Yossi schwartz ISL (RCIT section in Israel/Occupied Palestine), 19.05.2024
Lie number one: The Jews have returned to their homeland.
The American Jewish Committee’s main argument is:
“With the October 7, 2023, Hamas massacre with now 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals reported dead and 134 still held hostage, there have been renewed attempts to rewrite history and assert that Jews are “foreign occupiers” with no ties to the land of Israel.
Among the lies being spread is an effort to undermine Israel’s legitimacy by accusing it of being a settler-colonial state. Those spreading this lie argue that Jews have no historical connection to the land of Israel and that Zionists – those who support the right of Jewish self-determination and national homeland in the land of Israel – came to colonize the land, taking it from the Palestinians beginning in the late nineteenth century. However, this claim ignores the thousands of years of deep connection between the Jewish people and the Land of Israel”.[i]
“The Hebrews were one of the nations that lived in Cannan. According to the Hebrew Bible, six nations lived in the Land of Canaan prior to the arrival of the Israelites. They were the Girgashites, the Hittites, the Hivites, the Jebusites, and the Perizzites. The Israelite’s organ was the Amorites arriving from what is today Iraq. They arrived during the transition from the Late Bronze to the Early Iron Age—probably about 1250 BCE, settling first in the hill country and south of Cannan. While according to the Bible, the Israelites were ordered by the Jewish God t kill all members of these nations, it is clear from the Bible in the story of Ezra that the six nations of Cannan continued to live in that country. We do not know when or where the Book of Ezra was written. Estimates regarding when the book of Ezra was written generally range from 440 to 300 B.C. Although most of the book was written in Hebrew, portions of it (see Ezra 4:8–6:18; 7:12–26) were written in Aramaic, the language of the Persian Empire. The inclusion of Aramaic may indicate that parts of the book of Ezra were written during or after the Persian Empire ruled Canaan (approximately 530–334 B.C.).
According to the Jewish Bible, after the exiled Jews returned to Jerusalem at the end of the Babylonian Captivity, Ezra, one of the leaders of the people, discovered that “The people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices, like those of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians and Amorites. They have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons and have mingled the holy race with the people around them. And the leaders and officials have led the way in this unfaithfulness” (Ezra 9:1–2).
The ancient Hebrews indeed had two kingdoms: Israel and Judea. However, the Kingdom of Israel was destroyed around 720 BCE when the Neo-Assyrian Empire conquered it. While the Kingdom of Judah remained intact, it became a colony first of the Neo-Assyrian Empire and then the Neo-Babylonian Empire. In 587 BCE, Nebuchadnezzar II engaged in a siege of Jerusalem, ultimately destroying the city and ending the kingdom. Many Judeans were exiled to Babylon, and the fallen kingdom was then annexed as a Babylonian province. Not all the Jews were deported, and after Rome destroyed Jerusalem and the Jewish temple, Rome exiled the upper class. Many Jews lived in Canaan after the destruction of the Jewish temple, but after the Islamists conquered Palestine, these Jews converted to Islam. Ben Gurion and Ben Tzvi wrote a book that proved that the Palestinians are descendants of the ancient Jews.”
In the daily Haaretz, we can find: “Why Israel’s founders believed Palestinians were originally Jews, and how this discredited theory could offer hope for reconciliation today”.[ii]
Many Palestinians believe that they are descendants of the ancient nations of Palestine. At the same time, a study of DNA has proven that the European Jews have no connection to the ancient people of Canaan or Palestine. Thus, the Zionist’s most crucial claim is no more than a racist myth of settler colonialists while the enemies of Zionism are right.
The American Jewish Committee claims that:
Jews have had a continuous presence in the land of Israel.
“While the Romans expelled the majority of Jews in 70 CE, the Jewish people have always been present in the land of Israel. A portion of the Jewish population remained in Israel throughout Jewish exile, while the rest settled around the world and became the Jewish diaspora. In particular, Jewish communities existed throughout much of this period in what is known as the Four Holy Cities: Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed (Tzfat), and Tiberias. Jerusalem is the most sacred, and it is known for the Western Wall. Hebron is associated with the Cave of the Patriarchs, the traditional burial site of several critical Biblical figures” [iii]
This is also a fiction. Jews arrived in Palestine after King Ferdinand and Queen Isabel conquered Spain. Safed, for example, became the center of Jewish mysticism in the sixteenth century. In 1880, before Zionist immigration began, Palestine’s Jewish population numbered about 25,000. They lived there in four cities, but only for several generations.
“Jewish settlement in Hebron was sparse during the Middle Ages. In the Byzantine era, when a church was built over the Cave of the Patriarchs, the authorities allowed the Jews to pray in one part. A synagogue was established near the entrance to the Cave, but it was converted into a church after the Crusader conquest, and the Jews were driven out.[In the 16th century, under Ottoman rule, Jews from Spain established a community in Hebron and built the Abraham Avinu Synagogue. In the 19th century, the community expanded to include Ashkenazi Jews.”[iv]
“Tiberias also played a central role in revitalizing Jewish communities uprooted by the Spanish Inquisition. Throughout the Middle Ages, many Jews in Spain and Portugal had been forced to convert to Christianity, yet they continued to practice Judaism secretly. These Jews, called “Marannos”, took a huge risk in clinging to their Jewish heritage because if caught, they were subjected to torture and often burned at stake by the Inquisition. Many Marannos succeeded in fleeing Spain after formally converting to Christianity and once free, longed to return to their Jewish roots. Tiberias offered refuge to many of these Jews, and many Maranno families settled in Tiberias”.[v]
During Ottoman rule, there was a small but significant Jewish presence in Palestine and, by the 19th century, at the onset of Ottoman collapse, Jerusalem had become a more open city for the Jews.
The American Jewish Committee also claims:
“Even after the destruction of the Second Temple and the exile of Jews from the land, Jerusalem remained central to Jewish life – and it is still central today. No matter where Jews pray, they always face the direction of Jerusalem. The Western Wall, the last remaining wall from the Second Temple structure, is the holiest site in the world for Jews. At Jewish weddings, the groom traditionally breaks a glass in memory of the destruction of the Temple. At the end of the Passover Seder, Jews recite, “Next year in Jerusalem!”[vi]
The claim that the Jews always prayed in the direction of the Western Wall, the remaining wall of the Jewish temple, is also a lie. The Western Wall is the remaking wall of Antonina, built by King Herod. Jews in the 19th century who lived in Palestine prayed on the olive mountain and not in the direction of the Western Wall. But even if it was true, what? The Muslims in Indonesia pray in the direction of Mecca. Does this prove that Mecca belongs to them?
The American Jewish Committee also claimed that Jews wanted to return to Jerusalem. Still, anyone who is familiar with Judaism knows that traditional Jewish religious thought stated that the Jews had been exiled from their homeland as a punishment from God. They could only return in Messianic times. This belief kept most Jews from thinking about settling in Palestine.
The American Jewish Committee also claims that the land of Palestine is central to the Jewish faith and is mentioned throughout the Bible. In the Book of Genesis, the first book of the Bible, God promises the land of Israel to Abraham, the first Jew, and then reaffirms the promise to Abraham’s son Isaac and grandson Jacob. The name Israel is another name for Jacob.
In the Book of Exodus, Moses leads the Israelites out of slavery and oppression in Egypt with a promise to take them back to the land of Israel, the land of their forefathers. The books of Judges and Kings relate the stories of Jewish rulers over the land of Israel, and many accounts in these books have been proven historically accurate by archaeological finds and Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian sources.
The Zionists God is a god of real estate. The settler colonialists in North America claimed that they are the children of Israel and that America was the promised land. The settler colonialists of South Africa claimed the same.
Thus, the Zionist myth is no more than a collection of lies based on the assumption that the human race is ignorant and does not know real history.
Down with the Zionist apartheid state from the river to the sea!
For Palestine red and free from the river to the sea!
Endnotes:
[i] https://www.ajc.org/news/5-facts-about-the-jewish-peoples-ancestral-connection-to-the-land-of-israel
[ii] https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/2018-06-10/ty-article-opinion/.premium/should-palestinians-return-to-judaism/0000017f-e59a-df2c-a1ff-ffdba9090000
[iii] https://www.ajc.org/news/5-facts-about-the-jewish-peoples-ancestral-connection-to-the-land-of-israel
[iv] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Hebron
[v] https://www.safed.co.il/tiberias.html
[vi] https://www.ajc.org/news/5-facts-about-the-jewish-peoples-ancestral-connection-to-the-land-of-israel