Why Do Palestinians Deserve What Zionists Did?
“The tragedy of the people of Palestine is that their country was “given” by a foreign power to another people for the creation of a new state. The result was that many hundreds of thousands of innocent people were made permanently homeless. With every new conflict, their numbers increased. How much longer is the world willing to endure this spectacle of wanton cruelty?” ~ Bertrand Russell, 1970
The first question to ask when talking about Israel is Why should Palestinians suffer for European sins? If you think Jews need their own nation, it’s easy to argue that Germans should give them land. But why should Palestinians?
For twelve hundred years, Jews thrived in the Arab world. Muslims believe Jews are one of the peoples of the book, and therefore they are dhimmi, which literally means “protected”. Historically, in return for being protected, adult male dhimmi paid a special tax, the jizya, that gave them the privilege of being exempt from military service. The amount of the special tax varied under different rulers, but it was never described as excessive. Today, no Muslim country requires it.
That special tax explains why Palestine’s devout Jews became Arab (Musta’arabi) Jews. It explains why Palestine’s less religious Jews chose the cheaper solution and converted to Islam. It explains why Palestine’s Hispanic (Sephardi) Jews took refuge there after Spain expelled them in 1492. It explains why devout Germanic (Ashkenazi) Jews came. Before the birth of Zionism, religious Jews simply wanted to practice their religion in peace with their neighbors. They found that peace in many Arab lands, including Palestine. In 1913, a writer in Falastin (an Arab newspaper whose name means “Palestine”) remembered the past fondly:
“Ten years ago the Jews were living as Ottoman brothers loved by all the Ottoman races. Living in the same quarters, their children going to the same schools.” (Falastin, 4 April 1913)
There were some tensions between Europeans and Palestinians early on. In 1891, Ahad Ha’am wrote about the recent Ashkenazi settlers, the first Zionists in Palestine:
“…they walk with the Arabs in hostility and cruelty, unjustly encroaching on them, shamefully beating them for no good reason, and even bragging about what they do…”
But those tensions were minor. One of Jerusalem’s Jewish residents testified,
“the Muslim women cooperated respectfully with the customs of the Jewish religion…the Muslim neighbors allowed the Jewish women to pump water necessary before the Sabbath.” — Ya’akov Elazar, Jerusalem
Dafna Harpaz, granddaughter of the leader of one of the first Zionist settlements, remembered stories of the old days:
“…the Arabs were not one mass,” notes Harpaz, who says the women of Khalisa were particularly helpful, teaching the Jewish women to prepare purslane salad, local-style dumplings and traditional medicine. “From the tone of my grandmother, I think she was very grateful to these women.”
Everything changed after the Zion Organization decided to colonize Palastine.
The Falastin writer explained,
“The Zionists…prevented any intermingling with the indigenous population. They boycotted the Arabic language and the Arab merchants, and declared their intention of taking over the country from its inhabitants…” (Falastin, 4 April 1913)
That writer saw what some Zionist apologists miss and others lie about: Palestine’s troubles came from colonization, not religion. The Judaism of Palestine’s European settlers was no more relevant than the Calvinism of South Africa’s European settlers. Zionists did not come as immigrants who wanted to learn the local language and join the local community. They came as colonists who wanted to live in their own settlements, speak their own newly-revived version of Hebrew, and work to take all of Palestine for themselves.
If you say people should have the right to live among people they see as their own kind and speak the language they prefer, I’ll agree with you, though I’ll note the idea is racist. If you say Zionism was created in a racist time so it should be excused, I’ll remind you that the Anti-Imperialist League was formed only a year after the Zionist Organization began planning the colonization of Palestine.
“We maintain that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. We insist that the subjugation of any people is “criminal aggression”…” — Platform of the American Antilmperialist League, 1899
When I ask what Palestinians did to deserve what was done to them, Zionists offer a barrage of irrelevancies and lies to evade the obvious truth: The Palestinians were the poorer inhabitants of a land that richer people wanted.
Zionism was born at the height of the age of imperialism, traditionally dated from 1871 to 1914. The fate of the Palestinians only shows that age has not ended.
Coming soon: Dueling Zionisms: The Best Lost, the Worst Won; or, Jabotinsky beat Einstein
Did Zionists Start Every Violent Clash in Palestine between 1882 and 1930?