Ustrello wrote:
Overthrown 5 years later, and there was no solid proof we did anything.
Yeah, from there on the US and Russia played musical dictators.
And, according to declassified CIA documents, yes, yes you did.
A while ago, someone posted that there never was country called Palestine. I forget who, but actually, yes, there was before, the Mandate of Palestine, and herein lays the root of the problem.
During WW1 England promised various Arab provinces independence if they backed them against the Ottoman Turks. One of these was Palestine. Apparently they hadn't read up on how England plays this game, historically, or they'd have known better. However, they obligingly died in their thousands thinking they were getting independence out of it.
Imagine their surprise when England double crossed them and took over, supposedly only ruling until such time as they were 'self sufficient'.
Interestingly, the name Palestine is not a roman word. Variations on it go back as far as Rameses III in 1150BC, but the word was we now know it comes from Greek, which was the lingua franca of the region during the Roman era. Herodotus, in 450
BC, in his Histories, and Arrian, in
Anabasis both refer to the area as Palestine rather than Judea. At the time, it was the equivalent of calling people from the US 'Americans'.
Other interesting notes: historical Judea was about about a quarter the size of modern Israel, according to the boundaries set following the return when Cyrus of Persia conquered Babylon. Rome however lumped the current area all under the same administrative province briefly, along with Syria, Jordan, and Northern Iraq. (The Levant) The current boarders were the creation of the British and French, who wished to ensure that the region remained unstable, with no strong powers emerging, when they divided the place up.
Boy, did they succeed.
Edit: interestingly, several genetic studies have suggested that, at one point, Palestinians and Jews were the same people. Interestingly enough, Palestinians in the area of Nabalus are admitted to have been Samaritans before their force conversion to Islam under the Ottomans, and still use many Samaritan surnames.
