When I was younger I used to see things in slightly more black and white...this conflict included...I chose a little while back to examine the other side and some interesting points are worth raising...i'm not an expert so am bringing this up to encourage discussion...
And also as a caveat this isn't a discussion on the current Israeli state just a discussion on pre-1948...
Have Palestinians been in Palestine for thousands of years?
The arguments against this seem logical...many have...many haven't...the arguments appear to suggest that there have been big swaths of flight and also immigration at different times...
One such example of immigration that is mentioned is the Egyptian invasion of Palestine where many Egyptians stayed and are now 'Palestinian'...Ibrahim Pasha brought in immigrants...many natives fled...and Egyptians appropriated land...
Ottomans allowed immigration across their empire which naturally led to flight...asylum seekers sometimes ended in Palestine such as the Algerians...Circassians, Bosnians and people from Yemen also arrived and assimilated...this is around the 19th century...
There were at times flight due to problems between the fellaheen and bedouins...the Bedouins who often stole cattle and destroyed cultivated land...which meant bedouins came and stayed and natives sometimes left for pastures elsewhere...
So even prior to the advent of Zionism its argued that the population of Palestine was constantly changing...as was happening in many places...
The other argument that is often pushed is that Arab immigration to Palestine was significantly larger than Jewish immigration...
Between 1932-1936 there was significant economic prosperity and even a labour shortage...Palestine had been transformed from a backwater to somewhere economically booming...the British mandate brought in many Arabs from Lebanon and Syria...while it placed limits on the number of Jews...many Arabs also illegally immigrated...makes sense that everyone would flock to where the money is...
In short was the growing Arab population in Palestine any less immigrant than the Jews who were also arriving there?...
The other issue I always remember hearing was how land was 'stolen' from Palestinians prior to 1948...
This admittedly does seem to be false...
“Between 1880 and 1914 over sixty thousand Jews entered Palestine … Many settled on wasteland, sand-dunes and malarial marsh, which they then drained, irrigated and farmed. In 1909 a group of Jews founded the first entirely Jewish town, Tel Aviv, on the sandhills north of Jaffa. The Jews purchased their land piecemeal, from European, Turkish and (principally) Arab landlords, mostly at extremely high prices.”
It does seem that many sources suggest that Arabs were angry at how many Jews were buying land...not stealing them...
Wealthy Jews were arriving and they were purchasing land primarily from Arabs who were getting a lot more money than the land was worth...the irony is that even those who often attacked the Jews publically eg the mayor of Gaza were among those who made a killing selling land to Jews...and thus shafted the fellaeen...
The problem unfortunately for the tenants is the nature of their agreement with their landowners...i guess a bit like if my landlord sold the place i was renting and the new landlord desired new tenants...farmers never owned their properties...it was Arab oligarchs who did...
But even then there are arguments that Jews generally purchased unused land to avoid problems with Arab fellaheen...
on land that had no owners, and on partially utilized tracts owned privately or by the government. He estimated that four fifths of the country's territory was available for new settlement. Six million persons using modern methods could earn their livelihoods from farming these lands; an untold number could prosper from industry. None of this activity would impinge on the Arabs, who would continue to live in their established areas, while Jews lived in new settlements and worked new fields."
Of course this wasn't always the case but it's been argued that a total of 3,300 Arabs were displaced as a result of Jews buying land...out of 700,000...
Its been further argued that there was a desire to not provoke the farmers so even when these occasions occurred farmers were compensated...this is in stark contrast to the Arab landowners who sometimes evicted their farmers in order to make their property free for sale knowing buyers preferred a property that was free...
Its also been argued that Arabs generally did quite well during this period in general...
Under the Ottoman state people were often displaced usually through Bedouin land theft and tricks from landowners...did the Jews do something worse?...
And this is as someone who is viewing Britain right now...did the Arabs choose racial purity and nationalism over a better standard of living, better health care, better productivity etc?...
Lt. Col. Sir Arnold Wilson, presenting the Arab case, made no attempt to deny 'the material benefit which has accrued to the inhabitants of Palestine' as a result of Jewish immigration. But,' he added, 'I lived long enough among Persians and Arabs to know that they are not exclusively concerned with material benefits … Nationalism is a growing force, with its good as well as bad sides. There is no possibility whatever of the Arabs accepting, as consolation for the loss of their homeland, a few more cinemas and a few more dentists, and two pairs of shoes where before they had one pair or none. There is no solution by that road here or elsewhere."
If this is true is it a fair position to take?...would be having the rule of the Jews be worse than the British or the Ottomans if ones living conditions were improved?...
And also as a caveat this isn't a discussion on the current Israeli state just a discussion on pre-1948...
Have Palestinians been in Palestine for thousands of years?
The arguments against this seem logical...many have...many haven't...the arguments appear to suggest that there have been big swaths of flight and also immigration at different times...
One such example of immigration that is mentioned is the Egyptian invasion of Palestine where many Egyptians stayed and are now 'Palestinian'...Ibrahim Pasha brought in immigrants...many natives fled...and Egyptians appropriated land...
Ottomans allowed immigration across their empire which naturally led to flight...asylum seekers sometimes ended in Palestine such as the Algerians...Circassians, Bosnians and people from Yemen also arrived and assimilated...this is around the 19th century...
There were at times flight due to problems between the fellaheen and bedouins...the Bedouins who often stole cattle and destroyed cultivated land...which meant bedouins came and stayed and natives sometimes left for pastures elsewhere...
So even prior to the advent of Zionism its argued that the population of Palestine was constantly changing...as was happening in many places...
The other argument that is often pushed is that Arab immigration to Palestine was significantly larger than Jewish immigration...
Between 1932-1936 there was significant economic prosperity and even a labour shortage...Palestine had been transformed from a backwater to somewhere economically booming...the British mandate brought in many Arabs from Lebanon and Syria...while it placed limits on the number of Jews...many Arabs also illegally immigrated...makes sense that everyone would flock to where the money is...
In short was the growing Arab population in Palestine any less immigrant than the Jews who were also arriving there?...
The other issue I always remember hearing was how land was 'stolen' from Palestinians prior to 1948...
This admittedly does seem to be false...
“Between 1880 and 1914 over sixty thousand Jews entered Palestine … Many settled on wasteland, sand-dunes and malarial marsh, which they then drained, irrigated and farmed. In 1909 a group of Jews founded the first entirely Jewish town, Tel Aviv, on the sandhills north of Jaffa. The Jews purchased their land piecemeal, from European, Turkish and (principally) Arab landlords, mostly at extremely high prices.”
It does seem that many sources suggest that Arabs were angry at how many Jews were buying land...not stealing them...
Wealthy Jews were arriving and they were purchasing land primarily from Arabs who were getting a lot more money than the land was worth...the irony is that even those who often attacked the Jews publically eg the mayor of Gaza were among those who made a killing selling land to Jews...and thus shafted the fellaeen...
The problem unfortunately for the tenants is the nature of their agreement with their landowners...i guess a bit like if my landlord sold the place i was renting and the new landlord desired new tenants...farmers never owned their properties...it was Arab oligarchs who did...
But even then there are arguments that Jews generally purchased unused land to avoid problems with Arab fellaheen...
on land that had no owners, and on partially utilized tracts owned privately or by the government. He estimated that four fifths of the country's territory was available for new settlement. Six million persons using modern methods could earn their livelihoods from farming these lands; an untold number could prosper from industry. None of this activity would impinge on the Arabs, who would continue to live in their established areas, while Jews lived in new settlements and worked new fields."
Of course this wasn't always the case but it's been argued that a total of 3,300 Arabs were displaced as a result of Jews buying land...out of 700,000...
Its been further argued that there was a desire to not provoke the farmers so even when these occasions occurred farmers were compensated...this is in stark contrast to the Arab landowners who sometimes evicted their farmers in order to make their property free for sale knowing buyers preferred a property that was free...
Its also been argued that Arabs generally did quite well during this period in general...
Under the Ottoman state people were often displaced usually through Bedouin land theft and tricks from landowners...did the Jews do something worse?...
And this is as someone who is viewing Britain right now...did the Arabs choose racial purity and nationalism over a better standard of living, better health care, better productivity etc?...
Lt. Col. Sir Arnold Wilson, presenting the Arab case, made no attempt to deny 'the material benefit which has accrued to the inhabitants of Palestine' as a result of Jewish immigration. But,' he added, 'I lived long enough among Persians and Arabs to know that they are not exclusively concerned with material benefits … Nationalism is a growing force, with its good as well as bad sides. There is no possibility whatever of the Arabs accepting, as consolation for the loss of their homeland, a few more cinemas and a few more dentists, and two pairs of shoes where before they had one pair or none. There is no solution by that road here or elsewhere."
If this is true is it a fair position to take?...would be having the rule of the Jews be worse than the British or the Ottomans if ones living conditions were improved?...
