Whose Leaders are Natives of Eretz Yisrael?

Nadene Goldfoot                                                                  

                                                      Jews of Israel

Lots of static has been coming from the Palestinians in their offense against Jews by saying that Ashkenazi Jews are not native to Israel and should not be there.  Historically, the land was almost desolate after 70 CE when Rome attacked Jerusalem and burned it.  They took away many Jews as slaves but left some in the land.  Conquerors were also in the habit of moving out people from the conquered land to another in order to shake up the leadership.
                                                                     

                                               Kibbutz Degania Alef and its Sabras

Arabs have been very nomadic and only a few owned land by the time Ashkenazi Jews returned from Russia.  They came to settle in their first and successive large groups of Jews called an Alliyah in the 1880's.  It was like the land was waiting for Jews to return and nourish it as it was in terrible condition of being either swampy with only mosquitoes living in it or had become a desert. The only thing growing were plenty of weeds.   When the Christian writer, Mark Twain, visited the "Holy Land" starting on February 1, 1867, it was fairly desolate.
                                                                     

                                             A Sabra couple on a Moshav

As Israel's National Anthem, Hatikvah,  points out, so long as still within our breasts the Jewish heart beats true;  so long as still towards the Easts to Zion  looks the Jew;  so long our hopes are not yet lost--Two thousand years we cherished them--to live in freedom in the land  of Zion and Jerusalem.

Joan Peters, another Christian reporter did a deep research into the settling of Palestine and came up with facts that Palestinians cannot disprove.  Her book, "From Time Immemorial"-the origins of the Arab-Jewish conflict over Palestine is all from the actual records; not heresay.  Barbara Tuchman said that Joan's research made a superlative book.  Joan went back to the past and traces to the present with her unmatched skill as a researcher.  This book strikes a heavy blow against the broad consensus of who the Palestinians are and where they came from.  To sum it up quickly which she proves, they came in from neighboring lands near and far in order to work where the Jews were building.  There was no work for them in their lands.  Actually, I see this as a similar situation with Mexicans illegally entering the USA to work.  The difference is that Mexicans have to political agenda to take over the USA.  They had enough of a war with us long ago.
                                                                   

                               Young  Egyptian Yasser Arafat
Arab Palestinian leaders of today are not natives of the soil.
1. Yasser Arafat was born August 24, 1929 in Cairo, Egypt.  Chairman of PLO
2. Mahmud az-Zahar was born in 1945 in Cairo, Egypt.
3. Saeb Erekat was born on April 28, 1955 in Jordan and is a Jordanian citizen.
4. Faisal Abdel Qader Al-Husseini was born in 1948 in Bagdad, Iraq.
5. Sari Nusseibeh was born in 1949 in Damascus, Syria.
                                                                         

              Yigal Allon- one of founders and commander of Palmah before 1948
Our Jewish leaders of today are natives of the soil.
1. Yigal Allon was born October 10, 1918 in Kfar Tavor, Ottoman Empire, Palestine (today's Israel) and became the Interim Prime Minister of Israel in 1969.
2. Isaac Rabin was born March 1, 1922 in Jerusalem, than part of the British Mandate of Palestine, today is Israel.  Prime Minister in 1992.
3. Benjamin Netanyahu was born October 21, 1949 in Tel Aviv, Israel.  Prime Minister twice: 1996-1999; 2009-2013.
4. Ehud Barak was born on February 12, 1942 in Mishmar HaSharon, British Mandate of Palestine, now Israel. Prime Minister from 1999-2001
4. Ariel Sharon was born on February 26, 1928 in Kfar Malal, British Mandate of Palestine, now Israel. Defense Minister 1981,
5. Ehud Olmert was born September 30, 1945 in Binyamina-Giv'at Ada, British Mandate of Palestine, now Israel. Prime Minister from 2006-2009.
6. Izhak Navon was born on April 9, 1921 in Jerusalem, then British Mandate of Palestine, now of Israel.  He was President from 1977-1982.
7. Ezer Weizman was born on June 15, 1924 in Tel Aviv, then British Mandate of Palestine, now of Israel.  President from 1993-2000.

By 1972, Israel had 47.2% of their population made up of Sabras-Jews born in Israel.  Jews born in Asia and Africa which were mainly the Arab countries made up 25.7% of the population.  Ashkenazi Jews born in Europe and the Americas made up 27.1% of the population of Israel.

The biggest surge of Jews from America, Europe and Oceania came in 1919 to 1948 which amounted to 385,066.  From Asia and Africa came 44,809.  The immigrant  population then was 452,158 of which Arabs and others amounted to 22,283 .

From May 15, 1948 to 1951 came 334,971 Jews from America, Europe and Oceania.  330,456 came from Asia and Africa.  The immigrant population  was then 648,201 with 18,774 Arabs and others.

1961 to 1964 was a big surge of Jews with 86,748 from America, Europe and Oceania and 133,561 from Asia and Africa.  The immigrant population was 220,323.

Israel's Arab minority population was 126,000 in 1948 which grew to 458,500 by 1972.

Today, Israel, as of March 31, 2013, has a population of 8,012,400 .  1,656,600 are Arabs or 20.6%.  Others, which would be Christians and other denominations make up 318,100 or 4% of the population.

Resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican%E2%80%93American_War
Hatikva: posted by Gail Hopke
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
Facts About Israel by Division of Information, Ministry for foreign affairs, Jerusalem 1973
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Israel

The Almost Egyptian and Turkish Plans for a Jewish Palestine

Nadene Goldfoot
In 1831 Mehemet/Mohammed Ali conquered Palestine and took it from the Ottoman Empire Turks.  He ruled it from Egypt for 9 years.  It was nothing but a wasteland.   At this time Sir Moses Montefiore (first English Jew to be knighted in modern times) began plans and visited Mehemet Ali in Egypt in 1839 to put forward his idea for a Jewish settlement to regenerate Palestine.  Mehemet Ali liked the idea and accepted it.  Montifiore was discussing details with him when Mehemet was forced to leave Palestine which meant that it returned to Turkish rule.

1867 brought Mark Twain to Palestine on a vacation who wrote that "desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds--a silent mournful expanse.--there was hardly a tree or a shrub anywhere.  Even the olive and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country."

In 1879 the Turks were presented with the same idea for Jewish colonization and autonomy in a part of Palestine as Mehemet Ali had been.  Laurence Oliphant (English proto-Zionist, writer of The Land of Gilead and Haifa)  worked out the details and showed the Turks that it was in their own interest, as well as Britain's, to help in the Jewish restoration in Palestine.  The leading people of Britain, such as Prime Minister Lord Beaconsfield, Foreign Secretary Lord Salisbury, and the Prince of Wales (King Edward VII) recommended the idea to the Turks for Jews to settle in Gilead.  Even the French government with advocate Foreign Minister Waddington added their encouragement.  Gilead was the region of Transjordania, which became Jordan much later.  It was originally settled by the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh.  It was part of the northern kingdom and was captured by Assyria in 732 BCE with its people taken into exile.

The Sultan was interested in the plan and their Foreign Office proposed some amendments to be discussed but  in 1880 an election drove Lord Beaconsfield from office and he had been Turkey's friend.  William Edward Gladstone replaced him, a man the Turks considered an enemy.  The Jewish settlement was then forgotten.

Jews hadn't forgotten the idea of settling again in Palestine and the 1st Aliyah had started in 1881-1882, Eastern European  Jews returning to the land and working the soil.  It was a wave of immigration to join Jews who had never left. 35,000 Jews faced inclement climate, disease, crippling Turkish taxation and Arab opposition. Half left after a few years but had established new rural settlements with the rest moving to larger towns.  A 2nd Aliyah happened from 1904-1914 bringing in 40,000 mainly Russian Jews fleeing pogroms.

This came at a time when there were Christians who didn't like the idea of the Jews' return because it interfered with their idea of Jews being punished by the "edict" of exile.  Yet there was the fact that Palestine was a virtually empty land.  "No nation has been able to establish itself as a nation in Palestine up to this day," wrote Prof. Sir John William Dawson in 1888.  "No national union and no national spirit has prevailed there. The motley impoverished tribes which have occupied it have held it as mere tenants at will, temporary landowners, evidently waiting for those entitled to the permanent possession of the soil."

It wasn't until 1895 that Theodor Herzl, Jewish  reporter in Paris, wrote A Jewish State which started the Zionist movement.  His idea was that of a perfect idealistic Utopian state.He wrote, "We have sincerely tried everywhere to merge with the national communities in which we live, seeking only to preserve the faith of our fathers. It is not permitted us....Palestine is our unforgettable historic homeland.".  His plan was for the establishment of a Jewish state by international agreement as a solution to their problem of not being accepted by the other nations.  For centuries the Jews were seen as the helpless, vulnerable minority and it was only right to restore their human rights to live as equal citizens of the world.  He died in 1904 at age 44.

Moses left Egypt with 600,000 Jews.  Israel was reborn in 1948 with 650,000 Jews.  By 1951 they had absorbed 690,000 Jewish immigrants.  The miracle had begun.

Reference: http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Muhammad_Ali_Pasha_the_Great
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
Battleground, fact and fantasy in Palestine
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Immigration/First_Aliyah.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Aliyah
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Zionism/herzlex.html
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Israel: From Nothing to Something: Land That Is Coveted

Nadene Goldfoot

The land Israel sits on became a wasteland in the hands of people other than the original Jews after 70CE when Judea and the Jews fell from the Romans attacking Jerusalem.  Most of the Arabs came into the area because of the Jewish presence in bringing it back to life in the 19th Century.  There were very few Arabs living there when the 1st Aliyah of 5 Jewish settlements returned in the late 1800's. The land always had Jews living there but were also few in number.   For almost 2,000 years it lay wasted and the closest Arab people were not interested in these swamps and deserts. 

The establishment of Israel once again for Jews was the most important happening in the past 2,000 years for them.  After not being able to meld into any country permanently without suffering from much anti-semitism and going through a Holocaust and seeing 6 million of their own slaughtered, less than half of their population,  just because they were Jewish was a huge impetus to have their own nation back once again.  The Pograms had been bad enough and brought in many Jewish people.  The world thought so also, perhaps out of temporary guilt feelings or just seeing the just rationale of it happening to this wasted and unwanted piece of property, but they looked with favor upon the creation of a national Jewish homeland. 

Until the British Empire began to kow-tow to Arabs and their already oil-rich properties, they were the ones dealing with the creation of a Jewish state.  They quickly threw their promises aside and remembered the Arabs and what they offered to their British Empire; oil.  Arabs' numbers were altered, making their population bigger than it was.  The British armed the Arabs but not immigrating Jews.  Restrictions were put on  Jews, trying to prevent them from entering the land that was to be Israel.  What had been in the works for almost 30 years of planning suddenly was being pulled out from under the feet of the Jews and they hardly realized what was happening to them. 

An international Arab terrorist and lieutenant to Osama bin Laden, Sheikh Yousuf al-Qaradhawi,  said on TV in May, 2005 to his followers that Arabs do not excel in military or civil industries and that they import everthing from needles to missiles.  How come the "Zionist gang" was superior to them being so few?  It became superior because of knowledge, technology and strength and work.  "We had the desert before our eyes but we didn't do anything with it.  When they took over, they turned it into a green oasis." He continued, chiding that a nation that does not work does not progress or grow. 

Mark Twain vacationed in the "Holy Land and Egypt, the Crimea, Greece and points inbetween in 1867.  He and friends left New York June 1st on a first class steamer ship.  What he saw was an Arab sent to him as a guard against dangerous Bedouins from the Sheik of Tiberias who imposed guards upon travelers and charged them for it.  This was a source of finances and sometimes brought into his treasury as much as $35 to $40 a year. There were evidently not many tourists.   He was able to view the entrance and the exit of the Jordan, Safed, "the city set upon a hill," one of the four holy cities of the Jews, and the place where they believe the real Messiah will appear when he comes to redeem the world, ....pages 220, 221.  He continues in his book of 285 large pages " Desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds--a silent mournful expanse...A desolation is here that not even imagination can grace with the the pomp of life and action.  We reached Tabor safely...We never saw a human being on the whole route."  Another observation was "There was hardly a tree or a shrub anywhere.  Even the olive and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country....Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes.  Over it broods the spell of a curse that has withered its fields and fettered its energies.  Palestine is desolate and unlovely.."  Perhaps they had no need for a guard after all. 

When Arabs hear the word "Palestine" they view this thinking of Jews as intruding with a Jewish state amid what the Arabs consider their own exclusive environment or milieu, the "Arab region."  Egypt's Nasser's statement in 1956 was that this was "the imperialists' 'destruction of Palestine" and was "an attack on Arab nationalism" which "unites us from the Atlantic to the Gulf." 

They didn't want the land, didn't do anything with the land and didn't inhabit the land hardly at all, but were incensed with anyone else wanting and using the land that wasn't an Arab.  It seems like only the Arab leaders such as Emir Feisal had any background as to the Jewish history in the land.  The rest were quite uneducated about their own history. 

Britain showed its colors and continued siding with the Arabs by rejecting the US State Department's undersecretary Robert Lovett's request to suspend weapons shipment to the Arabs, as they ignored that and shipped arms to Iraq and Transjordan (Jordan).  They even helped Jordan's army by training the soldiers and leading them with a British officer.  The RAF flew with the Egyptians against Israel.  Israel managed to shoot a few down. 

Even so, public sentiment was with Israel as their image was of a weak little nation surrounded by enemies seeking its annihilation.  This picture changed after 1967 when Israel won against immense odds against all the prevailing Arab attacks and Israel managed to win in 6 amazing days.  The Arabs decided to change the picture to focus on homeless refugees which attracted the world's compassion.  The Palestinians who had left their homes that were in the range of land making up Israel in 1948 were kept away in refugee camps and not integrated into the Arab societies they were living among.  They were pawns in a terribly important chess game of life in the Middle East's holiest section.  They now have the distinction of being the world's oldest refugee population that hasn't been taken into surrounding territories by their own people, meaning that they have lived throught about 3 generations of people on welfare supplied through the U.N of which the United States is one of the largest contributors.  These are the people that are to make up the new state of Palestine.

Israel has gone through a metamorphasis of being a nation of accountants, rabbis, and emaciated survivors of the Holocaust to the likes of King David's warriors defending their land against their enemies.  They have witnessed their promised land sliced and diced, giving them the tiny worthless piece only to face attacks that could only have been won with G-d's help, the odds were so against them.  And still they face losing what ground they gained in their defensive struggle without the promise of peace in their time.  Now they face the proposition of finding their land taken from them and being only 10 miles in width making it indefensible if these 1967 lines are not adjusted.  The Good Book says that those that treat Israel badly will be treated likewise.  So goes the Saturday people will go the Sunday people.  I think it's time for the nations to shape up and support Israel for a change. 

Reference:  Big Lies:  Demolishing the Myths of the Propaganda War Against Israel by David Meir-Levi

The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain

Battleground; Fact and Fantasy in Palestine by Samuel Katz

From Time Immemorial: the origins of the Arab-Jewish conflict over Palestine by Joan Peters

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/1948_War.html