Nadene Goldfoot
Sunday, October 10, 2021
During the interwar period, 2 populations struggle to lay claim to Eretz Yisrael. By the end of the British Mandate‘s first decade, 1930, more that 162,000 Jews lived in Palestine, making up 17 percent of the country’s inhabitants. Of these, 37,000 lived on the soil, in 11 agricultural settlements totaling 700,000 dunams [approximately 175,000 acres]; 13 other Zionist agricultural schools and experimental stations were also functioning. Improved farming techniques were continually being devised. Citrus crops were growing in size and quality.
Arabs came into the former Israel ruins unknowingly. To them, it was just a wasteland, free for the camping with occasional interferences from the Ottoman Empire men there to collect taxes. Arabs came from many areas. Most were nomads. A few had bought land and were farming. That's where the taxes come in. They were extremely high and unaffordable. When a Jew came along and didn't haggle too hard, they quickly sold the land to them. Jews did come along and buy land. They didn't want to get this land any other way as it was precious and holy land to them.
Not once did these mostly Syrian-Palestinian Arabs think of creating their own country. What for? None were politicians. They were enjoying their way of life and always were looking for a better one. It was a great relief to them to be able to get rid of land that was tying them down by selling to the Jews. That way they could go to France or Beirut, somewhere that was interesting. Many said they were Syrian-Palestinians. Our Jewish people were also called Palestinians. They were in Palestine, a name the Romans had given the land in 135 after a battle with a Jewish general, Bar Kokhba, who gave them a very rough go of it for 3 years, wearing the Romans out before killing the general.
Jews, to them, were 2nd class citizens, lowly people in their former countries in the Middle East. Jews had taken refuge from European countries that were harassing them in many ways. Arabs had allowed them to enter their former countries but with stipulations. They were okay in some of their lands, treated rather well, others were not so nice.
Husseini at a Nazi concentration camp looking it over
Then along came Haj Amin al-Husseini, the Sherif of Jerusalem, a big-shot to himself, who stirred up all the Arabs to hate Jews, and they attacked them in 1929.1929 was a bad year in the USA with the stock market crash, and a bad year in Jerusalem.
Haj Amin al Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem distributed leaflets to Arabs in Palestine and throughout the Arab world which claimed that the Jews were planning to take over the al-Aqsa Mosque. The leaflet stated that the Government was "responsible for any consequences of any measures which the Moslems may adopt for the purpose of defending the holy Burak themselves in the event of the failure of the Government...to prevent any such intrusion on the part of the Jews." A memorandum issued by the Moslem Supreme Council stated, "Having realized by bitter experience the unlimited greedy aspirations of the Jews in this respect, Moslems believe that the Jews' aim is to take possession of the Mosque of Al-Aqsa gradually on the pretence that it is the Temple," and it advised the Jews "to stop this hostile propaganda which will naturally engender a parallel action in the whole Moslem world, the responsibility for which will rest with the Jews. In other words, they wanted the Jews to shut up about their history and the fact that the Temple Mount once held Solomon's Temple.
This is the problem right here. The Palestinians have been conditioned and educated to believe that Jews have no rights, no reason to be in Palestine at all by their petty leaders. They have been brain-washed. How does one fix brain-washing?
Israel has tried many ways, by showing them a different side than what they've been told to believe. I see teeny gains, but not enough to come to the point of allowing a 2-state solution. They are still of mind, especially since the 1967 Khartoum Meeting in Africa and its 3 NOs, of that meeting. There is hope, always hope that the Abrahamic Accords, with 4 counties on board joining the 2 of Jordan and Egypt, to start peeling away the hatred embedded in the Palestinian Arab mind.
The 1929 Palestine riots, Buraq Uprising was a series of demonstrations and riots in late August 1929 in which a longstanding dispute between Muslims and Jews over access to the Western Wall in Jerusalem escalated into violence.
The riots took the form, for the most part, of attacks by Arabs on Jews accompanied by destruction of Jewish property. 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 and at least 232 wounded, mostly by the Mandate police suppressing the riots. Around 20 Arabs were killed by Jewish attackers and indiscriminate British gunfire. After the riots, 174 Arabs and 109 Jews were charged with murder or attempted murder; around 40% of Arabs and 3% of Jews were subsequently convicted. During the riots, 17 Jewish communities were evacuated.
The British-appointed Shaw Commission found that the fundamental cause of the violence, "without which in our opinion disturbances either would not have occurred or would not have been little more than a local riot, is the Arab feeling of animosity and hostility towards the Jews consequent upon the disappointment of their political and national aspirations and fear for their economic future", as well as Arab fears of Jewish immigrants "not only as a menace to their livelihood but as a possible overlord of the future.". With respect to the triggering of the riots, the Commission found that the incident that "contributed most to the outbreak was the Jewish demonstration at the Wailing Wall on 15 August 1929".
The Western Wall is one of the holiest of Jewish sites, considered by Jews to be a remnant of the ancient Second Temple compound destroyed in 70 CE. The Jews, through the practice of centuries, had established a right of access to the Western Wall for the purposes of their devotions. As part of the Temple Mount the Western Wall was under the control of the Muslim religious trust, the Waqf. Muslims consider the wall to be part of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam, and according to Islamic tradition the place where Muhammad tied his horse, Buraq, before his night journey to heaven. There had been a few serious incidents resulting from these differences.
As a result of an incident, which occurred in September 1925, a ruling was made which forbade the Jews to bring seats and benches to the Wall even though these were intended for worshippers who were aged and infirm. The Muslims linked any adaptions to the site with "the Zionist project," and feared that they would be the first step in turning the site into a synagogue and taking it over.
In 1923 he was elected President of the Jewish National Fund which he headed until his death. Ussishkin was behind major land acquisitions in the Hefer, Jezreel and Beit She'an valleys.was a Russian-born Zionist leader and head of the Jewish National Fund.
Several months earlier when the 1929 riots occurred, Zionist leader Menachem Ussishkin gave a speech demanding "a Jewish state without compromises and without concessions, from Dan to Be'er Sheva, from the great sea to the desert, including Transjordan." He concluded, "Let us swear that the Jewish people will not rest and will not remain silent until its national home is built on our Mt Moriah," a reference to the Temple Mount.
Avraham Sela described the riots as "unprecedented in the history of the Arab-Jewish conflict in Palestine, in duration, geographical scope and direct damage to life and property". Up to now, things had been peaceful.
The Sherif of Jerusalem, appointed by a Jew in the British Administration, of course, had appointed him. Arabs were still not of the mind to take over and create another Muslim country of the Middle East, not when there was Syria and Egypt,, but just of kicking the Jews out. Haj Amin was a big man in his own eyes, and didn't want to lose that status.
The Hebron Massacre happened on 24 August 1929 in Hebron, Arab mobs attacked the Jewish quarter killing and raping men, women and children and looting Jewish property. They killed between 65 and 68 Jews and wounded 58, with some of the victims being tortured, or mutilated. Sir John Chancellor, the British High Commissioner visited Hebron and later wrote to his son, "The horror of it is beyond words. In one house I visited not less than twenty-five Jews men and women were murdered in cold blood." Sir Walter Shaw concluded in The Palestine Disturbances report that "unspeakable atrocities have occurred in Hebron.
Two horrible acts in August 1929 in Palestine; the Palestine Riots and the Hebron Massacre, all brought about by Husseini who was working for the English mandated authorities. One would have to be deaf, dumb and blind not to know what was brewing. The British were complicit.
This is where it all started with the Arab hope of establishing their own state, though not as important as chasing the Jews out of the neighborhood.
Resource:
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1929_Palestine_riots
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menachem_Ussishkin https://www.inn.co.il/news/527671
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lx5RLpvq2_U
https://www.science.org/news/2000/10/jews-and-arabs-share-recent-ancestry
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