'Of No Concern' Ignorance as regards the Temple Mount

In an academic journal, Revista d’Arqueologia de Ponent 34, 2024, Bijan Rouhani of the School of Archaeology, University of Oxford and Bill Finlayson, also of that same School of Archaeology, published "Constructing, Deconstructing, and Reconstructing Heritage Values Amidst Conflicts".

Israel is mentioned, of course, mostly in the connection with Iran and the heritage legacy of Cyrus the Great. They note, in another reference, that "in April 2024, UNESCO confirmed the destruction of at least 43 historical sites in Gaza, including a museum."

They quote from a 2000 work by Meron Benvenisti which "details how over 9,000 Palestinian natural features, villages, and ruins were systematically renamed with Jewish names, reshaping the physical and human landscape into a Jewish state, reflecting profound changes and cultural erasure." There is no counter-source to that and so the readers must assume that Benevinisti's claims are absolute truth, an incorrect assumption.

In another mention they further press this point:

The 1948 Israeli-Palestinian war transformed Palestine’s cultural landscape, with the systematic destruction of village landscapes as a key Israeli military strategy. The surviving ruins,  representing a lost cultural topography for Palestinians, challenge claims denying their historical ties to the land (Falah 1996).

What is not mentioned is the 7th century conquest and occupation of Judea, then ruled by the Byzantine Empire which it had assumed from the Roman Empire which applied to the territory the name "Palastina". That conquest was done by Arab tribes from the Saudi Peninsula who then applied Arabic names causing the loss of a 'cultural topography' not to note the various prohibitons by subsequent Muslim rulers on Jewish residency, immigration, property ownership and other elements of suppression, All this, especially the denial, until this very day, which obliterates the historical claims of Jews to this land.

It never occurs to them to see the other side of the picture.

They do quote from a speech delivered by Prime Minister Biyamin Netanyahu at the United Nations in 2013 in which he described the proclamation of Cyrus:

"he proclaimed the right of the Jews to return to the land of Israel and rebuild the Jewish temple in Jerusalem. That’s a Persian decree. And thus began an historic friendship between the Jews and the Persians that lasted until modern times."

A temple. A temple? Could a temple or a place where a temple, or even two, were located be part of all this culutral topography?

Could a cultural site, a heritage and legacy location be added to their study? After all, they do deal with the Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India.

I am referring to Jerusalem's Temple Mount. But they do not relate to it. At all.

A response there in that issue does not mention the Temple Mount either. In the response to that response, "temple" is mentioned. An Aztec one.

The Temple Mount's Jewish character is adamantly denied by Muslims and, in particular, the Palestinian Authority (Ramallah) and Hamas (Gaza). Under the supervision of the Islamic Waqf Trust, with Jordan's oversight, much archaeological destruction has been done. That, it appears, does not concern them although I would guess they have no idea of this issue at all. Their "of no concern" translates into their willful ignorance.

Moreover, it probably just isn't part of their agenda, their political interest, that is.

^

Interviewed for a Christmas Story in Trouw

I was interviewed, by telephone, by Mella Fuchs for the Dutch newspaper, Trouw. Incidently, that paper is a bit famous amongst Israelis as way back on March 31, 1977, it published an interview with PLO Executive Committee member Zuhayr Muhsein (see below) with a remarkable admission about the existence of a "Palestinian people".

The headline of the story is "What would Joseph and Mary's journey to Bethlehem have looked like in 2025?" with the Trouw correspondent speaking with residents along the route.

I will present my entire section and then make some comments.

"For Yisrael, it's relatively easy to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem, he says. Unlike Palestinians (without an Israeli passport), he's allowed to cross the border between Israel and the West Bank. Entering Bethlehem itself is a different story: he needs special permission from Israel, unless he—a native American—poses as a tourist. Bethlehem is located in Area A.

Under the 1995 Oslo Accords, which were intended to lead to Palestinian self-government, the occupied West Bank was administratively divided into three zones. Area A (18 percent of the West Bank) is officially administered by the Palestinian Authority (PA). This does not mean the Israeli army remains absent; Jenin, for example, also falls under this zone. In Area B (22 percent), the PA and Israel share control. Area C (the remaining 60 percent) is entirely under Israeli authority. This division was intended as a temporary solution: power would gradually be transferred to the PA. But almost thirty years later, nothing has come of it.

The route Mary and Joseph have traveled thus far is one that Yisrael would never take. After all, it runs through Palestinian urban areas (mostly Areas A and B) in the north, around Jenin. Moreover, there are few settlements in that part of the West Bank. Settlers travel on their own roads, which are often directly connected to Israeli highways, such as Routes 55 and 5, and are (partially) prohibited to Palestinians.

Yisrael himself usually travels by hitchhiking, as he doesn't own a car. He only gets into cars with yellow license plates, avoiding green Palestinian ones. "That's the first check," he says. "The driver's accent is the second." In 2014, three hitchhiking Israeli boys in a settlement were kidnapped and killed by Hamas. "Since then, we've been very categorical," Yisrael says. "We don't get into cars that aren't driven by Jews."

According to Yisrael, the idea that settlers have their own road network is "propaganda" and that "apartheid" is a fabricated concept. But he also says he takes the bus to Jerusalem three times a week, where Palestinians are only allowed with special permits. And that he's never locked out of his settlement, while Palestinians are often confined to their towns or villages.

Yisrael doesn't find it strange that Palestinians have to pass through checkpoints constantly. "If I cross a border in Europe, I have to show my travel documents. There's no Palestinian state, but the principle is the same." Yisrael believes that the nearly 1,000 roadblocks within the West Bank are also necessary. "The army is looking for terrorists. It's not because they're trying to cause problems for people. Yes, they sometimes get stuck. But sometimes I also have to travel long distances to get somewhere."

Yisrael doesn't think it would be dangerous for Joseph and Mary to walk to the settlement where he lives. "They were Jewish, right? Then there wouldn't be any problems."

An overnight stay is likely necessary after traveling 35 kilometers from Nablus. In Shilo, there's a kosher winery, where Joseph might enjoy a glass, unless he were in solidarity with Mary. "We produce hundreds of thousands of bottles of wine a year and win gold medals in Europe," Yisrael says."

My comments:

a. "it's relatively easy to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem, he says."

I actually said that it is not at all easy, as a Jew and an Israeli, or safe, as due to most of the route is from Jenin to Shiloh going through PA territory, I would be required to take a detour that would easily double the distance, and more, of the road length.

b. "They were Jewish, right? Then there wouldn't be any problems."

I had also said that at the time of the actual trek, the Romans were the occupiers of Judea and the family would perhaps have been feeling insecure, not to mention King Herod, the Jewish ruler, on the look out for them.

c. "Settlers travel on their own roads"

I specifically said that there are no "settler-only" roads and moreover, most of the traffic on Route 60, for example, was Arab traffic. There is no apartheid transportation phenomenon. Moreover, as noted in the article, most of the actual road kilometers in Judea & Samaria are prohibited for Israelis to travel along.

d. "The route Mary and Joseph have traveled thus far is one that Yisrael would never take."

I related to her that until the Oslo Accords of 1993, we indeed drove through much of the area. Bus 955 drove from Jerusalem to Afula (near Nazereth) straight through Ramallah and Shchem until the First Intifada [I maintain, as do the Arabs, that 1936-39 was the true first intifada] and its violence cause route changes.

----------------------------------

The words of Zuhayr Muhsein:

The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct "Palestinian people" to oppose Zionism.

For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.

^

How Oren Yiftachel Sees Zionism

How do Israeli academic anti-colonialists who identify with the cause of a liberated Palestine view Zionism? What is their conceptual thinking? How do they grasp the historical record?

One prominent such figure is Oren Yiftachel. As his biography attests, he is a product of Australia's higher education, home to the deveklopment of post-colonial studies.

I have selected an excerpt from a recent article, published in Hebrew in the Van Leer Institute's journal Theory and Criticism that recently appeared. Even the most cursory reading as well as a nominal knowledge of Jewish nationalism can easily notice that Yiftachel chooses to denude all historic depth of Jewish attachment to, residence in and returning to the Land of Israel over a 3,000 year period.

There is an absence of the literature, the religious rituals and cultural customs attached to the land, the various Returns of Zion, prayers and poetry, laws and commandments, financial support for the communities living in the Land during the centuries of Exile and so much more. He adopts fully the approach poularized by A.B. Yehoshua in his essay "Between Right and Right" [translated from his Hebrew Bein Zechut Le-Zechut], Doubleday, 1981 in which, as one reviewer puts it, he "proposes justifications for Israeli statehood in terms of universal morality rather than particularistic religious entitlement.".

On the other hand, the Palestinian narrative, all theoretical, lacks any critical review or detailed attention from Yiftachel. They, in good part, are "liberal".

The excerpt:

There is a clear disregard in Palestinian academic and political discourse in the Diaspora and the occupied territories for the tragic fate of Jews in the twentieth century and the need to discuss their future in the Middle East, most of which is hostile to Zionism. Zionism is perceived by many Palestinians primarily as an ideology of taking over the land, and not as much of its members formulated it — a national movement to save Jews from anti-Semitism and persecution. Palestinian discourse sometimes lacks the understanding that Israel served and still serves as a land of refuge in a historical homeland, and is characterized by frequent disregard for the legitimate rights of Jews the Israelis have earned them from the family of nations. 

The Zionist project is perceived as one-dimensional – an occupying homogeneous power of which the Palestinians are eternal victims. The critical discussion of the active part of the Palestinians in the disaster that rages upon their people is extremely poor, except for a few exceptions such as the researchers Salim Tamari, Rama Hammami, Asaad Ghanem or Yazid Sayigh, and its lack of an internal critical discussion on the devastating consequences of Palestinian defiance and terrorism in the century of struggle. Also, from the Palestinian discourse is almost completely absent an examining of non-colonial structural factors, such as Israeli nationalism and liberalism, which also shape the conflict and sometimes even moderate it.

And yet, it is important to note that throughout a century of conflict there have been Palestinian voices calling for mutual recognition and division of the land, led by communist leaders such as Emil Habibi and Tawfik Ziad but also prominent figures from the Nashashibi and Dajani families or relatively liberal  organizations led by leaders like Hanan Ashrawi or Mustafa Barghouti.

^

Turkey Reincarnating Itself as a Neo-Ottoman Empire

The threat from Turkey is deeply historio-ideological and religious.

How do I know?

Read on:

August 25, 2025

'Jerusalem Unites Us': Gaza Conference in Istanbul highlights Islamic duty toward Al-Aqsa

Delegates on Democracy and Freedom Island debate sanctity of Al-Aqsa Mosque, lessons of history, and practical strategies for global Muslim unity as Israel’s genocide on Gaza rages on

'Jerusalem Unites Us': Gaza Conference in Istanbul highlights Islamic duty toward Al-Aqsa

Delegates on Democracy and Freedom Island debate sanctity of Al-Aqsa Mosque, lessons of history, and practical strategies for global Muslim unity as Israel’s genocide on Gaza rages on

The eight-day Gaza Conference's fourth day continued Monday on Democracy and Freedom Island in Istanbul, with a series of workshops on the protection of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the historical lessons of the medieval Crusades, and strategies to strengthen unity across the Muslim world.

In the morning session, participants split into groups to discuss “the value of Al-Aqsa Mosque, the threats it faces and what must be done for its protection,” while another group examined “the duties of Muslims toward Al-Aqsa.”

The discussions underscored the centrality of Jerusalem to the Islamic faith and the shared responsibility of safeguarding its sanctity.

The afternoon program turned to historical and political questions, with one group analyzing “the causes that initiated the Crusader occupation” and another reflecting on “the reasons that would bring it to an end.”

...On the role of religious leaders, he stressed the need for spiritual revival: “If the Muslims are close to Allah, then Palestine will be close to their hearts. But if the Muslims are far away from Allah, Palestine won’t be.”

He recalled how an Israeli prime minister once remarked that “as long as the Muslims are not (performing) fajr (dawn prayers) in the masjid, they are still safe.”

For Gabriels, this reflected the urgent responsibility of scholars “to bring the Muslims closer to Allah and closer to their Deen (religion) and closer to the Quran.”

He emphasized that the Palestinian issue is not only political but moral and universal: “The issue of Gaza, the issue of Palestine, the issue of Al-Aqsa, it’s not a Palestinian issue. It is an issue of humanity and more so an issue of Muslims.”

MEMRI's report relates to the resolutions:

"A call for all countries, especially the Islamic ones, to immediately sever all their relations with the occupying Zionist entity and with anyone who supports it – including political, economic and military [ties] – in accordance with the principles of the Islamic shari'a and international law, which enjoin [us] to battle tyranny and restrain the occupation and its ongoing violations.

"The shari'a forbids maintaining commercial ties, or anything resembling them, with the occupying Zionists, or to allow their ships to traverse the waterways of the Islamic countries. This ruling applies to individuals, companies and governments.

"A call on Muslim scholars to urge mass demonstrations and protest strikes, and on governments to respect the civil rights of their peoples and remove all restrictions on public liberties – especially on freedom of expression and the right to demonstrate peacefully and express support for Gaza and opposition to the continuation of the war – as required by international charters of human rights.

"The decisions of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court must be implemented, and the international justice system must commence proceedings against the perpetrators of the crimes of extermination, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza… We demand that the Islamic countries and the free countries establish criminal tribunals in their territory to prosecute the war criminals…

"The IUMS contends that the countries likely to be harmed by the 'Greater Israel' plan [i.e. Jordan, Lebanon and Syria] bear the responsibility of dealing with  the enemy's plans and initiating tangible and pragmatic measures to deter it and confront it…"[10]

And most recently, this analysis from November last month:

Turkey’s return to great power status   November 6, 2025

Sumantra Maitra

A resurgent Turkey is returning to its Ottoman roots as an essential and influential pivot in the Eurasian balance of power.

Vigilance is required.

^

Judea, Samaria and...Tahpanhes, Egypt

In a recent academic archaeological article you can read of Judean Jews who are soldiers arriving in Egypt. The article is "Judeans and Samarians at Tahpanhes: Speculating on the Identity of the King in Papyrus Amherst 63" by Marshall A. Cunningham in Advances in Ancient, Biblical, and Near Eastern Research  4, no. 1 (Spring, 2024).

Cunningham highlights similarities between the story in the Papyrus record and the story of  the prophet Jeremiah’s forced flight to Egypt in Jeremiah 40–44.  Finally, he suggests that the two accounts are similar enough to use the Jeremianic version.

He thereby provides another ex-Biblical source that could possibly confirm the truth of Biblical history. He identifies the unnamed king as Apries, the fourth pharaoh of the Twenty-sixth Dynasty, and the royal outpost of  Tahpanhes as the site where he receives the Judean and  Samarian caravan.

Excerpts:

Papyrus Amherst 63, a scroll featuring a collection of Aramaic compo-sitions written in Demotic script, features a short narrative concerning the arrival of a group of Judean and Samarian refugees to an unnamed royal outpost. At this outpost, they are received by an  unnamed king who welcomes them into his kingdom with an offer to sustain them...The narrative of the Judean and Samarian caravan occurs in col. xvii of P. Amh. 632...the text opens with narration in the first person...When asked their place of origin, a spokesman for the caravan answers:ʾ[n(h)] ⸢mn⸣-[y]hwd ’t(h) [I] come from [Y]ehud. ’ḥy mn-šmry⸢n⸣ m{m}y⸢t⸣(y) My brother is brought from Samaria. pkʿt ʾdm ⸢m⸣sq ’ḥty myrwšl{l}m And now a man is bringing my sister up from Jerusalem.

...In a recent article on when the Judean garrison at Yeb was established, Kahn (2022, 154)  has  connected this scene with the description of the Elamite jackal causing chaos in Rash’s temples in the preceding column, suggesting Rash as the caravan’s point of origin...

...While the details surrounding the scene are vague, there is strong evidence to suggest that the Judean and Samarian caravan is to be understood as a group of refugees: displaced soldiers and their families fleeing war and seeking shelter. First of all, the narrator identifies the band of Samarians as a gys, [גיס] a “troop” (l. 1).

... a comparison with a similar account of migration to Egypt may allow us to fill in some of  the omitted details. Jeremiah 40–44 narrates the prophet Jeremiah’s forced flight from Judah in the aftermath of a political assassination of the Babylonian-appointed governor, Gedaliah, and his supporters. While the traveling party in that narrative is primarily composed of Judeans fleeing  Babylonian reprisal, it does include a group of Samarians that had been taken captive by the rebel Ishmael outside Mizpah. Notably, the group includes men of fighting age alongside their families (41:16; 44). Finally, according to Jeremiah 43:7–9, the Judeans and Samarians in  Jeremiah’s  caravan made their first stop at the Egyptian city of  Tahpanhes (תחפנחס). Once there, the prophet received an oracle that began by identifying the city as the site of a royal palace  (בית פרעה) before performing a sign-act and announcing Pharaoh’s (and the caravan’s) impending devastation at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian army (43:8–12)...

Impressive.

And another study there, posits that the Damascus Document, in existence before its earliest copy 4Q266 was produced in the first half of the first century BCE, employs a rhetorical use of  the terms “Israel,” “Ephraim,” and “Judah”.

^ 

Raz Segal: A "Liar-for-his-Cause"?

One Raz Segal, an Assoc Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies Stockton Univ, writing in the UK Guardian, once a very pro-Zionist newspaper in Manchester before it moved down to London, among other things describes Israel thus:

"a self-proclaimed exclusionary settler state – what Ze’ev Jabotinsky, the father of revisionist Zionism, described in his well-known essay from 1923 as a settler colonial project that can only work with an “Iron Wall.”

As readers of my blog know (and others can use the search engine), Jabotinsky did not advance an "exclusionary" character for the Jewish state or the idea of "racial supremacy". Moreover, the usage of "Jewish" indicates a nationality just like all other countries. Jabotinsky, a liberal democrat, envisioned full civic equality for all resident citizens of the future Jewish state. His last testament on the matter is his 1940 "The War and the Jew".

One can read the book here.

Here's p. 215:

216

217

218

Any fair reader would necessarily come to the conclusion that Segal is either an ignoramus, or unintelligent or, most likely, a liar-for-his-cause.

The idea of an "Iron Wall" was simply an expression of a firm, impenetrable defense system, not a physical structure, that would not allow the repeat of the 1920 and 1921 Arab murderous riots against Jews in Jerusalem and Jaffa. His idea was replacing unreliable British forces with Jewish soldiers and police. And as we saw on October 7, 2023, that wall was still necessary and continues to be.

UPDATE

Although Raz mentions the "Iron Wall" essay, he leaves out the opening lines that contradict his charaterization of Jabotinsky, who wrote:

I am reputed to be an enemy of the Arabs, who wants to have them ejected from Palestine, and so forth. It is not true.

Emotionally, my attitude to the Arabs is the same as to all other nations –

polite indifference. Politically, my attitude is determined by two principles. First of

all, I consider it utterly impossible to eject the Arabs from Palestine. There will

always be two nations in Palestine – which is good enough for me, provided the Jews become the majority. And secondly, I belong to the group that once drew up the Helsingfors Programme, the programme of national rights for all nationalities living in the same State. In drawing up that programme, we had in mind not only the Jews, but all nations everywhere, and its basis is equality of rights.

I am prepared to take an oath binding ourselves and our descendants that we

shall never do anything contrary to the principle of equal rights, and that we shall

never try to eject anyone. This seems to me a fairly peaceful credo.

But it is quite another question whether it is always possible to realise a

peaceful aim by peaceful means. For the answer to this question does not depend on our attitude to the Arabs; but entirely on the attitude of the Arabs to us and to

Zionism. 

^

Peter Beinart: Before and After

 Peter Beinart tweeted:

Tonight, I’m going to speak at Tel Aviv University. I know many people who I respect will think this was the wrong decision given that Israel—as widely recognized by experts on international law—practices not only apartheid but genocide. I support full equality for Israel’s Palestinian citizens, an end to the occupation and the right of Palestinian refugees to return. I support many forms of boycott, divestment and sanction against Israel and Israeli institutions. I have repeatedly advocated implementing the Leahy Law, which would radically restrict—if not end—US arms sales to Israel. I support the European Union ending its free trade agreement with Israel. I support ending Israeli participation in sports and cultural arenas like FIFA and Eurovision. I support these things because I don’t believe that Israel will end its oppression of the Palestinian people and move towards equality under the law and historical justice without outside pressure. But I believe there is value in speaking to Israelis about Israel’s crimes. I have spent much of my adult life speaking to Jews about Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. In that effort, I have conducted public discussions with many people whose views I consider immoral and spoken at many institutions that are based on principles with which I profoundly disagree. These include institutions like Tel Aviv University that are in various ways complicit in Israeli oppression. I do so because I want to reach Jews who disagree with me—because I believe that by trying to convince Jews to rethink their support for Israel’s oppression of Palestinians, I can contribute, in some very small way, to the struggle for freedom and justice. I don’t have many opportunities to speak to Israelis. As it is, right-wing Israeli organizations have pressured Tel Aviv University to cancel my talk. I felt I should take advantage of this opportunity to say in Israel what I’ve been saying elsewhere for the last two years. I know many people I admire will disagree with this logic. But it stems from my desire to challenge Jewish supremacy and see the end of Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people.

and then tweeted:

By speaking earlier this week at Tel Aviv University, I made a serious mistake. In the past, when formulating my views about Israel-Palestine, I’ve sought out Palestinian friends and interlocutors and listened carefully to their views. In this case, I did not. I really wanted to speak to Israelis. In the US, I’ve cultivated conversations with Jews with whom I strongly disagree, both to listen and in hopes of changing their minds. Over the horrifying last two years, I’ve hoped for more conversations with Israelis, to explain why I believe Israel has committed genocide in Gaza and why I believe Jewish supremacy is fundamentally wrong. My motivation for giving the talk wasn’t financial; I didn’t receive an honorarium. I wanted to say certain things to an Israeli audience. Speaking at Tel Aviv University seemed to offer that chance. I let my desire for that conversation override my solidarity with Palestinians, who in the face of ethnic cleansing, apartheid and genocide have asked the world boycott Israeli institutions that are complicit in their oppression. As Noura Erakat and others have pointed out, there are ways for me to talk to Israelis without violating BDS guidelines and undermining a collective effort against oppression. I could have had the exchange I desired while respecting a non-violent movement based on human rights and international law. Had I listened more to Palestinians, I would have realized that earlier. It’s embarrassing to admit such a serious mistake. I dearly wish I had not made this one, which has caused particular harm because international pressure is crucial to ensuring Palestinian freedom. This was a failure of judgment. I am sorry.

That reminded me of a Soviet show trial confession

^

UPDATE:

Read this blog post.

And this one.

^

The Jewish/Israel Left in the Eyes of Efraim Kishon

"The overt and joyful instinct for self-destruction is the national trait that has accompanied the conflicted Jewish tribe since its exodus from Egypt. The tradition of self-hatred has been woven like as a thread throughout Jewish history with its horrific consequences, as if it were a pathological curse passed down from father to son and son to grandson until the end of time. These days, this Jewish tendency is expressed in the fashionable, overt and covert skepticism regarding our right to resettle in the Land of Israel. Many people ask themselves whether the Palestinians are not entitled to demand our departure from here, and those with a conscience are tormented by the injustice we did to the refugees at the end of the Arab war of extermination that turned into a Jewish war of liberation. The Russians have no scruples about having conquered vast territories after their last war, which never belonged to them or their ancestors, and they have no scruples about tormenting the Czech people for the organized deportation of three million Sudeten people. The Poles also have no noticeable pangs of conscience about their cheerful annexations, the Turks have no scruples about wholesale 'population transfers', the Greeks have none, the Bulgarians have none, the Indians have none, the Pakistanis have none, and the Americans have none. Only the Israelis possess them.

The intellectual of conscience among us sees the expulsion of the million Jews from Arab countries as a historical process that cannot be reversed, while the flight of the Arabs, due to their campaign of killing along the lines of the Gush Etzion bloc, he sees as a terrible crime. The conscientious man believes that the twelve million square kilometers of Arab countries, an area larger than that of Europe, are not enough to absorb the refugees. The conscientious man finds that the residents of Bir'am and Ikrit were uprooted from their homes and transferred to another place in stealth and deceit, while the Jews of Hebron were massacred in a brutal manner, and therefore the people of Bir'am must be returned, but the residents of Hebron are forbidden. 

The Israeli-with-a-conscience understands the spirit of Yasser Arafat; is remarkably matter-of-fact and realistic about the national motives of this mass murderer; about our cruel and vile enemy and he is impressed by the legitimate right of the Palestinian liberation movements to chop off the heads of our children in schools with axes...

The Israeli-with-a-conscience is full of universal understanding. He hates only one thing: hate.

The Israeli-with-a-conscience is mentally ill."

From "A Smile Amidst a Drought", 1978

^

The Beinart/Nerdeen conversation

Within Our Lifetime/Palestine Nerdeen Kiswani tweeted, reacting to Zohran Mamdani's condemnation of the swastika daubings:

There’s no “scourge of antisemitism” in NYC. Acts like these, while reprehensible, are often weaponized to justify Zionist narratives and repression of Palestine solidarity. Many past “antisemitic” scares turned out to be fake, like the Israeli Jewish teenager who made hundreds of bomb threats to U.S. synagogues in 2017. Norman Finkelstein has spoken about how “antisemitism” in the U.S. is largely a political tool, not a real social phenomenon. Mamdani shouldn’t be validating this framing.

Peter Beinart responded:

Your response to a swastika at a yeshiva is to condemn the mayor for condemning it? Because that might imply that antisemitism is a "real social phenomenon?" Yes, like other bigotries, it's a "real social phenomenon." If you don't believe me, ask the 1 million people who follow Nick Fuentes on this platform

Nerdeen reacted:

Antisemitism is not a systemic structural issue in the U.S. everyone knows this except for professional victims. There is a nazi problem in the U.S. and sadly many of these Nazis are Jewish people. In fact many Jewish people proudly proclaim that 95% of Jews are Nazis (zionists) which even I said was a bit much. If you want to truly fight against the nazi problem, I suggest you start with your own community. 

 

Nerdeen continued:

You really have some nerve, grifting and writing books about “after” the genocide of my people as it’s still ongoing, to completely reframe what I was saying. I never condemned his condemnation of the graffiti, I explicitly called it reprehensible myself. I took issue with the implication that there’s an antisemitism problem in NYC and cited Norman Finkelstein on the idea that it’s not a social phenomenon. He talks about it in the context of the US, I referenced NYC.
There’s no structural disadvantage to being Jewish like there is to being Palestinian, and you know that. You’re being purposely obtuse. You can pander to the anti genocide line but you’re still a liberal zionist.

Nerdeen adds:

For those who are new here, especially the self-proclaimed anti- or “non-Zionists” (whatever that’s supposed to mean), antisemitism is not a structural issue in the United States. Jews are positioned as white in America, holding access to power, wealth, and protection under the same systems that oppress Black, brown, and Indigenous people. That doesn’t mean antisemitism doesn’t exist in individual attitudes, but it isn’t systemic in the way anti-Blackness or Islamophobia are. It’s not upheld by the state or capital, it’s weaponized by them to silence criticism of Israel and uphold Zionism.  

It may be still going on.

P.S.  Nerdeen's core belief:

For those that are new here, saying “Israel has a right to exist, just not as a Jewish state” isn’t anti-Zionism, it’s liberal Zionism. The question isn’t what kind of Israel, it’s how Israel came to exist, which is through genocide. Anti-Zionism necessitates decolonization.

P.P.S.   But is she really that bad? Here:

^

What Is Meant by Zionists by the term 'Colonization'?

 Anti-Zionists and the pro-Palestine propagandist point to the use by Zionist leaders of the term "colonization" as an indication they were, well, colonizing.

Here's a Ze'ev Jabotinsky quotation:

That's from 1922, his first visit to America at the head of a delegation of the Keren HaYesod. As an extra "bonues", he compares what is to be done in the Mandate territory to what was done to America's native population.

As can be readily comprehended, by the use of the term, Jabotinsky is referring not to a process whereby a country that does not belong to you is taken over and subjugated - militarly, economically or otherwise and its popualtion is done away with, physically or socially - but simply the various forms of rebuilding a country through agriculture and industry. It is the mechanics of how it is done not an imperial design to transfer a population from another part of the world into a territory you have no connection with as England, Holland, Belgium, Germany yand other Europeans countries did. And Arabs were involved in sharing this economic resurgence of the country even within the Histadrut but eventaully, their political opposition overroad their good sense.

^

^

Who was a "Palestinian Arab"?

Aside from the argument whether the Arabs resident in the area of historic Palestine (there was never a geopolitical country of 'Palestine') conisdered themselves as "Palestinian" or "Syrian" or "Southern Syrian", or "El-Shamites" or whether others viewed them as such, I have found a 1940 reference to the term.

Interstingly enough, it comes within the framework of the application of apartheid - whether Jews could purchase land in various Zones following the adoption of the 1939 White Paper and the 1940 Land Transfers Regulations.

Article 9 reads:

For the purposes of these regulations :-

"Palestinian Arab" shall be deemed to be an Arab who is ordinarily resident in Palestine. In case of any dispute as to whether a person is an Arab or whether he is ordinarily resident in Palestine, the question shall be referred to the High Commissioner whose decision thereon shall be final;

Residency is the defining feature of identity. Not nationality, not culture, not identification, not langauge, history or religion.

As we know, it was only in 1925 that a Palestine Nationality Law was enacted for the Mandate.

By the way, on March 6, 1940, MP Noel-Baker (Derby) moved a motion in the British Parliament: 

That this House regrets that, disregarding the expressed opinion of the Permanent Mandates Commission that the policy contained in the White Paper on Palestine was inconsistent wtih the terms of the Mandate, and without the authority of the Council of the League of Nations, His Majesty's Government have authorised the issue of regulations controlling the transfer of land which discriminate unjustly against one section of the inhabitants of Palestine...

It would seem logical that if residency was the defining term, Jews were also Palestinians, at least at that time. So, was their nationality "Palestinian"?

Mamdani the Elder in 2004

It seems that I never uploaded this post from 2015. But now that his son is running for election as New York City's next mayor with his 2023 Not On Our Dime Bill lurking, I realized it should appear as better late than never.

The things one finds as in “Representing Settlers” by Assaf Harel -

Mahmood Mamdani (2004. Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: Post-Apartheid Perspectives on America and Israel, PoLAR 27(1):1-15), for instance, opened a recent lecture by claiming that “The violence of the settler and the suicide bomber, more than any other, has come to define the contemporary work of terrorism and counter-terrorism.” [he establishes equality and equivalency] The settler has come to represent unbridgeable difference from the secular, liberal humanists of the West. [does the PLO, PA and/or Hamas do something to Western liberalism?] At the same time the settlement project in Israeli post-1967 occupied territories is seen as a break from the previous trajectory of the Israeli state. These depictions have become widely acceptable, especially in liberal academic circles. But they are not only analytically weak, they actually participate in a political purpose that might be unintended. As we have seen, many studies (Lustick 1988; Lustick 1993; Silberstein 1993; Sivan 1995; Feige 2003; Zertal and Eldar 2007) emphasize ideological differences or point to the settler project inthe Occupied Territories as having fundamentally altered the foundations of Israeli society. This discursive construction depicts religious settlers and their project as different from legitimate Israeli state practices by inscribing a moral high ground for those who vilify and denounce the settlers in the Occupied Territories.

The “settlers’” project, it would seem, is not really Zionism at all, [as if all that went on previously, of Jews emigrating and repatriating back to the Jewish historic homeland, resettling and creating agricultural communities throughout the centuries is not Zionism] and so the Zionism of mainstream Israel is morally elevated in its distinction from beliefs and practices in the Occupied Territories. Religiously motivated settlers are often condemned for the violence of their settlement project. This includes both the structural violence of territorial expansion and the face-to-face violence between settlers and Palestinians. Yet if we move beyond demonizing religious settlers and seek instead to apply a post-structural istanalytical framework to them, then we must seek commonalities with those who currently oppose these settlers.

Did Peter Beinart read that and become influenced? 

^

Mahmood Mamdani on Israel

Mahmood Mamdani, the father of, specializes, among other topics, in "settler-colonialsinm" and I thought I'd like to see what he thinks/writes about Israel and Zionism.

From his 2015 article, "Settler Colonialism: Then and Now":-

Walzer considered the colonial question to be a historical relic: the rights of “aboriginal peoples like the Native Americans or the Maori in New Zealand . . . are eroded with time.” This erasure in time, this dimming of memory, according to Walzer, was true also of  Palestinians inside Israel but not, for some reason, of ancient Israelites. Walzer never gives us a reason for this Israeli exceptionalism.

I'll provide a reason: Jews never yielded or surrendered their national identity, their longing for their homeland and, more importantly, the traveling to the Land of Israel, residing in it after emigrating to it and supporting it financially in all the centuries since the loss of Jewish political independence in 135 CE. Never.

Their proto-Zionism endeavors were made to and known to many non-Jewish heads of state and politicians and military leaders and religious leaders for 1800 years.

On the other hand, no one knew of a group of people called "Palestinians". In fact, "Palestine" was a replacement name for the Holy Land which was the Jewish homeland. They knew Arabs lived in the area but they came in the 7th century as conquerors and occupiers, just as the Romans, the Byzantines and the Persians before them.

A few pages later, Mamdani the Elder writes:-

"It is worth recalling the statement of Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, the former president of Tanzania, to a visiting Palestinian delegation in the 1960s, that Palestinians had suffered a fate worse than had South Africans. In Nyerere’s words: We only lost our independence, you lost your country!"

They didn't actually lose a country. They rejected a state, twice, in 1937 and 1947, intending that the Jews should not have their state after partition proposals were made to reduce violence. If they hadn't gone to war on November 30, 1947, and lost, they would have been in their towns and villages - in Israel.

At the end of the 1948 war, Arabs were left in Israel despite hundreds of thousands fleeing. In the eastern neigborhoods of Jerusalem, Hebron and other locations where Jews managed to continue to reside during the Mandate period in Judea and Samaria, Jews were completely ethnically cleansed from those areas. They lost home and a country that had been promised to them by the international community of nations.

Another excerpt:-

"in Israel, the state guarantees equal political rights for Jewish and Palestinian citizens. But that is where equal treatment ends. Like American Indians in reservations, Palestinian Israelis may have the right to vote or even to be elected to office, but they live under a state of exception that denies them constitutionally defensible civil rights."

What 'civil rights' are denied? And what of the civil rights of Jews in Jordan? Syria? Libya? Iraq? And on and on. Oh, and Arabs in Israel do not live in reservations.

I won't go through his other articles but think it enough to point to crooked thinking, misleading argumenation and misrepresentation of history and the present.

As for his son, Zohran, perhaps the apple has not fallen far from the tree?

^

Taking Israelis Hostage ... in 1948

From the pages of the Palestine Post in November 1948, reporting on an event on the night of November 5:

and then the next month:

^

Arabs Doing Arab Propaganda

I found this timeline here and selected on minor section to highlight how Arab propaganda works.

Item 1:

Jewish existed in Europe, and in every single location where a Jewish community existed in the Diaspora, for some 1800 cenutries since the loss of Jewish politicall sovereignty over Judea in 135 CE. Before that, Jewish nationalism caused the exiles in Babylon from the First Temple's destrauction in 586 BCE to 'return to Zion'.

Item 2:

The first wave of immigration is a misnomer. Jews constantly, consistently and continuously returned to the Land of Israel over the centuries.  Just one example, Rabbi Moses ben Nachman Girondi, the Ramban, moved to Israel in 1267 and visited several cities including Hebron.

Item 3:

The seven 'colonies' referred to are meant to indicate Jews are recent. First of all, 'colonies' is misleading as that was the term in contemporary usage for farming communities. Second, Petah Tikva, also a 'colony', was founded already in 1878 and Jews were resiiding in Jerusalem, Tiberias, Hebron and Peki'in in the Galilee for centuries in addition to other small communities.

I could make this long and detailed but I think my point is clear: Arab propaganda corrupts the facts, lies, misrepresents, leaves out anything that will distrupt their messaging and twists things about.

^

^

The Naqba: Caused by Israel or by the Arabs' Own Weaknesses?

I maintain: the "naqba" was a defeat of the Arabs by their own weaknesses as asserted by Constantin Zureiq in his summer of 1948 book.

Now another source: From the U. of Chicago's The Journal of Politics, Volume 18, Number 3 (1956) review of Dynamite in the Middle East by Khalil Totah, 1955:

And another review, from Political Research Quarterly, University of Utah, Volume 9 Issue 2, June 1956:

"...his account is notable for an equal frankness concerning Arab shortcomings, particularly the corruption in Arab governments and the illiteracy and poverty of the Arab masses.

Naively or deliberately he omits the entire Jewish record of transforming unpopulated swamps and desert land into oases of human settlement in Palestine, as well as the historic fact that the Arabs themselves came as conquerors into Palestine during the eighth century and imposed their national habits as well as the Islamic religion on the conquered of the area.

At no time will Totah grant the Jews with their historic and religious connection in Palestine the right of a dignified national and cultural existence.

...This reviewer can only express his utmost bewilderment at how an educated Arab who professes to be a Christian can advocate the most ruthless power politics with complete disregard for the human and ethical problem. In spite or perhaps because of all this, this book should be widely read.

Apart from conveying a solid analysis of Arab nationalism and a vivid picture of the dynastic rivalries and economic problems in Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan, the book affords a most interesting insight into the mentality of the intellectual leadership of the Arab world and its position in the great East-West struggle of our time.

^

What did 'colonization' mean in the 1920s?

One of the sleights-of-language employed by pro-Arab propagandists to "prove" that Zionism is colonialism is that the Zionist themselves used that term. And the even called their kibbutzim "colonies".

One favoriate example is this section from Jabotinsky's Iron Wall:

          My readers have a general idea of the history of colonisation in other countries. I suggest that they consider all the precedents with which they are acquainted, and see whether there is one solitary instance of any colonisation being carried on with the consent of the native population. There is no such  precedent...It does not matter at all which phraseology we employ in explaining our colonising aims, Herzl's or Sir Herbert Samuel's.  Colonisation carries its own explanation, the only possible explanation, unalterable and as clear as daylight to every ordinary Jew and every ordinary Arab. Colonisation can have only one aim, and Palestine Arabs cannot accept this aim.

As we all know, language usage alters and means one thing in one period and another in a different period.

Here is an example from this 1927 issue of a progressive magazine:

I've excerpted from one page and you can see that the term colonialization is used too describe what Russian Jews are doing in Birobyzhan, which is agricultural work. Zionism's first stage was returning Jews to their land in a very physical sense - becoming farmers. Socialist Zionists made it a "religion of labor". It did not mean intentionally taking over a country that one did nt have a claim to and ot kick the residents out but rather simply to bring the Jews back in.

The charge of settler-colonialism is false and misleading.

^

Palestinian Arabs Mentioned 1946

The Arabs of the Mandate for Palestine very rarely related to themselves as "Palestinian Arabs". The documents show that after the end of World War One and into the 1920s, they preferred to be termed Syrians and demanded that the territory of "Palestine" be "reunited with Syria". A Palestinian nationality only came into being officially in 1925, due to Zionist pressure.

Even the representative groups used the term "Arab" rather than "Palestinian", the most prominent example being the Arab Higher Committee which led the Arab Revolt of 1936-1939. I refer to the term as an example of inventivity.

"Palestinians" for the most part were the Jews.

Nevertheless, I have found the term "Palestinian Arabs" used by Arabs if very sparingly.

One additioonal source is this booklet, The Palestine Reality, by Jabir Shibli, first published in 1946 to counter the post-World War Two claims by the Zionist movement. Only 32 pages long, only two out of the three useages of "Palestinian" refer to the Arab population of the Mandate, and both are on page 23.

^

The Smol Emuni Letter on Gaza

 The Smol Emuni Letter on Gaza

A Call for Moral Clarity, Responsibility, and a Jewish Orthodox Response in the Face of the Gaza Humanitarian Crisis

(This statement was authored by Rabbi Yosef Blau and signed by many Torat Chayim rabbinic members although he is not a member and some of the others below are also not members)

​​The humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza is one of the most severe in recent history. While it began with the horrific terrorist attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, 2023—a brutal act that justifiably demanded a strong military response and demand for the release of the hostages—this does not absolve Israel’s government from assuming its share of the responsibility for the profound suffering of Gaza’s civilian population.

Hamas’s actions have repeatedly shown a cynical disregard for the lives of the people it claims to represent, using civilians as human shields and rejecting ceasefire proposals. However, Israel’s prolonged military campaign, now approaching two years, has devastated Gaza. The death toll is rising with very significant losses of lives, and Israel’s limiting of humanitarian aid, at times completely halting the entry of food and medical supplies, has raised the specter of coming starvation. We affirm that Hamas's sins and crimes do not relieve the government of Israel of its obligations to make whatever efforts are necessary to prevent mass starvation.

There have been months when Israel blocked humanitarian convoys on the mistaken premise that increased suffering would bring about Hamas’s surrender. Instead, the result has been the deepening of despair. The justified anger toward Hamas has dangerously expanded by some extremists into blanket suspicion of the entire population of Gaza—children included—tarnished as future terrorists. Meanwhile, in Yehuda and Shomron (the West Bank), extremist settler violence has resulted in the murder of civilians and has forced Palestinian villagers from their homes, further destabilizing the region.

Amid this devastation, the absence of a clear post-war vision from Prime Minister Netanyahu has allowed the most extreme voices in the Israeli government—including ministers from the religious Zionist community—to fill the vacuum with disturbing proposals. These include the forced “voluntary” exile of Palestinians from Gaza and the sacrifice of remaining Israeli hostages in the pursuit of an elusive “total victory.”

This moment demands a different voice—one grounded in our deepest Jewish values and informed by our traumatic history of being victims of persecution. 

Orthodox Jewry, as some of Israel’s most devoted supporters, bears a unique moral responsibility. We must affirm that Judaism’s vision of justice and compassion extends to all human beings. Our tradition teaches that every person is created b’tzelem Elokim—in the Divine image. We are the spiritual descendants of Avraham, chosen to walk in the path of Hashem, “to do righteousness and justice” (Bereshit 18:19). Allowing an entire people to starve stands in stark contrast to this teaching.

As we reflect on Tisha B’Av, the words of our prophets ring with renewed urgency. The Haftorah of Shabbat Chazon reminds us: “Zion shall be redeemed through justice, and those who return to her through righteousness” (Yeshayahu 1:27). And on the morning of Tisha B’Av, the voice of Yirmiyahu echoes through our prayers: “Let not the wise glory in their wisdom...but in this: that they understand and know Me, that I am the Lord who practices kindness, justice, and righteousness on the earth—for in these I delight” (Yirmiyahu 9:23).

These are not just poetic phrases. They are the foundations of our ethical obligation—to demand policies that uphold human dignity, to provide humanitarian aid wherever possible, and to speak out when our government’s actions contradict the Torah’s moral imperatives, no matter how painful this may be to accept.

The future of Israel depends not only on its military strength but on its moral clarity. Let us be resounding voices for justice, righteousness, and peace for all people—even and especially in the hardest of times.

^