In light of Bibi Netanyahu’s new far right government coalition, it seems a good time to reflect: How did a white ethnostate come to exist in the middle east?
The short answer is: The Holocaust. But there’s actually a longer history, and we should first delve into anti-Semitism. The first anti-Semitic trope was the idea that The Jews™ killed Jesus, as opposed to the Romans who presided over the proceedings, and the Roman soldier who, according to scripture, stabbed Jesus in the side while on the cross, finally ending his earthly misery.
World War I brought the anti-Semitic, anti-communist Judeo-Bolshevism trope, which asserted that Jews were trying to undermine capitalism in Europe. Today, we have the opposite: the anti-Semitic trope that Jews secretly control capital via the banks & media. There’s the trope that criticism of Israel is a criticism of Jews themselves. The trope that Jews are disloyal, ultimately siding with Israel over whatever country they might reside. And of course the horrific Holocaust, which indirectly resulted in the creation of the state of Israel.
In a reasonably sensible world, if Jews were to have land carved out for them from an existing state, it would’ve been Germany – reparations from the nation which most wronged them. Instead, the land was stolen from Palestine, a despicable political maneuver which fulfilled the abhorrent ambitions of the Crusades.
The West had always wanted the Holy Land for Europeans. Ever since the Caliphates, Muslims had controlled the area – Jerusalem, Mecca, Damascus… But by the early 20th century the Ottoman Empire was in steep decline. They’d lost wars and land. Additionally, they had a ton of oil, which saw increased demand given the modern horseless carriages Ford and the like were producing.
All that bounty was on the table when WWI popped off. And the US wanted in. Germany had taken out full page ads in Western newspapers, warning that ships entering the waters would be sunk. Nonetheless, the RMS Lusitania was sent housing 4 million rounds of ammunition, making it a legitimate military target. It was of course sunk by Germany, killing 1100 people. The sinking of the Lusitania was then used in ads promoting the US war efforts (which finally began in earnest two years later).
The Ottomans were initially negotiating with both sides of the conflict before attacking Russia and joining the Triple Alliance with Germany & Austria-Hungary in late 1914. They declared jihad against the Allies, in hopes to persuade British-controlled India to rise up against the Crown. But in the summer of 1915 the secret McMahon-Hussein Correspondence were held in which Britain promised post-war independence to Arab-majority areas in exchange for the Sharif of Mecca launching an Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire.
This was revealed as a betrayal within months, when Russian Bolsheviks leaked the secretly negotiated Sykes-Picot Agreement in which Europeans (largely Britain & France) carved up Africa & the Middle East on their own terms, with Brits controlling Palestine.
By 1917, the British government publicly released the Balfour Declaration, in support of turning Palestine into a “home for Jews”. Ostensibly in pursuit of world peace, the League of Nations was created in 1920, which in 1922 awarded Britain control of what it called Mandatory Palestine.
The Brits gave preferential treatment to Jews in Palestine, awarding them government contracts and giving Arabs minority status in the Mandate government.
In protest, Palestinians organized a six-month general strike in 1936. In order to “study” the causes, Britain established the Peel Commission which proposed a two-state “solution” which would steal half of Palestine to create a state of Israel.
In wake of the Arab Revolt (1936-39), and after the failed London Conference negotiations, Britain unilaterally released the White Paper of 1939, which asserted that Jewish settlers had indeed successfully established a “home” in Palestine, and as such capped Jewish immigration from Europe to Palestine at 15k/yr for five years, and called for the creation of a non-partitioned single state of Palestine within 10 years, with Arabs determining Jewish immigration levels from that point forward – honoring past promises to Arabs & rejecting the two-state solution of the Peel Commission.
However, things changed following WWII & the Holocaust. Civil war was raging in Palestine between Arab forces & the Haganah (IDF precursor), Israel declared independence, and Britain abandoned Mandate Palestine and relinquished control to the UN, which co-signed the Peel Commission’s recommendation of stealing Palestinian land to create dual states of Israel & Palestine.
Israel proceeded to carry out the Nakba against Palestinians, violently killing & displacing 700k Palestinians from 500 villages.
What’s been happened since is more of the same. Israel stole the West Bank & East Jerusalem, as well as the Golan Heights. European Jewish settlers have taken more & more Palestinian land, stolen & demolished more & more Palestinian homes. Arab-controlled areas have been chopped up and severed from one another, leaving no possibility of a contiguous Palestine as part of a two-state solution.
Walls were put up around the Gaza Strip, with anyone approaching shot, rendering Gaza a grizzly outdoor prison for Palestinians. Checkpoints were set up throughout the West Bank & East Jerusalem, with Palestinians subject to constant dehumanizing searches by armed forces. Palestinians residing elsewhere in Israel are subject to slightly less dehumanization, which Israel uses to divide them from those in the West Bank & East Jerusalem, and them from those in the Gaza Strip.
There are hundreds of laws rendering Palestinians as second class citizens in Israel. For instance, foreign Jews (with a Jewish mother) have guaranteed Israeli citizenship rights. In contrast, Palestinians who marry Israeli Jews have no such citizenship right. They have no right to travel. They have no recognized right to return to their stolen land & homes. They have no right to an army or even to commercially fish the sea.
What began as a Jewish Restoration project has morphed into ruthless Zionism, which seeks an ethno-state by & for Jews alone. Apartheid has been implemented. A genocide is being committed. There are too many Arabs in Israel for it to remain both a democracy & a Jewish ethno-state, and they’ve chosen the latter.
Every Palestinian effort is characterized as terrorism. Every act of terrorism committed by the Israeli apartheid regime against subjugated Palestinians is characterized by Zionists as “Israel’s right to defend itself.” Every statement of solidarity with Palestinians (such as BDS) is met with disingenuous accusations of anti-Semitism.
Gaza is a testing ground for military & surveillance. The IDF train US police on their dehumanizing & despicable tactics. They constantly bulldoze homes. They brutalize women, children, & the elderly. Every few years they kill thousands more in missile strikes celebrated by the ghoulish populace who are forces into service for the state. While threatening & bombing Syria, Iran, & Lebanon.
And now that Bibi is back in charge, this time with a far-right coalition, the brutality which Palestinians have bravely endured for decades will soon be remembered as the good old days.