Are Palestinian historical claims to the geography a lie? Read and decide for yourself.
“Oh what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive”.(Sir Walter Scott)
Lies, fiction, false narrative and mythology if told often enough by those with a far-reaching public profile and unconditionally supported by a willing and compliant media create the conditions whereby the uninformed and biased believe in fiction.
Exposing the mythical narrative and the lies in an effort to seek the truth will make unpalatable reading for the enemies of the Jewish people and the Jewish State of Israel. As a political researcher, activist and Middle East editor of this esteemed publication all I can ask of our readers is to comprehend, check and challenge the content of this article. And thereafter decide for yourselves.
How is it possible that the facts have been constantly ignored allowing the fiction to spread unchecked, unchallenged and multiply? I shall challenge and expose the myths and divorce the lies from the facts. The truth will astound the ignorant and the bigots.
Are Palestinian historical claims to the geography a lie?
Historical evidence is in abundance from travelers, pilgrims, researchers, historians and writers who described and recorded their visits over hundreds of years to the land currently claimed by Palestinian Arabs. Paradoxically a people called Palestinians were never identified within any of those testimonies. Not one scribe through the centuries referred to the existence of an indigenous group called Palestinians. Perhaps they somehow all forgot, connived, determined and decided to purposely ignore and erase from their research those identifying as Palestinians. All however certainly described the existence of Jews in numerous locations, towns and villages such as Shechem, Hevron, Haifa, Safed ,Caesarea, Gaza (yes Gaza), Ramleh, Sidon, Galilee, Kfar Alma and Jerusalem as just a few of many examples of Jewish culture and historical existence.
Even Napoleon recognized the land as belonging to the Jews without any record or recognition of a Palestinian Arab claim or existence. A few of the many travelling researchers are herewith listed with a selection of their books spanning the period between the fifteenth and twentieth centuries. None make any reference to a group , a race, a people, a tribe , a nation nor a culture referred to as indigenous Palestinian or Filastinian , the Arabic pronunciation.
- Siebald Rieter, 1426 -1488, Maps to Jerusalem
- Bernhard von Breydenbach, 1440 – 1497, Pilgrimage
- Felix Fabri, 1451 – 1502, Pilgrim and Preacher
- Martin Kabatnik, 1428 – 1503, From Jerusalem To Cairo
- Arnold van Harff , 1471 – 1505 , The Pilgrimage,
- Father Michael Naud, died circa 1674, The Jerusalem Connection
- John Bowles, 1701 – 1779, The Twelve Tribes Map
- Edward Robinson, 1794 -1863, Biblical Researches
- Sir George Gawler, 1795 -1869, Syria And Its Near Prospects
- Alphonse de Lamartine, 1790 – 1869, From Marseilles to Jerusalem
- Sir George Adam Smith, 1856 – 1942 Jerusalem.
Even the contemporary James A Parker, 1924 – 2001 in his History of the Arab World never mentioned the existence of the Palestinian people in his research of the area spanning the seventh and eighth century.
During the first half century after the Arab conquest, 670 – 740 CE, the caliph and governors of Syria and the Holy Land ruled entirely over Jewish and Christian subjects. Apart from the Bedouin there were no Arabs west of the Jordan”.
How can it be that all these respected researchers to the geography, claimed from time immemorial by the Palestinian Arabs, and the other itinerant scribes listed below, never recorded, witnessed nor identified the Palestinians who currently claim their roots to the area for millennia? It is simply because the Palestinians never existed as a race, people, tribe nor culture.
Today’s ‘Palestinians ‘ are immigrants who came to the geographical area for the economic benefits brought about by Zionism from the late 19th century as we shall verify beyond reasonable doubt.
Let us be totally clear and reiterate, there has never been and never was, a race, a tribe, a people, nor a culture at any period in history known as the ‘Palestinians’ indigenous to the land they now claim. Only since 1964 enemies of the Jewish State of Israel have perpetrated this myth. During the previous centuries no travelers writing about their exploits ever identified the ‘Palestinians’. They are a myth that have morphed into fact promoted by bigots, intellectual incompetents and racists. Fake news has assisted in facilitating the anthropological miracle of the Palestinian who falsely lay claim to the Land of The Jewish People. Let’s explore this further by sheer common sense if historical verification as explained above is insufficient proof of the non-existent Palestinian.
What is the mother tongue of the indigenous ‘Palestinian’ we ask? Naturally without hesitation the answer is Arabic easily verified by numerous sources. It is an absolute and indisputable fact. The Palestinian Charters are in Arabic, the school curriculum is in Arabic and the daily papers are in Arabic. However, to a disciplined researcher such as myself therein lies a paradox which unfortunately exposes further unpalatable facts for both the ‘Palestinians’ and their supporters.
There is no sound for the letter ‘P’ for Palestinian in Arabic. Just take that in for a moment and mentally process what I have written. There is no sound for ‘P’ in Arabic. Palestinian is simply the English language adjective and bastardisation of the Latin word for the geographical area Hadrian named “Palaestina” in the second century AD. Naming the area Palaestina was his way of further humiliating the defeated Jews having previously annihilated their revolt and uprising against the Roman invasion. Renaming the area from Judea to Palaestina after the ancient foes of the Jewish people, the Philistines, was the ultimate humiliation. There are two dictionary definitions of the word Philistine one being uncultured, uncouth heathen the other being ’extinct people from the Greek islands’.
You will note that there was no ‘Palestinian’ uprising or ‘Palestinian’ claims to Jerusalem against the Romans, only a Jewish fight for their indigenous lands. Thus, it is from the term Philistines that the name Palestine derives and both Philistines and Palestinians have the commonality of being invaders, the former from the Greek Islands, the latter from surrounding Arab countries. The very definition of their name has nothing whatsoever to do with ethnicity but is simply a descriptive application linked to the geography. Furthermore, and unsurprisingly the origination of the name Philistine derives from the Hebrew ”Peleshet” meaning invaders or penetrators.
Is it not therefore an absurd irony that today’s Palestinian Arabs call themselves after extinct Greek, seafaring invaders or uncultured, uncouth heathens? Why would any people, tribe or race accept, indeed be proud of such negative descriptions? The former immediately debunks their very existence and the latter is not the kind of description to take pride in.
Even more imbecilic, why call themselves a name they cannot pronounce in their mother tongue? An English word derived from Hebrew, describing Greeks, then translated into Latin without any Arabic derivation and with such offensive definitions to their, albeit false history and culture.
No, no, shout the offended Palestinians, we are called Filastinians, that is the Arabic word for us. Oh really, this disciplined researcher retorts in astonishment. But ‘Filastine’ is simply the Arab pronunciation of Philistine and therefore apart from one letter to conform with Arabic vocalization the Filastinians are still naming themselves after extinct Greek sailors or uncouth, uncultured heathens – and in Queen’s English. You really couldn’t make it up, it’s Monty Pythonesque – that was a British comedy mocking absurd situations which were themselves exaggerated.
Further investigation is surely necessary as it is patently imbecilic that supposedly, indigenous peoples should be satisfied with such negative and offensive definitions debunking all claims of indigenous ethnicity. So we research into the Filastinian historical archives in the expectation of discovering a people or persons who identified as indigenous Filastinian leaders or a war, battle or conflict fought by indigenous Filastinians against any domestic or foreign invaders throughput the centuries of warfare in their apparent homeland in an attempt to recapture their cherished Jerusalem.
Maybe we will find archaeological evidence of a Filastinian currency, town or city; maybe an historical construct originated and built by indigenous Filastinians and the name of the Filastinian architect. If the Filastinians are indigenous then history and evidence must surely reveal the name of any one, just one historical Filastinian King, Queen, Prince, Princess, President, Imam, Leader, Warrior, Apothecary, Writer, Poet, Scribe, Soldier, Sailor, Tinker, Tailor, Butcher, Baker or Candlestick maker.
Alas, there is no such evidence to be found of any race, culture, or people. Other noted travelers to the area , listed here such as Edward Webbe, 1553 – 1590 , Adrian Reland 1676 – 1718 , Count Constantine Francois Volney 1757 – 1820 , William Thackeray, 1811 – 1863 , Gustav Flaubert , 1821 – 1880 , James Finn 1806 – 1872 , Mark Twain , 1835 – 1910 , and B.W. Johnson, 1833 – 1894 , never recorded , discovered nor wrote of the indigenous Palestinians or Filastinians. These itinerant scribes did not write about them nor the villages they supposedly inhabited because they never existed.
And there is a reason for their nonexistence and it is simply because they are a recent construct invented by those political organizations and Arab countries who sought to eliminate the Jewish State of Israel and deconstruct the geographical area after 1948. And what is equally astounding is that the fiction has morphed into fact. The anthropological miracle we know today as Palestinians have revised history so that a non-existent people have existed apparently since time immemorial.
Peter Baum, Editor (International Political Affairs) at Blitz is a research-scholar, who writes extensively on Israel, Holocaust, Zionism, Middle East, Anti-Semitism, and other issues and worked for four decades in the International Financial Markets specializing in the Capital Market. He held directorships at large International Financial Institutions and is a member of the Institute of Directors. After retirement he spends his time as a political researcher, activist and columnist. In addition to his engagement with Blitz, he has also been writing for the Gatestone Institute, Conservative Woman and Decisive Liberty and has appeared numerous times on TV and radio mainly talking about Israel and the Middle East. He was a good friend of British MP Sir David Amess who was stabbed to death by a Muslim last October.
Reland, an avowed authority, specifically stated that he’d had a meticulous census done in 1696-7, and only a single Arab extended family was discovered, numbering about 120 people. The rest were mainly Jews, Samaritans and Christians. Not a single Arab origin place name; all transliterated from Hebrew, which hebrew names he also detailed..
His census took in 2500 towns and villages….. all those mentioned in the Tanach, and Talmud. He detailed the occupations of the inhabitants. and much much more. He wrote in Latin, Hebrew and Greek, or whatever language the occasion called for. He was a gifted linguist and held the Semitics chair in Utrecht University until he died.
Utrecht Uni held a 2 month symposium on his works in Feb 2017 to commemorate the date of his death. I had several email exchanges with their specialist professors and they confirmed that Reland was noted for using only the most certified correct information, in every one of his works.
He was also a world famous cartographer. A polymath of extraordinary talents..