Gaza, Who Has Been Here? Why Egypt and Jordan Were Told They'd Open Their Doors

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                  

You do realize, President Trump, that this land of Gaza has been desirable Riviera land for ages by every group of people imaginable.  It finally belonged to the Philistines, who King David of the Bible needed to wipe out as they were so anti-peaceful.  Each country who came along had had grandiose ideas for the land.  You are just one of the many.  Read on.  

Tel Aviv is also a seaside resort, like the Riviera.  Are you planning to have Gaza as competition to Tel Aviv?                      

                        Tel Aviv

 September 5, 2019:  Tel Aviv has been changing rapidly. Featuring boutique hotels, trendy restaurants and cocktail bars, and a completely new vibe, the tayelet is finally getting hot.  It was fantastic when I was there from 1980-1985.  Seaside in Oregon was nothing compared to Tel Aviv's seashore.  Over the years the beachfront’s destiny had been in the hands of many different authorities, changing its nature with every new policy decision. In the 1920s, the beach potential was first discovered by Tel Avivians; a casino operated in the area, and coffee shops flourished, with public spaces gradually expanding.

In 1917, during World War I, British forces captured the city.    Gaza grew significantly in the first half of the 20th century under Mandatory rule.  The Brits held a 30 year Mandate on Palestine which included Gaza since April 24, 1920 which was the end of World War I.   Since the 1917 Balfour Declaration and the 1920 creation of the British Mandate of Palestine, and in the context of Zionism and the mass migration of European Jews to Palestine, there had been tension and conflict between Arabs, Jews, and the British.  The historical novel,  The Settlers, is a history of this period in Palestine and is a must in taking one back as if in a time machine for understanding.  

 The population of the city swelled as a result of the Palestinian exodus during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. That war followed the civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war.

 The civil war became a war of separate states with the Israeli Declaration of Independence on 14 May 1948, the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight, and the entry of a military coalition of Arab states into the territory of Mandatory Palestine the following morning.    The civil war began the day after the adoption of the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine on 29 November 1947 – which planned to divide the territory into an Arab state, a Jewish state, and the Special International Regime encompassing the cities of Jerusalem and Bethlehem.                           

The mandate  ended with Golda Meier and others declaring this Promised Homeland had a name;  ISRAEL.  At the end of a series of offensives that began April 1948, in which Zionist forces had conquered cities and territories in Mandatory Palestine in preparation for the establishment of a Jewish state, Zionist leaders announced the Israeli Declaration of Independence on 14 May 1948. The following morning, after the termination of the British Mandate, Egypt, Transjordan, Syria, and expeditionary forces from Iraq entered Palestine.

 The invading forces took control of the Arab areas and attacked Israeli forces and several Jewish settlements. The 10 months of fighting took place mostly on the territory of the British Mandate and in the Sinai Peninsula and southern Lebanon, interrupted by several truce periods.                                                            

Gaza became a center of confrontation during the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, being occupied by Israel for decades. I don't know about decades. 

 Mark Twain wrote about his trip to Palestine in about 1860 and it wasn't occupied by anyone other than camels with a few Bedouin riders.  He never did see any Jews.  The book,  The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims' Progress, was published in 1869 and is considered one of the best-selling travel books of all time.             

By the end of the war in 1948, the State of Israel controlled all of the area that the UN had proposed for a Jewish state, as well as almost 60% of the area proposed for an Arab state, including Jaffa, Lydda and Ramle area, Upper Galilee, some parts of the Negev, the east coast as far as Gaza City, and a wide strip along the Tel Aviv–Jerusalem road. Israel also took control of West Jerusalem, which was meant to be part of an international zone for Jerusalem and its environs.

The city was largely destroyed and depopulated following the Israel-Hamas war.

           Settlement in the region of Gaza dates back to 3300–3000 BCE at Tell as-Sakan – a site located south of the present-day Gaza City – which began as an Ancient Egyptian fortress built in Canaanite territory.  People have been there for the past 5, 325 years!  

Gaza was part of Canaan originally.   Canaanite cities began to trade agricultural goods with the Egyptians. However, when Egypt's economic interests shifted to the cedar trade with Lebanon, Gaza's role was reduced to that of a port for ships carrying goods and it declined economically. The site was virtually abandoned and remained so throughout the Early Bronze Age II.

In 2250 BCE, the area experienced a total collapse of civilization and all of the cities in the Gaza region were abandoned by the 23rd century BCE.  This was when Abraham's family was either still in Mesopotamia or thinking of moving to Ur as the Exodus didn't happen till possibly in 1445 BCE as one researcher thinks, or by Jewish researching having Joshua entering the land of Israel in the year 1272 BCE.  Egypt settled Gaza once again and Tell el-Ajjul rose for the third time in the 15th century BCE. The city finally ceased to exist in the 14th century, at the end of the Bronze Age.  

 Gaza was in Egyptian hands for the next 350 years.  Egyptian direct rule ended in the 12th century BCE, when Gaza was settled by the Philistines, a seafaring people with cultural links to the Aegean, following their defeat against Ramesses III. It then became a part of the pentapolis, a league of the Philistines' five most important city-states. 

 Jews lived here as Gaza is also mentioned in the Hebrew Bible as the place where Samson was imprisoned and met his death.  According to biblical accounts, Gaza fell to Israelite rule during the reign of King David in the early 11th century BCE. When the biblically postulated United Monarchy split around 930 BCE, the territory of the Philistines, including Gaza, became part of the Kingdom of Judah. Some historians today believe that these stories about Israelite/Judean rule over Philistia are not historical, but rather mythical, but then many non-believers think all the bible is mythical.  The prophets Amos and Zephaniah are believed to have prophesied that Gaza would be deserted.                                                                        

                        David Fighting the Philistines, his worst enemy                      

 A large 6th-century synagogue with a mosaic tile floor depicting King David was discovered in Gaza. An inscription states that the floor was donated in 508–509 CE by two merchant brothers. https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-mosaic-floor-from-the-4th-c-ad-synagogue-in-gaza-depicting-king-david-30857688.html           

 The Jewish population left in 1917.  A few who returned departed during the 1929 Arab riots.  Gaza City became the main city in the Gaza Strip.  During the week of riots, from 23 to 29 August, 133 Jews were killed by Arabs, and 339 Jews were injured, most of whom were unarmed. There were 116 Arabs killed ...

When Canaan fell to the Assyrians under Tiglath-Pileser III and Sargon II around 730 BCE, Gaza came under Assyrian rule. In the 7th century, it again came under Egyptian control, but during the Persian period (6th–4th centuries BCE) it enjoyed a certain independence and flourished. In 601/600 BCE, Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II was defeated by the Egyptian army under pharaoh Necho II at Migdol near Gaza; however, it was captured by Nebuchadnezzar during his second unsuccessful campaign to invade Egypt in 568 BCE. In 529 BCE, Cambyses I unsuccessfully attacked Gaza. The first coins were minted on the Athens model around 420–410 BCE.

Alexander the Great besieged Gaza—the last city to resist his conquest on his path to Egypt—for five months, finally capturing it in 332 BCE.  Gaza was rebuilt after it was incorporated into the Roman Empire in 63 BCE, under the command of Pompey Magnus. Roman rule brought 600 years of peace and prosperity to the city—which became a busy port. Following Jerusalem's fall to the Romans who occupied her, then set the Temple and city on fire in 70 CE, captives were sold into slavery in Gaza. 

Emperor Hadrian,  favored Gaza, personally inaugurated wrestling, boxing and oratorical competitions in Gaza's new stadium. The city was adorned with many pagan temples, the main cult being that of Marnas. Other temples were dedicated to Zeus, Helios, Aphrodite, Apollo, Athena, and Tyche. With the suppression of the Bar Kokhba revolt (132–136 CE), Jewish captives were sold as slaves in Gaza. Gaza was a Roman Colony!!!

The arrival of the Muslim Arabs brought drastic changes to Gaza; its churches were transformed into mosques, including the Cathedral of John the Baptist (previously the Temple of Marnas), which became the Great Mosque of Gaza. Gaza's population adopted Islam as their religion relatively quickly in contrast with the city's countryside. Eventually, Arabic became the official language. The Christian population was reduced to an insignificant minority and the Samaritan residents deposited their property with their high priest and fled the city east upon the Muslim conquest.

In 796 the city was laid waste during a civil war by the Arab tribes of the area. Gaza apparently recovered by the 9th century according to Persian geographer Istakhri who wrote that merchants grew rich there "for this place was a great market for the people of the Hejaz." A Christian writer, writing in 867, described it as "rich in all things". Gaza's port, however, occasionally succumbed to neglect under Arab rule and an overall decline in commerce followed because of infighting among Palestine's rulers and Bedouin bandits who disrupted overland trade routes towards the city.  From 868 to 905 the Tulunids ruled Gaza, and around 909, the influence of the Fatimids from Egypt started to grow, leading to a slow decline of the city.

Skipping centuries to 1516, Gaza—by now a small town with an inactive port, ruined buildings and reduced trade—was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire.The Ottoman army quickly and efficiently crushed a small-scale uprising, and the local population generally welcomed them as fellow Sunni   Muslims.                          

Set in Palestine from the turn of the century to the Balfour Declaration, this novel revolves around a large Russian immigrant family facing a new life in a barren land.

Gaza City 's population in 1949 was 30,000 being swollen by many refugees.  Gaza was captured in November 1956 by Israel forces who remained there until March 1957.  It again passed under Israel rule during the Six Day War in 1967.  A census taken later that year gave its population at 119,000.    

The 1949 Armistice Agreements, which ended the 1948 Arab–Israeli War by delineating the Green Line as the legal boundary between Israel and the Arab countries, left the Kingdom of Egypt in control of a small swath of territory that it had captured and occupied in the former British Mandate for Palestine, namely the Gaza Strip.

    Map of the Gaza Strip after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, which established the Green Line between Israel and the Arab countries.  Gaza City is the capital. 

Gaza was captured in November 1956 by Israel forces who remained until March 1957.  It again passed under Israeli rule during the Six Day War of 1967.  

The Egyptian occupation of the Gaza Strip was briefly subsumed by Israel during the 1956 Suez Crisis and ended entirely during the 1967 Six-Day War, after which the territory became occupied by Israel with the establishment of the Israeli Military Governorate.  The census showed 119,000.  

Something to know about the land:  Gaza experienced destructive earthquakes in 1903 and 1914. Gaza is 22 miles long and about 8 miles wide.  The area was under Egyptian rule until 1949.  Then the Sinai  Operation allowed Israel to capture it back in November 1956.  They returned the land to Egypt in March 1957 who also had the UN Emergency Force to help them.                                                                     

The United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF), since its creation during the winter of 1956, has maintained a constant vigil along the Armistice Demarcation Line and the International Frontier. The Reece Squadron Unit has been responsible for patrolling the Northern Sector of the International Frontier.
Two members of the Royal Canadian Dragoons Reconnaissance Squadron on patrol along the Egypt/Israel frontier.

It was the UN Secretary U Thant who obeyed Nasser's demand to leave, which led to 1967's War which dumped Gaza into Israel's lap once more.  Now the population was 262,260 in Gaza of which 172,520 were refugees.    

Resource:

Book:  The Innocents Abroad, by Mark Twain

Book:  THE SETTLERS  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Gaza

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Arab%E2%80%93Israeli_War

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_the_Gaza_Strip_by_the_United_Arab_

Republic

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1929_Palestine_riots

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/community/articles/tide-turns-tel-aviv-promenade

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia

https://jewishbubba.blogspot.com/2025/01/how-we-got-involved-with-gaza-133-year.html

Who Were Oldest Unified People in Middle East?

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                 

First Pharaoh of Egypt was created long before others in the Middle East.  Egypt's first pharaoh of importance was Narmer who lived from 3273-2987 BCE.     A study found that the Y-chromosome haplogroup of the family was R1b. Haplogroup R1b is carried by modern Egyptians. Modern Egypt is also the only African country that is known to harbor all three R1 subtypes, including R1b-M269.  

                      Today's Middle East 

Amorites were living in today's Saudi Arabia.  The term Amorite refers broadly to an ethnic group of nomads who likely emerged from Mesopotamia, modern-day Syria, Iraq, Jordan or perhaps Arabia, in the third millennium BCE. Their earliest mention came about 4,400 years ago in an Akkadian cuneiform tablet that describes them as the enemy of the Sumerian kingdom of Ur where Abraham and his father, Terah had lived.                    

Amorites is one of the biblical names for the people of Canaan before the Israelite conquest.  After the mid-2nd millennium BC, Syrian Amorites came under the domination of first the Hittites and, from the 14th century BC, the Middle Assyrian Empire.

                                                  

The Assyrian Empire, an aggressive kingdom in the 20th century BCE, expanding in the 13th and 10th centuries BCE.  Ashurbanipal II (883-59 BCE overran Syria and Phoenician cities in 876 BCE. 

Shalmaneser III of Assyria  attacked Ben Hadad II of Damascus.At the time, Ahab of Israel was on the Damascus side in the battle at Karkar.  

The Exodus, which is figured to had been led by Moses, has a date going way back at least 3,000 years ago.  Moses is figured to have lived from 1391-1271 BCE.  Others believe the Exodus took place from 1579-1445 BCE.  Some say we entered Canaan by 1250 BCE. Moses left his him at age 80 and went to Egypt.  The Exodus ended outside of Canaan for him at age 120. He was an old man during the Exodus.    

1800 BC. Early Bronze Age. Traditional rabbinic dating of the patriarchs. Many clay tablets were also found in Ebla; tablets that tell of  a wealth of information on Syria and Canaan in the Early Bronze Age, and include the first known references to the "Canaanites", "Ugarit", and "Lebanon"..  The tablets were discovered by Italian archaeologist Paolo Matthiae and his team in 1974–75 during their excavations at the ancient city at Tell Mardikh. The tablets, which were found in situ on collapsed shelves, retained many of their contemporary clay tags to help reference them.   4,700 fragments, and many thousands of minor chips found in the palace archives of the ancient city of Ebla, Syria.

Ashur-uballit I, (reigned c. 1365–30 BC), king of Assyria during Mesopotamia’s feudal age, who created the first Assyrian empire and initiated the Middle Assyrian period (14th to 12th century BC). With the help of the Hittites he destroyed the dominion of the Aryan Mitanni (a non-Semitic people from upper Iran and Syria who had subjugated Assyria), ravaged Nineveh (near present Mosul, Iraq), and sent off the image of Assyria’s deity Ishtar to the Egyptian pharaoh (early 14th century). Later, allied with the Kassite successors in Babylonia, Ashur-uballit ended Hittite and Hurrian rule. By intermarriage he then influenced the Kassite dynasty and eventually dominated all of Babylonia, thus paving the way for the Neo-Assyrian mastery during the Sargonid dynasty (12th to 7th century).

The first king of the Babylonian Empire was Sumuabum and the only thing we really know about him was that he was an Amorite king and that he conquered the city-states of Dilbat and Kish, thus carving out a small kingdom in the middle of Mesopotamia.  Sumu-Abum (also Su-abu) was an Amorite, and the first King of the First Dynasty of Babylon (the Amorite Dynasty). He reigned between 1830 and 1817 BC (short chronology) or between 1897 and 1883 BC (middle chronology).

Nebuchadnezzar II -King of Babylonia ( was the 2nd  Neo-Babylonian emperor, ruling from the death of his father Nabopolassar in 605 BC to his own death in 562 BC. Historically known as Nebuchadnezzar the Great (605-562 BCE) , he is typically regarded as the empire's greatest king. He inherited the Assyrian Empire.   Nebuchadnezzar remains famous for his military campaigns in the Levant, for his construction projects in his capital, Babylon, including the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, and for the role he plays in Jewish history by exiling 8,000 of the Jewish aristocracy to Babylon. Ruling for 43 years, Nebuchadnezzar was the longest-reigning king of the Chaldean dynasty. By the time of his death, he was among the most powerful rulers in the world.

"According to a later Mesopotamian tradition enshrined in the Sumerian King List, the first king was Alulim, ruler of the city of Eridu.   Alulim) was a mythological Mesopotamian ruler, regarded as the first king ever to rule. He is known from the Sumerian King List, Ballad of Early Rulers, and others....The tablet of Old Babylonian period (c. 1900-1600 BC) from Ur describing the divine appointment of Alulim by the gods notes that he was chosen among "vast and many people,"and appointed by gods for the "shepherdship of the entirety of the many people".

The Amorite ruler Hammurabi (unknown–1750 B.C.), crowned king of Babylon around 1792 B.C., was both an avid warrior and a shrewd administrator who honored the traditions of Sumer, Akkad, and other lands he brought under his authority.

Bad-Tibira

Shuruppak

Sippar

Kish

Eridu

Mari

Adab

Isin

Ur

Uruk

class=notpageimage|

Map of Iraq showing the cities that are mentioned in the Sumerian King List and that have been identified archaeologically. Akkad, Awan, Akshak and Larak have not yet been securely identified. Gutium is located in the Zagros Mountains.  I see listed: Mari, Sippar, Kish, Adab, Isin, Shuruppak, Uruk, Bad-Tibira, and  Eridu and Ur which are close to each other.          

                  Eridu: The Earliest City in 

Mesopotamia and the World--- 

• Eridu is among the earliest permanent settlements in Mesopotamia, with a consistent occupation of some 4500 years.Eridu (called Tell Abu Shahrain or Abu Shahrein in Arabic) is one of the earliest permanent settlements in Mesopotamia, and perhaps the world. Located about 14 miles (22 kilometers) south of the modern city of Nasiriyah in Iraq, and about 12.5 mi (20 km) south southwest of the ancient Sumerian city of Ur, Eridu was occupied between the 5th and 2nd millennium BCE, with its heyday in the early 4th millennium.

  Archaeologists visit the site of the Mesopotamian city of Eridu (now called Tell Abu Shahrain), located about 22 kilometers south of Nasiriya in Iraq.

Wearing their traditional cassocks and scarlet fascias, and with large golden crosses around their necks, members of the Vatican delegation to Iraq paced across the ruins of the House of Abraham in the ancient Sumerian city of Ur.

Dating back to the Chalcolithic and early Bronze Ages, Sumer was the earliest civilisation known to mankind, which saw the development of the earliest form of writing and the invention of the wheel more than 5,000 years ago.

The city of Ur was the home of Abraham, Terah-his father, and family.  Abraham lived during the 2nd millennium BCE, most likely born in 1948 BCE.  

"In Ur, Mesannepada became king; he ruled for 80 years. Meskiagnun, the son of Mesannepada, became king; he ruled for 36 years. Elulu ruled for 25 years. Balulu ruled for 36 years. 4 kings; they ruled for 171 years. Then Ur was defeated and the kingship was taken to Awan".

Then we had the War of Independence from November 29, 1947  to the Armistice of February 1949.   Israel and the Arab states did not reach any formal armistice agreements until February. Under separate agreements between Israel and the neighboring states of Egypt, Lebanon, Transjordan, and 

Syria, these bordering nations agreed to formal armistice 

lines.                                     

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Israel gained some territory formerly granted to Palestinian 

Arabs under the United Nations resolution in 1947. Egypt and 

Jordan retained control over the Gaza Strip and the West Bank respectively. These armistice lines held until 1967. The 

United States did not become directly involved with the armistice negotiations, but hoped that instability in the Middle East would not interfere with the international balance of power between the Soviet Union and the United States.

Now we have Syria and Iraq terrorists of Hezbollah shooting again at Israel by Hezbollah, an arm of Iran.  Hamas is another arm.  Hezbollah was founded by Iran's Revolutionary Guards.  They do shootings, rocket attacks, bombings, kidnappings, and suicide bombings.  They support Palestinian terrorist groups with cells in Judea and Samaria and Gaza.  

Resource: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narmer

https://www.historyinthebible.com/supplementary_pages/geopolitics-bible-maps.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumu-abum#:~:text=Sumu%2DAbum%20(also%20Su%2D,1883%20BC%20(middle%20chronology).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebla_tablets#:~:text=The%20tablets%20were%20discovered%20by,tags%20to%20help%20reference%20them.