What Palestinians Are We Talking About?

 Nadene Goldfoot                                     

. Nadeen Ayoub’s dress featured imagery and symbols tied to centuries of Palestinian culture and resistance. Nadeen Ayoub became the first representative of Palestine at Miss Universe 2025. 

                                      

Melanie Shiraz was crowned Miss Universe Israel 2025 in July 2025 and represented Israel at the Miss Universe 2025 pageant in Thailand in November. A tech-savvy advocate with a background in data science, she focused her reign on empowering women and fighting antisemitism. 

In 1999, Rana Raslan made history as the first and only Arab-Israeli (Palestinian citizen of Israel) to be crowned Miss Israel. Recent discussions highlight controversy surrounding Miss Israel's costume, which some criticized for appropriating Palestinian symbols. 

Palestinian citizens of Israel, numbering over 1.9 million and comprising nearly 21% of Israel's population in 2026, are descendants of those who remained during the 1948 war. They are primarily Muslim (81–83%), with Christian and Druze minorities. While they possess Israeli citizenship, voting rights, and often speak Hebrew and Arabic, they face systemic discrimination in housing, education, and land rights, and report increasing harassment and inequality. 

• Demographics: Predominantly located in the Galilee, "Triangle" area, and the Negev (Naqab) desert.
• Status & Rights: They are citizens, but many feel like "second-class citizens" due to laws favoring Jewish national identity, such as the 2018 Nation-State Law. (There  is only one country in the world for Jews, and that is Israel who is about 80% Jewish, 20% Arab.  Saudi Arabia doesn't allow Jews in at all.  The Abraham Accords is easing the feelings of Arab countries, one of Trump's good endeavors.    
• Discrimination: Face systemic inequality in infrastructure, municipal funding, and education.
• Current Climate: Increased insecurity, suspicion, and professional/academic repercussions reported since October 2023.
• Distinction: They are distinct from the ~362,000 Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem, who hold residency but not full citizenship, and the millions of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, Gaza, and the diaspora. 
• Palestinians in East Jerusalem are not Israeli citizens primarily because most declined the offer of citizenship following Israel's 1967 annexation of the territory, choosing instead to remain holders of permanent residency. They are legally considered residents with limited rights, allowing them to live and work in Israel, but they cannot vote in national elections or hold Israeli passports. 
• 
  Yoseph Haddad, born 3 September 1985) is an Arab-Israeli journalist and activist who advocates for Israel on social media and international speaking tours. He is an Arab-Israeli Orthodox Christian who was born in Haifa, Israel, and later moved to Nazereth with his family.
• However, there is Yoseph Haddad now, an Arab-Israeli journalist who is speaking up and writing about their position who is a defender.  
• As of early 2026, the population of the State of Palestine (comprising the West Bank and Gaza Strip) is estimated to be approximately 5.6 million people. The population is young, with roughly 38% aged 0-14, and is rapidly growing, with a high density in the Gaza Strip. Most in Gaza are terrorists, Hamas terrorists.  So far, they 
• refuse to give up their arms and are fighting  at Rafa Crossing.
• Turkey is not helping by taking sides against the Kurds, who 
• are Israel's friends.  Jolani or (Ahmed al Sharaa, Syria's new president, a former 
• terrorist, is said to be killing dissenting Syrians right now.  
• 
  

Resource:

The Quad with Emily about Yoseph Haddad. 

https://imeu.org/resources/resources/fact-sheet-palestinian-citizens-of-israel/229 

How Fatah and Hamas-Led Palestinians Will Never Co-Exist, Remain Burdens on UNRWA

 Nadene Goldfoot                                        

A picture of Ein El-Hilweh refugee camp in Lebanon shows the overcrowding in the camp and the difficulty of achieving social distancing [Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ)]  As of 5 October, according to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) the total number of Covid-19 cases among Palestinian refugees in Lebanon was 1,282 with 478 active cases and 31 deaths. Based on these numbers, the General Director of the Rafic Hariri Government Hospital, Dr Firas Al-Abiad, tweeted that the Covid-19 mortality rate among Palestinians in Lebanon is 2.4 per cent, "more than double Lebanon's 1 per cent rate."

At the very least, it is estimated that 36,000 Palestinian refugees will need intensive care out of a total population of 224,901, which includes camp residents and Palestinian refugees from Syria, a statistic taken from the Committee's document. Given that the mortality risk is higher for those aged 70 and over, around 10,825 Palestinians are already vulnerable.

"The UN agency that supports Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, on Tuesday appealed for $1.6 billion to support its lifesaving work this year amid acute regional crises and chronic funding shortfalls. "  "UNRWA provides services and programmes, including education, health and food assistance, to more than five million Palestinians across the Middle East."

Mahmoud Abbas (Arabic: مَحْمُود عَبَّاس,  born 15 November 1935),  is the president of the State of Palestine and the Palestinian National Authority. He has been the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) since 11 November 2004, PNA president since 15 January 2005, and State of Palestine president since 8 May 2005-now for the past 17 years.  Abbas is also a member of the Fatah party and was elected chairman in 2009.

  Ismail Abdel Salam Ahmed Haniyeh (born 29 January 1962) is a senior political leader of Hamas and formerly one of two disputed Prime Ministers of the Palestinian National Authority. Haniyeh became prime minister after Hamas won the Palestinian legislative elections of 2006- now for the past 16 years.Hamas was originally the strong-arm of Fatah, and got so powerful that they broke away to rule themselves.   He's become an Iranian puppet. (Jason Greenblatt).  (updated 10/12/22)

The 2022 budget proposal includes additional emergency funding to address humanitarian needs arising from crises in:

 1. Gaza-ruled by Ismail Haniyeh, 

 2. West Bank (Judea-Samaria)-ruled by Mahmoud Abbas 

These two men have never agreed with each other and fight for single power.  They haven't changed yet.  

3. Syria--by President Bashar al-Assad-Bashar Hafez al-Assad who is a Syrian politician and the 19th president of Syria, since 17 July 2000- for the past 22 years. In addition, he is the commander-in-chief of the Syrian Armed Forces and the Secretary-General of the Central Command of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party.

COAR(an international association that acts as a global voice for the repository community.---COAR is an international association with 157 members and partners from around the world representing libraries, universities, research institutions, government funders and others.)  says that Syria is already a failed state.  "On 17 June, the U.S. Department of the Treasury officially enacted the sanctions contained in the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, thus beginning an inauspicious new phase of the long Syria conflict. The sanctions targeted 39 Syrian individuals, including President Bashar Al-Assad and his wife, Asma, in addition to members of the extended Al-Assad family, senior military leaders, and business executives. Many of the sanctioned individuals were already designated under existing U.S. sanctions."

 and 

4. Lebanon--by President Michel Aoun. Michel Naim Aoun is a Lebanese politician and former military general who has served as the President of Lebanon since 31 October 2016-for the past 6 years, the new kid on the block. Lebanon and Israel through the USA just came to an agreement about a gas discovery in the sea.               

 Shu'fat camp is located on the outskirts of Jerusalem. The Israeli settlement of Pisgat Zeev, illegal under international law, is located to the camp’s north. The camp was established by UNRWA in 1965 in order to provide improved housing for the roughly 500 refugee families living in Mu'askar camp in the Old City of Jerusalem.  This refugee camp is 57 years old, and looks like a town or city to me; but its people are mostly surviving on UNRWA.  Shu'fat camp was annexed by Israel after the 1967 hostilities ( considered illegal by UNRWA and rest of world) even though Israel won the 1967 war -a huge attack against them by all the Arab countries)  when Israel unilaterally established new municipal boundaries for Jerusalem. Camp residents still hold Jerusalem IDs and, unlike West Bank ID holders, are allowed to reside in Jerusalem. 

Because the Israeli Ministry of the Interior has a policy of revoking Jerusalem IDs from Palestinians who do not have their ‘centre of life’ in Jerusalem, the camp has become a popular place of residence for Palestinians (non-refugees) with Jerusalem IDs who might not otherwise be able to afford the high living costs of Jerusalem.

The Palestinians of Gaza, Judea-Samaria and Israel have been without a country ever since they entered Palestine in the 1880's to work for the Jewish returnees to their homeland and were in the act of building up their home.  The Palestinian Arabs were looking for jobs in building.  At the time, anyone living in Palestine (named by Romans in 135 CE) were called Palestinians.                        

Many of these Arab Palestinians came from Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and many from farther places than that, all documented and verified in the book, FROM TIME IMMEMORIAL, by Joan Peters. 

War of Independence 1947-1949

Since the Arab attack on Jews at the announcement of the State of Israel on May 14, 1948, all the Arabs attacked the Jewish Israelis, telling the Arab Palestinians what to do--to leave, and let them win the battle.  Well, they were wrong.  The Jews won, keeping their new state, and the Palestinian Arabs were led to live in refugee camps---now seemingly forever.  

Since 1948, they have been fed and clothed by UNRWA- 74 years, the same age as Israel.   What skills have they learned to support themselves?  Make bombs, dig tunnels, What mindset have they given to their families?  Sacrifice their children in the name of a future nationalism of their Palestine; hatred for Jews. That's what living in a refugee camp has done for most all of their people.  

The number of Palestinian workers in Israel and Israeli settlements was an estimated 130,000 in 2019, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)—but is likely to be higher due to the number who cross into Israel without permits.[1] Most Palestinians work in Israel’s construction sector, where it is estimated that they make up 65-70 percent of the workforce.

The Israeli minister for construction and housing was quoted in the Israeli media explaining that the construction sector must continue as normal “to ensure that construction in Israel for the benefit of home buyers will not be affected, even in the current exceptional circumstances.”  So in Israel, Palestinians are keeping the skills their ancestors came with, and using them. Still, Palestinian murderers keep on attacking Israelis at any given moment; the IDF being their most favored target.  Are they among these with employment?  Or are they coming in from other sources?              

Soda Stream had jobs for Palestinians in Judea-Samaria.  The company left the West Bank-(Judea-Samaria) because the CO said the boycott (BDS)  against them was anti-Semitic and pointless.They even had Golden Globe nominee Scarlett Johansson as the official global ambassador for SodaStream International, the Israeli-made manufacturer and distributor of home beverage carbonation systems.

It's time, way past time for the Palestinian Arab refugees to be freed from just being on the dole of UNRA, treated as a child, and allowed to learn to be honest bread-winners and be able to support their own families by the sweat of their own brows. Such skills must be something that will help their population they live in, not killing or harming others.  They need to learn that Jews are their cousins and not their enemy.  They have so much to learn other than what they have picked up in UNRWA camps which have become political prisons spreading hate.  

  A Jewish Yementite family walking through the desert to a reception camp set up by the American Joint Distribution Committee near Aden.  

  Operation Magic Carpet;  Jews from Yemen in an airplane on their way to Israel. © Beit Hatfusot

Israel took in the very same numbers of Jewish refugees that came streaming out of Arab countries in 1948, the birth of their re-born nation.  They managed.  It's time Lebanon and Syria and the other took back their own people by making them citizens and not of refugee status anymore.   In being realistic, I realize that this is a bad time;  these countries are barely able to hang on as a country themselves and are about to fold.  

"In 2014, the United Nations General Assembly recommended that 2014 a year of solidarity with the Palestinian people and called on people around the world to recognize their “inalienable rights”.

Perhaps 2016 should become the Jewish year of solidarity with the Jewish refugees from Arab countries and there should be greater recognition, understanding and education of the inalienable rights of these people to rights and redress" but Israel took them all in, ready for them or not.  

There are Palestinians in Israel who are citizens.  In other Arab countries, they are refugees on the dole with UNRWA, a source of finance and control.  

Tweet URL

Reference:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ismail_Haniyeh#:~:text=Ismail%20Abdel%20Salam%20Ahmed%20Haniyeh,Palestinian%20legislative%20elections%20of%202006.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Abbas#:~:text=Mahmoud%20Abbas%20(Arabic%3A%20%D9%85%D9%8E%D8%AD%D9%92%D9%85%D9%8F%D9%88%D8%AF%20%D8%B9%D9%8E%D8%A8%D9%8E%D9%91%D8%A7%D8%B3,and%20the%20Palestinian%20National%20Authority.

https://www.maccabeetaskforce.org/education/videos/?gclid=Cj0KCQjwy5maBhDdARIsAMxrkw1cCdZSL_Ih0rQ2Ti_ylmQFGtukCT_W_K79CB7m7G9Uom9ML63D-MgaAi5QEALw_wcB

https://www.unrwa.org/where-we-work/west-bank/shufat-camp

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/03/sodastream-leaves-west-bank-as-ceo-says-boycott-antisemitic-and-pointless

https://merip.org/2020/05/palestinian-workers-in-israel-caught-between-indispensable-and-disposable/

https://israelforever.org/interact/blog/jewish_refugees_from_arab_countries/

JBS interview of Jason Greenblatt on "Conversations on Abraham Accord"

Rome's EDICT OF CARACALLA in Year 212 CE and How It Affected Jews

Nadene Goldfoot                               
                                                                             

 The first record of Jews in Rome is in 161 b.c.e., when Jason b. Eleazar and Eupolemus b. Johanan are said to have gone there as envoys from Judah Maccabee. The Roman Jews are said to have been conspicuous in the mourning for Julius Caesar in 44 b.c.e. on the death of Herod in 4 b.c.e. 8,000 native Roman Jews are reported to have escorted the Jewish delegates from Judea who came to request the senate to abolish the Herodian monarchy. Two synagogues were seemingly founded by "freedmen" who had been slaves of Augustus (d. 14 c.e.) and Agrippa (d. 12 b.c.e.) respectively and bore their names. 

In the year 212 in Rome, The Constitutio Antoniniana (Latin for: "Constitution [or Edict] of Antoninus") (also called the Edict of Caracalla or the Antonine Constitution) was an edict issued in 212 CE, by the Roman 
Emperor Caracalla declaring that all free men in the Roman Empire were to be given full Roman citizenship and that all free women ...in the Empire were to be given the same rights as Roman women.  This included the Jews to a certain degree.  This was 1,808 years ago when Jews might have a lot of rights.  Then the world backslid and Jews were not an emancipated people until Emperor Napoleon came along.                                             

Emperor Caracalla (4 April 188-8 April 217)
AKA Antonius, born as Lucius Septimius Bassianus of the Severan Dynasty.
This is the period of the Christian Byzantium

The trick was to be able to be declared a free person in order to have citizenship which gave more rights.  People were either citizens or free people or slaves.  
                                                             

Emperor Herod's Days Before Caracalla was Emperor 

The main reason Caracalla passed the law was to increase the number of people available to tax. In the words of Cassius Dio: "This was the reason why he made all the people in his empire Roman citizens; nominally he was honoring them, but his real purpose was to increase his revenues by this means, inasmuch as aliens did not have to pay most of these taxes." However, few of those that gained citizenship were wealthy, and while it is true that Rome was in a difficult financial situation, it is thought that this could not have been the sole purpose of the edict. Cassius Dio generally saw Caracalla as a bad, contemptible emperor.  Cassius was born in 163,  as Lucius Cassius Dio or Dio Cassius who was a Roman statesman and historian of Greek and Roman origin. He published 80 volumes of history on ancient Rome, beginning with the arrival of Aeneas in Italy.  
                                                       

Citizens of the Roman Empire
Roman citizenship was acquired by birth if both parents were Roman citizens (cives), although one of them, usually the mother, might be a peregrinus (“alien”) with connubium (the right to contract a Roman marriage). Otherwise, citizenship could be granted by the people, later by generals and emperors.

Another goal may have been to increase the number of men able to serve in the legions, as only full citizens could serve as legionaries in the Roman Army. In scholarly interpretations that agree with a model of moral degeneration as the reason for the fall of the Roman Empire, most famously the model followed by British historian Edward Gibbon, the edict came at the cost to the auxiliaries, which primarily consisted of non-citizen men.

Evidently there were Jews who were free men, traders and such.  Being Jewish anyway they came under certain restrictions.  They were affected as polygamy was ended for them this way.  They were excluded from the army.  They could not serve in public office from the 5th century onward because they were Jews.  They  couldn't offer evidence against any Christian  in the courts of law.  Roman minorities were also under their laws and were restricted people.  

Additionally, before the edict, one of the main ways to acquire Roman citizenship was to enlist in the Roman Army, the completion of service in which would give the citizenship to the discharged soldier. The edict may have made enlistment in the army less attractive to most, and perhaps the recruiting difficulties of the Roman army by the end of the 3rd century were related to this.

In the analyses of more recent scholars, the Constitutio Antoniniana marks a major milestone in the provincialisation of Roman law, meaning that the gap between private law in the provinces and private law in Italy narrowed. This is because, in granting citizenship to all men in the provinces, much private law had to be re-written to conform with the law that applied to Roman citizens in Rome. To these scholars, it therefore also marks the beginning of a process by which imperial constitutions became the primary source of Roman law.

• A male Roman citizen enjoyed a wide range of privileges and protections defined in detail by the Roman state. A citizen could, under certain exceptional circumstances, be deprived of his citizenship.
• Roman women had a limited form of citizenship. They were not allowed to vote or stand for civil or public office. The rich might participate in public life by funding building projects or sponsoring religious ceremonies and other events. Women had the right to own property, to engage in business, and to obtain a divorce, but their legal rights varied over time. Marriages were an important form of political alliance during the Republic.
• Client state citizens and allies (socii) of Rome could receive a limited form of Roman citizenship such as the Latin Right. Such citizens could not vote or be elected in Roman elections.
• Freedmen were former slaves who had gained their freedom. They were not automatically given citizenship and lacked some privileges such as running for executive magistracies. The children of freedmen and women were born as free citizens; for example, the father of the poet Horace was a freedman.
• Slaves were considered property and lacked legal personhood. Over time, they acquired a few protections under Roman law. Some slaves were freed by manumission for services rendered, or through a testamentary provision when their master died. Once free, they faced few barriers, beyond normal social snobbery, to participating in Roman society. The principle that a person could become a citizen by law rather than birth was enshrined in Roman mythology; when Romulus defeated the Sabines in battle, he promised the war captives that were in Rome they could become citizens.

The ancient sources portray Caracalla as a tyrant and as a cruel leader, an image that has survived into modernity. Dio Cassius (c. 155 – c. 235) and Herodian (c. 170 – c. 240) present Caracalla as a soldier first and an emperor second. Modern works continue to portray Caracalla as an evil ruler, painting him as one of the most tyrannical of all Roman emperors.

This Edict of Caracalla  granted Jews legal equality to all other citizens, and formed the foundation of their legal status in Byzantium following the founding of Constantinople in 330. Indeed, Jews enjoyed the right to practice their faith under the rule of the Byzantines, as long as they paid the Fiscus Judaicus. 

For example, circumcision, which was considered mutilation and therefore punishable by death if performed on a non-Jewish child, and by exile if performed on a non-Jewish adult, was legally permitted within Jewish religious practices. Byzantine law recognized synagogues as places of worship, which could not be arbitrarily molested, Jewish courts had the force of law in civil cases, and Jews could not be forced to violate Shabbat and their festivals.
                                                     

Roman (Byzantine) Empire 271 CE

In addition to the matter of holding public office, Jews were also unequal to Christians with respect to the ownership of slaves. Restrictions on the ownership of Christian slaves by Jews were in place through the reign of many emperors, under the fear that Jews would use conversion of slaves as a means to increase their number. Additionally, this was designed to provide an incentive for non-Christian slaves to convert into Christianity, and an economic restriction on the Jews. Restrictions on slave-owning could not, however, be excessively burdensome, because slaves, although numerous, were between 10-15% of the population. Under the Theodosian Code, therefore, ownership of Christian slaves by Jews was not prohibited, although their purchase was. Thus, one who gained possession of a slave by means such as inheritance would remain his or her owner. Purchase of slaves was usually penalized by compelled sale at the original purchase price.

The third important restriction on Judaism—in addition to the limitations on public service and slave ownership—was that the Jewish religion, though allowed to survive, was not allowed to thrive. Theologically, the victory of Christianity could be successfully asserted by maintaining a small contingent of Jews within the empire, although allowing them to become too sizable a minority would threaten the theological monopoly of Orthodox Christianity within the Empire.

One important ramification of this policy was the prohibition on the construction of new synagogues within the Empire, though the repair of old synagogues was permitted. This prohibition was difficult to enforce, as archaeological evidence in Israel indicates that illegal synagogue construction continued throughout the sixth century. The synagogue did continue to be respected as an inviolable place of worship until the reign of Justinian.

Beginning at this time, most legislation regarding the Jews—even laws which expanded the rights which they were afforded—were "prefaced by unambiguous expressions of hatred and contempt for Judaism."

                                                      

Since the year 390 nearly all of the territory of present-day Israel came under Byzantine suzerainty. The area was divided into the following provinces: Palestina Prima, Palestina Secunda and Palestina Tertia. These provinces were part of the Diocese of the East.  Palæstina Secunda or Palaestina II was a Byzantine province from 390, until its conquest by the Muslim armies in 634–636. Palaestina Secunda, a part of the Diocese of the East, roughly comprised the Galilee, Yizrael Valley, Bet Shean Valley and southern part of the Golan plateau, with its capital in Scythopolis (Bet Shean). The province experienced the rise of Christianity under the Byzantines, but was also a thriving center of Judaism, after the Jews had been driven out of Judea by the Romans in the 1st and 2nd centuries.
                                                          

In 70 CE Rome destroyed Jerusalem while burning down the 2nd Temple.  Jews if captured, were taken as slaves.  It didn't seem to matter that there were Jews living in Rome at the same time as Roman Citizens.  They were used in all the usual manners of Roman slaves, fighting off lions in the stadiums, etc, even as army slaves.  

Resource
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitutio_Antoniniana#:~:text=The%20Constitutio%20Antoniniana%20(Latin%20for,and%20that%20all%20free%20women
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caracalla
Book:  Religous Roots of Contemporary European Identity by Bloomsburg.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_the_Byzantine_Empire 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_citizenship