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Arabs and Jews

Arabs and Jews. A Brief History of the Middle East. Learning Objectives. Identify the claims to Palestine of the Arabs and of the Jews. Explain why both sides feel anger at the way they have been treated. Explain why the Arabs may distrust the Americans. The Roman Empire. ‘The Holy Land’.

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Arabs and Jews

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  1. Arabs and Jews A Brief History of the Middle East

  2. Learning Objectives • Identify the claims to Palestine of the Arabs and of the Jews. • Explain why both sides feel anger at the way they have been treated. • Explain why the Arabs may distrust the Americans.

  3. The Roman Empire

  4. ‘The Holy Land’ • At the time of Jesus Palestine was called Judea and populated largely by Jews; • Jews were followers of the teachings of Moses; • Judea was occupied by the Romans as part of their empire; • The Jews fought a terrorist campaign to rid their land of the Romans; It has been suggested that Jesus was in fact a leader of the Jewish Resistance and died, not on the cross, but at the siege of Masada in AD70.

  5. The Crusadesin the Twelfth Century • By the 12th Century Christianity had spread north into Europe; • The dominant religion of the Middle East was the newer Islam; • The Jews had been forced to leave the Holy Land and make their way into Europe (The Diaspora). • As Islam spread into Europe the Christians decided it was time to hit back…

  6. To Jerusalem… • Their aim was to unite Christians and march to defeat the Muslims and recover the holy city of Jerusalem. • “Christians, hasten to help your brothers in the East, for they are being attacked. Arm for the rescue of Jerusalem. Christ himself will be your leader ... Wear his cross as your badge. If you are killed your sins will be pardoned ... Let those who have been fighting against their own brothers now fight lawfully against the barbarians.” • Pope Urban encourages the Crusaders.

  7. “The Blood of the Unbelievers” • “Some of our men [...] cut off the heads of their enemies; [...] others tortured them longer by casting them into the flames. Piles of heads, hands and feet were to be seen in the streets of the city. [...] But these were small matters compared with what happened in the Temple of Solomon, a place where religious services are normally chanted. What happened there? [...] men rode in blood up to their knees [...] Indeed, it was a just and splendid judgement of God that this place should be filled with the blood of the unbelievers, since it had suffered so long from their blasphemies. The city was filled with corpses and blood.” • From Raymond d'Aguilers, Historia francorum qui ceprint Jerusalem

  8. Ultimately the Crusades failed and the Holy Land remained in Muslim control; • Jerusalem is a holy city for all three major faiths: • Where Jesus died; • Home to Mohammed; • Location of the Temple of Solomon.

  9. 1897 - first Zionist conference held in Basle The First Zionist Congress met in Basle, Switzerland, to discuss the ideas set out in Theodor Herzl's 1896 book Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State). Herzl, a Jewish journalist and writer living in Vienna, wanted Jews to have their own state - primarily as a response to European anti-Semitism. The Congress issued the Basle Programme to establish a "home for the Jewish people in Palestine secured by public law" and set up the World Zionist Organisation to work for that end.

  10. Ottoman Empire • By the beginning of the Twentieth Century Palestine was a part of the shrinking Ottoman Empire; • In 1914 the Turks entered the First World War and British troops made for the Middle East to fight them.

  11. A League Mandate • At the Paris Peace Conference control of Palestine was taken from the Turks and handed to the League of Nations, under the supervision of Britain.

  12. The Balfour Plan • In 1917 British politician Lord Balfour came up with a plan which would allow the Palestinian Arabs to control their own land, whilst there was also room for the Jews to have land of their own too. • When given control of Palestine in 1919 Britain chose not to implement this plan.

  13. Letter written by Balfour Foreign OfficeNovember 2nd, 1917 Dear Lord Rothschild, I have much pleasure in conveying to you. on behalf of His Majesty's Government, the following declaration of sympathy with Jewish Zionist aspirations which has been submitted to, and approved by, the Cabinet: His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country. I should be grateful if you would bring this declaration to the knowledge of the Zionist Federation. Yours,Arthur James Balfour

  14. Arab Discontent Zionist project of the 1920’s and 1930’s saw hundreds of thousands of Jews emigrating to Palestine. In 1922, a British census showed the Jewish population had risen to about 11% of Palestine's 750,000 inhabitants. More than 300,000 immigrants arrived in the next 15 years. Zionist-Arab antagonism boiled over into violent clashes in August 1929 when 133 Jews were killed by Palestinians and 110 Palestinians died at the hands of the British police.

  15. A Jewish Homeland? • As a result of persecution throughout the Fascist states of Europe, the Jews campaigned in the 1930s for a Jewish homeland. • Zionism = the belief that the Jews were destined to have a Jewish homeland in the Holy Land

  16. Pressure increased for a Jewish homeland as a response to the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust; • Many people were sympathetic to the cause of the Jews after 1945; • However Britain still refused to concede, worried about the rights and future of the Palestinian Arabs who already lived on this land, and had done for centuries.

  17. Jewish Terrorism • The Stern Gang and Irgun. • Starting in the 1930s and continuing until 1948 these two Jewish terror groups attacked British property and personnel. • Their most famous attack was the bombing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. Menachem Begin, Irgun member and later Prime Minister of Israel.

  18. An Independent Israel, 1948 • Israel was declared an independent state in 1948; • Because of unrest between Jews and Palestinian Arabs the UN drew up a plan to divide the land (Jews = yellow, Arabs = grey); • However the new Jewish Government of Israel was in no mood to give away its newly won land.

  19. The Six Day War, 1967 The Israelis attacked their Arab neighbours – Jordan, Egypt and Syria – without warning and with devastating force and speed. The disputed Palestinian lands of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank were absorbed into Israel. Israel After 1967 War Israel Before 1967 War

  20. The Yom Kippur War, 1973 • The Arab states hit back, attacking Israel on the day of Yom Kippur, a Jewish festival; • Egypt recovered the Sinai Desert, and Syria retook part of the Golan Heights; • Gaza and the West Bank remained disputed, but in Israeli hands; • Arabs gained confidence that they could take on Israel. In a World dominated by the Cold War between the USA and the Soviet Union, inevitably countries sought help from one side or the other. The Soviets assisted the Arab states of Egypt and Syria; the US supported and supplied the Israelis.

  21. Palestinian Terrorism • Born out of the frustration of living in a land they see as occupied by Israeli outsiders; • Divided ethnically, culturally, and linguistically from their ‘oppressors’; • Feeling let down by the rest of the World; • Desperate times have led some to desperate actions. Yasser Arafat, Palestinian leader and PLO terror chief

  22. Yasser Arafat In 1974, Arafat made a dramatic first appearance at the United Nations mooting a peaceful solution. He condemned the Zionist project, but concluded: "Today I have come bearing an olive branch and a freedom fighter's gun. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hand."

  23. Why do the Arabs hate the Americans? • US supported Israel in its persecution of the Palestinians; • US supported Israel’s attacks on her neighbours – Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon; • Supported the corrupt regime of the Shah of Iran, overthrown by the Islamic Revolution of 1979; • See Western influence and decadence as contrary to some of the teachings of Islam; • Believe that US is interested in expanding its control over oil, and thus reducing Arab countries’ ability to make money out of oil sales.

  24. Learning Objectives • Identify the claims to Palestine of the Arabs and of the Jews. • Explain why both sides feel anger at the way they have been treated. • Explain why the Arabs may distrust the Americans.

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