Myth-Busters: Palestine? Part I

Myth-Busters ™: Palestine and Israel

Worldwide, one of the most contentious issues today and for the past sixty years has been the status of the State of Israel and the land commonly called “Palestine” (“Filistin” in Arabic). I recently received an e-mail that purported to refute a series of claims made about the history and status of the area. Unfortunately, the responses were often as wrong and biased as the original claims. In this, as in ALL of life, there is no “perception” that makes something true for some people and false for others: there is just ONE truth: we may not know all of it, but it is impossible for two things that conflict with each other to BOTH be true.

In each of these paragraphs, the statement in capital letters is the original claim; the statement in brackets is the response made in the e-mail I received. My discussion is in italics.

1. ISRAEL BECAME A STATE IN 1312 B.C., TWO MILLENNIA BEFORE ISLAM;
   [I rather doubt that. It became a "state", note that's an idolatrous construct, upon the accession of Sha'ul ben Kish. Did "Islam" ever become a "state"? Does the writer mean the Saracen and Ottoman Empires, or just the promulgation of the religion called "Islam"?]
   
   FACT: The religion today known as Judaism was established at Mount Sinai (probably in what is today northwestern Saudi Arabia, NOT the modern “Sinai Peninsula” with the giving of the Law to Moshe by the Lord, around 1400 BC; the Exodus from Egypt also effectively marks the establishment of a “nation of Israel” although it did not become a “kingdom until around 1050 BC (Sha’ul ben Kish). There have been significant gaps in the history of the nation, including the Babylonian Captivity of 60 years, and the Dispersion following the Roman War of AD 66 – 70. Although called by a different name (Judah or Judea) the “Southern Kingdom” can be considered a successor/ancestor of ancient and modern Israel and is recognized as such. The current State of Israel was established in 1948, reoccupying some land that had been Israeli/Jewish since the time of Joshua, although occupied for a time by Romanized members of several different nations (ethnic groups) and then incorporated into the Islamic Arabic culture beginning in approximately AD 640.
   The Qu’ran clearly teaches the union of “church” and “state” and effectively established the Arab-Islamic “nation” or “state,” led by Mohammed (PBUH) and his successors: the caliphs. That began in approximately AD 635, and a series of conquests saw an explosive growth over two centuries. Although many other peoples were amalgamated into this nation (or empire) the Arabs remained dominant, with significant challenges made only by the Persians (Iranians) and the Ottoman Turks, but even under Ottoman rule, the Arabs continued to see themselves as a single people and nation.
   
   
2. ARAB REFUGEES FROM ISRAEL BEGAN CALLING THEMSELVES "PALESTINIANS" IN 1967, TWO DECADES AFTER (MODERN) ISRAELI STATEHOOD;
   [Pack of lies. Romans named it that when they evicted the Jews.]
   FACT: Although the area has been known as “Palestine” (or some very close word in various languages) for more than 2,000 years, it was not until after the 1967 Arab-Israeli War (the Seven-Day War) that a significant number of occupants of the area began identifying themselves as “Palestinians” rather than as Arabs, Jews, Christians, Greeks, etc. To understand why, we need to look at the region’s history briefly.
   We also need to look briefly at exactly where and what “Palestine” is. Through history, this and other names have referred to somewhat different areas. (This is not unusual: the area called “the United States” has changed significantly in just 250 years; the land called “France” has also varied significantly over centuries.) It is only since 1967 that Palestine has been used to refer JUST to the area between the Mediterranean and the River Jordan, stretching to the very top of the Gulf of Aqaba in the south and to the base of Mount Herman in the north. “Palestine” has also included what is today the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan (originally called Trans-Jordan, or “beyond the Jordan”), and portions of what today Lebanon, some of the Sinai Peninsular territories of modern Egypt, and portions of modern Syria. Also important, this area was not always called “Palestine.” It was considered for many centuries to be a part of “Syria” (perhaps 400 years), and was known even longer as “Canaan” (perhaps 3,000 years). In this paper, I shall use the more neutral name of “Canaan” rather than the politically-charged (and even discriminatory) name of Palestine.
   Alexander of Macedon’s conquests included the Persian satrapies of Judea, Samaria, and other territories within ancient Canaan. Following his death, these territories were fought over by the dynasties of two of his Successors: the Seleucids of “Syria” and the Ptolemys of Egypt. Both Hellenistic dynasties took a serious dislike towards the stiff-necked and recalcitrant Jews, and this combination finally allowed the Jews, under the Hasmonean (Maccabean) family, to gain independence in about 160 BC. A century later, severe problems in both Syria and Egypt led to Roman intervention in the region, a power struggle in Judea ended with the Roman general Pompey marching into Canaan, where he inspected the Temple, and granted power to a man named Antipater (the father of later King Herod). Since Syria was already under direct control of Rome, and Egypt was just a client kingdom at the time, Pompey assigned the area to the Roman province of Syria.
   Specifically, he called the area “Syria Palestina,” or properly translated “Philistine Syria” – that is, that part of Syria associated with the Philistines, as the ancient Philistine cities were the major coastal population centers, and the name had probably been given by Hellenistic Syrians who hated the Jews anyway. (Think of the way most English-speaking people refer to the Netherlands as “Holland” even though Zuid- and Nord-Holland are just two provinces of the modern Nederlande.) This name was used by the Romans from before the time of the effective annexation of Judea in BC 63 by Pompey. “Judea” was the official name of only that large part of Canaan which was part of the Maccabean-created kingdom ruled by Herod until about 4 BC – then the various regions were identified as Judea, Perea, Galilee, Samaria, Gaza, Ashdod, etc. and the Syria Palestina name applied to the region as a whole. It was NOT a political designation, because Canaan was so strangely organized politically throughout this period that no such designation was needed or logical.
   Obviously, there were Christians in Canaan after AD 30, but apparently most of them heeded Jesus’ warning about the coming revolt and reconquest, and they fled, first to Perea and the Decapolis (now parts of Jordan) and later to Syria proper, and other places. For nearly 300 years, until the “conversion” of the Empire under Constantine, there were a fair number of Jews in the area together with the descendents of earlier Greek colonists and the various pagan people settled in the new colonies, such as Aelia Capitolina (formerly Jerusalem), but very few Christians.
   Following the Roman War, Jewish rebellions in Egypt and North Africa in 115-117, and the subsequent Bar Cochba Rebellion in AD 132-135, most (but not all) Jews were dispersed once more (especially to Egypt, the Western Med, and back to Mesopotamia), but small groups of Jews (together with Samaritans and groups clearly identifiable historically as Edomites, Philistines, and Moabites) continued to dwell in Canaan until modern times. (In fact, the great transition from the temple-based religion to the modern rabbinical form is said by many historians to have occurred in the primarily-Jewish Galilee.
   Roman Palestine (AD 135 to AD 640) was settled by additional various peoples (especially after the Empire forbad Jewish settlement in/near Jerusalem in AD 135), including some Bedouin (Arabic tribes), and the name Judea was suppressed and officially replaced by Syrian Palestina. Oddly enough, though Jewish communities and population generally declined (from 200 communities in AD 135 to only 50 in AD 630, in the 3^rd Century under Emperor Julian (the Apostate), there was a brief revival, the old prohibitions were ended, and work actually started on rebuilding the Temple in Jerusalem. Many of their pagan neighbors converted to Christianity by the end of the 4^th Century, along with fresh Christian migration and apparently a trickle of native Jews themselves converted. But it was not until the 5^th Century that Galilee’s Jewish population became a minority in their own land. The brief occupation of the area by Persia (Parthia) in the early 7^th Century apparently had little long-term effect (Persia was mixed Christian/Zoastraian by that time).
   The Arab/Islamic invasion of 640 led immediately to the establishment of dhimmitude (“protected status”) in the 7^th Century for the Jewish and Christian peoples of the area, and led to the gradual conversion of much of both the Jewish and Christian population, and the gradual Arabization of much (but not all) of the population. Crusaders and their Islamic opponents conducted pogroms against remaining Jews in the 1000-1300 era, and after the fall of the Latin Kingdom, the new Islamic rulers further reduced the remnants of the original Christian and Jewish population. By 1890, only an estimated 50,000 each Jews and Christians remained in Canaan west of the Jordan.
   Unlike in Egypt and modern Syria, where the pre-Islamic populations were virtually wiped out or almost-completely absorbed into the dominant Arab population, both Canaan and Lebanon retained a variety of unintegrated populations, including various Jewish groups, the Samaritans, Druze, and others – many descended from the original Canaanite populations and from subsequent invaders (such as the Philistines), not just Jews. As in the Roman Empire, under the various Islamic regimes, including the Ottomans, the area was ruled as several provinces. Many of the so-called “Christian Arabs” of today are actually descendents of the pre-Islamic conquest population – and are not Arab at all, except to the extent of a shared culture. Some may even trace their ancestry back to the remnants of Canaanite, Hivite, and Hittite populations from Pre-Conquest (Joshua’s Conquest), and the Assyrian and Babylonian colonists from the 8^th and 7^th Centuries BC, as well as the Jews in the area who were converted to Christianity.
   It was not until the partition of the Ottoman Empire after WW2 that an area designated “Palestine” was organized as a territorial unit, under the control of the UK (through a League of Nations Mandate) – and this was divided into two parts in 1923: the Arab Emirate of Trans-Jordan (in which the British prohibited Jewish settlement and sought to expel the Jews which had lived there for centuries) and “Palestine” reduced to just that area west of the Jordan River. The 1948 war triggered by a series of events saw massive movement (expulsion) of both Jews and Arabs (and other nationalities) from Canaan and other regions: many or most Jews who had lived for 1300 years as dhimmis in various Arab and Muslim countries were expelled, as were Arabs from predominantly Jewish areas that were declared to be part of the new (or revived) State of Israel. Until the 1967 war, both Arabs living in Canaan west of the Jordan, and throughout the Arab world referred to the Arabs living in “Palestine” as part of the greater Arab nation, but NOT as a separate nation or people called “Palestinians.
   We should note that both the Romans and the various Islamic regimes did NOT divide people by territorial boundaries so much as by religion and culture: thus you had Greek, Canaanite/Phoenician, Philistine, Samaritan, Jewish, and later Christian and Nabetean (Arab) communities; and people did not speak of themselves as being “Syrian” or “Palestinian” but rather “Christian,” “Galilean”, “Jewish,” “Perean,” “Samaritan”, etc.

3. AFTER CONQUERING THE LAND IN 1272 B.C., JEWS RULED IT FOR A THOUSAND YEARS AND MAINTAINED A CONTINUOUS PRESENCE THERE FOR 3,300 YEARS;
   [Some hid out, yes, and others maintained fairly continuous dwelling in somewhat remote areas such as Safed/Tzfat.]
   FACT: History does not justify the claim of a thousand year rule, but does document a continuous presence of Jews in Canaan since approximately 1300 BC.
   Moses led the people of Israel into Canaan from Midian about 1272 BC, first conquering the East Bank and then, under Joshua, crossed the Jordan and partially conquered that portion of Canaan between the Jordan and the Mediterranean. During the period of the Judges, the people of Israel were roughly organized by tribes and frequently under the domination of other people, but were clearly a “nation” by the standards of the day. Samuel the prophet established a united Kingdom, led in turn by Saul, David, and Solomon, and which was divided into North (Israel – ten tribes) and South (Judah – two tribes). The Northern Kingdom fell to Assyria in 721 BC, and Judah and Jerusalem fell to Babylonia in 605 BC: at most about 670 years. However, there was a Jewish presence in Canaan continuously since the original conquest, and a “nation” of some type for all but a sixty-year period of the 1400 years until the Roman prohibition. There were members of the “Ten Lost Tribes” who remained in Canaan after the Assyrian conquest and exile – or which returned quickly to their homes when conditions improved. In the same way, there were Jews who remained in Canaan during the Babylonian Captivity (as well as many who fled to Egypt and presumably to Arabia, Lebanon, and more distant points). Following the return led by Ezra and Nehemiah they continued to live openly in Judea and nearby areas, spreading out to return to Galilee, and pushing back east across the Jordan. This was true until AD 135, when Judea was barred to Jewish settlement, but apparently Perea (East of Jordan) and Galilee continued to be Jewish. And Jews began returning openly to the area around Jerusalem perhaps only a century later.
   The Jewish communities in Galilee, Gaulanitis, and Perea which survived both major revolts were hardly “hiding out”, although there may have been some who did that even in the old Judean and Idumenean areas, where they were proscribed. (See above note about rabbinical Judaism’s roots in Galilee and the 3^rd Century attempt to rebuild the Temple.) There was a well-established and documented community of Jews (albeit often persecuted by their “christian” neighbors) in Canaan up to the time of the Islamic conquest. Ironically, during the brief occupation of the region by the Persians, in 614, the Persian administration gave the local Jewish population the city of Aelia Capitolina for a brief period. In fact, Jews stayed in virtually all parts of Canaan right through to the 20^th Century, or approximately the 3300 years claimed. (We should also note that there were also Jewish “tribes” and residents of Arabia itself at the time of Mohammed (PBUH) and though some were wiped out in the first years of the Islamic revolution, many survived until 1948.)

4. THE ONLY ARAB RULE FOLLOWING CONQUEST IN 633 B.C. LASTED JUST 22 YEARS;
   [The Ottoman Empire, which in the early 16th century under Selim I conquered Palestine is excluded because they're Mongolians and Turks rather than "Arabs"? Still Moslems; what's with all the shell games?]
   FACT: Arabs ruled the area for considerably more than 22 years, and the conquest is generally believed to have happened in AD 640 (I assume the “BC” was just a typo). Although the Arab-Islamic domains went through a number of dynasties, these various rulers were all Arab, and Arabs were the overlords of Canaan until the Crusaders conquered Jerusalem in 1099. They were defeated by a mixed Islamic force around 1187, and then the Mamluks (slave warriors; the word “mamluk” means “white slave” in Arabic) finally pushed the last of the Crusaders out in 1291, 41 years after they overthrew their Arab masters and took control of Egypt. These bizarre rulers continued to follow Islam and maintain Arabic culture until they were finally defeated by the Ottoman Turks in 1517. For 401 years, the Arabs were themselves subject to the Turks (although both WERE Muslim), until they liberated themselves with British help in WW1. The Ottomans were classically Islamic, and ruled an Islamic state, of which the Arabs were a key part, and which controlled the Christian and Jewish dhimmi populations of Canaan as well as the Islamic population. By that time, Jews from elsewhere had already begun to migrate to Canaan to join the Jewish population that had never left. That migration grew after 1919; technically (except for the modern Palestinian Authority), the Arabs have not ruled Canaan west of Jordan since then.

We'll continue with Part 5 in the next post. Copyright 2006, Nathan A. Barton