You can trace the word Palestine back almost 2,500 years in recorded history. Palestinians have always had close ties to their land, relying on agriculture for the basis of life and the economy.
For centuries, Palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire, which spanned from south-eastern Europe and western Asia to north Africa, with Constantinople (now Istanbul) as its capital. Palestine’s economy grew, and there were advances in education and health.
Muslims, Jews, and Christians co-existed and were fully integrated in the communities throughout Palestine, respecting each other’s religions, cultures, and rights to the Holy Land.
A political movement called Zionism began in Europe in the 1880s, which promoted the idea of a ‘Homeland’ for Jews.
Firstly, it must be recognised that anti-semitism is mankind’s longest hate – documented and perpetrated for hundreds of years across mainland Europe as well as in the British Isles too – and is undoubtedly a stain on humanity. Some felt that a Jewish state or country somewhere in the world was the only hope of guaranteed safety for Jews. Lands as far afield as in South America, North Africa, and Mesopotamia were all suggested, and indeed some Jews did move to these places, set up communities, and are still in these places today.
Other extreme nationalist Jews and fundamentalist Christians pointed to Palestine, referring to selective texts from religious writings of thousands of years ago as justification. This proposal faced mixed reactions from Jews in Palestine and across Europe.
This promise was formalised in what became known as the Balfour Declaration of 1917 by the then British foreign secretary Arthur Balfour, himself an ardent Christian fundamentalist and anti-semite. This despite Britain not even ‘owning’ Palestine and without bothering to consult Palestinians – Muslim, Christian, or Jewish people living there peacefully and amicably.
1930’s
After many centuries of anti-semitism (racism against Jews), atrocities against Jews in Germany and Austria increased as the Nazis rose to power. This resulted in the horrors of the Holocaust, in which an estimated 11 million men, women and children were systematically murdered, over half of these being Jews, simply for being Jews.
1940’s
After the Holocaust, European powers (especially Britain) and the USA supported limited European Jewish immigration to Palestine, within a United Nations trusteeship and a division of Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab provinces.
They also, however, supported, trained, and armed Jewish zionists.
These armed zionists soon formed themselves into gangs who then turned on the British armed forces there to uphold the UN mandate, and waged war against the indigenous Palestinians in their nationalist pursuit to create a Jewish supremacist state to be called ‘Israel’, with unfettered immigration of Jews.
These zionist gangs, amongst them the Stern Gang, the Irgun and the Haganah, were outlawed and regarded as terrorists by the British Mandatory Authority as they were responsible for many atrocities, including mass murder against unarmed Arab civilians, Muslims, Christians, and even any Jews who opposed them.
This included the murder of Lord Boyne, a British minister of state, and the blowing up of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing 91 soldiers and civilians (British, Arab, and Jewish).
1948
This terrorism and armed insurrection by the Zionist gangs, resulted in the loss of life of many British servicemen and citizens and an untold number of murdered Palestinian men, women, and children, the theft of land from over 750,000 refugees, the destruction of 531 towns and villages, and 78% of the UN-mandated area of Palestine being occupied by the so-called ‘Army of Israel’. Terrorists calling themselves this then unilaterally declared the creation of the state of ‘Israel’.
This devastation for Palestinians is known as the Nakba (catastrophe).
The next 50 years
Over the next five decades, ‘Israel’ continued to expand its takeover and military occupation of Palestinian land and people. Then, as today, the Israeli state refused to map any defining borders for its nation. Then, as today, ultra-nationalist Zionists believe they have ‘God given’ rights to not only the whole of Palestine, but also parts of modern-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia and that this ‘Greater’ Israel should be run on racist, supremacist lines by Jews and for Jews only. That they are God’s ‘chosen people’ and therefore all others should either leave the land they call ‘Israel’, submit to Apartheid* rules there or suffer the consequences of ‘violence and ethnic cleansing’.
Israel has continually attacked neighbouring countries, grabbing land from Egypt, Lebanon and Syria as well as illegally occupying (invading and militarily seizing control of) the Palestinian West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, creating a further 300,000 refugees in 1967.
Israelis have since encircled remaining Palestinian towns and villages to create Jewish-only communities on stolen Palestinian land. These communities are called ‘settlements’ and are illegal under international law. ‘Israel’ is regarded as an ‘occupying’ power by the UN.
The annexation (taking full control) of East Jerusalem in 1980 was also a clear violation of international law protecting the equal access to religious sites of Judaism, Christianity and Islam located there. This act was immediately condemned by the United Nations, but ever since then, the ‘Israelis’ have continued to ethnically cleanse the Palestinians from their ancestral lands in East Jerusalem.
Not all Jews, of course, are Zionists or extreme nationalists, either within or outside of ‘Israel’. Most followers of Judaism do not live in ‘Israel’ and many openly oppose and campaign against Zionism, Israeli state violence and even the very existence of ‘Israel’ as a Jewish state. Peaceful opposition and campaigning by Palestinians and their Jewish supporters turned to more radical action with the first ‘Intifada’, a massive grassroots uprising against Israeli occupation in 1987. In retaliation, Israel murdered over 1300 Palestinians, including more than 200 children.
There have been many international attempts over these decades to resolve the never-ending conflict, expansion, historic and continuing human rights violations and social injustices.
The closest to success was possibly the Oslo Accords, agreed between the Israeli government, the USA and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation in the 1990s. This road to possible peace, however, was abandoned after the assassination of the Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin, in 1995, who signed the Accords, by one of his own countrymen, an Israeli Jewish extremist and Zionist supporter of the illegal settlements.
2000-22
Israel started to build the ‘Apartheid’* Wall, which today cuts deep into the occupied West Bank and separates Palestinian families from each other. The Wall reduces the freedom of movement of Palestinians and severely damages Palestinian agriculture, towns and villages. The International Court of Justice has ruled that the path of the Wall is illegal.
The Second Intifada (Uprising) occurred after further failed peace negotiations. It was triggered by a deliberately provocative visit by a senior Israeli politician to the holy Islamic site of the Al-Aqsa mosque. Israel killed around 4000 Palestinians during the Second Intifada.
In 2007, Israel imposed a total air, land and sea siege on Gaza. From this time, it means Israel controls everybody and everything that goes in and out of Gaza, including all humanitarian aid, food, water, medicine and power. Palestinians in Gaza experience extreme suffering under the siege and frequent brutal bombardments by Israel. These indiscriminate bombings continue over the next fifteen years, with many thousands of Palestinians being murdered in this way, hundreds of whom are children, in complete violation of international law.
In a damning report in 2022, three major humanitarian organisations: Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and B’Tselem confirmed what Palestinians have been saying for decades, that Israel is imposing Apartheid on Palestinians from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea.
*Apartheid https://www.palestinecampaign.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/apartheid-factsheet-jan-2012.pdf
https://www.scottishpsc.org.uk/is-israel-an-apartheid-state-south-africa-legal-study-results/
https://www.foa.org.uk/about-palestine/keyquestions
Sources:
https://www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org/
https://jewishnetworkforpalestine.uk/
Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions
The Israeli Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories
Friends of Al-Aqsa
Encyclopedia Britannica
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