Palestinians Need to Admit Their Narrative is a Lie
Shalom friends, -
Recently, I read Hussein Aboubakr Mansour’s most recent article, “There is Actually No Solution,” in which he broke down every aspect of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
I’ll save you the time, and the free paid post, and summarize what most of you already understand.
At the end of the day, the battle between Israel and its foes is simply too advantageous to too many geopolitical players for them to ever allow it to come to a resolution.
Even the United States and Europe are incentivized to prolong the conflict until the messianic era arrives. Friendlier nations like the UAE and Saudi Arabia use their support for the Palestinians as a cover for their increasing modernization and growing ties with the West. Jordan and Egypt use it to maintain stability at home. Qatar and the Islamic Republic use the Palestinians to divert attention from their atrocious domestic issues. Turkey utilizes it to maintain its exceptionally advantageous position as an Islamist nation that is also a NATO ally.
The key to all of this is the Nakba.
Meaning “catastrophe,” most know the Nakba as the all-encompassing narrative that describes the evil the Jews incurred onto the poor Arabs of Palestine as they systemically removed them from their homes. Even many Arabs and Muslims who are now second or third generation Israelis who hold equal rights in Israel, believe that the rest of their brethren were forced from their land. Refugee “camps” (that are just cities) in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and Judea and Samaria were created as a result of the Nakba, and the Arabs of Palestine refused to take any action to improve their situation because everyone else convinced them their glory would return one day.
In 1961, Martha Gellhorn of The Atlantic wrote an article, “The Arabs of Palestine,” that reflects her time amongst the Arabs throughout the Levant. Remember that the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was created in 1964. Not only has the general sentiment transported across time, but so have the talking points. The Arabs of Palestine in 1961 are saying the same thing the pink-haired barista with an English degree from Columbia who served you yesterday. Here are two examples:
In the course of its parenthood UNRWA has spent about $360 million on the Arab refugees… Of the total the United States provided more than $238 million, Great Britain over $65 million—but spread across an in varying amounts, sixty-one states, including Israel and the Holy See, have helped with cash. The Soviet Union has never paid one cent. This is a tiny note of malice: Arab refugees often express tender emotions for the Soviet Union, whereas most of the village orators blame the United States and England, or that bogey, “Western Imperialism” for their exile.
Judging by the refugees I saw in Jericho, in camps outside Jerusalem, in Jerusalem itself, the boon of citizenship fosters sanity… In Jordan, a refugee’s education and self-reliance showed at once in his politics. The better educated, the more able do not waste their time on thoughts of violent revenge, and give their loyalty to King Hussein. The more ignorant and less competent nourish themselves with a passion for Nasser, war, and Return.
Except the Nakba is a lie — at least as they describe it. Undoubtedly, the non-Jewish population of 1948 Palestine left due to the actions of the Jewish army; but they also left because people always leave war zones and they also left because their leaders told them to and wait for the Jews to be pushed into the sea. The idea that Jews systematically committed any version of ethnic cleansing or genocide in 1948 is a complete lie. An exchange between Martha and an Arab Christian who stayed in Israel after 1948 reveals their true intentions:
MG: “The Arab governments and the Palestinian Arabs rejected Partition absolutely. You wanted the whole country. There is no secret about this. The statements of the Arab representatives in the UN are on record. The Arab governments never hid the fact that they started the war against Israel. But you, the Palestinian Arabs, agreed to this, you wanted it. And you thought, it seems to me very reasonably, that you would win and win quickly. It hardly seemed a gamble; it seemed a sure bet. You took the gamble and you lost. I can understand why you have all been searching for explanations of that defeat ever since, because it does seem incredible. I don’t happen to accept your explanations, but that is beside the point. The point is that you lost.
AC: “Yes.”
MG: “…If the position were reversed, if the Jews had started the war and lost it, if you had won the war, would you now accept Partition? Would you give up part of the country and allow the 650,000 Jewish residents of Palestine—who had fled from the war—to come back?”
AC: “Certainly not… But there would have been no Jewish refugees. They had no place to go. They would all be dead or in the sea.”
They knew this in 1961 and they know it today. While the term nakba does in fact mean catastrophe, said catastrophe referenced was not the genocide of Arabs, but of the failure of the Arab armies to genocide the Jews. Constantine K. Zurayk authored The Meaning of Disaster in 1948 that waits no further than two pages before making the purpose of his book crystal clear.
Despite this unapologetic statement, the Arabs of Palestine pushed the narrative that they were innocent victims with the Muslim Umma reinforcing it, and the rest of the world accepting it. Accusing the Jews of committing any form of ethnic cleansing or genocide against the Palestinians is no less of a blood libel than accusing us of killing Christ himself. Like the Christians who used this falsehood to wage a war against Jews, the Muslims have committed a similar sin, and it’s time we finally push back against it.
Gam v’Gam is the idea that two things can be true at the same time, and until October 7th, I believed the narrative of the Nakba and the one of Jewish independence were two things I could hold at the same time. Even though I was well aware of the falsehoods inside the narrative, I accepted the Palestinian truth because I believed that’s what would lead to peace. I was very wrong. I now understand that by accepting even an ounce of their lie, I perpetuated the conflict. I will not accept a false narrative believed to be true if that that false narrative is the oil that turns the gears of a globalized Jew-hating machine.
Even after October 7th, I remained committed to the two-state solution because I believed we could not allow the extremists to win. I applauded Israelis who figured out how to hold the pain and grief from October 7th at the same time they held the pain and grief for Palestinians who are suffering in Gaza. There are many smart and wonderful people who remain committed to peace and reconciliation, but I’ve determined their efforts remain futile until the Palestinians on the other side of the table, who claim to be for peace, admit this narrative is a lie.
Even though I was well aware of the falsehoods inside the narrative, I accepted the Palestinian truth because I believed that’s what would lead to peace.
I was very wrong.
Jews have had to come terms with the misrepresentation of our narratives as well. We were not “a people without land going to a land without a people,” and we were not wholly benevolent actors in the fight for independence. Many Jews committed horrible acts of violence in the name of creating a Jewish state, and any Jew who doesn’t admit that is lying. But that’s the difference between us and the Palestinians. We have admitted that our national narrative is complicated, complex, and not black and white. We were not helpless victims nor were we virtuous rebels. The people who fought for the creation of the Jewish state were human—imperfect; time for Palestinians to admit the same.
I have no idea what the future holds or what the day after looks like in Gaza, Judea and Samaria, Lebanon, Syria, Israel, the Middle East, or the world as a whole. I do know that the entire world seems to strangely hinge on a piece of land the size of New Jersey. Not a single country in the world can, or will, change the status of this conflict because too many other parties are interested in perpetuating it. Ironically, the only party that can change this dynamic is the one who has no country. Arabs of Palestine have been demanding a country of their own since 1917, and they have rejected every single opportunity to acquire one because they are committed to fighting and dying on a singular lie.
Self-determination is the underlying concept behind the creation of a Palestinian state—and, like always, the Palestinians have a choice. One option is to keep fighting on the lie that will also perpetuate their suffering. There is another option—much harder, complicated, and even life threatening—and that is to tell the truth. Speak the reality that the Palestinians so desperately need to face and the wheel will be broken. Once the Palestinians accept and admit their own history is just as complicated as our own, the oil that greases the gears will run dry, and we will watch the entire machine crumble.
At that point, we can build a new machine… together.
