The Canaanites and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict

a) Herodotus certainly knew of the story. It is irrelevant whether he meet Jacob who probably did not exist. Certainty is not a good thing when dealing with ancient words that sound similar. Just stop! Philistines are a people not a geographic region.
b) I'm not confusing anything - I'm saying that there was neither a State (nationality) or an ethnicity. They were Muslim/Arabs or other Muslims living in the geographic region called Palestine.
c) I never said that those calling themselves Palestinians did not have genetic ties to this area. And your claim that Ashkenazim are not genetically related to this area is BS. Anyone on here (a cite with tons of genetic info) who has not availed themselves of these studies should not be taken seriously. Jew is not just an ethnicity - anyone can convert. As such they still need their Homeland.
d) Does not matter the point is that they did not identify as a separate ethnic State, kingdom, country, polity, whatever term or concept you want to use. Palestine was sparsely inhabited and very much so only in the main towns except Jerusalem and a few others. It was very very underdeveloped as any travelogue will tell you and any early footage. And you don't seem to understand Ottoman Islamic land laws during this time. Hardly any land was 'settled' or owed land as private property by peasants - they were mostly migrant tenant farmers. One Jews started coming in and buying up land from Arab land owners who did not even live there more Arab/Muslims came to work in/on/near these communities.
e) I use that term flippantly sicne many peole supporting Palestinians justify their horrible actions and a response to Jewish and Israeli actions. But those actions are born out of centuries of antisemitism and hatred of Muslims towards Jews - including theft of their lands and property and murder rape. So what is good for the goose is good for the.. I never said all Muslims have treated Jews badly - it depends of the time and the ruler and the people under that ruler. To be a non-Muslim in a Muslim controlled area is not good for many a people as has be seen through many a time. To deny this is ridiculous.

Phobia is an irrational fear of something. I think Islam is a crap backwards religion that has created a mass of assholes and murders. Sorry history offends you. What many of them believe and how they have acted on those beliefs is not good and I have the right to hate it. You can call it whatever you want.
You are doubling down on your ignorance.
a) The Ionian historian Herodotus (c. 484 – c. 425 BC) visited the area where the province of Judah would have been located but he makes no mention of Judeans or Hebrews, although by his time the Babylonian captivity was supposed to have ended. In fact not even aristotle mentions them despite describing the Red Sea in his meteorology. The word Παλαιστινη is a transcription into greek, not a greek word. Just like e.g Egypt is Αἴγυπτος from the Egyptian ḥwt-kꜣ-ptḥ (literally “The temple of the ka of Ptah”). So it is more than obvious that the word refers to the Peleseth.

b) Yes you are. In fact you go one step further and now you are mixing in a religion as well...The palestinian people are the direct descendents of the people living in the province of Syria-Palestina when the majority of the jews left after the destruction of the 2nd temple in 70 ad (and the following years after the second romeojudean war and the failed Bar Kokhba revolt.)
The area was under Roman/Byzantine control for 7 centuries untill the first muslim took over Jerusalem. Who do you think lived there for 7 centuries? Which people lived in the christianised Palaestina Prima and Palaestine Salutaris? Do you even understand the demographics or the history of this area ?

c) No such thing as religion, scriptures, genetics, history gives the right to free real estate? Need their "homeland" ? You really think that Scarlett Johansson, Harisson Ford and Gylenhaal have any genetic ( or other) ties to that "homeland" ? Do the native americans NOT need their homeland ? I am pretty sure their genetic ties to north america are far stronger than the ties of askhenasim to the palestine region.

d) You fail to grasp the history of this area in its entirety but let's focus on the post-zionism era which you are focusing on. On 1 April 1945, the British administration's statistics showed that Jewish buyers had legal ownership over approximately 5.67% of the Mandate's total land area. That is a ridiculously low %. Do I need to mention the % of jewish population during the previous decades ? You really need to read about the demographics of this area because you are completely clueless. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history_of_Palestine_(region)
Of course they identified as Palestinians.

e) It is hilarious to talk about centuries long hatred of Muslims towards Jews when the primary persecution of the jews was done by christians catholics over a period of 2 millenia. Even the christianisation of the area during late antiuity ( 4th-6th century) was intentionally an attempt to reduce the judean influence of the area. So you are ignoring a history of 2 millenia just to focus on the past century while ignoring the obvious fact of the immense injustice of giving 44% of the land to 1,2 million palestinian people and 56% to 500k jews. When exactly did the palestinian muslims steal jewish owned land ?

Islam is a horrible backwards religion indeed. So is judaism and christianity - abrahamic religions. You are misunderstanding a pure political issue as some form of religious war. I do not know if you are doing it because you are just a misled american by years of jewish propaganda and false flags ( there are countless americans as such especially of low education) or because you are jewish yourself. If it is the latter you being I1 haplogroup makes it hilarious.

 
You are doubling down on your ignorance.
a) The Ionian historian Herodotus (c. 484 – c. 425 BC) visited the area where the province of Judah would have been located but he makes no mention of Judeans or Hebrews, although by his time the Babylonian captivity was supposed to have ended. In fact not even aristotle mentions them despite describing the Red Sea in his meteorology. The word Παλαιστινη is a transcription into greek, not a greek word. Just like e.g Egypt is Αἴγυπτος from the Egyptian ḥwt-kꜣ-ptḥ (literally “The temple of the ka of Ptah”). So it is more than obvious that the word refers to the Peleseth.
Right, Herodotus lumps the region as 'Palestine', which is very interesting, but the etymology of Palestine itself is not Greek.

Our friend here seems to not know that 'Israel' was also originally not a geographic name, but the name of a tribe/confederation/people. There's almost a unanimous agreement among Egyptologists that the name 'Israel' in the Merneptah stele denoted a tribe or people in its context, similar to how in the Bible it denoted Jacob and his descendants of the 12 tribes.
 
You are doubling down on your ignorance.
a) The Ionian historian Herodotus (c. 484 – c. 425 BC) visited the area where the province of Judah would have been located but he makes no mention of Judeans or Hebrews, although by his time the Babylonian captivity was supposed to have ended. In fact not even aristotle mentions them despite describing the Red Sea in his meteorology. The word Παλαιστινη is a transcription into greek, not a greek word. Just like e.g Egypt is Αἴγυπτος from the Egyptian ḥwt-kꜣ-ptḥ (literally “The temple of the ka of Ptah”). So it is more than obvious that the word refers to the Peleseth.

b) Yes you are. In fact you go one step further and now you are mixing in a religion as well...The palestinian people are the direct descendents of the people living in the province of Syria-Palestina when the majority of the jews left after the destruction of the 2nd temple in 70 ad (and the following years after the second romeojudean war and the failed Bar Kokhba revolt.)
The area was under Roman/Byzantine control for 7 centuries untill the first muslim took over Jerusalem. Who do you think lived there for 7 centuries? Which people lived in the christianised Palaestina Prima and Palaestine Salutaris? Do you even understand the demographics or the history of this area ?

c) No such thing as religion, scriptures, genetics, history gives the right to free real estate? Need their "homeland" ? You really think that Scarlett Johansson, Harisson Ford and Gylenhaal have any genetic ( or other) ties to that "homeland" ? Do the native americans NOT need their homeland ? I am pretty sure their genetic ties to north america are far stronger than the ties of askhenasim to the palestine region.

d) You fail to grasp the history of this area in its entirety but let's focus on the post-zionism era which you are focusing on. On 1 April 1945, the British administration's statistics showed that Jewish buyers had legal ownership over approximately 5.67% of the Mandate's total land area. That is a ridiculously low %. Do I need to mention the % of jewish population during the previous decades ? You really need to read about the demographics of this area because you are completely clueless. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history_of_Palestine_(region)
Of course they identified as Palestinians.

e) It is hilarious to talk about centuries long hatred of Muslims towards Jews when the primary persecution of the jews was done by christians catholics over a period of 2 millenia. Even the christianisation of the area during late antiuity ( 4th-6th century) was intentionally an attempt to reduce the judean influence of the area. So you are ignoring a history of 2 millenia just to focus on the past century while ignoring the obvious fact of the immense injustice of giving 44% of the land to 1,2 million palestinian people and 56% to 500k jews. When exactly did the palestinian muslims steal jewish owned land ?

Islam is a horrible backwards religion indeed. So is judaism and christianity - abrahamic religions. You are misunderstanding a pure political issue as some form of religious war. I do not know if you are doing it because you are just a misled american by years of jewish propaganda and false flags ( there are countless americans as such especially of low education) or because you are jewish yourself. If it is the latter you being I1 haplogroup makes it hilarious.

a) Gee an argument from silence. Why would he call them Hebrews or Jews? This was during the Persian rule. Thus, after the conquest of the Assyrians and the Baby's. Who do you think they conquered in that area? And how would these people's history not be known by the time of Herodotus going there?

Herodotus divided the Achaemenid Empire into 20 districts for the purpose of tribute payments. Since the area was known as Syria (District 5) anyone in that area was you guessed it a Syrian who paid taxes. For Herodotus there was a part of Syria called Palestine. Yet no one uses that prior to him. That is not a people but a region within Syria.

The Persians had the satrap called Eber-nari (Akkadian). A province or Medinat of this area was Jehud. Northeast of the Eberi-nari was the satrap of Assyria (also called Athura). In the book of Ezra it is called Abar Nahara (Old Aramaic) which means ‘beyond the river’ – that is the Euphrates - the Western bank of the Euphrates from a Mesopotamian and Persian viewpoint. It's also related the the term Hebrew.

Neither the Egyptians, the Assyrians, nor the Babylonians called the REGION Palestine. You are trying to link an Egyptian named people - Peleset - to a regional name used by a Greek traveler hundreds of years later. The Assyrians called it Palashtu/Palatu or Philistu (for the people who inhabited a smaller area that what Herodotus mentions) around 800-700 BCE. During this time, you had the Kingdom of Judah and the Kingdom of Israel.

The Babylonians translated the Hebrew name [Judah] into Aramaic as Yehud Medinata ('the province of Judah') or simply 'Yehud' and made it a new Babylonian province.

So Herodotus most definitely heard this history of Jews being conquered and as I noted probably knew some of their stories. Just because he does not mention 'Jews' and 'Hebrews' per-se when telling PERSIAN history and their districts does not mean anything. Philistines and Peleset have connection but not necessarily with the term Palestine as used by Herodotus over 600 years later with no connection prior.
As such I'll triple down on the possibility that Herodotus is the first to use it because he is making some type of pun on Israel wrestling with God.

Like Herodotus, Aristotle gives the strong impression that when he uses the term Palestine, he is referring to the Land of Israel. In his description of the Dead Sea, Aristotle says that it is situated in Palestine. The Land of the Philistines, however, was separated from the Dead Sea by the hills and wilderness of Judea, so Aristotle could hardly have intended the two to be directly connected! He, too, seemed to identify the Land of Israel as Palestine. Although Aristotle does not actually name the lake, his comment that neither man nor beast could sink in its waters, which are bitter and salty and do not support fish, leaves no doubt that he is referring to the Dead Sea.

Herodotus also says that 'Syrians of Palestine' learnt the custom of circumcision from the Egyptians.

b) They never identified themselves as a distinct Palestinian people. Again, it is a region and anyone living there who referenced the region and it people (which could be anyone from Jews to Greeks to whoever) was a Palestinian. Again, I never said that they have no connection to the land.

c) If someone is going to use genetics as a principle for connection to the land then I'm going to point out that the Jews (even Ashkenazim) have a genetic connection. And those that do not have a genetic connection but have become Jews as a result of conversion are still persecuted as Jews whether they have the genes of not. As such saying that Jews who are not genetically related to the ancient peoples of this area is not an argument for why they have no right to exist in their 'homeland' Israel where they feel free and protected.

d) Jews were called Palestinians - hello! I understand the demographics very well. Ownership was low all around. I'll deal with this in subsequent posts.

e) Not sure how this is relevant. I did not deny any of that. We are talking about a conflict born out of the time since the Muslim conquest of this land towards the Jews not their history in Europe. I'm not ignoring anything I'm focusing on the subject of the Israel Palestinian/Arab/Muslim conflict in that region.

The Mandate was for Israel to have that region - read the docs. They gave Arabs Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia (the only Arabs that fought against the Ottoman Turks) and Trans-Jordan - four ARAB-RELIGIOUS states that surrounded the area designated for the Jews. But then that subsequently got fought over as if the Arab Palestinians were a separate group needing another Arab State. BS!

If you don't think this has any religious roots and branches and leaves but simply political your blind. Islam is a political religious sect. The two go together. I know the facts and read primary docs not some books with attempts to massage those docs. And no I have never thought of mayself as either ethnically Jewish or religiously Jewish but according to my DNA I'm 10% but have no clue where that comes from since the possible Germans that were Jewsih probably changed their names and religion.
 
Right, Herodotus lumps the region as 'Palestine', which is very interesting, but the etymology of Palestine itself is not Greek.

Our friend here seems to not know that 'Israel' was also originally not a geographic name, but the name of a tribe/confederation/people. There's almost a unanimous agreement among Egyptologists that the name 'Israel' in the Merneptah stele denoted a tribe or people in its context, similar to how in the Bible it denoted Jacob and his descendants of the 12 tribes.
I'm quit aware of that and the fact that they were mostly Canaanites themselves. Herodotus is not using etymology he is possibly making some sort of pun on the word wrestler for a region associated with the historic people that are in the area he notes as Syria. This story would have been interesting to him given their own story of Milon the wrestler.
 
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- Palestinian Arabs are not defined only by their Islamic religion. The most of them were there since a long time, before this artificial and arbitrary creation of an Israelian state. I find funny VMax seems thinking that a defined enough pop (religion, language and some longlasting occupation at least) could be kicked out of the land they occuped because they have not a well established and recognized state. No ethnicity? Very disputable!
- whatever what occurred before the Oslo accords, the only way to peace is to respect a partition with two distinct states.
Israel I think has the bigger and better placed part of lands, at first sight.
- If I support the restitution of Cisjordany to Palestinians Arabs (I cannot endure these arrogant religious Jew colons), I wouldn't support Palestinian terrorism in the case this restitution could occur.
- What occurred lastely against Israelians is war crimes, even worst, crimes against Humanity, and I have no respect for the Hamas Palestinians (and maybe other foreign people who helped them). Now, is the destruction of the Gaza tongue of lands and a great number of its inhabitants the better way to eradicate the Hamas? I doubt... We know more or less that other states are at work to sustain the Hamas. But the Cisjordany solution if respected can at least take these states a good alibi off.
 
Not only was Palestine as a whole well-populated during the 18th-19th century, which was recorded by many travelers who visited the area, the rural population comprised ~85-90% of the total population. Anyone even a tiny bit familiar with the Levant's demography and history knows that.

You're obviously not that, which is why you had to make up the word 'migrant tenant farmers' for Palestine. Most Palestinian villages were established way before the Ottomans set foot in 1516. Land owership of the villages was then coopted either into domains of 'multezim' families (responsible for tax-colllecting) or were owned by the villagers themselves - that is they did their own collecting. The notable local families who received iltizam, i.e tax-collecting mission for collecting taxes from some villages, also partitioned the domains of their iltizam among villagers. E.g Zaydans in Galilee, the rival Kurdish and Tamimi clans in the city of Khalil/Hebron, the Turabays, Touqans, Nashashibe of Tulkarm. We can go on.

It's actually very funny that you need to defer to an arbitrary 'legal' issue relevant for a specific time period (land ownership was made a thing in the later Ottoman empire). Should Greeks and Serbs give back their land to Turkey because the peasants did not 'own the land'?

Approximately upwards of 500,000 people in all of Palestine in 1880 is not 'well populated' particualrly when in a few main towns. "Collecting" is not ownership under Islamic land laws at this time.

Lets see what this guy says: Voyages and Travels in the Levant in the Years 1749-1752, by Fredrick Hasselquist 1766.

The 4th of April he went out to take a view of Joppa

‘The houses in the town are poor huts chiefly inhabited by Turks and Arabs with some Greeks and Armenians.’

‘The country around the town is not very agreeable… The plain which reaches as far as Rama begins at a small distance from the town’ -
where some gardens and trees are found.

Page 120-121

The 5th of April he leaves Joppa at noon.

‘The whole country from Joppa to Rama consist of little hills… which extend in large plains. A part of it consists of corn fields but most of it lies waste.’

‘Cranes, the inhabitants of uncultivated countries, were to be found here in great numbers.’

From the 7th onwards he was in Jerusalem. Pages 122-124.

‘Jerusalem has amongst its inhabitants about 20,000 Jews. The Jewish woman go here with their faces uncovered; this the Turks have ordered, that they may be known from their own woman.’ The greatest part of the Jews here are poor, as they have no opportunity of trafficking… They have no other means of income here other than what they can get from the pilgrims, of their nation who come here far and wide… of which the Turks take the largest part; for Jews as well as Christians must constantly bring offerings to their alters, if they will kiss their holy places with peace.’

The object of the 1858 laws were to maintain the rights of the State over these types of property ownership which is a general concept in Islamic Law. Justice Tute contends that after the abolition of the "feudal conditions" in the Ottoman land revenue system after 1839, a confiscatory and corrupt system of tax-farming emerged which harmed the tenants and reduced state revenues. "It was...to restore the prosperity of the agriculturalists," writes Tute, "that the Land Code of 1858 was framed. ...It is clear that this legislation could only be given effect by setting up a system of land registration."

The Ottoman Land Codes and Laws of 1858 and 1859, then, were issued to assure state control over the lands of Palestine and to increase state revenues from those lands. For a variety of reasons much of the cultivated or occupied land was never registered or was registered in the name of someone other than the individual or collective that actually worked it. The resulting concentration of land ownership and the confusion as to legitimate title contributed significantly to the development of antagonism and ill-will between Jews and Arabs in Palestine and Israel.

Altogether, the laws contributed significantly to the concentration of property titles into the hands of a few individuals and the state.  One writer observes concerning the code that "long before the Balfour Declaration, which is often seen as the fount of all contention over Palestine, the inarticulate but ancient peasantry had slipped a rung on the ladder which was to lead them down into the refugee camps in 1948.

No matter the problems created by these laws the Jews under both Ottoman and British control are not to blame. Muslim Arabs taking advantage of other lower-class Muslims operating within such Islamic laws and the fear of other Arab tenets with registration is also not the fault of the Jews or Zionism. And certainly, it is not their fault that this whole system under the Ottoman Empire (an Islamic one at that) was lost when they were not victorious in WWI and then the British had to figure out what the hell to do with it – both for Jews and Arabs. But it is the Arab obstinance towards the Jews that further divided this area and created more problems.

Milk was land in unrestricted private ownership for which paramount ownership (raqaba) in vested in the individual. Most of this land at the time, which was very little, had been assigned to unbelievers (non-Muslims) by the Muslim conquerors of the Ottoman period.

Waqf was land dedicated to a religious purpose. In Islamic Law theory it is owned by God (Allah) and administered by a religious council.

Miri, Matruk, Mawat was land where the raqaba was vested in the hands of the State.

Miri is land assigned for cultivation acquired through conquest and forfeiture of milk through failure of having heirs. An individual could gain rights over Miri land by cultivating it and paying taxes, but the State continued to regulate its transfer and improvement. These rights of the tenet were forfeited by failure to cultivate the land. If this happened it was called mahlul. In practice, neither the Ottomans nor the British ever repossessed maḥlul.  Miri included "by far the largest portion of the landed property in Palestine.” Subsequent laws gradually extended the rights of miri tenure to approach those of milk. Miri land could be converted by order of the sultan into matruk maḥmiyya (property for public use such as lakes or roads) or into matruk murfaqa (property for use by a particular community such as market places and cemeteries).

I could on as well!
 
- Palestinian Arabs are not defined only by their Islamic religion. The most of them were there since a long time, before this artificial and arbitrary creation of an Israelian state. I find funny VMax seems thinking that a defined enough pop (religion, language and some longlasting occupation at least) could be kicked out of the land they occuped because they have not a well established and recognized state. No ethnicity? Very disputable!
- whatever what occurred before the Oslo accords, the only way to peace is to respect a partition with two distinct states.
Israel I think has the bigger and better placed part of lands, at first sight.
- If I support the restitution of Cisjordany to Palestinians Arabs (I cannot endure these arrogant religious Jew colons), I wouldn't support Palestinian terrorism in the case this restitution could occur.
- What occurred lastely against Israelians is war crimes, even worst, crimes against Humanity, and I have no respect for the Hamas Palestinians (and maybe other foreign people who helped them). Now, is the destruction of the Gaza tongue of lands and a great number of its inhabitants the better way to eradicate the Hamas? I doubt... We know more or less that other states are at work to sustain the Hamas. But the Cisjordany solution if respected can at least take these states a good alibi off.

Where did I say that this justifies them being kicked out? They have had their chance at many partition plans even though they have plenty of Arab States and they still rejected everyone of them.
 
In the end of the day, the law of the jungle will determine the outcome of this conflict. I bet the Arabs wish they accepted the UN partition plan from 1947 as it was a pretty good deal compared to what they have today. I concur with some of the comments here that the Palestinians are pretty much native to the disputed territories, definitely more than a bunch of European settlers who may have had a native ancestor who lived 2000 years ago. However, the Palestinian identity is a pretty recent invention. The British Mandate for Palestine knew of Jews and Arabs. As citizens, they were both Palestinians. Only since 1967 did the Arabs begin to identify as a Palestinian people. Their leadership has been parasiting off victimhood for way too long. It seems like if they finally got their state, they wouldn't know what do with it. Playing the victim and enjoying financial support via the UNRWA seems preferable to building a nation through hard work. That is at least how the Palestinian Authority behaves. Mahmoud Abbas is a very wealthy man and so was Arafat. They don't seem to care much about their people nor do the surrounding Arab states in spite of their leaders' crocodile tears and big paroles. They use the Palestinians to advance their own interests.

But none of the corruption and errors of the Palestinian leadership justify Israel's collective punishment of the people in Gaza. No other country in the world could get away with the slaughter of 15.000 people in such a short time. More civilians were killed in Gaza in a month than in Ukraine in almost two years, yet Putin is constantly called the new Hitler and the Russians accused of all kinds of atrocities. Meanwhile, Israeli officials are openly calling for the eradication of Gaza and employing a rhetoric that would shock the Nazis. The word genocide is frequently thrown around, mostly for propaganda purposes. I don't agree that Israel is committing genocide but some of the statements of Israeli government officials and army officers can be interpreted as genocidal intent. International law is a joke invented to keep the weak in line. The big players only talk about it when it suits them. What's currently happening is a problem that can spiral out of control quickly. All the sinister and despotic regimes in the surrounding Arab states would rather trade with the West and Israel than shed tears for the Palestinians but if Israel decides to go all the way, the may be forced to intervene to save their own asses because of the pressure that will come from their populations. Israel might feel existentially threatened and forced to resort to the use of nuclear weapons which would also mean the end of Israel and the collapse of global economy because the entire Middle East would be incinerated and all the oil fields destroyed. Once that happens, all gloves will be off in the rest of the world.

This conflict goes beyond religious extremism. It's about expulsion, oppression, injustice and humiliation. Religion provides the necessary fuel for more hatred and "morale." How are the zealots among Jewish settlers any different from Hamas? Yes, Islam is a backward religion. We see how Muslims behave here in Europe where they're not killed, incarcerated and discriminated like the Palestinians. In Germany, Lebanese and Palestinian clans are among the leading crime syndicates and they notorious welfare cheats. How can you expect people with that mentality and culture to build a state? All the Arab states are authoritarian. Only a strong hand seems to keep those tribes in line who have no concept of society and solidarity beyond their own blood. If there is a two-state solution, what kind of state will Palestine be? A country of lazy bums who have 10 children per family and who think the world owes them a living? Or will they do their best to prove the world that they worth having a state of their own?

I don't see the world in black and white. The Palestinians are victims because they have been ethnically cleansed from their homes and because they are facing an enemy who has a vastly superior military force at its disposal. It is a disproportional use of force. That doesn't mean that moralising, hysterical outbursts will lead to a solution. People who mean well and who come in defence of the Palestinians regularly talk about the suffering of more than 2 million people in Gaza, of whom half are children not older than 14. What surprises me is how no one talks about the incredible birthrate in a small strip of land with an unemployment rate of almost 50% and 70% among the youth. It seems that the Palestinians are best at making new mouths to feed. Perhaps if they got their state and were forced to work for it, they'd assume more responsibility.

What is also needed is a rational and diplomatic approach from the West. This bowing to pressure from the Israel lobby must come to an end. Israel's current government is composed of far-right, almost fascist elements and they're getting all the help and cover from the AIPAC-bought and paid for US government and the EU. The entire US Middle East policy is formulated and executed by people who are openly Zionist. Another problem are the "Christian Zionist" born-again nutjobs who believe in the apocalypse. One of them, Brian Mast of the Republican Party, posed in an IDF uniform on Capitol Hill after the Hamas attacks. I used to be pro-Israel myself. What made me change my mind was the Zionist and establishment-led smear campaign against Jeremy Corbyn in 2017. A man tries to do politics "for the many, not the few" and his solidarity with the Palestinians is used to smear him as an alleged anti-Semite and to surpress any attempt of putting an end to the disastrous legacy of neoliberalism. Corbyn was a serious threat to the financial oligarchy because he wanted to bring the Labour party back to its roots but nope, they couldn't have that. The Labour party is only acceptable as long as it's the party of the few, not the many and the Jewish press in Britain played a very shameful role in the political assassination of Mr. Corbyn because they advocated a philosophy according to which the interests of a foreign country and a small minority were much more important than the interests of the vast majority of working people. I still believe that Israel has a right to exist but I also believe that that right can be squandered. Someone has to draw the line for Israel for its own good.
 
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The fact you are using the argument " the land was promised to us and our offspring" shows that you have no intention and probably not the knowledge to conduct a civil discourse which contains scientific data regarding population migration, genetics or even politics. This is an argument originating from religious mumbo jumbo. It has 0 value.

The fact also that you believe that a jewish person from NY brooklyn whose ancestors cluster genetically to eastern european/south italians/aegean greeks ( askhenai) has more of a right to live in that land than a person of a far higher genetic proximity to levante/semitic heritage whose ancestors lived there for centuries ( or millenia) is evidence that you do not respect any principle of fairness or justice. People living in the roman province of Palestina-Syria were not muslims before 7th century ce ( not that it matters what religion someone follows) and are far more linked genetically to the indigenous canaanite populations than a lot of jewish people who settled the last decades. If you cannot accept that you are hypocrite.

The palestinian people are one of the four people that have suffered most during the 20th century ( kurds armenian and jews are the other three). You are doing exactly what jews have undergone during the WW2 era but whenever someone criticises the fascist state of israel you play the antisemite card ( which btw has absolutely no effect any more-it has been overplayed). Palestinians are also semites btw. So are arabs. So I do not understand how someone can be antisemite.

" If I don't steal your house, someone else will" Jakob - settler from the US who cannot even speak hebrew, to the palestinian owners of a house.

Didn't you forget two others?
 
Palestinians are native to the land in all possible ways. The thing is that this conflict is now between the western world and the east, not between pagan and monoteisthic natives, Israel is just a strategical representant of the western world in the area, it was created with this purpose and is mantained the way it is with this same purpose.Israel is western colonialism in the middle east and its apartheid politics have barely anything to do with religion or ethnicity they just want to impose the western way of live upon the "exotic" easterners.
 
Palestinians are native to the land in all possible ways. The thing is that this conflict is now between the western world and the east, not between pagan and monoteisthic natives, Israel is just a strategical representant of the western world in the area, it was created with this purpose and is mantained the way it is with this same purpose.Israel is western colonialism in the middle east and its apartheid politics have barely anything to do with religion or ethnicity they just want to impose the western way of live upon the "exotic" easterners.
Sorry, I think you oppose a simplistic analysis to another simplistic ones, do you not?
To be honest, I think that most of the Arabic pops are different from us and very unstable, unable todate to form true democratic states, used they are to force power. I'm also afraid by their birthrate. ATW may this justify a population cleansing or an outdoor prison?
 
Palestinians are native to the land in all possible ways. The thing is that this conflict is now between the western world and the east, not between pagan and monoteisthic natives, Israel is just a strategical representant of the western world in the area, it was created with this purpose and is mantained the way it is with this same purpose.Israel is western colonialism in the middle east and its apartheid politics have barely anything to do with religion or ethnicity they just want to impose the western way of live upon the "exotic" easterners.

Israel might have played a role as a Western wedge in the Middle East during the Cold War but even then it became only interesting since 1967, at least to the US. But I don't think this argument can be used today or since the collapse of the USSR and its block. What followed is the rise of the neoconservatives who began to shape US foreign policy. I think there is a discernible pattern of using US military strength and ressources to dispose of Israel's main adversaries in the region. Ever since the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003, I have been hearing and reading about how it was all about oil. That may have been a factor but not the main factor. Was the destabilisation of Syria about oil? No, it was about Israel. The only country they can't plunge into chaos is Iran because it has ICBMs as an effective enough deterrence that makes an invasion of that country a suicidal gamble. Iran can take out all the oil fields in the Middle East just as its rockets can reach Israel and there is nothing the Iron Dome can do about it. It can't even protect Israel from Hamas' toy rockets sufficiently.

Israel may be a remnant of Western colonialism in the Middle East but it is not a Western country. It used to be a European-style social democracy as long as the "Western" Ashkenazim were in charge but the country's political and cultural landscape has been radically shifted with the influx of Jews from the former Soviet Union (who seem to be the most racist) and the Mizrahim who are basically Hebrew-speaking Arabs and whose cultural traditions bear no similarities with a Western way of life. I'm pretty sure that a lot of liberal Jews from the US go through a cultural shock when they visit Israel and realise that it is not an extention of Brooklyn or Beverly Hills but a desert strip with a culture and lifestyle that suits it.
 
It used to be a European-style social democracy as long as the "Western" Ashkenazim were in charge but the country's political and cultural landscape has been radically shifted with the influx of Jews from the former Soviet Union (who seem to be the most racist) and the Mizrahim who are basically Hebrew-speaking Arabs and whose cultural traditions bear no similarities with a Western way of life. I'm pretty sure that a lot of liberal Jews from the US go through a cultural shock when they visit Israel and realise that it is not an extention of Brooklyn or Beverly Hills but a desert strip with a culture and lifestyle that suits it.
Precisely.
 
Sorry, I think you oppose a simplistic analysis to another simplistic ones, do you not?
To be honest, I think that most of the Arabic pops are different from us and very unstable, unable todate to form true democratic states, used they are to force power. I'm also afraid by their birthrate. ATW may this justify a population cleansing or an outdoor prison?
My gaulish friend I did not say it justify, much to the oposite.
 
Dude, this is comical. You took an excerpt describing the strip of country straddling between Jaffa and Rama, and somehow projected that into Palestine's whole settled landscape and its rural vs urban distribution. This is the equivalent of saying most of Nevada is uninhabited desert, therefore the US is sparsely populated.

It's amply clear you know very little about the Levant's archaeology and its demographic lanscape, even on a general time transect. Tens if not hundreds of accounts of European and Arab pilgrims and travelers survive between the 15th and 17th centuries, and they all tell of a prospering countryside within Palestine. We can go back even further to al-Muqaddasi who gave a more detailed picture on Palestine's prosperity down to villages. They're open source too, so you can read up a bit.

Now let's turn to actual statistics and qualified sources. In the book, The Towns of Palestine Under Muslim Rule: AD 600-1600, the urban population in Palestine's six major cities was roughly 38,000 at the end of the 16th century. When combined with all towns retaining a population of above one thousand, the population is roughly 58,871 (28.5%) compared to a largely rural population of 200,419 (71.5%). In other words 71% of Palestinian villagers were living in small villages with a population of less than one thousand.
This is also confirmed by Bernard Lewis' study of Ottoman tax registers for Palestine during the *first* half of the 16th century.

Since you might not get the gist of it, a population of roughly 250-300,000 is comparable to Lebanon's population of around ~220-250,000 at the time, while Syria obviously maintained a larger population.
 
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Dude, this is comical. You took an excerpt describing the strip of country straddling between Jaffa and Rama, and somehow projected that into Palestine's whole settled landscape and its rural vs urban distribution. This is the equivalent of saying most of Nevada is uninhabited desert, therefore the US is sparsely populated.

It's amply clear you know very little about the Levant's archaeology and its demographic lanscape, even on a general time transect. Tens if not hundreds of accounts of European and Arab pilgrims and travelers survive between the 15th and 17th centuries, and they all tell of a prospering countryside within Palestine. We can go back even further to al-Muqaddasi who gave a more detailed picture on Palestine's prosperity down to villages. They're open source too, so you can read up a bit.

Now let's turn to actual statistics and qualified sources. In the book, The Towns of Palestine Under Muslim Rule: AD 600-1600, the urban population in Palestine's six major cities was roughly 38,000 at the end of the 16th century. When combined with all towns retaining a population of above one thousand, the population is roughly 58,871 (28.5%) compared to a largely rural population of 200,419 (71.5%). In other words 71% of Palestinian villagers were living in small villages with a population of less than one thousand.
This is also confirmed by Bernard Lewis' study of Ottoman tax registers for Palestine during the *first* half of the 16th century.

Since you might not get the gist of it, a population of roughly 250-300,000 is comparable to Lebanon's population of around ~220-250,000 at the time, while Syria obviously maintained a larger population.

No, I'm simply giving an example of the low population and under development outside of the main towns. There is plenty more. Again, and upward bound of 500,000 no matter where they are is low for all of Palestine in 1880.

Here is a simply wiki look at what B.L. said:

From the mass of detail in the registers, it is possible to extract something like a general picture of the economic life of the country in that period. Out of a total population of about 300,000 souls, between a fifth and a quarter lived in the six towns of Jerusalem, Gaza, Safed, Nablus, Ramle, and Hebron. The remainder consisted mainly of peasants (fellahin), living in villages of varying size, and engaged in agriculture. Their main food-crops were wheat and barley in that order, supplemented by leguminous pulses, olives, fruit, and vegetables. In and around most of the towns there was a considerable number of vineyards, orchards, and vegetable gardens.

Yeah, 25% in 6 towns. LMAO!

According to Justin McCarthy, the population of Palestine throughout the 17th and 18th centuries (1601–1801) was likely not much smaller than when it in 1850 (~340,000), after which it started to increase.

According to Alexander Scholch, Palestine in 1850 had about 350,000 inhabitants, 30% of whom lived in 13 towns.

In 1914 out of a tot. of just over 600,000 there was 120,000 in Jerusalem alone and it close surroundings.

And lets not forget you started out saying 85-90% of the rural areas where populated as if it was uniformly spread out across all of Palestine, then you reduced that to 71% and quoted B.L. But B.L tells that the most of that 71% was near and around those towns. Just give up already!

Yeah, 30% in 13 Towns - just like I said. There was more than 13 towns. Now what does that look like in an area the size of Palestine. It looks underdeveloped and underpopulated.

Thanks!
 
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Let's tidy-up this notion that Herodotus did not know of Jews (Judeans and later Syrians) or some of their history and that Palestine being a possible relation to the Greek word for wrestler.

Herodotus, as mentioned earlier, noted that the Syrians of Palestine were circumcised (Book II.104). He also was quit aware of the Assyrian march towards Egypt during which Sennacherib conquered Hezekiah king of Judah. He also never linked the Philistines with Palestine, a term that originated with him, and Palestine was a much larger area within Syria as noted previously.

Herodotus II.141.2

“So when presently king Sanacharib came against Egypt, with a great force of Arabians and Assyrians, the warrior Egyptians would not march against him.”

Sennacherib's attack on Hezekiah of Judaea was made on his march to Egypt. —II Kings, xviii.

Assyrian Inscription of Sennacherib:
(49) (As for) Hezekiah of the land Judah, I surrounded (and) conquered forty-six of his fortified walled cities and small(er) settlements in their environs, which were without number, (50) by having ramps trodden down and battering rams brought up, the assault of foot soldiers, sapping, breaching, and siege engines. I brought out of them 200,150 people, young (and) old, male and female, horses, mules, donkeys, camels, oxen, and sheep and goats, which were without number, and I counted (them) as booty.

(52) As for him (Hezekiah), I confined him inside the city Jerusalem, his royal city, like a bird in a cage. I set up blockades against him and made him dread exiting his city gate. I detached from his land the cities of his that I had plundered and I gave (them) to Mitinti, the king of the city Ashdod, and Padî, the king of the city Ekron, (and) Ṣilli-Bēl, the king of the land Gaza, (and thereby) made his land smaller. To the former tribute, their annual giving, I added the payment (of) gifts (in recognition) of my overlordship and imposed (it) upon them.


(55) As for him, Hezekiah, fear of my lordly brilliance overwhelmed him and, after my (departure), he had the auxiliary forces (and) his elite troops whom he had brought inside to strengthen the city Jerusalem, his royal city, thereby gaining reinforcements, (along with) 30 talents of gold, 800 talents of silver, choice antimony, large blocks of ..., ivory beds, armchairs of ivory, elephant hide(s), elephant ivory, ebony, boxwood, garments with multi-colored trim, linen garments, blue-purple wool, red-purple wool, utensils of bronze, iron, copper, tin, (and) iron, chariots, shields, lances, armor, iron belt-daggers, bows and uṣṣu-arrows, equipment, (and) implements of war, (all of) which were without number, together with his daughters, his palace women, male singers, (and) female singers brought into Nineveh, my capital city, and he sent a mounted messenger of his to me to deliver (this) payment and to do obeisance.
To think that he did not know this history is absurd and that it did not related to the Jews of Judeah particularly, the descendants of Jacob/Israel, is also absurd.

Now the first to make a weak link in terms of Palestine and the Philstines was Josephus. It has stuck ever since. Note he never explicity says such but incorporated the Philstines within the Palestine area.


c. 94: Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book XX: "...these Antiquities contain what hath been delivered down to us from the original creation of man, until the twelfth year of the reign of Nero, as to what hath befallen us Jews, as well is Egypt as in Syria, and in Palestine."

Here we se that Jews were in and part of what is called Palestine.

c. 94: Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 1:30: "...the children of Mesraim, being eight in number, possessed the country from Gaza to Egypt, though it retained the name of one only, the Philistim; for the Greeks call part of that country Palestine."

Note here that the area of the Philistines is only part of what is Palestine - it is not equated with it. Note also that this is not true - the Egyptians are not the ancestors of the Philistines. He is telling us Bible history.

c. 94: Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews Book 1:6.4: "... Aram had the Aramites, which the Greeks called Syrians; as Laud founded the Laudites, which are now called Lydians. Of the four sons of Aram, Uz founded Trachonitis and Damascus: this country lies between Palestine and Coelesyria."

Again, no direct linkage.

c. 97: Josephus, Against Apion Book I: "Nor, indeed, was Herodotus of Halicarnassus unacquainted with our nation, but mentions it after a way of his own... This, therefore, is what Herodotus says, that "the Syrians that are in Palestine are circumcised." But there are no inhabitants of Palestine that are circumcised excepting the Jews; and, therefore, it must be his knowledge of them that enabled him to speak so much concerning them."

Now this is interesting that it deals with both the points I make - 1) Herodotus knew of the Jews, and 2) Palestine was not strictly equal to Phhistines. At the time of Josephus there was no others who circumcised.

Those Jews who also actually understood Greek and translated the Septuagint (LXX) did not use the term Palestine when referring to the Philstines. In the LXX the "Philistines" is transliterated and called “Philistieim” and their country is called” land of the Philistieim.”

Ovid (Art of Love 1.416) noted that the 'Syrians of Palestine' observed a 7th day feast. Clearly the Sabbath of the Jews.

Philo also, before Josephus, related Palestine to the Jews not the Philistines.

(1) Every Good Man is Free: "Moreover Palestine and Syria too are not barren of exemplary wisdom and virtue, which countries no slight portion of that most populous nation of the Jews inhabits. There is a portion of those people called Essenes."

(2) On the Life of Moses: "[Moses] conducted his people as a colony into Phoenicia, and into the Coele-Syria, and Palestine, which was at that time called the land of the Canaanites, the borders of which country were three days' journey distant from Egypt."

(3) On Abraham: "The country of the Sodomites was a district of the land of Canaan, which the Syrians afterwards called Palestine."

Sodom, any of the possible places, is nowhere near Philistine territory.

Herodotus, again, a very likely possibility was using it to relate the idea of Jacob/Israel as the wrestler against God.

Per Martin Noth, the name likely comes from a proto-Semitic word, albeit there is a strong similarity between Palaistī́nē and palaistês, the Greek word for "wrestler/rival/adversary", which has the same etymological meaning as the Hebrew word "Israel." This was expanded by David Jacobson to theorize the name being a portmanteau of the word for Philistines with a direct translation of the word Israel into Greek (in concordance with the Greek penchant for punning on place names.)

Se this paper: https://www.jstor.org/stable/1357617?seq=2
 
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You started out claiming Palestine's population was mainly in the cities, and somehow extrapolated a verse describing Ramle's country as 'waste' to mean Palestine had no population. Now after you've done a quick Wiki search, you contend with the 80-75% rural range for the 16th century. Thank you for playing along my side. The only next step left for you is to open a book.

Ottoman rule was not a uniform period by any means, and similar to the rest of the region the population contracted and increased depending on many variables.

You seriously thought "only 6 towns" was the jaw breaker when, in fact, Bernard Lewis himself says that Palestine only had six major administrative centers which retained an urban status during that period:
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What happened after the mid-16th century is a fast development of the urban centers of Palestine - akin to all of Syria.

1702465199834.png



Now going to Scholch, the population was still overwhelmingly rural in the mid-19th century as mentioned above. The 85-90% range was a mistake on my part, as it was only for the districts of Nablus and Jerusalem, which I had misremembered.

However, much of Palestine was still rural c. 1849 after the urbanization that ensued in the 18th and 19th centuries
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Roughly 670 villages and cities in Palestine were included in the census of 1871. A 'wasteland' indeed!
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Scholch adds - the rural population, in fact, underwent a reverse process of decline pre-1870:
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With the rise of Yusuf Effendi al-Khalidi, the power of rural shaykhs was basically diminished. What happened then? Scholch tells us:
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It's amazing what opening a book can do.

Let's also not forget that none of this - absolutely none - justifies Zionism and the colonization that's going on in Palestine at the moment.
 

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You have no genuine interest in this topic and you're constantly ignoring the claims you've made after they're dismissed, without acknowledging that you were mistaken, choosing instead to nitpick on topics which you haven't researched adequately.

It's very clear that you're not arguing in good faith or actually want the truth. As such, I won't respond to your replies anymore.
 
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