Posted on 04/23/2002 4:42:47 AM PDT by hardwood
Date: Wed, 10 Apr 2002 09:45:01 +0300 The following was written by an Arab-American journalist, Joseph Farah, who seems to be the lead man in the Internet-based conservative paper, WorldNetDaily. This article is pretty amazing, given the author's ethnic background. Unfortunately, there aren't enough people out there who share his views. ********************************************** "I've been quiet since Israel erupted in fighting spurred by disputes over the Temple Mount. Until now, I haven't even bothered to say, "See, I told you so." But I can't resist any longer. I feel compelled to remind you of the column I wrote just a couple weeks before the latest uprising. Yeah, folks, I predicted it. That's OK. Hold your applause. After all, I wish I had been wrong. More than 600 people have been killed since the current fighting started. And for what? If you believe what you read in most news sources, Palestinians want a homeland and Muslims want control over sites they consider holy. Simple right? Well, as an Arab-American journalist who has spent some time in the Middle East dodging more than my share of rocks and mortar shells, I've got to tell you that these are just phony excuses for the rioting, trouble-making and land-grabbing. Isn't it interesting that prior to the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, there was no serious movement for a Palestinian homeland? "Well, Farah," you might say, "that was before the Israelis seized the West Bank and Old Jerusalem." That's true. In the Six-Day War, Israel captured Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem. But they didn't capture these territories from Yasser Arafat. They captured them from Jordan's King Hussein. I can't help but wonder why all these Palestinians suddenly discovered their national identity after Israel won the war. The truth is that Palestine is no more real than Never-Never Land. The first time the name was used was in 70 A.D. when the Romans committed genocide against the Jews, smashed the Temple and declared the land of Israel would be no more. From then on, the Romans promised, it would be known as Palestine. The name was derived from the Philistines, a Goliathian people conquered by the Jews centuries earlier. It was a way for the Romans to add insult to injury. They also tried to change the name of Jerusalem to Aelia Capitolina, but that had even less staying power. Palestine has never existed--before or since--a an autonomous entity. It was ruled alternately by Rome, by Islamic and Christian crusaders, by the Ottoman Empire and, briefly, by the British after World War I. The British agreed to restore at least part of the land to the Jewish people as their homeland. There is no language known as Palestinian. There is no distinct Palestinian culture. There has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Jordanians (another recent invention), Syrians, Lebanese, Iraqis, etc. Keep in mind that the Arabs control 99.9 percent of the Middle East lands. Israel represents one-tenth of 1 percent of the landmass. But that's too much for the Arabs. They want it all. And that is ultimately what the fighting in Israel is about today. Greed. Pride. Envy. Covetousness. No matter how many land concessions the Israelis make, it will never be enough. What about Islam's holy sites? There are none in Jerusalem. Shocked? You should be. I don't expect you will ever hear this brutal truth from anyone else in the international media. It's just not politically correct.
Why is it the despised West rushing aid to these people while their Arab "brothers" "help" them only to the extent it serves their purpose in the destruction of Israel?
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