‘In One Stroke, Palestine Exists’

Apparently Pfaff feels he has a license to rewrite Jewish history.

“The West Bank never belonged to Israel.” “It was Ottoman territory until World War I.” Really, now! And from whom did the Ottoman Turks and their predecessors steal it?

The West Bank is a name invented by the Jordanians as a modern-day technique emulating the Romans of old--change the name to eliminate the Jewish connection with the land. The so-called West Bank is Judea and Samaria, and all international maps prior to 1948, including Ottoman maps, so stated.

King Hussein’s reminder: Palestine exists--that’s right, but in Jordan! The exact words of the Balfour Declaration are repeated in the preamble of the League of Nations Mandate that Palestine shall be a homeland for the Jews. But England unilaterally departed from the mandate and created a fait accompli by splitting off 78% of the land from Palestine, giving it to the Muslims, establishing Trans-Jordan there. The vastly reduced remaining 22% west of the Jordan River was all that was left for the re-establishment of the homeland for the Jews.

Sixty-five percent of Jordan’s population are Palestinian Muslims. If Jordan isn’t Palestine, what is it?

If Muslim Palestinians, who are the children of the conquerors of the Jews, can’t now live in peace with the Jews, they have only to move 18 miles away to join their families and relatives on the other side of the river.

J.L. GREENBERG

Seattle