I am especially delighted to address
an American audience, for the tragic problem of
Palestine will never be solved without American
understanding, American sympathy, American support.
So many billions of words have been written about
Palestine perhaps more than on any other subject in
history that I hesitate to add to them. Yet I am compelled to do so, for I am
reluctantly convinced that the world in general, and
America in particular, knows almost nothing of the
true case for the Arabs.
We Arabs follow, perhaps far more than you think,
the press of America. We are frankly disturbed to find
that for every word printed on the Arab side, a thousand
are printed on the Zionist side.
There are many reasons for this. You have many millions
of Jewish citizens interested in this question.
They are highly vocal and wise in the ways of publicity.
There are few Arab citizens in America, and we are as yet
unskilled in the technique of modern propaganda. The
results have been alarming for us. In your press we see a
horrible caricature and are told it is our true portrait.
In all justice, we cannot let this pass by default.
Our case is quite simple: For nearly 2,000 years
Palestine has been almost 100 per cent Arab. It is still
preponderantly Arab today, in spite of enormous
Jewish immigration. But if this immigration
continues we shall soon be outnumbered minority in our
home. Palestine is a small and very poor country, about
the size of your state of Vermont. Its Arab population is
only about 1,200,000. Already we have had forced on us,
against our will, some 600,000 Zionist Jews. We are
threatened with many hundreds of thousands more.
Our position is so simple and natural that we are amazed
it should even be questioned. It is exactly the same
position you in America take in regard to the unhappy
European Jews. You are sorry for them, but you do not
want them in your country.
We do not want them in ours, either. Not because they are
Jews, but because they are foreigners. We would not want
hundreds of thousands of foreigners in our country, be
they Englishmen or Norwegians or Brazilians or whatever.
Think for a moment: In the last 25 years we have had one
third of our entire population forced upon us. In
America that would be the equivalent of 45,000,000
complete strangers admitted to your country, over your
violent protest, since 1921. How would you have reacted
to that?
Because of our perfectly natural dislike of being
overwhelmed in our own homeland, we are called blind
nationalists and heartless anti-Semites. This charge
would be ludicrous were it not so dangerous. No
people on earth have been less "anti-Semitic"
than the Arabs. The persecution of the Jews has been
confined almost entirely to the Christian nations of the
West. Jews, themselves, will admit that never since the
Great Dispersion did Jews develop so freely and reach
such importance as in Spain when it was an Arab
possession. With very minor exceptions, Jews have lived
for many centuries in the Middle East, in complete peace
and friendliness with their Arab neighbours.
Damascus, Baghdad, Beirut and other Arab centres have
always contained large and prosperous Jewish
colonies. Until the Zionist invasion of Palestine began,
these Jews received the most generous treatment, far
better than in Christian Europe. Now, unhappily, for the
first time in history, these Jews are beginning to feel
the effects of Arab resistance to the Zionist assault.
Most of them are as anxious as Arabs to stop it. Most of
these Jews who have found happy homes among us
present, as we do, the coming of these strangers.
I was puzzled for a long time about the odd belief which
apparently persists in America that Palestine has somehow
"always been a Jewish land."
Recently an American I talked to cleared up this mystery.
He pointed out that the only things most Americans know
about Palestine are what they read in the Bible. It was a
Jewish land in those days, they reason, and they assume
it has always remained so. Nothing could be farther from
the truth. It is absurd to reach so far back into the
mists of history to argue about who should have Palestine
today, and I apologise for it. Yet the Jews do this, and
I must reply to their "historic claim." I
wonder if the world has ever seen a stranger sight than a
group of people seriously pretending to claim a land
because their ancestors lived there some 2,000 years ago!
If you suggest that I am biased, I invite you to read any
sound history of the period and verify the facts.
Such fragmentary records as we have indicate that the
Jews were wandering nomads from Iraq who moved to
southern Turkey, came south to Palestine, stayed there a
short time, and then passed to Egypt, where they remained
about 400 years. About 1300 BC (according to your
calendar) they left Egypt and gradually conquered most
"but not all"of the inhabitants of Palestine.
It is significant that the Philistines "not the
Jews"gave their name to the country:
"Palestine" is merely the Greek form of
"Philistia." Only once, during the empire of
David and Solomon, did the Jews ever control nearly
"but not all "the land which is today
Palestine. This empire lasted only 70 years, ending in
926 BC. Only 250 years later the Kingdom of Judah had
shrunk to a small province around Jerusalem, barely a
quarter of modern Palestine.
In 63 BC the Jews were conquered by Roman Pompey,
and never again had even the vestige of independence. The
Roman Emperor Hadrian finally wiped them out about 135
AD. He utterly destroyed Jerusalem, rebuilt under another
name, and for hundreds of years no Jew was permitted to
enter it. A handful of Jews remained in Palestine but the
vast majority were killed or scattered to other
countries, in the Diaspora, or the Great Dispersion. From
that time Palestine ceased to be a Jewish country, in any
conceivable sense. This was 1,815 years ago, and yet the
Jews solemnly pretend they still own Palestine! If such
fantasy were allowed, how the map of the world would
dance about!
Italians might claim England, which the Romans held
so long. England might claim France, "homeland"
of the conquering Normans. And the French Normans might
claim Norway, where their ancestors originated. And
incidentally, we Arabs might claim Spain, which we held
for 700 years.
Many Mexicans might claim Spain, "homeland" of
their forefathers. They might even laim Texas, which was
Mexican until 100 years ago. And uppose the
American Indians claimed the "homeland" of
which they were the sole, native, and ancient occupants
until only some 450 years ago!
I am not being facetious. All these claims are just as
"or just as fantastic"as the Jewish
"historic connection" with Palestine. Most are
more valid. In any event, the great Moslem expansion
about 650 AD finally settled things. It dominated
Palestine completely. From that day on, Palestine was
solidly Arabic in population, language, and
religion. When British armies entered the country during
the last war, they found 500,000 Arabs and only 65,000
Jews.
If solid, uninterrupted Arab occupation for nearly 1,300
years does not make a country "Arab", what
does?
The Jews say, and rightly, that Palestine is the home
of their religion. It is likewise the birthplace of
Christianity, but would any Christian nation claim it on
that account? In passing, let me say that the Christian
Arabs "and there are many hundreds of thousands of
them in the Arab World "are in absolute agreement
with all other Arabs in opposing the Zionist invasion of
Palestine. May I also point out that Jerusalem is, after
Mecca and Medina, the holiest place in Islam. In fact, in
the early days of our religion, Moslems prayed toward
Jerusalem instead of Mecca.
The Jewish "religious claim" to Palestine is as
absurd as the "historic claim." The Holy
Places, sacred to three great religions, must be open to
all, the monopoly of none. Let us not confuse religion
and politics.
We are told that we are inhumane and heartless because do
not accept with open arms the perhaps 200,000 Jews in
Europe who suffered so frightfully under Nazi cruelty,
and who even now "almost three years after wars
end" still languish in cold, depressing camps. Let
me underline several facts. The unimaginable persecution
of the Jews was not done by the Arabs: it was done by a
Christian nation in the West. The war which ruined Europe
and made it almost impossible for these Jews to
rehabilitate themselves was fought by the Christian
nations of the West. The rich and empty portions of the
earth belong, not to the Arabs, but to the Christian
nations of the West. And yet, to ease their consciences,
these Christian nations of the West are asking Palestine
"a poor and tiny Moslem country of the East" to
accept the entire burden.
"We have hurt these people terribly," cries the
West to the East. "Why you please take care of
them for us?"
We find neither logic nor justice in this. Are we
therefore "cruel and heartless
nationalists"? We are a generous people: we are
proud that "Arab hospitality" is a phrase
famous throughout the world. We are a humane people: no
one was shocked more than we by the Hitlerite
terror. No one pities the present plight of the desperate
European Jews more than we. But we say that Palestine has
already sheltered 600,000 refugees. We believe that is
enough to expect of us "even too much. We believe it
is now the turn of the rest of the world to accept some
of them.
I will be entirely frank with you. There is one thing the
Arab world simply cannot understand. Of all the nations
of the earth, America is most insistent that something be
done for these suffering Jews of Europe. This feeling
does credit to the humanity for which America is famous,
and to that glorious inscription on your Statue of
Liberty.
And yet this same America "the richest, greatest,
most powerful nation the world has ever known
"refuses to accept more than a token handful of
these same Jews herself!
I hope you will not think I am being bitter about this. I
have tried hard to understand that mysterious paradox,
and I confess I cannot. Nor can any other Arab.
Perhaps you have been informed that "the Jews in
Europe want to go to no other place except
Palestine."
This myth is one of the greatest propaganda triumphs of
the Jewish Agency for Palestine, the organisation which
promotes with fanatic zeal the emigration to Palestine.
It is a subtle half-truth, thus doubly dangerous.
The astounding truth is that nobody on earth really knows
where these unfortunate Jews really want to go! You would
think that in so grave a problem, the American, British,
and other authorities responsible for the European Jews
would have made a very careful survey, probably by vote,
to find out where each Jew actually wants to go.
Amazingly enough this has never been done! The Jewish
Agency has prevented it.
Some time ago the American Military Governor in
Germany was asked at a press conference how he was so
certain that all Jews there wanted to go to Palestine.
His answer was simple: "My Jewish advisors tell me
so." He admitted no poll had ever been made.
Preparations were indeed begun for one, but the Jewish
Agency stepped in to stop it.
The truth is that the Jews in German camps are now
subjected to a Zionist pressure campaign which learned
much from the Nazi terror. It is dangerous for a Jew to
say that he would rather go to some other country, not
Palestine. Such dissenters have been severely
beaten, and worse. Not long ago, in Palestine, nearly
1,000 Austrian Jews informed the international refugee
organisation that they would like to go back to Austria,
and plans were made to repatriate them. The Jewish Agency
heard of this, and exerted enough political pressure to
stop it. It would be bad propaganda for Zionism if Jews
began leaving Palestine. The nearly 1,000 Austrian are
still there, against their will.
The fact is that most of the European Jews are Western in
culture and outlook, entirely urban in experience and
habits. They cannot really have their hearts set on
becoming pioneers in the barren, arid, cramped land which
is Palestine.
One thing, however, is undoubtedly true. As matters stand
now, most refugee Jews in Europe would, indeed, vote for
Palestine, simply because they know no other country will
have them. If you or I were given a choice between a
near-prison camp for the rest of our lives "or
Palestine" we would both choose Palestine, too. But
open up any other alternative to them "give them any
other choice, and see what happens!
No poll, however, will be worth anything unless the
nations of the earth are willing to open their doors
"just a little"to the Jews. In other words, if
in such a poll a Jew says he wants to go to Sweden,
Sweden must be willing to accept him. If he votes
for America, you must let him come in.
Any other kind of poll would be a farce. For the
desperate Jew, this is no idle testing of opinion: this
is a grave matter of life or death. Unless he is
absolutely sure that his vote means something, he will
always vote for Palestine, so as not to risk his bird in
the hand for one in the bush.
In any event, Palestine can accept no more. The 65,000
Jews in Palestine in 1918 have jumped to
600,000 today. We Arabs have increased, too, but not by
immigration. The Jews were then a mere 11 per cent of our
population. Today they are one third of it.
The rate of increase has been terrifying. In a few more
years "unless stopped now" it will overwhelm
us, and we shall be an important minority in our own
home. Surely the rest of the wide world is rich enough
and generous enough to find a place or 200,000 Jews
"about one third the number that tiny, poor
Palestine has already sheltered. For the rest of the
world, it is hardly a drop in the bucket. For us it means
national suicide. We are sometimes told that since the
Jews came to Palestine, the Arab standard of living has
improved. This is a most complicated question. But let us
even assume, for the argument, that it is true. We would
rather be a bit poorer, and masters of our own home. Is
this unnatural?
The sorry story of the so-called "Balfour
Declaration," which started Zionist immigration into
Palestine, is too complicated to repeat here in detail.
It is grounded in broken promises to the Arabs
"promises made in cold print which admit no denying.
We utterly deny its validity. We utterly deny the right
of Great Britain to give away Arab land for a
"national home" for an entirely foreign people.
Even the League of Nations sanction does not alter this.
At the time, not a single Arab state was a member of the
League. We were not allowed to say a word in our own
defense.
I must point out, again in friendly frankness, that
America was nearly as responsible as Britain for this
Balfour Declaration. President Wilson approved it before
it was issued, and the American Congress adopted it word
for word in a joint resolution on 30th June, 1922.
In the 1920s, Arabs were annoyed and insulted by Zionist
immigration, but not alarmed by it. It was steady, but
fairly small, as even the Zionist founders thought it
would remain. Indeed for some years, more Jews left
Palestine than entered it, in 1927 almost twice as many.
But two new factors, entirely unforeseen by Britain or
the League or America or the most fervent Zionist, arose
in the early thirties to raise the immigration to
undreamed heights. One was the World Depression; the
second the rise of Hitler.
In 1932, the year before Hitler came to power, only 9,500
Jews came to Palestine. We did not welcome them, but we
were not afraid that, at that rate, our solid Arab
majority would ever be in danger. But the next year
"the year of Hitler" it jumped to 30,000!
In 1934 it was 42,000! In 1935 it reached 61,000! It was
no longer the orderly arrival of idealist Zionists.
Rather, all Europe was pouring its frightened Jews upon
us. Then, at last, we, too, became frightened. We knew
that unless this enormous influx stopped, we were, as
Arabs, doomed in our Palestine homeland. And we have not
changed our minds.
I have the impression that many Americans believe the
trouble in Palestine is very remote from them, that
America had little to do with it, and that your only
interest now is that of a humane bystander.
I believe that you do not realise how directly you are,
as a nation, responsible in general for the whole Zionist
move and specifically for the present terrorism. I call
this to your attention because I am certain that if you
realise your responsibility you will act fairly to admit
it and assume it. Quite aside from official American
support for the "National Home" of the
Balfour Declaration, the Zionist settlements in
Palestine would have been almost impossible, on anything
like the current scale, without American money. This was
contributed by American Jewry in an idealistic
effort to help their fellows. The motive was worthy: the
result were disastrous. The contributions were by private
individuals, but they were almost entirely Americans,
and, as a nation, only America can answer for it.
The present catastrophe may be laid almost entirely at
your door. Your government, almost alone in the world, is
insisting on the immediate admission of 100,000 more Jews
into Palestine "to be followed by countless
additional ones. This will have the most frightful
consequences in bloody chaos beyond anything ever hinted
at in Palestine before. It is your press and political
leadership, almost alone in the world, who press this
demand. It is almost entirely American money which hires
or buys the "refugee ships" that steam
illegally toward Palestine: American money which pays
their crews. The illegal immigration from Europe is
arranged by the Jewish Agency, supported almost entirely
by American funds. It is American dollars which support
the terrorists, which buy the bullets and pistols that
kill British soldiers "your allies" and Arab
citizens "your friends".
We in the Arab world were
stunned to hear that you permit open advertisements in
newspapers asking for money to finance these terrorists,
to arm them openly and deliberately for murder. We could
not believe this could really happen in the modern
world. Now we must believe it: we
have seen the advertisements with our own eyes.
I point out these things because nothing less than
complete frankness will be of use. The crisis is too
stark for mere polite vagueness which means nothing. I
have the most complete confidence in the fair-mindedness
and generosity of the American public. We Arabs ask no
favours. We ask only that ou know the full truth, not
half of it. We ask only that when you judge the Palestine
question, you put yourselves in our place. What would
your answer be if some outside agency told you that you
must accept in America many millions of utter strangers
in your midst "enough to dominate your country
"merely because they insisted on going to America,
and because their forefathers had once lived there some
2,000 years ago?
Our answer is the same.
And what would be your action if, in spite of your
refusal, this outside agency began forcing them on you?
Ours will be the same.
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