The Downfall Of Palestine And The Rise Of Israel

By Ismail Amsyar Mohd Said This is the first of the two part series on the Jewish conspiracy to carve out the Palestine state. This first part looks in retrospect how Palestinian land was confiscated and the rise of a Jewish state. KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 16 (Bernama) – A nonagenarian who was resting at the sacred Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem was approached by a representative of a Jewish setup that wanted to buy the land of the Palestinians. "Ye old man, do you want to sell your land to a Jew?" asked the representative. The astounded old man replied: "Yes why not. However, there is a condition that you have to fulfill. "You have to get the consent of all the Muslims on this earth and the permission of all the Muslim babies born after this." The startled representative replied; "This is ridiculous, something impossible. How are we going to get those signatures?" The old man answered: "That is how impossible it is for me to sell the land to you." This analogy was provided by Sheikh Raed Solah to Bernama during an exclusive interview with Bernama some time back showed Palestinians were never ready to give up their land. Sheikh Raed has been fighting for the return of the occupied Jerusalem and the Al-Aqsa to Palestine. Sadly, though the Palestinians did not want to part with their land, Israel’s land area has been growing while Palestine’s has been reduced to West Bank and the Gaza Strip, no thanks to Israel’s aggression and hegemony since 1948. Jerusalem, where the Al-Aqsa is located, is considered sacred by the Christians, Muslims and Jews. Hence, the ancient city has been claimed by the adherents of the three faiths and left under purview of neutral party – the international community. However, on Dec 6, 2017, American President Donald Trump recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, ending Palestine’s claim over the city and further reducing the country’s land area. THE BEGINNING OF THE WOES FOR PALESTINE Palestine’s woes goes far back in time. The epochs of Persians, Romans, Muslims, The Crusaders, Tatars (Mongol) and even as recently as the Ottoman and the British Empire led to the country’s many predicaments. Humanitarian Care Malaysia (MyCARE) chairman Dr Hafidzi Mohd Noor provided some insights on the trials and tribulations of Palestine in its modern history, starting with World War I (WWI). During WWI, the Allied Power especially Britain and France succeeded in unseating the Ottoman Empire that straddled from east to west covering Palestine and much of the Arab land as well. Hafidzi noted defeating the Ottoman Empire was particularly important to Britain as can be seen in the words of Sir Winston Churchill; “Constantinople is better than London and Paris put together. That’s how valuable Constantinople is. If you control Constantinople, you will control Palestine.” Constantinople was the seat of the Ottoman Empire and since has been renamed Istanbul. During WW1 Churchill was the First Lord of the British Admiralty and he would rise to become the prime minister during World War II (WWII). In 1917 the British with the help of their Australian counterpart managed to capture the empire’s stronghold of Barsheeba, now the administrative centre of Negev in south of Israel. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the countries under the empire were divided through the British and French mandate with Palestine and Iraq ending up under the former. THE CALL FOR JEWS TO THEIR ANCESTRAL LAND By the end of the 18th century, there was another development that no one imagined could pose a serious threat to Palestine – the rise of Zionism that set the goal of Jews returning to their promised land as stated in the book of Torah. Zionism promoted by Theodore Herzl aimed at establishing a publicly and legally assured home for the Jews in Palestine, stated the manifesto issued during the inaugural Zionism Congress in Basel in Aug 30, 1897. He was well aware then that the Jews were unwelcomed in Europe. However, initially, several locations including Argentina in South America, and Uganda and Tanzania in Africa were considered but the Jews saw these locations had no cultural or religious significance to them, unlike Palestine. Herzl planned to meet the last ruler of the Ottoman Empire, Sultan Abdul Hamid II, twice in 1896 and 1901, in the hope of buying over Palestinian land by paying the empire’s accrued debts or acquire the rights for the Jews to domicile in Palestine. “Abdul Hamid, however, never gave face to Herzl and this how he ended up going to the British to seek their help after the sun set on the Ottoman Empire,” said Hafidzi. THE BALFOUR DECLARATION It was the most opportune moment for Herzl to put forth the idea of a nation for the Jews to the British, especially when there was already an established platform for the Jews in Britain - Zionist Federation of Britain. “Herzl succeeded in lobbying the House of Commons to consider the goal of Zionism and hence on 2 Nov 1917 the Balfour declaration was signed by Britain’s Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour,” said Hafidzi. “After the Union Jack came down in Jerusalem on 14 May the same year, David Ben Gurion, the founder of Israel and its first prime minister declared the birth of Israel the following day,” he said adding that the Arabs declared the episode as An-Nakbah or ‘catastrophe’. Initially, Jews started moving to Palestine in small numbers. However, after the Holocaust where almost six million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis under Adolf Hitler from 1933-1945 the Jews arrived in vast numbers and started displacing the Palestinians. Subsequently, in 1947, the Jewish state was legalised when the United Nations (UN) approved Resolution 181, the Partition Plan whereby Palestine was to be divided into two with Israel as the other nation. As the claim on Jerusalem was a point of contention involving both sides, it was placed under international control. Hafidzi pointed out under the partition plan, 55 percent of the land area in Palestine was allocated for the Jews while rest to the Palestinians. However, unfortunately Palestine lost more land due to Arab-Israeli wars and land grab by the Jews even up to now. The Rhodes Armistice following the 1947-1949 war between Israel and its Arab neighbours handed over more territories to Israel, with Israel occupying 78 percent of the Palestine’s land area now. THE ARAB ANTAGONISM The Arab nations were also incensed with the presence of a Jewish state at their neighbourhood and the testament to this is the subsequent Arab-Israeli wars including the Six-Day War of 1967, where Israel grabbed West Bank from Jordan, Golan Heights from Syria, and Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula from Egypt. The Palestine Liberation Organisation under Yasser Arafat launched the intifada to liberate the country from the so called Israeli occupation but without much success. The Jews brutally displaced the Palestinians right from the start including the Deir Yassin massacare in April 1948. Even now Jewish settlers have been encroaching Palestine territories to drive out the Palestinians and stake claim on their land. Jerusalem, where the Al Aqsa is located is divided into West and East Jerusalem with the latter within the Arab quarter and hence that is why the sacred mosque comes under Jordan’s administration. However, now with Trump’s decision on Jerusalem, Israel once again emerged victorious and Palestine’s borders had shrunk further. There is no sign of Israel stopping its hegemony and hence Palestine may one day end up in the footnote of history. -- BERNAMA