Palestine's Hidden History - From Ancient Times to 1948

For over two millennia, Jews have maintained an unbroken presence in the Land of Israel. Despite the Roman destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE and the massacre of over a million Jews, followed by the failed Bar Kokhba revolt of 135 CE, which claimed the lives of another million or so Jews, the Jewish people remained the majority in the land until the Muslim conquest in 636 CE.

This has never been seriously disputed.

Between 636 and 1920, Arabs in the land, who at the time did not identify as Palestinians, did not strongly oppose the growing Jewish presence, which began in the late 19th century and coincided with a significant wave of Muslim immigration into the land starting in the 1890s. During the Crusades, the Jews of Haifa even assisted the Arabs in repelling European Christians. In the 16th century, Jews welcomed the Turkish rule with enthusiasm, all while remaining a small minority.

Arab opposition began to take shape only after the British Mandate in 1917 and the Balfour Declaration. The Arabs feared that the increasing Jewish migrations would threaten their control of the land for they were used to living with a Jewish minority. This fear was understandable: Jews had always been there, long before the birth of Muhammad, before the Arabs arrived from the Arabian Peninsula, and even after the Arab conquest.

Yet, since the 8th century, they had been a minority in this land.

The increasing numbers of Jews arriving created a sense of threat among Arabs who feared that the colonial achievements of their ancestral invaders might be undermined by a people who carried both the faith and, genetically, the paternal bloodline of the land’s original inhabitants.

This fear was not only about losing political control but also a deeper concern: they could not face the return of the Jews, knowing that the land they now inhabited rightfully belonged to those same Jewish people - whom their ancestors had, in part, helped depose.

After all, the Jews lost power under the Roman invasion but lost their majority under the Muslim one.

The Arab presence in the land was the result of a colonial conquest, and now, with the Jewish renewal and legal land purchases, the Arabs feared losing what they had taken.

Yet, throughout the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, Jews proposed multiple plans for peaceful coexistence and partition, the Arab response remained consistently rejectionist.

In America, when a vehicle lacks precise registration, the buyer knows there’s a period during which the original owner can reclaim it, putting the new buyer's investment at risk. This mirrors the "stolen land" mentality in the Muslim context: the Arabs knew all along they were sitting on land that rightfully belonged to the Jews, but they never believed any Jew would reclaim it. Moreover, they would taunt the Jews, who, until 1880, were a mere 5% minority, and push in their faces the fact that they were second-class citizens in their own land. It was as if they were saying, "I know it's your title, but it's my car!" Who could have believed this would ever change?

Therefore, the Arab fear of the Jews becoming a majority led them to commit thousands of murders even before 1948, which ultimately led, thank God and human justice, to the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of them in 1948, following their refusal for peace and delaration of war.

The events of 1948, which led to the expulsion of Arabs and the establishment of the State of Israel, should not be viewed as an injustice, but rather as a historical correction. After centuries of displacement, in large part due to Muslims and Christians alike, the Jewish people were finally able to return to their homeland in even larger numbers, and the Arab refusal to acknowledge Jewish sovereignty over the land played a central role in the ensuing conflict.

It is true that the Arabs were not the Romans who initially brought destruction upon Israel. It is also true that some Jews have European blood, primarily through early medieval maternal Mediterranean women who married Jewish slaves who came in from Judea. However, these facts do not alter the undeniable reality that the Arabs are invaders who took control of land they knew was never theirs to begin with.

The current situation, particularly in Gaza over the last year and a half, should be viewed through this exact historical lens. The Arabs, understanding that their presence in the land was the result of a colonial conquest, continue to project their own colonial history onto the Jews, who are now reasserting their ancient connection to the land. It is true that non-Jews can immigrate to Israel under the Law of Return, and there may be some validity in revisiting the genealogical claims of certain individuals. But generally speaking, it should be recognized that the Jewish return to their ancestral land is not an act of colonialism, but a process of reclaiming historical rights.

The accusations of colonialism are unfounded and stem from an ideological perspective that fails to recognize the historical rights of the Jewish people. It is time to acknowledge that the Jewish return is just because it uproots the Islamic-colonialist mindset that has bred through generations of Muslims, and that the rights of the Jewish people to live in the Land of Israel in peace and security should be respected by the Arab invaders.

Today, after Europe has shifted its focus away from colonialism and more towards pride parades and mass immigration, perhaps there is room for the hypothesis that Europe is experiencing its own form of colonialism by encouraging Muslim colonialism, not only within Europe itself but also in the Land of Israel.