More than 900,000 Jewish Refugees from Arab Lands

Given the general state of ignorance of history worldwide, it is no surprise that most people, even many Jews, are not aware of the  Jewish refugees from Arab lands. Of those who know something of this forgotten history, few know that these Jewish refugees outnumbered the Arab refugees who fled the Arab-initiated war on the not yet born Jewish State of Israel which started on 30 November 1947. Last year, Israel's parliament, the Knesset, passed a law that every 30 November is to  be a day to commemorate the Jewish refugees from Arab lands and Iran. Arab attacks on Jews on Arab lands accelerated after that date, which was the date, by Middle Eastern time, that the UN General Assembly  recommended partitioning the Land of Israel ["palestine" in Western parlance] between a Jewish state, an Arab state, and and international enclave in and around Jerusalem [corpus separatum]. After more than 1000 years of oppression, inequality, humiliation and recurrent persecution and pogroms in Arab/Muslim lands in the inferior status of dhimmis, the Arab states wanted to get rid of the local Jews, since they could not tolerate Jews sharing an equal status with Muslims.

Ashley Perry and Lyn Julius have written separately on this day of commemoration, a day to remember what has been too long forgotten and relegated to the periphery of discussion of Arab-Israeli issues, of Arab-Israeli diplomacy.

Here is Lyn Julius:
The date chosen was 30 November - to recall the day after the UN passed the 1947 UN Partition Plan for Palestine. Violence, following bloodcurdling threats by Arab leaders, erupted against Jewish communities. The riots resulted in the mass exodus of Jews from the Arab world, the seizure of their property and assets and the destruction of their millennarian, pre-Islamic communities. In 1979, the Islamic revolution resulted in the exodus of four-fifths of the Iranian-Jewish community.

Refugees are much in the news these days. Until the mass population displacement caused by wars in Iraq and Syria, however, the world thought that 'Middle Eastern refugee' was synonymous with 'Palestinian refugee.' Yet there were more Jews displaced from Arab countries than Palestinians (850, 000, as against 711,000 according to UN figures.)

The majority of Jewish refugees found a haven in Israel. For peace, it is important that all bona fide refugees be treated equally, yet Jewish refugee rights have never adequately been addressed. The 30 November commemoration is first and foremost a call for truth and reconciliation.

The Jewish refugee issue is more than simply a question to be resolved at the negotiating table. It is a symptom of the Arab and Muslim world's deep psychosis - an inability to tolerate the non-Arab, non-Muslim Other.

Today, both Muslim sects and non-Muslim minorities are being persecuted in the Middle East, but people are apt to forget that the Jews were one of the first. As the saying goes, 'First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people.' And it does not stop there. A state that devours its minorities ends up devouring itself.
This Arab/Muslim psychosis is the product of fundamentalist ideologies, many of them Nazi-inspired, which took root in the first half of 20th century. These ideological forces left a legacy of state-sanctionedbigotry and religiously-motivated terrorism. That legacy is with us today, in the atrocities in Paris, in Mali and in the stabbings on Israel's streets.

. . . .

The Israeli government is telling the Jewish refugee story at the UN on 1 December. From Amsterdam to Sydney, Toronto to Geneva, Liverpool to New York, San Francisco to London, Jewish organisations worldwide - my own (Harif) included - are organising lectures, film screening and discussions.

Read article in full 
Same article in The Algemeiner 
It's time to remember the other refugees on 30 November (Jewish Weekly)

here is Ashley Perry:

Making 2016 the Year of the Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries
. . . . . .
One of the issues I was able and proud to raise during my time in Government was the issue of the ethnic cleansing of almost a million Jews from the Middle East and North Africa, many of these communities massively predating Islam and the Arab conquest of the region in the Seventh Century, and the appropriation of their assetsestimated in today’s prices to be many billions of dollars.
. . . . . . . .

Growing up in a thriving Jewish community, attending a Jewish school and being involved in the Jewish community and Zionist organizations, I am amazed now, thinking back, how little was taught about the long and illustrious history of the Jewish communities of the Middle East and North Africa and their subsequent expulsion.

How many are taught about the Jewish communities of Algeria, Egypt, Syria and Yemen, to name but a few of many nations now completely without a Jewish presence?

We often raised this issue on the international stage and at the Foreign Ministry under the leadership of then-Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, and even initiated a now annual event at the United Nations solely devoted to the issue of the Jewish refugees from Arab countries with our partners in the World Jewish Congress and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.

However, the more we pressed the issue, which by international and Israeli law must be part of any resolution to our conflict, the more I understood that Jews in Israel and abroad are not even aware of it.

. . . . now more than ever, it is vitally important that the issue of the Jews of the Middle East and North Africa is studied and discussed in Jewish schools and educational and communal institutions across the Diaspora.
. . . . . .
In 2014, the United Nations General Assembly recommended that 2014 [be] a year of solidarity with the Palestinian people and called on people around the world to recognize their “inalienable rights”. Perhaps 2016 should become the Jewish year of solidarity with the Jewish refugees from Arab countries and there should be greater recognition, understanding and education of the inalienable rights of these people to rights and redress.

 We should not allow the suffocation and extinction of these historic communities to be erased from the pages of history. We should share their stories, and keep their memory alive, especially their destruction which was largely ignored around the world.

Let’s make 2016 the year where this changes.
[See full article here]
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Report on the upcoming commemoration on the News1 web site [in Hebrew]:
נתניהו: להרחיב לימודי יהודי המזרח
תישקל הצעת השרה גמליאל לתת פרס 
 ראש הממשלה לחוקרים ובאקדמיה על 
מחקרים בתחום מורשת היהודים יוצאי 

ראש הממשלה בנימין נתניהו הורה להרחיב את לימודי מורשת היהודים יוצאי ערב ואירן במערכת החינוך וכן לשקול את הצעת השרה לשוויון חברתי גילה גמליאל לקיומו של פרס שיינתן מטעמו של ראש הממשלה לחוקרים ובאקדמיה על מחקרים בתחום מורשת היהודים יוצאי ארצות ערב ואירן.  השרה גמליאל סקרה לפני הממשלה את נושא היציאה והגירוש של יהודים מארצות ערב ומאירן וזאת לרגל ציון יום מיוחד לנושא זה שיחול ב-30.11.15.  במסגרת סקירתה, מסרה גמליאל נתונים על מספר היהודים שעזבו את ארצות מוצאם והבהירה כי כשני שלישים מהם הגיעו למדינת ישראל והשתקעו בה.  היא הציגה גם את החלטות האו"ם בעניין פליטים והחלטות הכנסת באמצעות חקיקה לגבי השמירה על זכויות היהודים לפיצוי על רכושם. כן ציינה השרה את הפעולות הנעשות בארץ ובעולם לציון מורשתם של היהודים יוצאי ארצות ערב ואירן לרבות פעולות שצריך להמשיך ולנקוט בהן בעיקר במערכת החינוך ובאקדמיה.

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More Articles on This Subject
Jewish refugees from the Farhud in Baghdad [here]
A commemoration in Australia [here]
Dr Edy Cohen on Ynet news [here]
Elderly Jewish refugees remember their experiences [here]
Report on the commemoration in Jerusalem [here]
Review by Elliott A Green of a book on this subject compiled by Malka Hillel Shulevitz [here]
Excerpt from the aforementioned book, by Bat Yeor [here]
"Forgotten Oppression of Jews under Islam" by Elliott A Green [here]
Report on the commemoration event at the UN in New York [here]

Why Do the Arabs Oppose Recognizing a Jewish State?

Prime Minister Netanyahu suggested to US  secretary of state John Kerry that the framework he was drawing up for negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority include Palestinian Arab recognition of Israel as a Jewish state, as the nation-state of the Jewish people. Kerry did intend to include this Israeli proposal but since has backed away from it in view of Arab opposition, first of all from Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah and Palestinian Authority. Just today, the Arab League voted its support for Abbas' position.

One of the justifications for this opposition that apologists for the PA/PLO present is that by Israel being a Jewish state, the civil rights of Arab citizens of Israel would be adversely affected. However, all states belonging to the Arab League define themselves as Arab states. All Arab League member states but Lebanon define themselves constitutionally as Islamic states in one way or another. This does not stop them from opposing Israel being defined as a Jewish national state. The arguments against Israel as a Jewish state could logically be applied to Arab and Islamic states, and with more justification, since we have the benefit of hindsight to know just how non-Arabs and non-Muslims have been treated in Arab states.

The explanation for the Arab position lies, I believe, in the traditional Arab-Muslim view of Jews as an inferior dhimmi people, a millet [see below] devoid of national rights, and only entitled to live if they pay a yearly head tax on dhimmis called the jizya. The dhimma system applied to all non-Muslims who were subjects of the Islamic state, with individual exceptions. Within this system, the Jews were at the bottom of the barrel, at least in the Fertile Crescent  countries, including the Levant, where the Jews' status was inferior to that of their fellow dhimmis, the Christians.

Whereas the Quran and medieval Arab historiography, such as the writings of Ibn Khaldun, recognize the Jews as a nation or people, the entrenched Islamic view of Jews as an evil, inferior contemptible millet is now dominant. Moreover, in fact, in practice, that was the actual status of Jews in the Arab-Muslim countries for centuries. Even today in the 21st century Muslims believe that Jews do not deserve the dignity of having a national state of their own, the Quran and the old Arab historians notwithstanding.

This contemptuous view of Jews is clearly stated by the PLO in its charter. Article 20, already denies that the Jews are a people, claiming that they are merely a "religious" group. Jewish tradition holds that the Jews are both a people and a  religious group. Here is the relevant text of Art. 20:

"The claim of historical or religious ties between Jews and Palestine does not tally with historical realities nor with the constituents of statehood in their true sense. Judaism in its character as a religion is not a nationality with an independent existence. Likewise the Jews are not one people with an independent identity. They are rather citizens of the states to which they belong."

Note the contempt for Jews which oozes from this text. The history of Israelite/Jewish kingdoms in the country, as well as of the Roman province of Judea, is denied. The setting of much of the Hebrew Bible lies in the Land Of Israel which the PLO denies in a way reminiscent of Holocaust denial. Further, Jews do not have "the constituents of statehood in their true sense." Just by the way, the Nazis and other German Judeophobes claimed that the Jews were not capable of being a "state-forming nation." [see Francis R  Nicosia, The Third Reich and the Palestine Question (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press 1985)].

For texts of the PLO charter and the  Hamas charter, see here.
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Addition: in ancient Greek Jews were sometimes referred to as Ethnous Ioudaion, Jewish nation.
millet -- Turkish word referring to a recognized, organized religio-ethnic community within the Ottoman Empire [from the Arabic word milla or millatun, meaning originally people or nation but in Turkish usage referring specifically to the legally inferior communities of dhimmis (zimmis in Turkish), who were in turn the non-Muslim subjects of the Islamic states]. The millet was charged with keeping order among its members and often charged with collecting the jizya tax from them, and the millet enjoyed a certain religious autonomy and authority over its members, provided that Islamic restrictions on dhimmis were not violated. The traditional millets were the Armenians, Ermeni millet, like the Jews a religio-ethnic community, the Jews, a millet within the Ottoman Empire and also including Samaritans defined as Jews in Muslim tradition; as well as Greek Orthodox Christians, who were called I believe Rumi millet. The Greek Orthodox millet included Arabic-speaking Christians as well as other Eastern Orthodox Christians, such as Vlakhs [the old name for Rumanians], Bulgars, Serbs, etc. In the 19th century up to 1914, eleven millets were added to the original three, with the new millets representing ethnic subdivisions of the Greek Orthodox.There were no doubt nuances of the law in effect in different places.

More on the US pro-Islam, pro-Arab Policy

US policy in the Middle East in the 20th century followed in the footsteps of British Middle Eastern policy, and can be seen as a continuation of it. It was no accident that the British upper crust called the American elite "our American cousins." Indeed, this was often true in a literal sense as many titled Britishers married rich American men and women. Therefore, cousins were found on both sides of the Atlantic.

British policy announced a pro-Islamic turn in 1920 when the Supreme Command of the WW One allies, the Entente powers, ordered the Greek army to stop advancing in Anatolia, and thereby to stop defeating the Turkish army. There is reason to believe that Britain was the leading power pushing for the order to the Greeks to stop. In that same year, British officers in Jerusalem --in what was then officially called Occupied Enemy Territory Administration-South-- encouraged Haj Amin el-Husseini to instigate anti-Jewish riots in order to discourage Great Power approval of the Jewish National Home principle at the San Remo Conference. This British encouragement for Arab violence against Jews in Israel was not at that time the official policy out of London but seems to have been a local initiative of British officers in the country, some or all of whom had been influenced by the notorious Tsarist forgery/plagiarism, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Later, the London policy towards the Jewish National Home followed the local initiative and became hostile to the Jews, encouraging Arab hostility to Jews in the country. In other words, the Arabs became a tool of London for its own anti-Jewish hostility.

Back in Anatolia, in 1922, naval ships of the UK, US and other Western Great Powers watched as Ataturk's new Turkish army drove the Greeks of Anatolia and Smyrna into the sea at the Smyrna port, although Greek boats of all sorts were allowed to pick up refugees. Meanwhile, the powers did not oppose renewed massacres of Armenians in the city [see George Horton, Marjorie Housepian]. The new revolutionary Soviet Union also sided with the Turks in those years, thereby taking the same stance as the Western capitalist powers.

In other parts of the British Empire, the British encouraged Muslims against non-Muslims, and Arabs against non-Arab Muslims. In India, the UK encouraged Muslim demands for a separate state ["pakistan", which had never existed before] against the aspiration of the Indian National Congress for a unified India. In the former Ottoman Empire, the UK saw to it that the vilayet [province] of Mosul, inhabited not by Arabs but by Kurdish Muslims , Assyrian Christians, Jews and smaller ethno-religious groups, be transferred to the new, British-sponsored Kingdom of Iraq and taken away from the new Turkish Republic. Some say that this was because oil had been discovered in and around the city of Mosul, which would be more under British influence as a part of Iraq --then under a British mandate-- than as a part of Turkey. In Iraq, the British winked at the massacre of thousands of Assyrians in 1933 at the hands of the Iraqi Arab army.

During WW2, the UK violated its mandate to foster development of the Jewish National Home by severely limiting the number of Jews to be allowed to immigrate into the Jewish National Home when the Jews most needed a home. This was the notorious 1939 White Paper policy. More generally, UK foreign minister Anthony Eden came out in support of pan-Arab nationalism by calling for formation of what became the Arab League. Eden's speech came on 29 May 1941, just three days before the notorious pro-Nazi pogrom against Jews in Baghdad [1 & 2 June 1941]. Hence, it would have been only natural for Eden to keep British troops outside Baghdad at that time from intervening to stop the massacre of the Jews. Be that as it may, British troops there at that time did not intervene.

When the Jewish underground in Israel was fighting for independence and to have the UK let Jewish Holocaust survivors into the country, the UK continued to refuse to honor its commitments under the mandate. Although Pres. Truman had called for 100,000 Jewish Holocaust survivors to be allowed into Israel by the UK in 1946, by 1947 the US State Dept and other USGovt agencies were encouraging the Arab war effort against the as yet unborn Israel. Here the US slipped into the role of continuing the British anti-Jewish, pro-Arab, pro-Muslim policy.
The UK in Israel supported Arab forces against the Jews, fighting the Jews directly in Yafo [Jaffa] and in Jerusalem.

In 1952, British and US operatives encouraged and helped Nasser and his pro-Hitlerite "Free Officers" to overthrow the parliamentary monarchy of King Farouq. Mubarak belonged to the regime put in place by Nasser and the "Free Officers" in 1952. In that year, American mainstream publications celebrated the fall of King Farouq by explaining that the rebels were against Farouq's "corruption." In Iraq, in the 1960s and 1970s, the USA supported the Arab national socialist Ba`ath Party, the crowning glory of which was Saddam Hussein. After Israeli aircraft had destroyed the Iraqi Osirak atomic development facility [1981], the US administration wanted to denounce Israel for this defensive action, although it did not because public opinion was with Israel. The US also formally "recognized" the PLO in November 1988, although high level contacts with the PLO had gone on for decades.

In early 1979, the Carter Administration --its foreign policy directed by the Sorcerer's Apprentice, Zbigniew Brzezinski-- helped the Islamist fanatic Ayatollah Khomeini, take over Iran. Was Zbig unaware of Khomeini's fanaticism and bigotry? It was no secret to specialists on Iran at that time where Khomeini stood. Likewise, James Clapper, Obama's director of national intelligence [Intelligence?], knows where the Muslim Brotherhood stands and pretended it was something else. Interestingly, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Carter's national insecurity advisor has also been an advisor to Obama. Zbig's grand theory was and --apparently-- still is to build up Islamic fanaticism. No doubt in pursuit of this purpose, Obama sent Zbig to Damascus in February 2008, months before his election. Zbig was probably supposed to tell Junior Assad that if Obama were elected, then the Assads would have a friend in the White House. The fact that Damascus and Assad's very own mouth are world centers of Judeophobic agitprop and hate indoctrination, did not deter either Zbig or Obama.

These facts among others are the background to Obama administration efforts to put the Muslim Brotherhood in power in Egypt. I think that the disciples of Zbig succeeded all too well in Iran. We don't need another Khomeini, this time in Egypt. But stopping Obama's goal from being realized needs constant criticism of Obama for the dangerous course that he is taking.

Sources
Mitchell Bard, The Arab Lobby (New York: Harper Collins 2010) [a lengthy excerpt is found here]
Isaiah Friedman, British Pan-Arab Policy, 1915-1922 (2009) [see synopsis here & here]
Martin Gilbert, Exile and Return (London 1978)
George Horton, The Blight of Asia [Horton was the US consul in Smyrna in 1922]
Marjorie Housepian, The Smyrna Affair
Lord Kinross, Ataturk; A Biography of Mustafa Kemal (1965)

Richard Meinertzhagen, Middle East Diary
Jacques de Morgan, The History of the Armenian People (Boston: Hairenik Press 1918)
Horace Samuel, Revolt by Leave (London)
E K Sarkisian & R G Sahakian, Vital Issues in Modern Armenian History (Watertown, MA: Armenian Studies 1965)
Shlomo Slonim, "The 1948 American Embargo on Arms to Palestine," Political Science Quarterly, (Fall 1979)
Bernard Wasserstein, Britain and the Jews of Europe, 1939-1945.
_ _ _ _ _ _. The British in Palestine: The Mandatory Government and the Arab-Jewish Conflict 1917-1929. (British Historical Society)
Meir Zamir [see several online articles by Zamir on British policy in the 1944 to 1948 period in HaArets & Jerusalem Post]
William Ziff, The Rape of Palestine

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One Jerusalem on the changes in Egypt [includes link to Victor David Hanson].
2-24-2011 At least one mainstream journalist, Arnaud de Borchgrave, talks common sense about the Muslim Brotherhood. If he could only get the ears of Obama, Hilary, James Clapper, and the other fantasy mongers in the Administration [here]
Another MSM journalist, Jeffrey Goldberg, also gives helpful info about the MB's hatred of Jews, specifically Qaradawi's explanation that Muslim hatred of Jews is rooted in Islam and that Muslims must kill all Jews before Judgment Day can come [here]. For those unfamiliar with Islamic lore, this article demonstrates that hatred for Israel is rooted in Islam's hatred for Jews and has nothing especially to do with "settlements" or "occupation."

Obama flunkey denies that Obama supports Saudi "peace plan"

UPDATED 11-20-2008
see at bottom

Dennis Ross, now an Obama flunkey, formerly a "peace processor" in the State Dept during Clinton's tenure, has denied that the so-called "Arab peace plan," first proposed by Saudi Arabia, will be part of president-elect Obama's foreign policy. We all recognize the peaceful role played by Saudi Arabia for many years in financing Hamas and before that funding arafat and the Fatah. We also acknowledge that Saudi Arabia is the right country to propose peace plans because of its known devotion to religious tolerance, human rights and justice for all, especially Jews.

However, the trouble with Ross' denial is that a flunkey made it, not Obama himself. It cannot be taken seriously if The One himself does not make it. On the other hand, BHO has contradicted himself so often that we can never be sure where he stands on any issue. And where he stands today might not be where he stands two weeks from now.

As to the Saudi plan, it is also called the "Arab peace plan" because the Arab League adopted it in 2002 during a massive Arab campaign to mass murder Jews by bombings, suicide and otherwise. All this notwithstanding, one could be more trusting about Arab "peace plans" if the Arabs were more at peace with each other. Instead, we have Arab slaughter of fellow Arabs in Iraq [mainly Sunnites against Shi`ites], in Lebanon: Muslims against Arabic-speaking Christians, in Algeria: [Sunni Muslims against Sunni Muslims], Sudan: Arabic-speaking black Muslims against tribal, non-Arabic speaking Muslims, and lastly, in Gaza, Fatah against Hamas, etc etc.

Getting back to Obama & Co., he is still surrounded by the ilk of Zbig B, Brent Scowcroft, Lee Hamilton, Rashid al-Khalidi, etc. Obama has never sent a signal that he supports the human and civil rights of Jews. Does he favor pardon or clemency for Jonathan Pollard, a victim of a "cruel and unusual punishment," sentenced virtually to life in jail for espionage whereas others sentenced for espionage in the same period --for instance, in behalf of Egypt-- got light sentences of a few years. Does Obama oppose the racist exclusion of Jews from purchasing land in Judea-Samaria which was imposed by the British mandate govt in 1939-1940 or the even more racist denial by Jordan from 1948 to 1967 of the Jewish right to even inhabit Judea-Samaria?? If the answer to both questions is No, then Obama is an anti-Jewish racist.
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Here is commentary on this matter from the Italian "leftist" press.
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Coming: Obama's corruption and Israelophobia, UK Holocaust partnership, the UK threat towards Israel, Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron, the Land of Israel, archeology, etc.

False Premises of Annapolis & of the "peace process"

It is characteristic of decaying
societies and ruling groups that
they are incapable of adjusting to
the evolution of reality. They repeat
discussions and arguments and behaviors
that have failed, but which they cannot
renounce because they have been as if
hypnotized by their own beliefs.
The myth of the "peace process"
in the Middle East is one of these. ******
Le propre des sociétés et des pouvoirs
finissants est leur incapacité à s'ajuster
à l'évolution de la réalité. Ils réitèrent
des discours et des comportements qui
ont echoué mais auxquels ils ne peuvent
renoncer parce qu'ils sont comme
hypnotisés par leurs propres croyances.
Le mythe du «processus de paix» au
Moyen Orient est de ceux-là.
[Shmuel Trigano, "Le Besoin d'un nouveau
paradigme pour le Moyen Orient,"
France-Israel Information,
juillet-aout-septembre 2007, p 5]

One of the big lies of the "peace process" [and of the Annapolis Conference] is that a "peace process" necessarily ends up in a state of peace. This is idiotically viewing a "peace process" as something like a scientific or industrial process that always produces the same results. As if it were like heating water to 100 degrees celsius which --we know from experience-- will cause it to boil and evaporate as steam. Or the process may be like kindling a fuse that leads to well-packed dynamite. Which --we know from experience and reputation-- will bring about an explosion. Of course a "peace process" may very well end up in an explosion but that's not what the promoters of the process would have us believe. They speak of a "peace process" as if it were scientifically sure to result in peace. They might prefer an analogy to putting out a fire. The rage of the "palestinians" over "unfair treatment" might be likened to a fire which Israel could put out by giving them territory which would have the effect on "palestinian" or Arab rage of the chemicals in a fire extinguisher which put out fires.

Of course that may work in a natural science like physics or chemistry but not in political science. The diplomatic peacemongers disregard or pretend to be unaware of the fact that human beings in all their variety, with their virtues and vices [more of the latter than the former], are involved.

Shmuel Trigano writes that the Oslo "peace process" has "proven itself over the years to be, above all, a war process" [processus de guerre]. That seems obvious to many people, probably to the overwhelmingly majority of Israelis. But it still has to be said. And repeated over and over. Because, as Trigano points out, "'the peace process' still continues today. . . and some push the impudence or the farce" so far as to "announce to us a soon to come final --'historic'-- peace agreement."
So much for "peace processes" in general and the Oslo "peace process" in particular.

Another big lie is that there is a people called a "palestinian people." Actually, those people now fashionably called "palestinians" consider themselves merely a section of the Arab nation [see Article One of the PLO charter, among other documents]. There never was a "palestinian people" in history and indeed the Arabs did not traditionally call the country "palestine" nor did they see it as a separate, distinct country. Rather for Arabs and other Muslims it was an undefined, indistinct area of bilad ash-Sham [translated as Greater Syria or Syria]. But the "palestinian people" notion is necessary for creating a body of public opinion in the West in favor of taking territory away from Israel, territory vital for Israel's defense against the Arab states in general or against Arab and other Islamic states. Shmuel Trigano points out that:

After 15 years of illusions, two facts force themselves to be noticed:
1) The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is an Israel-Arab conflict, or Israel-Islamic conflict (indeed, Pakistanis and Indonesians, even Muslim Europeans who have become Islamists, are not Arabs).
2) The Palestinians don't want a Palestinian state but the disappearance of the state of Israel.

Hence, Israel is not fighting merely "palestinians" but Arabs generally and other Muslims. Thus Trigano refutes two more lies of the "peace process," that is, that Israel is fighting "palestinians" alone, that there is an "Israel-palestinian" conflict, and that the palestinian Arabs or other Arabs want a separate "palestinian state," much less a state alongside Israel living at peace with Israel.
Of course, President Bush Junior claims that that's what he wants. But if he thinks that that's what the Arabs want, then he's a fool or ignoramus or liar or all of those.

Bush also now says that setting up a "palestinian state" is a "national interest" of the USA. That could be true but it is a matter of interpretation at best or a matter of definition. Bush and the State Department want people to believe that it is within their competence to decide what is the American national interest. But should Americans rely on Bush or the State Department? Jimmy carter and his power behind the throne, Zbig Brzezinski, helped bring the Islamic fanatic Khomeini to power in Iran. The current ranting, bomb-brandishing leader of Iran, Ahmadinejad, was a follower of Khomeini. So carter-zbig's policy helped bring Ahmadinejad to power years later and now the world faces the threat of the atomic bomb in the hands of maniacs. In 1990, james baker, Daddy Bush's secretary of state, helped fascist Syria take over most of Lebanon. This kind of policy is sometimes called "realism." Yes, it's real, real kooky. No doubt walt-mearsheimer agree that a "palestinian state" is a national interest of the United States, one of those national interests that they often talk about as a general category but don't specify when they complain that Israel thwarts US "national interests." If so, then Bush Junior and walt-mearsheimer are on the same team.

That is, walt-mearsheimer aid Bush and Condi Rice [signorina riso amaro] in promoting a "palestinian state." But it is seldom argued any more or even questioned whether there is a "palestinian people," for if there were no "palestinian people," then people throughout the world might ask: If there is no "palestinian people," then why is a "palestinian state" necessary?
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Coming: more lies of Annapolis and the "peace process," peace follies, propaganda, Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron, and the Land of Israel, etc.

Britain wanted to use Arabs to protect its interests in the Middle East

The French scholar of the Middle East, Pierre Rondot, asserts that Britain wanted to use the Arabs to protect British Middle Eastern interests. It is noteworthy that Rondot was a strong sympathizer of the Arabs against Israel and Zionism, yet, being French, he did not have a motive to cover up British policies and motives.

Great Britain, for reasons both of fact and sentiment, continues to be with the Arab nation; its favor in 1917 towards Zionism, its resignation to the arrangements of 1920 [at the San Remo Conference?] do not allow it to forget its essential design, which is to entrust the care of its transit interests in the Near East to an alliance with the Arabs; it also emancipated, as soon as it could, Transjordan (treaty of 1928) and Iraq (treaty of 1930); it also ended up during the second world conflict [WW2], as the patron if not the inventor of the 'Arab League,' evolving in the first days of peace [after WW2] towards the even more concrete projects of 'Greater Syria' and 'The Fertile Crescent.' [p 124]

La Grande Bretagne, pour des raisons de fait comme de sentiment, ne cesse pas d'etre avec la nation arabe; sa faveur de 1917 envers le sionisme, sa resignation aux accomodements de 1920 ne lui fait pas oublier son dessin essentiel, qui est de confier a` une alliance arabe le soin de ses interets de transit en Proche-Orient; aussi emancipe-t-elle, de`s qu'elle le peut, Transjordanie (traite de 1928) et Iraq (traite de 1930); aussi aboutira-t-elle , au cours du second conflit mondial, au patronage sinon a` l'invention de la 'Ligue arabe,' pour evoluer aux premiers jours de la paix vers les projets plus concrets encore de la 'Grande Syrie' et du 'Croissant Fertile.'
[Pierre Rondot, Les Chretiens de l'Orient (Paris: Peyronnet 1966), p 124]

Rondot was not British and was not beholden to the British government. Therefore, he was not compelled or induced to cover up the true British policy in the Middle East. Today, unofficial spokesmen for Britain and unofficial defenders of British policy pretend that Britain was solidly pro-Zionist and pro-Jewish before the rise of the State of Israel. That's just another of the big lies now circulating so widely. The chomskys and edward saids compulsively propound the lie of British favoritism for Zionism, whereas the truth was the opposite. Rondot clearly says that Britain was pro-Arab. Earlier posts on this blog have pointed to British encouragement for establishing the Arab League, while British enthusiasm for the League was greater than that among the Arabs themselves. Britain propounded the Arab League notion at the same time that it was serving as a silent partner in Hitler's Holocaust of the Jews.

Now, with Condi Rice's tragic Annapolis Conference over, but leaving ominous signs for the future, we can say that the United States seems to be taking over the pro-Arab role of Britain, while the State Department asserts in a pro forma manner that it wants peace for the Jews. Arab spokesmen, Sa'eb Erikat and Nabil Abu Rudeyna, spokesmen for terrorist leader, Mahmud Abbas, are already denying, today, 28 November 2007, that anything agreed on at Annapolis binds them or obliges them in any way and that they made no concessions at Annapolis. We can expect that in the future, the Bush White House and the State Department will criticize or even punish Israel for not fulfilling supposed commitments made by Israel at Annapolis. But they will not criticize or punish the PLO/Arab/PA side for any barbarity or violation of commitments. More or less like British policy up to 1948.
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Coming: the lies and falsehoods that Annapolis was based on, propaganda, peace follies, Jews in Jerusalem, Hebron and the Land of Israel, etc.