There isn't any such thing as a "Palastinian". The only time there ever was a "Palastine" is when the Romans got so mad at the Jews that they re-named Israel "Palestine", which was a Romanization of the name of the Israelli's ancient enemy, the Philistines.
Okay, that Roman name was in constant use for nearly 2000 years, and you think it's out of bounds for a person from that land (called by the filisteen for 2000 years, mind you) to call himself/herself a Palestinian???
You don't know much history, do you? That "Roman name" was a deliberate insult, was NOT in use for anywhere NEAR 2000 years, (ever heard of the Ottoman Empire?) and NOT chosen by its residents.
What language do "Palestinians" Speak? (Arabic) What food do they eat? (Arabian) What culture do they have? (Arab) They are ISRAELLI ARABS - most of whom fled Israel when the Islamic sountries around it told them to, so they wouldn't be "in the way" while they drove the Jews into the sea
Americans speak English. Does that mean we're really British?
...again, not much of a history buff, I see. We WERE originally British, and had to fight two wars to be something OTHER than British. No parallel with the so-called "Palestinians".
They were recognized as distinct by all the parties investigating the Palestine mandate, and they never were citizens of any of the surrounding Arab states...so again, I'm going to have to say that Palestinian is an entirely appropriate term.
Arab activist Musa Alami despaired: as he saw the problem, "how can people struggle for their nation, when most of them do not know the meaning of the word? ... The people are in great need of a 'myth' to fill their consciousness and imagination. . . ." According to Alami, ar indoctrination of the "myth" of nationality would create "identity" and "self-respect.
However, Alami's proposal was confounded by the realities: between 1948 and 1967, the Arab state of Jordan claimed annexation of the territory west of the Jordan River, the "West Bank" area of Palestine -- the same area that would later be forwarded by Arab "moderates" as a "mini-state" for the "Palestinians." Thus, that area was, between 1948 and 1967, called "Arab land," the peoples were Arabs, and yet the "myth" that Musa Alami prescribed-the cause of "Palestine" for the "Palestinians" -- remained unheralded, unadopted by the Arabs during two decades. According to Lord Caradon, "Every Arab assumed the Palestinians [refugees] would go back to Jordan."
Can you please provide some credible evidence for this claim that most Arabs left Israel because other Arabs asked them to? The only reliable sources I've ever seen attribute the exodus to hardships of war and mass panic that militias would slaughter any Arabs who stayed.
The U.S. Consul-General in Haifa, Aubrey Lippincott, wrote on April 22, 1948, for example, that "local mufti-dominated Arab leaders" were urging "all Arabs to leave the city, and large numbers did so."
The Economist reported on October 2, 1948: "Of the 62,000 Arabs who formerly lived in Haifa not more than 5,000 or 6,000 remained. Various factors influenced their decision to seek safety in flight. There is but little doubt that the most potent of the factors were the announcements made over the air by the Higher Arab Executive, urging the Arabs to quit....It was clearly intimated that those Arabs who remained in Haifa and accepted Jewish protection would be regarded as renegades."
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Said declared: "We will smash the country with our guns and obliterate every place the Jews seek shelter in. The Arabs should conduct their wives and children to safe areas until the fighting has died down."
On April 3, 1949, the Near East Broadcasting Station (Cyprus) said: "It must not be forgotten that the Arab Higher Committee encouraged the refugees' flight from their homes in Jaffa, Haifa and Jerusalem."27
"The Arab States encouraged the Palestine Arabs to leave their homes temporarily in order to be out of the way of the Arab invasion armies," according to the Jordanian newspaper Filastin (February 19, 1949).
One refugee quoted in the Jordan newspaper, Ad Difaa (September 6, 1954), said: "The Arab government told us: Get out so that we can get in. So we got out, but they did not get in."
The Arab National Committee in Jerusalem, following the March 8, 1948, instructions of the Arab Higher Committee, ordered women, children and the elderly in various parts of Jerusalem to leave their homes: "Any opposition to this order...is an obstacle to the holy war...and will hamper the operations of the fighters in these districts" (Middle Eastern Studies, January 1986).
"Since 1948 Arab leaders have approached the Palestine problem
in an irresponsible manner.... they have used the Palestine
people for selfish political purposes. This is ridiculous and,
I could say, even criminal."
-- King Hussein of Jordan, 1960
"Since 1948 it is we who demanded the return of the refugees... while it is we who made them leave.... We brought disaster upon ... Arab refugees, by inviting them and bringing pressure to bear upon them to leave.... We have rendered them dispossessed.... We have accustomed them to begging.... We have participated in lowering their moral and social level.... Then we exploited them in executing crimes of murder, arson, and throwing bombs upon ... men, women and children-all this in the service of political purposes .... "
-- Khaled Al-Azm, Syria's Prime Minister after the 1948 war
The Secretary-General of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha, assured the Arab peoples that the occupation of Palestine and Tel Aviv would be as simple as a military promenade," said Habib Issa in the New York Lebanese paper, Al Hoda (June 8, 1951). "He pointed out that they were already on the frontiers and that all the millions the Jews had spent on land and economic development would be easy booty, for it would be a simple matter to throw Jews into the Mediterranean....Brotherly advice was given to the Arabs of Palestine to leave their land, homes and property and to stay temporarily in neighboring fraternal states, lest the guns of the invading Arab armies mow them down.
According to a research report by the Arab-sponsored Institute for Palestine Studies in Beirut, "the majority" of the Arab refugees in 1948 were not expelled, and "68%" left without seeing an Israeli soldier.
Israel has offered many times to compensate them for any lost property *IF* the Arab countries would compensate the Jews that forced out of THEIR countries for the property they lost.
Could you please direct me to the text of this offer? I've never even heard of it.
David BenÂGurion (August 1, 1948):
"When the Arab states are ready to conclude a peace treaty with Israel this question will come up for constructive solution as part of the general settlement, and with due regard to our counterÂclaims in respect of the destruction of Jewish life and property, the long-term interest of the Jewish and Arab populations, the stability of the State of Israel and the durability of the basis of peace between it and its neighbors, the actual position and fate of the Jewish communities in the Arab countries, the responsibilities of the Arab governments for their war of aggression and their liability for reparation, will all be relevant in the question whether, to what extent, and under what conditions, the former Arab residents of the territory of Israel should be allowed to return."
The Palestinian demand for the 'right of return' is totally unrealistic and would have to be solved by means of financial compensation and resettlement in Arab countries.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak
