This week I heard radio discussion about Palestine. One British diplomat said that he supported Trump’s ‘out of the box’ idea of the direct occupation of Gaza and expulsion of its citizens, saying the two-state solution has failed. In the video above made in Feb 2024, I argue why it was never really a genuine solution.
However, he said that Palestinians had rejected a Palestinian state twice in recent years - and this was the main problem.
This is more pro-Zionist propaganda. He would argue giving examples but I will tell why these are false.
In fact, Zionist propaganda is that the Palestinians rejected statehood five times.
Refuting this does not take a thesis. It takes a few images and a reminder of some of the event
1937 - During the era of the British occupation the UK government established the Peel Commission which proposed that Palestinians be given 80% of their own land but 20% be forcibly usurped for Europe settlers.
A quick look at the Peel proposal reveals obvious problems. Those families living in the North - in Haifa and Akka and elsewhere, would be expected to lose everything. Which leader had the right to surrender that?
1947 - UN Partition plan - Frankly a ridiculous and unworkable suggestion. Which country could function like this. Indeed, it was this proposal that drove the Zionist plan to seize the areas which were bottlenecks for their planned first stage of occupation.
1967 - After the so-called ‘Six Day War’, some Zionist leaders suggesting offering the Palestinians what was left of their homeland as a ‘state’.
2000 - In the early to mid-1990s the Oslo process gave even more land to the Zionist occupation within the West Bank, whilst giving an archipelago of small settlements to the Palestinian Authority. This was the basis for the suggestion of a ‘solution’ between Ehud Barak and Yasser Arafat at Camp David in 2000.
2008 - Faced with external pressure to make some concessions to appease the Palestinians, Ehud Olmert included a little additional land. But Mahmoud Abbas, like Yasser Arafat before, knew that accepting this would be seen by their people as not just a treacherous surrender, but as a humiliating treacherous surrender by a bunch of clueless foolish political leaders.
Against all of this is in addition to the absolute refusal by the occupiers that no Palestinian had the right to return to their homelands. Whereas someone born in London or New York had a ‘right’ to settle in Palestine if they were Jewish, they did not if they were Palestinian and their families had owned land for centuries which had been usurped.
Moreover, the status of Al Quds (Jerusalem), the Holy City wherein is Al Masjid Al Aqsa Al Mubarak, it blessed precincts, the site of the Israa of the Messenger of Allah (صلى الله عليه و سلم) was that it would remain under occupation.
The people of Palestine do not merely see themselves as fighting for their homes. They see themselves as guardians over a blessed land - a responsibility they have taken up on behalf of the Ummah, though in truth that responsibility lies heavier on those who are capable and do not live under occupation.
I will end with the point I made in my video - that the only time that the people of the region - whether Jew, Muslim, or Christian - managed to live side-by-side with harmony and justice for any significant period was during approximately twelve centuries of rule under an Islamic civilisation. That peace, harmony and justice is only likely to return when that Islamic civilisation returns.
Abdul Wahid has been active in Muslim affairs in the UK for over 25 years. He has been published on the websites of Foreign Policy, Open Democracy, the Times Higher Educational Supplement, and Prospect Magazine. You can follow him on X/Twitter @AbdulWahid_X and elsewhere: https://linktr.ee/abdulwahid101010
