is morally entitled to a piece of property.

I completely disagree with you about Jerusalem being the epicenter of Jihad. This is what the antisemites and the liberal western media would like you to believe. Bin Laden himself said that the worst thing to happen to the Muslim world since the death of Mohammed was the presence of the US military in Saudi Arabia. That is why he started al-Qaeda in the first place. When Bin Laden started griping about "Palestine," Arafat even criticized him

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2576741.stm

saying:

"Why is Bin Laden talking about Palestine now? Bin Laden never, not ever, stressed this issue. He never helped us. He was working in a completely different area and against our interests."

"I am telling him directly not to hide behind the Palestinian cause," he said.

If the Arab/Muslim world cared so much about the Palestinians, there would be an outcry wherever and whoever they are wronged. Why aren't they allowed citizenship in any Arab countries except Jordan? Why was there no outcry when Kuwait expelled 400000 of them after Iraq was kicked out of Kuwait? Why was there no outcry when Lebanon passed legislation a few years ago singling out Palestinians preventing them from owning property (even previously owned property) or holding jobs outside refugee camps? Why was there no outcry when Saudi Arabia this year past new citizenship laws that specificly single out Palestinans as not being eligible for citizenship? Why has there been no outcry over Palestinians being discriminated against in post-Saadam Iraq? For that matter, why has there been no outcry over how the Palestinians abuse themselves? It's because nobody cares about them (as a group, obviously there are individuals who care). Not the Arabs, not the Muslims, not the leftists, not the media.

Jerusalem is not the epicenter of jihad, it used to be on the front lines, because it is in the middle of the Arab world. But now jihad has gone global (again, since the Ottoman Empire started declining). People like Spect8or think that when Israel gets attacked it's different and separate from attacks on the rest of the world. But it's all part of the same jihad. That's what Spencer and Fitzgerald understand, and Spect8or does not.

As for getting the UN involved or an international military presence, past and present experience have shown them to be almost as corrupt and ineffectual as the Palestinian Authority.

I commend you for trying to think of solutions to the conflict, but I'm 100% certain they won't bring peace.

Posted by: MrsEener

at November 10, 2005 6:43 PM

Nonsense. Let the world stay the hell out of Israel's business.

Israel was doing just fine defending herself after the Six Day War. Consequently, a strong competent Israel lost favor and was no longer admired by the sick world community. Moreover, the nations that have a problem keeping their noses out have never been a friend to Israel anyway -- Saudi Arabia, UK, Russia and now the US who has offered up Israel to the Arab world to keep them from thinking it's biased towards Israel. G-d forbid our administration openly state that Islamic lunatics threaten civilization and admit that Palestinian Authority is a terrorist entity and part of the threat...

These countries have attempted to tie Israel's hands behind her back. They've ignored the blood running in her streets. Now they're fighting terrorism on their own soil.

Posted by: Kemaste

at November 10, 2005 9:46 PM

Mrs E,

I'm not so naive to believe that if the Palestinian problem were solved tomorrow, the Muslim world would suddenly become pacifist. I think I indicated as much in my earlier acknowledgement that jihad is a theological construct transcending local conditions. And I agree completely that the Arab treatment of the Palestinians has been both deplorable and hypocritical.

But the issue of Palestine does resonate as a cause celebre among Muslims worldwide in a way that Chechnya, Kashmir and other conflicts don't (Iraq would be the exception). This is due to two primary reasons:

1) The status of Jerusalem is of theological relevance (though its importance to Islam is often exaggerated)

2) The stateless status of the Palestinians has no equivalence in the other conflicts, where Chechens are full-fledged citizens of Russia, Muslim Kashmiris are citizens of India, the Moros of Southern Mindanao are citizens of the Philippines, etc.

I also concur you have a good point about the UN. Perhaps the Afghan model could be employed, where NATO is sub-contracted for the job of rebuilding Palestinian institutions and policing the agreement.

As I wrote, these are just ideas to break the impasse. I'm wide open to feasible alternatives.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 10, 2005 11:04 PM

Cornelius,

We've been over this before on other threads, but I'll elaborate and repeat my view, fwiw:

Your favorite analogy to "lancing a boil" misses the reality. Whether this particular boil is healed, or not, there will always be another pretext, another boil, here or there, in the present or the past, for jihad. So even "solving" this conflict, as you envision, would have little overall impact on the global jihad. Imposition of a "solution" in Israel from the outside is useful for little but short-term pr. And any pseudo-solution would necessarily be accompanied by permanent jizya greater than what we give Egypt now.

If you really want a solution to this particular subconflict, figure out some way that prestigious figures within palestinian society (whatever that is), would actively, sincerely and publicly support a peaceful and as-just-as-possible (and of course it is necessary that the meanings of "peaceful" and "just" are agreed upon by all concerned and observing) and real peace.

I don't see that happening. But that would be a required basis for a real peace.

Why don't I see it happening? : A real peace is incompatible with authentic islam. Anyone truly advocating a real peace would instantaneously lose any prestige they might have. I expect you realize this, which leads to your call for imposition of a solution from the outside. But no conflict ever ends until the participants themselves decide that it ends. And islam cannot allow a conflict between infidels and muslims to end in any peace other than the "peace" of submission: dar-al-islam.

It always comes back to islam, the triumphalist, hegemonist, imperialist, supremacist and totalitarian ideology of the arabs.

Posted by: del

at November 11, 2005 2:35 AM

DEL: "Whether this particular boil is healed, or not, there will always be another pretext, another boil, here or there, in the present or the past, for jihad."

CORNELIUS: Does that mean we should not bother trying to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Does it mean the stateless status of the Palestinians is a problem that needs no redress?

DEL: "And islam cannot allow a conflict between infidels and muslims to end in any peace other than the "peace" of submission: dar-al-islam."

CORNELIUS: From the mid 17th century on, the Ottoman Caliphate repeatedly signed agreements entailing concessions and territorial retreat. There are other examples in history.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 11, 2005 7:57 AM

Cornelieus:

Watch it with the "KingTolerance" style "parsing" of issues.

Posted by: waterdragon52

at November 11, 2005 8:57 AM

You guys/gals are doing quite a nice job of discussing this matter. Please remember you Are on the same side!

(*rolls eyes* Yeah. Yeah Nariz, I hear you)

Posted by: Gary

at November 11, 2005 9:54 AM

Cornelius wrote:
I would point out that some Palestinian families have Ottoman-era land deeds dating back a century or more. Are these any less valid than those purchased by Jews in the late 19th/early 20th century?

I wrote:
No, absolutely not. I agreed with you on the land ownership thing. From a secular point of view, it is not possible to determine who is morally entitled to a piece of property.

Acually, I retract this. I have read plenty examples of how property was aquired in the Ottoman period, the mandate period, and even recently that most people would probably agree were immoral transactions.

Here is just one example, again from "A Home in the Holy Land" by Emily Finn, published in 1866

p. 330 [Speaking to a Christian peasant outside Beit Jala] “We asked her whether the olives were ripe. ‘Not yet.’ ‘Then why do you gather them?’ ‘It is a bad year; olives are dear this year; and if we do not gather them, they will be stolen…My trees are pledged; and if I get no oil, I must pay double…Twelve years ago he [her husband] had no money to pay the taxes; so he pledged his trees for five hundred piastres and wrote a bond upon himself to pay fifteen jars of oil to Suleiman Assali [during the next 12 years they were unable to pay so they owed more and more each year] and we now owe him still eighty jars of oil.’ ‘Where is your husband?’ “He is gone to sell his goats; for last night Suleilman sent a horse-soldier to our house to buy the oil, and we had to kill a kid for his supper,and to give him butter and rice and honey; and he filled his bag with barley, twice as much has his horse could eat; and if he stays a week, our family will be ruined…. ‘Is it possible,’ exclaimed Walter, ‘that the peasantry are ground down in this manner?’ ‘I have seen but too much of it,’ sad Mr Anderson…I dare say half this forest is pledged to them in the same manner...are those trees pledged to any one?’ ‘Those are my brother-in-law’s. Yes, they were pledged seven years ago for four hundred piastres. He owes sixty jars of oil on them.’ ‘And those trees?’ ‘They are pledged to Moosa el Assali, and those next to Abdallah el Khaldy, and those up there to Emin Effendi, and those to Ali Effendi, and those to Yussuf Effendi. Our whole village, and all our olive-yards, are pledged. We are slaves to the Muslims. Woe is me, our house is ruined! Woe is me, our days are shortened by grief!’”

This was a very common occurance, and other examples have been noted elsewhere, even in the British mandate period. Eventually the peasants were forced to "sell" their land to the effendies to pay off some of their debts, and then continue working on the land as virtual slaves to try to pay off the rest, else be thrown in prison, or worse. Would you say these were "valid" land transactions? Later, when the effendies then sold these entire villages to a third party were these valid land transactions?

I could give other examples. I have a quote from another book (I can get you the exact quote and reference if you'd like), that relates how Jews in Jerusalem (in 16th or 17th century, I forget) were forced to pay exhorbitant fees for permission to do any repairs on their homes. Once their homes became uninhabitable because of this forced neglect, they had to simply abandon them. Would you say that the next owners had a "valid" claim to the property?

I have another book that relates how during the mandate period, the British handed out deeds to huge parcels of state-owned land to different Arab families, not according to need and only sometimes tangentially related to occupancy. The British had no right to do this according to the terms of their mandate. Are these deeds valid?

Posted by: MrsEener

at November 11, 2005 10:31 AM

Cornelius

you wrote:
But the issue of Palestine does resonate as a cause celebre among Muslims worldwide in a way that Chechnya, Kashmir and other conflicts don't (Iraq would be the exception). This is due to two primary reasons:

I think it is more the leftist media, more than the Arab street that has made the Palesitnian issue the cause celebre.

you wrote:
1) The status of Jerusalem is of theological relevance (though its importance to Islam is often exaggerated)

Jerusalem has never been important to Islam except as a reminder of their supremecy over the Jews and Christians that used to rule it. You will never find a book or a pilgramage account that describes Jerusalem as being anything but neglected under Muslim rule. Maybe you are familiar with Mark Twain's description of Jerusalem as a pauper village, small, underpopulated and dirty. You are probably not aware that Twain described Beirut as "beautiful" and Alexandria as "too European." The area that became Palestine was *never* goverened by the Muslims from Jerusalem, but at various times from Damascus, Cairo, and other more distant places. How can anyone take seriously the lie that Jerusalem is more important to Muslims than these other cities? Jerusalem is not even mentioned in the PLO charter and when East Jerusalem was in Jordanian hands, no head of state of any Muslim county went to visit there, except King Hussein.

I thought we agreed that this isn't about rights for the Palestinan people. If the Arabs really cared about Palestinians having citizenship, the Arab League would allow its members stop singling out Palestinians from all other Arabs and denying them the right to obtain citizenship in their own countries.

Posted by: MrsEener

at November 11, 2005 11:00 AM

MRS E: "Acually, I retract this. I have read plenty examples of how property was aquired in the Ottoman period, the mandate period, and even recently that most people would probably agree were immoral transactions."

CORNELIUS: In the interests of fairness, I'm in the uncomfortable position of having to defend the other side.

I once saw a news report where a Palestinian refugee in Lebanon produced a late 18th century Ottoman property deed in his family's name that was on land outside Haifa. He was not one of those who voluntarily heeded the call to evacuate in 1948, but fled intense fighting only to see his propery confiscated.

Israel has admitted to forcibly expelling residents of entire villages in '48. This stands in contrast to Israeli behavior at the same time in which Arabs were implored to stay.

My point is, we can both find anecdotal evidence in which each side is victimized by the other. That mindset is everything that is wrong with the conflict.

MRS E: "Jerusalem has never been important to Islam except as a reminder of their supremecy over the Jews and Christians that used to rule it. You will never find a book or a pilgramage account that describes Jerusalem as being anything but neglected under Muslim rule."

CORNELIUS: Islamic theology alternately makes me angry, nausous or incredulous, so it's with great reluctance that I use it to make a point.

Surah 17.1 of the Quran makes reference to the "blessings" of the "farther Temple" which is Jerusalem. Muhammad is said to have flown there in a dream.

I'm willing to conceed a degree of theological relevance of Jerusalem for Muslims, though obviously it is nothing approaching the importance of the city to Christianity and particularly Judaism.

MRS E: "I thought we agreed that this isn't about rights for the Palestinan people. If the Arabs really cared about Palestinians having citizenship, the Arab League would allow its members stop singling out Palestinians from all other Arabs and denying them the right to obtain citizenship in their own countries."

CORNELIUS: This does nothing for the 3 million Palestinians living inside Israeli-controlled territory on the West Bank and Gaza and who have no citizenship.

I don't expect you or the others here to agree with me. Islamic terrorism has unquestionably hardened attitudes. It is only with great effort that I'm trying to maintain at least some objectivity as I observe conditions around the world.

Believe me, if this was a pro-Palestinian website, I'd be arguing the Israeli case with alot more enthusiasm than I am now trying to present a balanced view.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 11, 2005 4:42 PM

Cornelius,

you wrote: "Does that mean we should not bother trying to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Does it mean the stateless status of the Palestinians is a problem that needs no redress?"

It means that attempting to impose an external "solution" on the Israeli-Arab conflict is fruitless (notice that i describe the conflict as Israeli-Arab. And the Israeli-Arab conflict is a subset of the infidel-muslim conflict). Conflicts can be contained, to a limited extent, by top-down action, but only solved from the bottom up. The people who call themselves palestinians need to figure out for themselves that their limbo status is a direct result of their own, and their fraternal-arab-brethren's, choices and actions. The problem needs redress, but most especially by the "palestinians" and their allies, themselves. Occasionally, a secular Arab, here or there, gets an inkling of responsibility. I read an op-ed in the Daily Star (Lebanon) the other day in which one was beginning to voice some criticism of arab treatment of Jews, and obliterationist attitude towards Israel. Of course he was more critical of Israeli actions, but still it seemed a very very small step forward. Unfortunately I don't have the link handy. My suggestion to you is to quit infantilizing the palestinians by treating them as small children, who can get their way by whining to "adults" (the outside world). The less aid and less attention they get, the better. What is the current count of UN resolutions about the conflict in the Holy Land, compared to any and all other conflicts worldwide?

you wrote:

(I had written: "And islam cannot allow a conflict between infidels and muslims to end in any peace other than the "peace" of submission: dar-al-islam.")
"From the mid 17th century on, the Ottoman Caliphate repeatedly signed agreements entailing concessions and territorial retreat. There are other examples in history."

The very fact that the treaties were repeatedly signed demonstrates that none were complete "solutions" to the various wars the Turks were involved in. They were repeatedly defeated militarily in the balkans and Ukraine and the Crimea, so they signed hudnas. That is basically all. Of course some of the conflicts were instigated by the Turks, others by the Russians of Austrians, but, still, treaties are basically worthless pieces of paper, unless they are backed by sincere action. And no treaty with infidels can be sincere, unless it is a treaty where the infidel acknowledges dhimmitude.

Posted by: del

at November 11, 2005 4:52 PM

Del,

Yes, the Ottoman acquiesence to Hungarian and later Wallachian independence were the result of battlefield defeat. But the results were permanant. The Ottomans never maintained claims to these territories.

Another example would be Indonesia's withdrawal from East Timor.

I don't know whether or not these historical examples are pardigmatic for Israel/Palestine, but it is not beyond the realm of possibility that an enforcible peace might be effectual, at least in the short and medium-term. I say we go for it, instead of being content to let Palestinian society slip further and further into pathological sickness and dysfunctionality.

Posted by: Cornelius

at November 11, 2005 10:50 PM