The need to prove that ‘Palestine was never an independent Arab state’ is the absolute wrong approach. Anyone with eyes can open maps to see that a piece of land in the Middle East was called Palestine for over 1,000 years. It matters not to antisemites whether it was ‘independent’ or not. What they are connecting is that the Arab occupiers many Jews are calling antisemitically ‘Palestinians’ must be from that land and that Jews came and stole it.
Instead, using facts and history matters to combat antisemitic lies, by clearly explaining that Israel/Judea was renamed to Palestina by the Romans in 136 AD. They took the Greek term for Judea, a term in use by the Greeks since the 5th century BC. That is why Jews IN Israel for 1,812 years (136 AD – 1948), and ONLY Jews were called Palestinians while Israel was under occupation. In 1948, Israel was liberated by brave Jews after nearly twenty years of fighting the British occupiers.
Not one Arab occupier from the 7th century to 1967 was called ‘Palestinian’ – they hated the term as it was so closely associated with Jews.
So then why do nearly all the Jewish organizations, including those focused on ‘combating antisemitism’ using the KGB’s antisemitic campaign, which was called Operation SIG, to lie that Arab occupiers are Palestinians? ‘Palestinians’ is not some ethnicity, rather a name which was assigned to Jews IN Israel by occupiers and conquerors, while Israel was under occupation.
The first ‘Free Palestine’ poster was from the 1920s to free Israel from British occupation after their Mandate turned into an illegal occupation, after barely two years post-the San Remo Accords of 1920.
Jews literally emerged from the Semitic tribes IN Judea & Samaria 4,000 years ago; that is a historical fact that has been proven by archeologists and historians. From 136 AD – 1948, so for 1,812 of the 4,000 years, Israel was under occupation. The Romans did not hate Jews for being Jews, but because it cost them more men and money to defeat Jews (three expensive wars) than any other group. Romans renamed numerous other places they conquered (one of the more famous being the Greek city of Byzantium which became Constantinople in 330 AD), as well as take defeated soldiers as slaves.
We cannot let antisemites bastardize the word ‘Palestine’ and concoct it into a weapon against Jews, when the term was part of the Jewish homeland for 1,812 years, and part of the Jewish identity to the world at large.
