Palestinian Arabs will lose Jerusalem too

T. Belman. Actually the Palestinians lost it when Jerusalem annexed it.

By Ron Jager

Palestinian factions have come out with a public call to escalate the latest Jerusalem ‘intifada’. Over the past week Jewish Jerusalemites have been attacked on the light rail, on the streets, and in the Old City for no other reason than their being Jews going about their daily business. Alongside the uptick in street violence in Jerusalem, Hamas, the sister terror organization, fired from the Gaza Strip no less than 40 missiles and rockets on Jewish communities located in the Gaza envelope surrounding the Gaza Strip. Hamas has urged terror groups to remain ready to fire additional rocket salvos into Israel: “We call on the masses everywhere to organize activities of support for this uprising,” to “escalate the uprising in Jerusalem” and to form a “unified leadership for popular resistance” against Israel.

To their detriment, the Palestinian Arabs and their leaders seem to have a short memory and never learn from past experience. At the conclusion of Israel’s War of Independence, instigated by a coordinated and massive four front attack on Israel, the Palestinian Arabs lost the Negev and the Galilee regions. The 1967 Six Day War, also instigated by a coordinated Arab declaration of war, ended with the Palestinian Arabs losing all of Judea and Samaria, the Golan Heights (Ramat HaGolan), and East Jerusalem. The 1st and 2nd Intifada instigated by Arafat and the Palestinian Authority after the Oslo Agreement concluded with Israel retaking a measure of control of most of the land it had given over to Palestinian Arab sovereignty.

During the past week, Jerusalem has been at the center of a renewed Palestinian Arab terror campaign against Jews; stone throwing, violent demonstrations, attacking Jews on the street and light rail, and putting all of these events on social media so as to convey visceral hatred of Israel. Learning nothing from their own historical experience, and repeating the same destructive expression of hatred and rejection of anything Jewish, the Palestinian Arabs will eventually lose all Arab rights in Jerusalem just as they lost control of lands they held in the past.

Despite the horrors of radical Islam, it is Israel exclusively that lives under a microscope with the events in Jerusalem scrutinized by the nations of the world. The Biden administration came out with a public call for “both sides” to show restraint. Russia invades and occupies Crimea, Nigeria enslaves, China oppresses, Pakistan rapes, Iraq slaughters, North Korea starves, Iran nuclearizes, Syria massacres, Afghanistan tortures, ISIS beheads, and yet Israel remains the sole state put under the magnifying glass by the morally bankrupt and hypocritical nations of the world.

What the nations of the not so “enlightened “ world fail to note is that the Palestinian Authority and its sister Hamas terror organization are actively supporting the street violence in Jerusalem, for the same reason thousands of missiles have rained down on Israeli cities over the years – even though it created more destruction for Palestinian Arabs in Gaza. Their goal is keep the Palestinian Arabs focused on “resistance” – a synonym for endless war that won’t be solved by Israeli territorial concessions or greater sensitivity for the Muslims’ desire to deny Jewish rights in Jerusalem. What we do simply does not matter to them and it will never sink in that they are facing the Jewish nation and the Jewish people, We are here to stay.

For countless centuries, our ancestors have been praying to return home to Zion. For those of us born in the generation that did in fact return home to Israel, we can only cherish and uphold the immense blessing that we feel for being part of this amazing historical and almost biblical period.

In 1947, Israel accepted the “two-state solution” declared by the United Nations, focusing her efforts on moving ahead, never looking back. Since then, Israel has made a desert bloom. We have built roads, schools, hospitals, universities and great cities. Despite the many wars Israel has had to fight, the people of Israel have never stopped looking forward. Israel has shown time and time again its willingness to make painful sacrifices for the sake of a genuine and enduring peace with its Arab neighbors.

Israeli Arabs including Jerusalem’s Arab residents have infinitely more human rights in Israel than Jews ever had in any Arab nation, or that Arabs have in any Muslim nation in the Middle East today. Not surprisingly, these fundamental freedoms seem to be always overlooked by the very Palestinian and Israeli Arabs who enjoy and benefit from their democratic rights in Israel. The hearts and minds of the Palestinian Arabs continue to be overwhelmingly “occupied” with Jew-hatred. This is the true narrative about the so-called “occupation”.

Once again a new generation of Israeli and Palestinian Arabs who live in Jerusalem, are expressing their hatred of Jews to further that same futile aim and in the name of this ancient hatred. Though many of Israel’s enemies promote the notion that the violence is caused by Jewish actions, the latest street terror campaign, if it continues, will be very much like every other episode in the Palestinian Arab’s hundred-year war against Zionism. They lose and we march on forward.

Those who wish the Palestinian Arabs well should urge them to try to shake off this rejectionist mindset, and stop acting like the great whales that continue ramming the shore, again and again until they die; Jerusalem’s Palestinian Arabs will in the very soon future lose it all; and that includes losing Jerusalem.

Historical legend tells the story that Napoleon Bonaparte visited a synagogue in Russia on the eve of the Fast of Tisha B’Av. Noticing the lamentations and expressions of mourning of the Jews, who sat on the floor with minimum candlelight, Napoleon asked his advisors: “Why are the Jews weeping and mourning?” It was explained to Napoleon that they are mourning for the destruction of their Temple. Napoleon asked when this Temple was destroyed. Informed that it had occurred 1700 years earlier, Napoleon said that if these people are still mourning their Temple so deeply after 1700 years, they will be restored to their land and their Temple rebuilt.

What Napoleon understood at a glance about the Jewish nation, the Palestinian Arabs will never be willing or able to comprehend. For the past three quarters of a century since the Peel Commission which recommended the partition of the land between the Jews and the Arabs, the Arabs have consistently rejected any possibility of compromise or willingness to live alongside a Jewish state. The latest street terror campaign by the Palestinian Arabs will be just another passing episode, a blip on the road of Jewish emancipation and the continued building of the Jewish State.

Ron grew up in the South Bronx of New York, making Aliyah in 1980. Served for 25 years in the IDF as a Mental Health Field Officer in operational units. Prior to retiring was Commander of the Central Psychiatric Clinic for Reserve Solders at Tel-Hashomer. Since retiring has been involved in strategic consultancy to NGO’s and communities in the Gaza Envelope on resiliency projects to assist first responders and communities. Ron has written numerous articles for outlets in Israel and abroad focusing on Israel and the Jewish world.