Libia, Siria, Libano, Irak, Jordania, Israel y Palestina: como los imperios crearon las naciones de hoy

El historiador Daniel Pipes señala que la decisión de los británicos y los franceses de separar Palestina de Siria en la Conferencia de San Remo en abril de 1920, con el fin de controlar ambas áreas, desencadenó protestas en toda Palestina. Se exigieron la independencia de una Siria unida que se extendiera desde Turquía hasta el Sinaí.

Después de que los franceses se apoderaran de Damasco en 1920, destruyendo el reino árabe, los sirios centraron su atención en liberar su país del dominio francés y unificar la comunidad nacional siria, en particular tratando de integrar las formidables minorías territoriales alauitas y drusas, afirma el historiador Moshe Ma’oz.

La invención de los palestinos

A principios del siglo XX y durante todo el gobierno británico obligatorio, había poca evidencia discernible de la conciencia nacional palestina.

Corren rumores de un plan de paz inminente israelí-palestino que será propuesto por la administración Trump. Por lo tanto, podría ser apropiado analizar el reclamo palestino, basado en el mito y no en la historia, de la soberanía nacional.

La soberanía judía en su patria bíblica comenzó con el gobierno de los reyes David y Salomón en el siglo X aeC. El reino de Israel existió como un estado independiente hasta 722 aC, mientras que el reino de Judá mantuvo su independencia hasta 586 aC. No había señales de personas identificadas, o autoidentificadas, como palestinos. A pesar de las afirmaciones repetidas, no hay un fragmento de evidencia, histórica, arqueológica o textual, para relacionarlos con los antiguos cananeos, filisteos o jebuseos, que precedieron el regreso de los judíos de Egipto a la patria de sus patriarcas y matriarcas bíblicos.

Myths and Facts 23.- Appendix C – Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations

57

1. To those colonies and territories which as a consequence of the late war have ceased to be under the sovereignty of the States which formerly governed them and which are inhabited by peoples not yet able to stand by themselves under the strenuous conditions of the modern world, there should be applied the principle that the well-being and development of such peoples form a sacred trust of civilization and that securities for the performance of this trust should be embodied in this Covenant.

Myths and Facts 22.- Appendix B – Article 25 of the “Mandate” Was Realized

Geneva, September 23, 1922

Territory known as Trans-Jordan

Note by the Secretary-General

The Secretary-General has the honour to communicate for the information of the Members of the League, a memorandum relating to Article 25 of the Palestine Mandate presented by the British Govern­ment to the Council of the League on September 16th, 1922.

Myths and Facts 21.- Appendix A – The “Mandate for Palestine”

LEAGUE OF NATIONS MANDATE FOR PALESTINE (Eretz-Israel) 56

TOGETHER WITH A

NOTE BY THE SECRETARY-GENERAL

RELATING TO ITS APPLICATION

TO THE

TERRITORY KNOWN AS TRANS-JORDAN,

under the provisions of Article 25

Presented to Parliament by Command of His Majesty,

December, 1922.

LONDON:

PUBLISHED BY HIS MAJESTY’S STATIONERY OFFICE

The Council of the League of Nations:

Whereas the Principal Allied Powers have agreed, for the purpose of giving effect to the provisions of Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, to entrust to a Mandatory selected by the said Powers the administration

Myths and Facts 20.- Myth: Palestinian Arabs Seek Peace with Israel

The PLO Charter, also known as “the Palestinian National Charter” or “the Palestinian Covenant,” was adopted by the Palestine National Council (PNC) on July 1-17, 1968. It reads:

“Article 2: Palestine, with the boundaries it had during the British Mandate, is an indivisible territorial unit.

“Article 9: Armed struggle is the only way to liberate

Myths and Facts 19.- Myth: The 1949 “Green Line” is Israel’s Internationally Recognized Border

Israel’s pre-1967 borders reflected the deployment of Israeli and Arab forces on the ground after Israel’s War of Independence in 1948. Professor Judge Stephen M. Schwebel, the former President of the International Court of Justice clarified in his writings “Justice in International Law” that the 1949 armistice demarcation lines are not

Myths and Facts 18.- Myth: Palestine Was Promised to the Arabs by Sir Henry McMahon

Addressing the Arab claim that Palestine was part of the territories promised to the Arabs in 1915 by Sir Henry McMahon, the British Government stated:

“We think it sufficient for the purposes of this Report to state that the British Government have never accepted the

Myths and Facts 17.- Myth: The “Mandate” Violates Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations

The Palestinian [British] Royal Commission Report of July 1937 addressed Arab claims that the creation of the Jewish National Home as directed by the “Mandate for Palestine” violated Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations,45 arguing that they are the

Myths and Facts 16.- Myth: The “Mandate For Palestine” is a Class “A” Mandate

There is much to be gained by attributing Class “A” status to the “Mandate for Palestine.” If the inhabitants of Palestine were ready for independence under a Class “A” mandate, then the Palestinian Arabs that made up the majority of the inhabitants of Palestine in 1922 38

Myths and Facts 15.- The “Mandate for Palestine” is Valid to This Day

The Mandate survived the demise of the League of Nations. Article 80 of the UN Charter implicitly recognizes the “Mandate for Palestine” of the League of Nations.

This Mandate granted Jews the irrevocable right to settle anywhere in Palestine, the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, a right unaltered in international law and valid to this day. Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria (i.e. the West Bank), Gaza and the whole of Jerusalem are legal.

The International Court of Justice reaffirmed the meaning and validity of Article 80 in three separate cases:

ICJ Advisory Opinion of July 11, 1950: in the “question concerning the International States of South West Africa.”33

ICJ Advisory Opinion of June 21, 1971: “When the League of Nations was dissolved, the raison d’etre [French: “reason for being”] and original object of these obligations remained. Since their fulfillment did not depend on the existence of the League, they could not be brought to an end merely because the supervisory organ had ceased to exist. ... The International Court of Justice has consistently recognized that the Mandate survived the demise of the League [of Nations].”

ICJ Advisory Opinion of July 9, 2004: regarding the “legal consequences of the construction of a wall in the occupied Palestinian territory.”35

In other words, neither the ICJ nor the UN General Assembly can arbitrarily change the status of Jewish settlement as set forth in the “Mandate for Palestine,” an international accord that has never been amended.

All of western Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, including the West Bank and Gaza, remains open to Jewish settlement under international law.

Professor Eugene Rostow concurred with the ICJ’s opinion as to the “sacredness” of trusts such as the “Mandate for Palestine”:

“‘A trust’ – as in Article 80 of the UN Charter – does not end because the trustee dies ... the Jewish right of settlement in the whole of western Palestine – the area west of the Jordan – survived the British withdrawal in 1948. ... They are parts of the mandate territory, now legally occupied by Israel with the consent of the Security Council.”36

The British Mandate left intact the Jewish right to settle in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip. Explains Professor Rostow:

“This right is protected by Article 80 of the United Nations Charter, which provides that unless a trusteeship agreement is agreed upon (which was not done for the Palestine Mandate), nothing in the chapter shall be construed in and of itself to alter in any manner the rights whatsoever of any states or any peoples or the terms of existing international instruments to which members of the United Nations may respectively be parties.

“The Mandates of the League of Nations have a special status in international law. They are considered to be trusts, indeed ‘sacred trusts.’

“Under international law, neither Jordan nor the Palestinian Arab ‘people’ of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have a substantial claim to the sovereign possession of the occupied territories.”

It is interesting to learn how Article 80 made its way into the UN Charter. Professor Rostow recalls:

“I am indebted to my learned friend Dr. Paul Riebenfeld, who has for many years been my mentor on the history of Zionism, for reminding me of some of the circumstances which led to the adoption of Article 80 of the Charter. Strong Jewish delegations representing differing political tendencies within Jewry attended the San Francisco Conference in 1945. Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Peter Bergson, Eliahu Elath, Professors Ben-Zion Netanayu and A. S. Yehuda, and Harry Selden were among the Jewish representatives. Their mission was to protect the Jewish right of settlement in Palestine under the mandate against erosion in a world of ambitious states. Article 80 was the result of their efforts.”37

Futile Efforts to Challenge the “Mandate for Palestine”

³³ ICJ – International status of South West Africa. Advisory Opinion of July 11, 1950. See at:
www.mefacts.com/cached.asp?x_id=10954. (10954)
³⁴ Legal consequences for states of the continued presence of South Africa in Namibia ( South West Africa) notwithstanding Security Council Resolution 276 (1970). International Court of Justice, Advisory Opinion of June 21, 1971 (paras. 42-86) states: “The last resolution of the League Assembly and Article 80, paragraph 1, of the United Nations Charter maintained the obligations of mandatories. The International Court of Justice has consistently recognized that the Mandate survived the demise of the League.” 
³⁵ Advisory Opinion of July 9, 2004, paragraph 49. See:
www.mefacts.com/cache/html/icj/10908.htm. (10908)
³⁶ Eugene V. Rostow, www.mefacts.com/cache/html/bio/10956.htm. (10956)
³⁷ Ibid. Eugene V. Rostow, The Future of Palestine. Adapted from the paper delivered at the American Leadership Conference on Israel and the Middle East on October 10, 1993 in Arlington, Virginia.

Eli E. Hertz 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#37a

Myths and Facts 14.- United States Government and the “Mandate” Policy

United States President Woodrow Wilson (the twenty-eighth President, 1913-1921) was the founder of the League of Nations for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1919.

Wilson 's efforts to join the Unites States as a member of the League of Nations were unsuccessful due to oppositions in the U.S. Senate. Despite not being a member of the League, the U.S. Govern­ment claimed on November 20, 1920 that the participation of the United States in WWI entitled it to be consulted as to the terms of the Mandate. The British Government agreed, and the outcome was an agreement calling to safeguard the American interests in Palestine. It concluded with a convention between the United Kingdom and the United States of America, signed on December 3, 1924. It is imperative to note that the convention incorporated the complete text of the “Mandate for Palestine,” including the preamble!30

President Wilson was the first American president to support modern Zionism and Britain’s efforts for the creation of a National Home for Jews in Palestine (the text of the Balfour Declaration had been submitted to President Wilson and had been approved by him before its publication).

President Wilson expressed his deep belief in the eventuality of the creation of a Jewish State:

“I am persuaded,” said President Wilson on March 3rd, 1919, “that the Allied nations, with the fullest concurrence of our own Government and people, are agreed that in Palestine shall be laid the foundation of a Jewish Commonwealth.”31

On June 30, 1922, a joint resolution of both Houses of Congress of the United States unanimously endorsed the “Mandate for Palestine,” confirming the irrevocable right of Jews to settle in the area of Palestine – anywhere between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea:

“Favoring the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.

“Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled. That the United States of America favors the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which should prejudice the civil and religious rights of Christian and all other non-­Jewish communities in Palestine, and that the holy places and religious buildings and sites in Palestine shall be adequately protected.”32 [italics in the original]

On September 21, 1922, President Warren G. Harding (the twenty-ninth President, 1921-1923) signed the joint resolution of approval to establish a Jewish National Home in Palestine.

30 Palestine Royal Commission Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 31.

31 Palestine Royal Commission Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 24. 

32 Palestine Royal Commission Report, July 1937, Chapter II, p. 31.

Eli E. Hertz 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#37a

Myths and Facts 13.- Jewish Rights to Palestine Were Internationally Guaranteed

In the first Report of the High Commissioner on the Administration of Palestine (1920-1925) presented to the British Secretary of State for the Colonies, published in April 1925, the most senior official of the Mandate, the High Commissioner for Palestine, underscored how international guarantees for the existence of a Jewish National Home in Palestine were achieved:

“The [Balfour] Declaration was endorsed at the time by several of the Allied Governments; it was reaffirmed by the Conference of the Principal Allied Powers at San Remo in 1920; it was subsequently endorsed by unanimous resolutions of both Houses of the Congress of the United States; it was embodied in the Mandate for Palestine approved by the League of Nations in 1922; it was declared, in a formal statement of policy issued by the Colonial Secretary in the same year, ‘not to be susceptible of change.’ ” 29

Far from the whim of this or that politician or party, eleven successive British governments, Labor and Conservative, from David Lloyd George (1916-1922) through Clement Attlee (1945-1952) viewed themselves as duty-bound to fulfill the “Mandate for Palestine” placed in the hands of Great Britain by the League of Nations.

²⁹ Report of the High Commissioner on the Administration of Palestine 1920-1925, Jerusalem, April 22, 1925, p. 24-25

Eli E. Hertz 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#37a

Myths and Facts 12.- Jerusalem in “Mandate” Time

Two distinct issues exist: the issue of Jerusalem and the issue of the Holy Places.

Cambridge Professor Sir Elihu Lauterpacht, Judge ad hoc of the International Court of Justice and a renowned editor of one of the ‘bibles’ of international law, International Law Reports has said:

“Not only are the two problems separate; they are also quite distinct in nature from one another. So far as the Holy Places are concerned, the question is for the most part one of assuring respect for the existing interests of the three religions and of providing the necessary guarantees of freedom of access, worship, and religious administration [E.H., as mandated in Article 13 and 14 of the “Mandate for Palestine”] … As far as the City of Jerusalem itself is concerned, the question is one of establishing an effective administration of the City which can protect the rights of the various elements of its permanent population - Christian, Arab and Jewish - and ensure the governmental stability and physical security which are essential requirements for the city of the Holy Places.”27

The notion of internationalizing Jerusalem was never part of the “Mandate”:

“Nothing was said in the Mandate about the internationalization of Jerusalem. Indeed Jerusalem as such is not mentioned – though the Holy Places are. And this in itself is a fact of relevance now. For it shows that in 1922 there was no inclination to identify the question of the Holy Places with that of the internationalization of Jerusalem.”28

Jerusalem the spiritual, political, and historical capital of the Jewish people has served, and still serves, as the political capital of only one nation – the one belonging to the Jewish people.

Jerusalem, a city in Palestine, was and is an undisputed part of the Jewish National Home.

27 See: Judge, Sir Elihu Lauterpacht, Jerusalem and the Holy Places (London: The Anglo-Israel Association, 1968).

28 Ibid.

Eli E. Hertz. 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#37a

Myths and Facts 11.- Jewish Peoplehood in Palestine

It is remarkable to note the April 22, 1925 Report of the first High Commissioner on the Administration of Palestine, Sir Herbert Louis Samuel, to the Right Honourable L. S. Amery, M.P., Secretary of State for the Colonies’ Government Offices, describing Jewish Peoplehood:

“During the last two or three generations the Jews have recreated in Palestine a community, now numbering 80,000, of whom about one-fourth are farmers or workers upon the land. This community has its own political organs, an elected assembly for the direction of its domestic concerns, elected councils in the towns, and an organisation for the control of its schools. It has its elected Chief Rabbinate and Rabbinical Council for the direction of its religious affairs. Its business is conducted in Hebrew as a vernacular language, and a Hebrew press serves its needs. It has its distinctive intellectual life and displays considerable economic activity. This community, then, with its town and country population, its political, religious and social organisations, its own language, its own customs, its own life, has in fact national characteristics.” [italics by author]

Eli E. Hertz 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#37a

Myths and Facts. 10.- Political Rights in Palestine Were Granted to Jews Only

The “Mandate for Palestine” clearly differentiates between political rights – referring to Jewish self-determination as an emerging polity – and civil and religious rights, referring to guarantees of equal personal freedoms to non-Jewish residents as individuals and within select communities. Not once are Arabs as a people mentioned in the “Mandate for Palestine.” At no point in the entire document is there any granting of political rights to non-Jewish entities (i.e., Arabs). Article 2 of the “Mandate for Palestine” explicitly states that the Mandatory should:

“... be responsible for placing the country under such political, administrative and economic conditions as will secure the establishment of the Jewish National Home, as laid down in the preamble, and the development of self-governing institutions, and also for safeguarding the civil and religious rights of all the inhabitants of Palestine, irrespective of race and religion.”

Political rights to self-determination as a polity for Arabs were guaranteed by the League of Nations in four other mandates – in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and later Trans-Jordan [today Jordan].

International law expert Professor Eugene V. Rostow, examining the claim for Arab Palestinian self-determination on the basis of law, concluded:

“… the mandate implicitly denies Arab claims to national political rights in the area in favor of the Jews; the mandated territory was in effect reserved to the Jewish people for their self-determination and political development, in acknowledgment of the historic connection of the Jewish people to the land. Lord Curzon, who was then the British Foreign Minister, made this reading of the mandate explicit. There remains simply the theory that the Arab inhabitants of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip have an inherent ‘natural law’ claim to the area. Neither customary international law nor the United Nations Charter acknowledges that every group of people claiming to be a nation has the right to a state of its own.”26 [italics by author]

²⁶ See Eugene V. Rostow, The Future of Palestine, Institute for National Strategic Studies, November 1993. Professor Rostow was Sterling Professor of Law and Public Affairs Emeritus at Yale University and served as the Dean of Yale Law School (1955-66); Distinguished Research Professor of Law and Diplomacy, National Defense University; Adjunct Fellow, American Enterprise Institute. In 1967, as U.S. Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs, he became a key draftee of UN Resolution 242. See also his article: Are Israel’s Settlements Legal? The New Republic, October 21, 1991.

Eli E. Hertz 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#37a

Myths and Facts 9.- There Has Never Been a Sovereign Arab State in Palestine

The artificiality of a Palestinian identity is reflected in the attitudes and actions of neighboring Arab nations who never established a Palestinian state themselves.

The rhetoric by Arab leaders on behalf of the Palestinians rings hollow. Arabs in neighboring states, who control 99.9 percent of the Middle East land, have never recognized a Palestinian entity. They have always considered Palestine and its inhabitants part of the great “Arab nation,” historically and politically as an integral part of Greater Syria – Suriyya al-Kubra – a designation that extended to both sides of the Jordan River.20 In the 1950s, Jordan simply annexed the West Bank since the population there was viewed as the brethren of the Jordanians. Jordan’s official narrative of “Jordanian state-building” attests to this fact:

“Jordanian identity underlies the signific ant and fundamental common denominator that makes it inclusive of Palestinian identity, particularly in view of the shared historic social and political development of the people on both sides of the Jordan. ... The Jordan government, in view of the historical and political relationship with the West Bank ... granted all Palestinian refugees on its territory full citizenship rights while protecting and upholding their political rights as Palestinians (Right of Return or compensation).”21

The Arabs never established a Palestinian state when the UN in 1947 recommended to partition Palestine, and to establish “an Arab and a Jewish state” (not a Palestinian state, it should be noted). Nor did the Arabs recognize or establish a Palestinian state during the two decades prior to the Six-Day War when the West Bank was under Jordanian control and the Gaza Strip was under Egyptian control; nor did the Palestinian Arabs clamor for autonomy or independence during those years under Jordanian and Egyptian rule.

Only twice in Jerusalem’s history has the city served as a national capital. First as the capital of the two Jewish Commonwealths during the First and Second Temple periods, as described in the Bible, reinforced by archaeological evidence and numerous ancient documents. And again in modern times as the capital of the State of Israel. It has never served as an Arab capital for the simple reason that there has never been a Palestinian Arab state.

Well before the 1967 decision to create a new Arab people called “Palestinians,” when the word “Palestinian” was associated with Jewish endeavors, Auni Bey Abdul-Hadi, a local Arab leader, testified in 1937 before the Peel Commission, a British investigative body:

“There is no such country [as Palestine]! Palestine is a term the Zionists invented! There is no Palestine in the Bible. Our country was for centuries, part of Syria.”22

In a 1946 appearance before the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, also acting as an investigative body, the Arab-American historian Philip Hitti stated:

“There is no such thing as Palestine in [Arab] history, absolutely not.” According to investigative journalist Joan Peters, who spent seven years researching the origins of the Arab-Jewish conflict over Palestine (From Time Immemorial, 2001), the one identity that was never considered by local inhabitants prior to the 1967 war was “Arab Palestinian.”23

The “Mandate” Defined Where Jews Are and Are Not Permitted to Settle

The “Mandate for Palestine” document did not set final borders. It left this for the Mandatory to stipulate in a binding appendix to the final document in the form of a memorandum. However, Article 6 of the “Mandate” clearly states:

“The Administration of Palestine, while ensuring that the rights and position of other sections of the population are not prejudiced, shall facilitate Jewish immigration under suitable conditions and shall encourage, in co-operation with the Jewish agency referred to in Article 4, close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes.”

Article 25 of the “Mandate for Palestine” entitled the Mandatory to change the terms of the Mandate in the territory east of the Jordan River:

“In the territories lying between the Jordan and the eastern boundary of Palestine as ultimately determined, the Mandatory shall be entitled, with the consent of the Council of the League of Nations, to postpone or withhold application of such provision of this Mandate as he may consider inapplicable to the existing local conditions ...”

Great Britain activated this option in the above-mentioned memorandum of September 16, 1922, which the Mandatory sent to the League of Nations and which the League subsequently approved – making it a legally binding integral part of the “Mandate.”

Thus the “Mandate for Palestine” brought to fruition a fourth Arab state east of the Jordan River, realized in 1946 when the Hashemite Kingdom of Trans-Jordan was granted independence from Great Britain.

All the clauses concerning a Jewish National Home would not apply to this territory [Trans-Jordan] of the original Mandate, as is clearly stated:

“The following provisions of the Mandate for Palestine are not applicable to the territory known as Trans-Jordan, which comprises all territory lying to the east of a line drawn from ... up the centre of the Wady Araba, Dead Sea and River Jordan. ... His Majesty’s Government accept[s] full responsibility as Mandatory for Trans-Jordan.”

The creation of an Arab state in eastern Palestine (today Jordan) on 77 percent of the landmass of the original Mandate intended for a Jewish National Home in no way changed the status of Jews west of the Jordan River, nor did it inhibit their right to settle anywhere in western Palestine, the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.

These documents are the last legally binding documents regarding the status of what is commonly called “the West Bank and Gaza.”

The September 16, 1922 memorandum is also the last modification of the official terms of the Mandate on record by the League of Nations or by its legal successor – the United Nations – in accordance with Article 27 of the Mandate that states unequivocally:

“The consent of the Council of the League of Nations is required for any modification of the terms of this mandate.”24

United Nations Charter recognizes the UN’s obligation to uphold the commitments of its predecessor – the League of Nations.25

20 See Daniel Pipes, Greater Syria: History of an Ambition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990) at: www.danielpipes.org/books/greaterchap.shtml. (11498)
21 “Political History & System of Government - Jordan’s State Building and the Palestinian Problem,” Embassy of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, at:
www.jordanembassyus.org/new/aboutjordan/ph3.shtml. (11589)
22 For this and a host of other quotes from Arab spokespersons on the Syrian identity of local Arabs, see:
www.yahoodi.com/peace/palestinians.html. (11921)
23 See Jim Gerrish, “The Lie of the Land or How to Steal a Heritage,” Church & Israel Forum, at:
www.churchisraelforum.com/the_lie_of_the_land.htm. (11570)
24 See: Article 25 in the “Mandate for Palestine.”
25 See: The Charter of the United Nations at:
http://middleeastfacts.org/content/UN-documents/ UN_Charter_One_Document.htm. (11032)

Eli E. Hertz 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#37a

Myths and Facts. 8.- Palestine is a Geographical Area, Not a Nationality

Delineating the final geographical area of Palestine designated for the Jewish National Home on September 16, 1922, as described by the Mandatory:11

PALESTINE

INTRODUCTORY.

POSITION, ETC.

Palestine lies on the western edge of the continent of Asia between Latitude 30º N. and 33º N., Longitude 34º 30’ E. and 35º 30’ E.

On the North it is bounded by the French Mandated Territories of Syria and Lebanon, on the East by Syria and Trans-Jordan, on the South-west by the Egyptian province of Sinai, on the South-east by the Gulf of Aqaba and on the West by the Mediterranean. The frontier with Syria was laid down by the Anglo-French Convention of the 23rd December, 1920, and its delimitation was ratified in 1923. Briefly stated, the boundaries are as follows: -

North. – From Ras en Naqura on the Mediterranean eastwards to a point west of Qadas, thence in a northerly direction to Metulla, thence east to a point west of Banias.

East. – From Banias in a southerly direction east of Lake Hula to Jisr Banat Ya’pub, thence along a line east of the Jordan and the Lake of Tiberias and on to El Hamme station on the Samakh-Deraa railway line, thence along the centre of the river Yarmuq to its confluence with the Jordan, thence along the centres of the Jordan, the Dead Sea and the Wadi Araba to a point on the Gulf of Aqaba two miles west of the town of Aqaba, thence along the shore of the Gulf of Aqaba to Ras Jaba.

South. – From Ras Jaba in a generally north-westerly direction to the junction of the Neki-Aqaba and Gaza-Aqaba Roads, thence to a point west-north-west of Ain Maghara and thence to a point on the Mediterranean coast north-west of Rafa.

West. – The Mediterranean Sea.

Arabs, the UN and its organs, and lately the International Court of Justice (ICJ) as well, have repeatedly claimed that the Palestinians are a native people – so much so that almost everyone takes it for granted. The problem is that a stateless Palestinian people is a fabrication. The word Palestine is not even Arabic.12

In a report by His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Council of the League of Nations on the administration of Palestine and Trans-Jordan for the year 1938, the British made it clear: Palestine is not a State, it is the name of a geographical area.13

Palestine is a name coined by the Romans around 135 CE from the name of a seagoing Aegean people who settled on the coast of Canaan in antiquity – the Philistines. The name was chosen to replace Judea, as a sign that Jewish sovereignty had been eradicated following the Jewish Revolts against Rome.

In the course of time, the Latin name Philistia was further bastardized into Palistina or Palestine.14 During the next 2,000 years Palestine was never an independent state belonging to any people, nor did a Palestinian people distinct from other Arabs appear during 1,300 years of Muslim hegemony in Palestine under Arab and Ottoman rule. During that rule, local Arabs were actually considered part of, and subject to, the authority of Greater Syria ( Suriyya al-Kubra).15

Historically, before the Arabs fabricated the concept of Palestinian peoplehood as an exclusively Arab phenomenon, no such group existed. This is substantiated in countless official British Mandate-vintage documents that speak of the Jews and the Arabs of Palestine – not Jews and Palestinians.16

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

Some examples include:

The Jerusalem Post, founded in 1932, was called The Palestine Post until 1948.

Bank Leumi L’Israel, incorporated in 1902, was called the “Anglo-Palestine Company” until 1948.

The Jewish Agency – an arm of the Zionist movement engaged in Jewish settlement since 1929 – was initially called the Jewish Agency for Palestine.

Today’s Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, founded in 1936 by German Jewish refugees who fled Nazi Germany, was originally called the “Palestine Symphony Orchestra,” composed of some 70 Palestinian Jews.17

The United Jewish Appeal (UJA) was established in 1939 as a merger of the United Palestine Appeal and the fund-raising arm of the Joint Distribution Committee.

Encouraged by their success at historical revisionism and brainwashing the world with the “Big Lie” of a Palestinian people, Palestinian Arabs have more recently begun to claim they are the descendants of the Philistines and even the Stone Age Canaanites.18 Based on that myth, they can claim to have been “victimized” twice by the Jews: in the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites and again by the Israelis in modern times – a total fabrication.19 Archeologists explain that the Philistines were a Mediterranean people who settled along the coast of Canaan in 1100 BCE. They have no connection to the Arab nation, a desert people who emerged from the Arabian Peninsula.

As if that myth were not enough, former PLO Chairman Yasir Arafat also claimed, “Palestinian Arabs are descendants of the Jebusites,” who were displaced when King David conquered Jerusalem.

Arafat also argued that “Abraham was an Iraqi.” One Christmas Eve, Arafat declared that “Jesus was a Palestinian,” a preposterous claim that echoes the words of Hanan Ashrawi, a Christian Arab who, in an interview during the 1991 Madrid Conference, said: “Jesus Christ was born in my country, in my land,” and claimed that she was “the descendant of the first Christians,” disciples who spread the gospel around Bethlehem some 600 years before the Arab conquest. If her claims were true, it would be tantamount to confessing that she is a Jew!

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

11 See “Introductory,” Page 1 of the Report by the Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Council of the League of Nations on the Administration of Palestine and Trans-Jordan for the year 1938. 

12 For more on this subject, see Popular Searches: Territories and Palestinians, at: www.mefacts.com.

13 Until recently, no Arab nation or group recognized or claimed the existence of an independent Palestinian nationality or ethnicity. Arabs who happened to live in Palestine denied that they had a unique Palestinian identity. The First Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations (Jerusalem, February 1919) met to select Palestinian Arab representatives for the Paris Peace Conference. They adopted the following resolution: “We consider Palestine as part of Arab Syria, as it has never been separated from it at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, natural, economic and geographical bonds.” See Yehoshua Porath, The Palestinian Arab National Movement: From Riots to Rebellion (London: Frank Cass and Co., Ltd., 1977) vol. 2, pp. 81-82.

14 For a Christian perspective of the “Palestinian people” myth, see The Jewish Roots of Christianity –The Myth of Palestine at: www.rbooker.com/html/the_myth_of_ palestine.html. (11500)

15 See the 1st Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations to the Paris Peace Conference, Jerusalem, February 1919. For an in-depth article on Palestinians’ Syrian identity, see Daniel Pipes, “ Palestine for the Syrians?” Commentary (December 1986) at: www.danielpipes.org/pf.php?id=174. (11501) 

16 Document’s text can be found in the Yale University online law library. British documents, such as the White Paper of 1939, speak of “Jews and Arabs” or “the Arabs of Palestine,” and even the United Nations 1947 Partition Plan speaks of “Arab and Jewish states.” There were no “Palestinians.” See:

www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/mideast/mideast.htm. (11587) 

17 Mentioned in the report by the High Commissioner on the Administration of Palestine 1920-1925 to the Right Honorable L. S. Amery, M.P. Secretary of State for the Colonies. Government Offices, Jerusalem, April 22, 1925. 

18 “Dear pupil, do you know who the Palestinians are? The Palestinian people are descended from the Canaanites.” See the survey and quotes from Palestinian textbooks at: 

www.edume.org. (11503) 

19 For information on the coining of the name Palestine and Philistine origins, see Rockwell Lazareth, “Who are the Palestinians? What and Where is Palestine?” at: 

www.newswithviews.com/israel/israel14.htm. (11504)

Eli E. Hertz. 

http://www.mythsandfacts.org/conflict/mandate_for_palestine/mandate_for_palestine.htm#13a