[econjack]

What does “Palestinian Territory” mean? There was no Palestine until Yasser Arafat stood up in the UN General Assembly in 1987 and announced he was creating it.

[Pearls Before Swine]

People forget that there was a time... either pre-Arafat or slightly afterwards... when Israel gave Palestinian workers relatively easy access to Israeli territory, and slow economic integration was attempted. There were too many so-called workers who used that access as an opportunity to murder (they didn't call it jihad back then), so the access was removed.

Also, stricter occupational measures--isolating different regions of the West Bank, increased "settlements"-- were also introduced. The Palestinians largely brought this on themselves.

And then, who can remember the attempt to give Gaza independence... complete with a working industrial greenouse?

You can't work with these people. Neither can the Egyptians.

[Sam Gamgee]

I think it was the Jews who actually referred to themselves at one point as “Palestinians”. So as usual it was co-opted from them.

[Eleutheria5]

There still is no Palestine, and unlikely to ever be one, and that’s a good thing for the Palestinians, who are still not entirely at the mercy of the corrupt, repressive Palestinian Authority.