Many today yearn for "peace" and with the ongoing "war against terrorism" continuing to dominate our headlines such concerns are clearly justified. The sheer depravity of terrorism showing that it respects no norms or standards of morality. The proponents being prepared to target civilians, including women & children, as justifiable victims in the pursuit of numerous agendas throughout the World. The hearts of many are "failing themselves for fear" of when and where the next terrorist strike will occur.

The horrifying scenes that we have witnessed in Beslan themselves have disturbing parallels to that of the Ma'alot massacre in Israel some thirty years ago, albeit on a far lesser scale in terms of casualty numbers.

On May 15, 1974 Palestinian terrorists seized a schoolhouse in Ma'alot, Israel and held over 100 students hostage. The terrorists wired the school with explosive charges as a protective measure. The terrorists subsequently fired automatic weapons and threw grenades amongst the children, 22 of whom were killed and over 60 wounded.

Few would dispute that the Middle East is probably the most volatile region in the World today. Central to the instability in the region is the Arab-Israeli conflict. In recent years the very core of this unrest has been the "Palestinian" issue. To the surprise of many, this has not always been the case, with the "Palestinianization" of the dispute being a relatively recent development.

On this occasion it is the intent of the writer to analyse the particular disputes surrounding this specific conflict from both a secular and religious approach. Much reference being made throughout to the media coverage, historical facts, the Hebrew-Christian Scriptures and Islam. The writer is extremely sensitive to the purposes of the Jews and the Land promised to them as an eternal inheritance in the Bible in the redemptive plan of Almighty God. This sensitivity does not preclude any contextual, fair and unbiased critique of the actions of the Israeli government or dismiss/demean the plight of any suffering peoples or individuals in the region whether they be of Palestinian/Arab/Jewish/Muslim/Christian origin.

Tempers easily become frayed when this extremely contentious issue is discussed, at the very time when above all a calm, composed analysis of the entire situation and it’s historical/future context is needed.

Most ordinary people rely solely upon the International news media for their information in relation to these matters. Indeed, nowadays it is far easier to sit back in your armchair and listen to the BBC, CNN, ITV, FoxNews, Sky News and others for the information upon which we base our opinions in life. Subsequently the vast array of relevant history books seldom have the dust removed from their covers and historical facts remain hidden from view.

Regrettably media portrayal of the Arab-Israeli conflict has seen basic historical truths and absolute facts relating to the Israeli-Palestinian/Arab conflict either being ignored or trodden underfoot. The perception of the Western public is being slanted by a series of half-truths, selective omission and some fundamental untruths.

The news media is the world’s spokesman. And the one who controls the public’s information controls the public’s judgement. The media’s extraordinary ability to influence and manipulate World opinion i undisputed. Journalists are trained to reserve personal opinion for the editorial page, but sadly only those few with discipline and integrity comply.

We trust them to impartially report the news, yet many covering the Middle East in recent years have written with a persistent and undeniable tilt against Israel.

This has also been the case within many TV News Channels. Biassed news-copy and the use of sensational selective headlines have distorted the facts on the ground and have serve to advance particular points of view. Such reporting of the Israeli-Palestinian situation has exacerbated widespread anti-Jewish feelings, eroded any possible support for Israel and has considerably increased sympathy for the Arab position.

Studies of the Worldwide increase in anti-Semtism have shown these principles to have been major factors in the re-birth of this ancient hatred.

Recently it has frequently been the media theme that Israel alone is responsible for the turmoil in the Middle East and that Israel alone holds the key to peace and stability. Israel is then often portrayed by some as an outlaw state. Indeed most recent news coverage has presented the Palestinians as blameless victims and the Israelis as aggressive oppressors. (Those honest with themselves will sadly verify this.)

The ignorance of Western society in relation to the history of the Middle East and the Jewish & Arab peoples is being fundamentally abused by the Western world in order that the International political, monetary and material interests of such nations can be achieved. The scapegoat of such policies is again the Jew.

Spin - intentional manipulation of the truth -- is everywhere. There is absolutely no hesitation whatsoever by the media to broadcast/film any incident which portrays Israel in as bad a light as possible, but at the very same time, every possible effort is made by the very same media to minimise the reports of brutal activities on behalf of the Palestinians.

Publicity is the oxygen that terrorists need. Distorted reporting which only serves to distort the International public perception of pivotal conflict such as this by selective omission of vital context only fans the flames of an ever increasing hatred. In this case it is a hatred of the Jews.

According to the International Community and the news media, the reason for the continuous state of war between Israel and the Arabs is because Israel is "occupying Arab land". By endless repetition, this line of political propaganda has been engraved upon people’s minds by feeding on the ignorance of the populace. The Arabs, however, were making war against Israel when the Arabs held the land and that is how they came to lose it in the first place. Israel’s very existence is the problem, irrespective of ANY boundaries.

When the Arab world demands a ‘just peace’, it is saying in effect that ‘peace’ can only come when Israel no longer exists and there are "just" Arab nations in the Middle East.

Despite the repeated use of the term "Palestine" in political and media circles including the House of Commons in London, it is a fact that "Palestine" as a social, political, national, regional, religious or geographic entity of any description does not exist at this time and has not done so since 1948.

It is sadly rarely reported in the media that after the First World War, Britain was given a Mandate at "Versailles" to establish the Jewish National Home in ALL of Palestine.

Britain however, soon embarked on a policy of Arab appeasement, which it still pursues to this day.

It gave control of the Golan Heights to the French, who were then occupying Syria. Then, with one swift stroke of a pen, Britain cut off a further 77 percent of then Palestine and gave it to Abdullah Ibn Hussein, whose family had been ousted from Arabia by the Sa’ud family.

Abdullah formed the new nation Transjordan (now Jordan) and became it’s King. The British also established Abdullah’s brother, Feisal as King over a semi-independent Iraq.

In November 1947 what remained of "Palestine" at that time was divided by the League of Nations between Arabs and Jews, with the Jews receiving the smaller allotment. The Jewish National Home that was to have originally incorporated all of Palestine now actually constituted less than 11 percent of that land. These facts are readily available in history books but seldom is the dust brushed away from their covers to reveal the truth.

The name "Palestine" is the 'anglicised' term for "Syria Palaestina", the name given by the Romans when they defeated the kingdoms of Israel & Judah in AD135. A name given to utterly remove any Jewish connection from the territory, when Jerusalem was simultaneously renamed "Aelia Capitolina".


From that time even to the rebirth of the Jewish State in 1948 a Jewish presence STILL remained in the Land despite the area being conquered by numerous foreign occupiers.

After the Roman occupation ending in 330AD, the region that eventually became known as "Palestine" was then occupied by numerous empires;

Byzantines (330-638AD),
Arabs (Fatimids & Abbasids), and Turks (Seljuks) (638-1099AD),
Crusaders (1099-1291AD), Mamluks (1291-1516AD),
Ottomans (1516-1917AD),
British (1917-1948AD).
Israel was reborn in 1948 and exists to the present day.

"Palestine" itself has NEVER existed as a 'sovereign' nation with it's own people, culture and capital city. Until 1948 it was just a regional land occupied by foreign empires.

Despite the repeated use of the term "Palestine" in political and media circles including the House of Commons in London, it is a fact that "Palestine" as a social, political, national, regional, religious or geographic entity of any description does not exist at this time and has not done so since 1948.

The use of the term is a distortion and shows an inherent bias against the Jewish state, yet such a term is continually used in political and media circles with full knowledge of the reality.

In 1947/8 the UN tried to pass Resolution 181 to separate what was left of "Palestine" between the Jews and the Arabs. The Jews were prepared to eat the crumbs that fell off the British table but the Arabs were not and refused another "Palestinian" state along with Jordan. The Arab world then embarking on it's publicly declared policy of the genocide of the Jewish presence from the Middle East.

Between 1948 and 1967, the Arabs (Jordan & Egypt respectfully) illegally occupied the so called "West Bank" (Judea & Samaria) and Gaza. During this NINETEEN year period of Arab occupation, no moves were made to create any Palestinian state in these territories. Instead they were used as a base and platform from which to launch terrorist attacks into the Jewish state.

Indeed the PLO was created in 1964 by Egypt, which raises the question as to what "Palestine" exactly they needed to liberate.

At any point during the past 62 years since the re-birth of Israel in 1948, Arab governments could have helped the Palestinian Arabs settle down to a decent life. They could have created the infrastructure of an autonomous Palestine on the West Bank of the Jordan and the Gaza territory that Egypt controlled until 1967, or encouraged the resettlement of Palestinians in Jordan, which constitutes the lion's share of the original mandate of Palestine. Rather than fund the Palestine Liberation Organization to foment terror against Israel they could have endowed Palestinian schools of architecture, engineering, medicine and law. What Israel did for its equally large number of refugees forcibly expelled from Arab lands during the same period, Arabs could have done much more sumptuously for the Palestinians displaced by the same conflict. With 'Palestine' never having been a sovereign state of any description since the Jewish diaspora and Jerusalem never having been a capital city of any nation other than that of the Jewish people, one is left to wonder about the 'Palestinian' history that we hear so much about. Mark Twain's own comments about a visit to the Holy Land in 1867 reveal much about the desolate and sparsely populated locality.


http://twain.thefreelibrary.com/The-Innocents-Abroad/56-1

The following is an excerpt from Mark Twain’s observations.


The "desolation" of Palestine in 1867.

Indeed, during the 2,000 years of the Jewish diaspora there were indeed many Jewish, Christian & Muslim elements of the population but a distinct "Palestinian people" with their own nationality, heritage, language and customs etc. has never existed to this day.

During the Jewish diaspora, the land of ‘Palestine' was never exclusively Arab or Muslim. Clearly Jewish nationalism and Arab nationalism, each embracing its own cluster of scattered populations, each sharing specific cultural, religious, traditional, and historical experiences deeply rooted in the Middle East region, have arisen.

However, at the time of the 1920 San Remo Peace Conference, when the Jewish and the Arab sides came forward with their claims to the Land, the Arab claimants actually identified the Jewish side with Palestine. Thus confirming again that a separate "Palestinian people" did not exist at the time.




When these issues are considered against what the media portrays as "struggle" of the "Palestinian people" for self-determination, a whole new light is shed on the subject .

The common misconception in this case is that Israel "owes" the Palestinian Arabs a state. Therefore the terrorist activity of the Arabs is to a certain extent excusable, since they are "fighting for their rights." However, nothing can be more remote from the truth. In reality, any land to which the Palestinian Arabs can claim any rights has already been held by other Arabs who took no action to create a separate state for a "Palestinian" people.

And the "struggle for self-determination against Israel" really needs to be studied against the factual history of the Land.Reference has already been made to the so called "West Bank" (Biblical Judea and Samaria) and "East Jerusalem".

These areas, part of Biblical Israel, were regained by Israel when the Jewish state was attacked during the Six Day War in 1967.

Yet what few people seem to realise is that Jordan never relinquished their own claim to these territories until 31 July 1988. At that time Jordan submitted to the Arab League's decision to recognise the PLO as the official representative of the "Palestinian people" and therefore made provision for the "West Bank" to become part of a future "Palestinian" state. (Up until 1948, Judea, Samaria and Gaza were a part of the British Mandate. In the 1948 War of Independence, Egypt illegally grabbed the Gaza Strip, and Jordan took Judea and Samaria, the 'West Bank.' Egypt did not claim sovereignty in Gaza, but Jordan deigned, in 1950, to annex Judea and Samaria.)

For decades the Arab world has sought to eradicate the Jewish state. Year after year, the Arab world would invent a new public relations theme, or a new form of disinformation or a new way to misrepresent the Arab war against Israel.

The grand-daddy of all such decisions was the agreement to accept the disinformation by the Arab world that the Arab-Israeli conflict actually had something to do with Palestinians.

It was only well into the 1970s that the Arabs themselves thought up the idea of basing their campaign on "Palestinian rights." Before that, they had a far more candid approach and demanded openly that the Jews be tossed into the sea.

The "Palestinianization" of the campaign of Arab aggression arose from their realization that you can further your agenda far more successfully through the political goals of self-determination than with declarations of intended genocide. Palestinian self-determination subsequently played the same role for Arab aggression as Sudeten self-determination did for German aggression.

In reality, the Arab world could not have cared less about Palestinians. It had already fought four wars that had nothing to do with Palestinians. When the West Bank and Gaza were under the rule of Arab countries, they were not converted into some sort of Palestinian state and there were no Palestinians demanding "self-determination." These Arab occupied lands were only used as stepping stones from which to wage conflict against their unwelcome Jewish neighbour.

Indeed, there were no Palestinians demanding such self-determination; they were far more likely to demand that they be annexed by Syria or Jordan.

The very adoption of the "Palestinian cause" has become the fig leaf for the Arab war against Israel. A cause which has cloaked it’s parallel agenda with political and media spin that has completely distorted the publics’ perception of what is really going on in the Middle East.

We should not be deceived, the State of Israel is at war with an enemy, under Yasser Arafat, as implacably committed to its destruction and to the murder of Jews as any other in the past.

The relevance of the following statement from Zahir Muhsein, executive committee member of the "Palestinian Liberation Organisation" itself cannot be exaggerated. In an interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw on 31st March1977 he declared;-
"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism."

The PLO’s own representative correctly recognising that there never has been a Palestinian people, nation, language, culture, or religion. The claim of descent from a Palestinian people who lived for thousands of years in a land called Palestine is a hoax! Those who today call themselves Palestinians correctly being recognised by one of their own representatives as Arabs by birth, language, and culture, and are close relatives to Arabs in surrounding countries from whence most of them came, attracted by Israel’s prosperity.

If the Palestinians are indeed a "myth", then the real question becomes "Why?" Why invent a fictitious people?

The answer is that the myth of the "Palestinian People" serves as the justification for Arab occupation of the Land of Israel.

While the Arabs already possess 21 sovereign countries of their own (more than any other single people on earth) and control a land mass 800 times the size of the Land of Israel, this is apparently not enough for them. They therefore feel the need to rob the Jews of their one and only country, one of the smallest on the planet. Unfortunately, many people ignorant of the history of the region, including much of the world media, are only too willing to help.

It is interesting to note that the Bible makes reference to a fictitious nation confronting Israel. "They have provoked me to jealously by worshipping a non-god, angered me with their vanities. I will provoke them with a non-nation; anger them with a foolish nation .."(Deuteronomy 32:21).

The public is clearly being completely and utterly deceived by the manner in which the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is being presented to them. A process which consists of a mixture of propaganda and political euphemisms that circumvent the truth. Anti-Israeli spin-doctors in the media and diplomatic arenas have had enormous success in deluding the public at large.

We hear much about Palestinian history but a senior member of the PLO himself has admitted that "...there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people..". So what constitutes a "Palestinian".

If you check your history books you will discover that prior to 1948 all Jews living in the Holy Land were also called 'Palestinians'.

The UNRWA's operational definition of a Palestinian refugee being confined to that of a person whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the TWO year period between June 1946 and May 1948 (re-birth of Israel). Today some 80% of Jordan´s population is (so-called) Palestinian. The following quotes add fuel to the fire of confusion.

The Palestinian refugee issue is often used as the ‘tip of the spear’ in the war against Israel.

It is expediently overlooked that in 1948 there would not have been one single Arab refugee - not even one - had the Arab states not chosen to go to war in defiance of a United Nations resolution with the declared aim of destroying the newly reborn State of Israel.

The following is a direct quotation during 1948 of the public declaration of Jamal Al-Hussein, the Vice-president of the A.H.C. (Arab High Committee - the effective Palestinian-Arab `government');-

A general public circular of the same Arab High Committee at that time also publicly declared, just three years after the Holocaust;- "The Arabs have taken into their own hands, the FINAL SOLUTION of the Jewish problem. The problem will be solved only in blood and fire. The Jews will be driven out."

Haled al-Azm, the Prime Minister of Syria in 1948 and 1949 declared in his memoirs "Since 1948 we have been demanding the return of the refugees to their homes. But we ourselves are the ones who encouraged them to leave. Only a few months separated between our call to them to leave. Only a few months separated between our call to them to leave and our appeal to the United Nations to resolve on their return." (Vol. I, pp. 386-87)




And writing in FaZastin al-Thawra (an official publication of the PLO) in March 1976, Abu Mazer, a member of the PLO executive committee, noted:
"The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians. .. . but, instead, they abandoned them, forced them to emigrate and to leave their homeland, imposed upon them a political and ideological blockade and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live in Eastern Europe."

Time and again, over the years, Israel offered to help rehabilitate the refugees, but the Arab states refused because they wanted to perpetuate the conflict and did not want to lose this invaluable political pawn towards their goal of eventually eradicating the Jewish state. For instance, Israel offered compensation for the refugees' property, but the Arab states would not hear of it, since this would have implied recognition of the State of Israel. Every proposal that Israel made over the years indicating a willingness for compromise was turned down by the Arabs.


In an article published in al- Nahar (Beirut) on May 15, 1975, Sabri Jiryis, a researcher with the Institute of Palestinian Studies in Beirut, observed:
"This is hardly the place to describe how the Jews of the Arab states were driven out of the countries in which they lived for hundreds of years, and how they were shamefully deported to Israel after their property had been confiscated or taken over at the lowest possible price." ". . . Since 1948, you Arabs have caused the expulsion of just as many Jews from the Arab states, most of whom settled in Israel after their properties had been taken over in one way or another. Actually, therefore, what happened was only a kind of "population and property exchange," and each party must bear the consequences. Israel is absorbing the Jews of the Arab states; the Arab states, for their part, must settle the Palestinians in their own midst and solve their problems.."

The Arab refugee problem does not differ from the many other refugee problems, except for the fact that it is the only major one that has not been resolved. In virtually all cases other refugee problems, infinitely larger in scope, have been solved through the resettlement and rehabilitation of the refugees with the help of suitable, financial arrangements.

This is what happened, for example, after the Greek-Turkish conflict following World War I, after World War II in West Germany and elsewhere, after the Indian-Pakistan conflict of the early 1960s. None of these refugee problems, involving tens of millions of human beings, was resolved by attempting to repatriate the refugees, en masse, to the countries and homes from which they had fled.

The Arabs have deliberately kept the problem of the refugees alive for thirty years in order to use it as a political weapon in the struggle against Israel. The Arab world today disposes of an unprecedented glut of assets and resources which are employed for such purposes as the purchase of arms instead of the benefit of their kin-the Palestine Arab refugees.





Jewish refugees forcibly ejected from Arab countries.

It is important ,to remember again that 800,000 Jewish refugees were driven out of Arab countries where their ancestors had lived for thousands of years, contributing to the culture, the commerce, the science, the literature and the well-being of the countries of which they were part. (In 1945 there were about 140,000 Jews in Iraq; 60,000 in Yemen and Aden; 35,000 in Syria; 5,000 in Lebanon; 90,000 in Egypt; 60,000 in Libya; 150,000 in Algeria; 120,000 in Tunisia; and 300,000 in Morocco, including Tangiers. That comes to a total of about 960,000 — and more than 200,000 in Iran and Turkey.) The refugees left behind considerable wealth. Yet not one word of their rights is heard in the UN or the International media.

The Arabs, consisting of some 22 nations, occupy land which covers one tenth of the World's surface, the largest area occupied by ANY ethnic group. These nations are all (with the exception of Egypt and Jordan) still technically at war with Israel (which is the size of Wales), refuse to recognise it's right to even exist and are sworn to destroy it....

The World wants Israel (the only Jewish state) to sacrifice it's very heartland to yet ANOTHER Arab state, virulently sworn to it's destruction and the genocide of it's people, swearing to finish the job which Hitler started.

However, as I have described in some detail, whereas the Jewish state was once looked upon as the "David" against the combined "Arab Goliath", the well oiled Palestinian/Islamic propaganda machine, through using the diplomatic, political and media weapon of the so-called 'Palestinian issue', has now reversed the roles. The "Palestinians" are now the new "David" and the Israeli army is the new "Goliath".

At the Orient House in "East" Jerusalem, (the "official Palestinian Authority HQ"), a map is displayed for all visitors to see outining the borders of the intended "Palestinian State". The territory extends from the Lebanese border in the north to the Red Sea in the south AND from the Mediterranean Sea in the west to the Jordanian border in the east. In other words ALL OF MODERN DAY ISRAEL. Every single Jewish village, town or city has been replaced by a Palestinian equivalent. There is no provision for the existence of any Jewish State of Israel.

Palestinian Authority Chairman, Yasser Arafat, himself also stated publicly on CBS on 09 February 1988, "The victory march will continue until the Palestinian flag flies in Jerusalem and in all of Palestine, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea and from Rosh Hanikra to Eilat."

At any point during the past 62 years, Arab governments could have helped the Palestinian Arabs settle down to a decent life. They could have created the infrastructure of an autonomous Palestine on the West Bank of the Jordan and the Gaza territory that Egypt controlled until 1967, or encouraged the resettlement of Palestinians in Jordan, which constitutes the lion's share of the original mandate of Palestine. Rather than fund the Palestine Liberation Organization to foment terror against Israel they could have endowed Palestinian schools of architecture, engineering, medicine and law.

What Israel did for its refugees from Arab lands, Arabs could have done much more sumptuously for the Palestinians displaced by the same conflict. Instead, Arab rulers cultivated generations of refugees in order to justify their ongoing campaign against the Jewish state.

The unwanted presence of the Jews became the rallying point for internal dissatisfaction with the mounting problems of Arab regimes. The drumbeat against Israel invited the world to debate the iniquities of the Jews rather than question the legitimacy of the attacks against them. This comparison is not intended to equate, for example, the Germans with the Arabs, except in the ways that both exploited anti-Semitism to achieve broader political goals. Both used the alleged threat of "the Jews" to excuse their own failures. Anti-Semitism in both situations linked otherwise warring groups of the Left and Right.

The Palestinian Authority's own racist indoctrination program from birth to adult-hood, depicts Jews as "murderers and rapists", "bloodsuckers", "dogs", "monkeys", "pigs", and "enemies of Islam who massacre the faithful", but all this is side-stepped by the International community, as is the Arab world's sworn agenda to eradicate the Jewish state. Indeed, the Palestinian media & education syllabus which promotes such racism is sadly funded by the European Union.

Israelis are not allowed to live in Palestinian areas full stop and those who even enter them are under threat of death. No security reasons, just racial hatred in a Palestinian society that depicts Jews as sub-human and an entity that must be eradicated.The concept of peace with Israel is not to be found anywhere in Palestinian school books. The peace process between Israel and the Palestinians, based on the Oslo accords, is not even mentioned. Nowhere are Palestinian youths led to see Israel as a neighbour with whom peaceful relations should be desired. The Jewish connection to the Holy Land is confined to antiquity. From the Roman period onwards this Jewish link is ignored. The Jews return to Palestine is described as infiltration and in a negative context only.

Indeed, through Palestinian/Arab society, Israel is being robbed of its political, historic and geographic legitimacy, whilst seeming and being made to appear to rob the Palestinians of the nation it never had.

So where do we go from here ? What hopes are there for "peace" between the Arabs and the Jews. Is "peace" really being pursued or is the true agenda of the Arab/Palestinian world being cloaked by political euphemisms ? Perhaps this can best be addressed again through the words of the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat himself.

Many will remember how in full view of the cameras and an International audience, upon the lawn of the White House on 13 September 1993, the late Prime Minister of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin, called for an end to bloodshed and the conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians. He shook the hand of Yasser Arafat and pledged his commitment to resolve the conflict through negotiations. Arafat made the same verbal commitment in relation to negotiations being the only way forward.


How many though are aware that on the very same day, Yasser Arafat made the following broadcast in Arabic on Jordanian TV;
"Since we cannot defeat Israel in war, we do this in stages. We take any and every territory that we can of Palestine, and establish sovereignty there, and we use it as a springboard to take more. When the time comes, we can get the Arab Nations to join us for the final blow against Israel."

The following is an excerpt from a private speech made by Yasser Arafat entitled "The Impending Total Collapse of Israel" in Stockholm, Sweden, January 30, 1996

The same attitude prevails throughout most of the Arab world. Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk al-Shara stated in the government controlled Syrian Newspaper, ‘Tishrin’, ‘Israel is the enemy of Islam and all Moslems.’ (14 November 1999).

Whilst further interviewed by a gathering of writers and journalists in Damascus, he further elaborated;-

Syrian’s Foreign Minister then proceeded to state Syria’s real intention to the audience. He explained that Syria’s intent was identical to that of the PLO in using Islam’s ‘Truce Of Hudaybiyyah’ of 628 AD, and continue it’s war against Israel in stages. Clearly any intention by Israel to cede the Golan Heights to Syria in exchange for a useless piece of paper will NOT bring peace. The Minister admitting that cessation of the territory by Israel will just give Syria a more strategic position from which it will admittedly launch another military onslaught against Israel in the not too distant future.

Objectively it can be seen that there is little if any difference between the rhetoric directed from the Arabs towards the Jews from the re-birth of Israel in 1948 until the present day. With the Palestinian National Charter calling for the total eradication of the Jewish state still not having been rescinded, it would appear that the region is still heading towards the same destination but having expediently changed the route slightly in order to distort the perception of the public at large.

The Middle East ‘peace-process’, whose main principle is supposed to be ‘land for peace’ involves a paradox whereby the minuscule democracy of Israel is being forced to provide it’s totalitarian neighbours & enemies even more territory. Arab states sworn to the destruction of the Jewish state and who themselves occupy territory 99.5% of the Middle East itself; an area vast in size and many score times the size of the tiny state of Israel.

However, in exchange for land, Israel did not get peace, it got suicide bombers, suicide machine gunners, drive-by terrorists, snipers, mortar bombs, car bombs, fire bombs, grenades, booby traps, explosive packages, remote controlled explosives, forest fires, lynching, and kids bludgeoned to death. Israel also got a few staged arrests and revolving prison doors. Many hundreds of Israelis have been killed by PLO militias. Many thousands of others were maimed, many for life.

The issue here is not ‘land for peace’! It never has been. It is the very existence of the Jewish state in the land of ‘Islam’ in the Middle East that is the issue. An existence that will never be accepted by the Moslem world, irrespective of any boundaries.

Political, man-made initiatives to solve this apparently intractable situation have been dubbed as the "Road-Trap to peace" with the participation of the Arab League & European Union being addressed as "Eurabia". The conditions in the Palestinian Autonomy under Yasser Arafat were appropriately dubbed "Arafatistan". Gaza under Hamas rule being cited as "Hamastan".

The late, former Israeli leader Golda Meir said, "there will never be peace until the Arabs learn to love their children more than they hate the Jews."

When one takes the time to analyse the numerous recent cases where even pregnant Palestinian women have been publicly executed on mere suspicion of collaborating with Israel, with many of the victims having had their bodies hung from lamp-posts as a deterrent to others, the relevance of this statement is only too apparent.

Many of those innocent Palestinians also jailed on mere suspicion of collaboration have been shot dead whilst in their Palestinian Authority cells without trial. Those 'fortunate' enough to have been wounded and hospitalised, then being shot dead in their hospital beds by those gunmen who have seen fit to 'finish the job'.

Again, the media seldom report such incidents, only providing a sanitized, selective and perhaps politically expedient version of the news that they choose to reveal to the general public. As individuals we really need to be fully aware of what is truly happening on the ground in relation to this conflict.

This subject will continue to be addressed through ongoing articles together with the perspective as revealed in the Hebrew-Christian Scriptures. The purpose of this initial commentary is to reveal some of the more obscure yet essential and fundamental issues which are not readily presented by the Western media. The reader is left to ask his/her own questions as to why such facts are hidden.

Might I respectfully recommend the following books which provide an in-depth, mostly secular, study of many of these contentious issues;

"From Time Immemorial; The Origins Of The Arab-Jewish Conflict Over Palestine" by Joan Peters

"Empires Of The Sands; Struggle For Mastery In The Middle East, 1789 - 1923" by Efraim & Inari Karsh

"Battleground; Fact & Fantasy In Palestine" by Samuel Katz

"The Palestine War 1948; Arab - Israeli Conflict" by Efraim Karsh

"Arafat’s War" by Efraim Karsh

"The Case For Israel" by Alan Dershowitz

"Fabricating Israeli History; The ‘New Historians’ " by Efraim Karsh

"Islam & The Jews" by Professor Mark Gabriel
"Islam & Terrorism" by Professor Mark Gabriel