So who does Israel belong to?! jews or muslims

all this discussion on the problems between the jews an muslim over who should control the country. but instead of just saying they should compromise or why they shouldnt be there i wanna know who you think should control the whole country as a whole.
because both jews an muslims have religious structures in the country an both claim they should own it, with the we were here first an so on... the jews have the west wall which is suppose to be whats left of the kindom that was once there an the muslims have the Dome of rock which it suppose to be where allah ascended to heaven an back.

posted by DalairTheGreat

All this discussion on the problems between Jews and Muslim over who should control the country. Instead of saying they should compromise or why they shouldn’t be there I wanna know who you think should control the country as a whole. [Edited by Don W]

You are talking Lebanon, South. A so-called "confessional" democracy. Look that up. (This may be how Iraq ends.) Prior to 1918-1922, the Ottoman’s controlled the region for more than 500 years. A benign caliphate. Damascus was the religious center, Istanbul was the political center, Beirut was the commercial center and Baghdad was a regional center. After WW1, that was changed as the victorious Allied Powers divided the spoils of war. Oil was the lingua franca. A left over area was assigned to the British. It was divided into Palestine (west of the Jordan River) and then what we called Trans-Jordan, meaning “across” or east of the Jordan River, but later changed to just Jordan. Palestine and Jordan are bereft of natural resources unless you count rocks a resource.

In 1948, the Allied Powers, again the West but this time including the United States, at the United Nations, decided to pay homage to the 6 million Jewish persons destroyed by the Nazis in the Holocaust. Instead of giving the surviving Jews half of New Jersey, for example, we - white Christian Euro-types - decided to give them (the Jews) half of Palestine but we never thought to ask the people who already lived there what they thought about our plan.

Already (1948) about 15% of the land was owned by Jewish persons. In the late 19th century, a Zionist Movement began and it encouraged Jewish re-population of the ancient Land of Israel. There never was a time when all the Jews were out of Palestine. Almost all of the remaining land was owned by Arabs who were predominantly Islamic. The majority population of Palestine was Arabs. They resented the influx of new European Jewish immigrants who were themselves proclaiming their ultimate goal of restoring the Temple of Solomon on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

Solomon’s Temple was destroyed around 570 BCE by the Babylonians (Iraq) and Herod’s Temple was destroyed in the First Jewish Revolt of 66-70 CE, by the Romans. Historic Masada held out until 73 CE. Secular historians dispute that Saul, Solomon and David were real people, bur rather, that they were legends from the good old days.

The current locations of Holy Sites in Jerusalem were chosen at the instigation of Helena, mother of Constantine, Emperor of Rome, around 330-340 CE and are hard to prove today. It seems early Jewish Christians had little or no regard for the holy sites over which 1000s have died, especially post the Crusade era starting around 1100 AD.

More To Come


[edit on 1/19/2007 by donwhite]

israel belongs to the israelis
and by israelis i mean anyone who lives there
regardless of gender, race, or creed

israel should just be a secular country

posted by DalairTheGreat

Because Jews and Muslims (and Christians) have religious structures in the country and both claim they should own it, with the “we were here first” and so on . . the Jews have the West Wall which is supposed to be what left of the kingdom that was once there an the Muslims have the Dome of Rock which it supposed to be where Muhammad ascended to heaven and back. [Edited bu Don W]

I believe the Temple Mount’s Dome of the Rock dates from the 8th century. The other Muslim Holy Site, the al Aqsa Mosque is next-door to the Dome. I don’t know what is special about al Aqsa, but it too is very old. There have been 2 or 3 re-builds of the West Wall (a/k/a Wailing Wall) and I’ve mentioned earlier that secular scholars doubt the existence of King Solomon or his temple. The Ark of the Covenant went missing at the same time the Temple is said to have been destroyed, which further compounds the mystery. The Muslims will not allow digging on the Temple Mount so I goes we can never hope to resolve those very serious questions.

People who claim to have a God-given “right” to the Holy Land are referred to as Zionists. One problem is that there are 2 or 3 recitations of this “Divine Land Grant” in the Hebrew Bible - the Christian Old Testament - but one does not agree with the other on the metes and bounds. Accepting the proposition that God is not the author of confusion, it remains true that His recording secretaries have been. That claim - Dvine Right - is hog-wash. Ridiculous. Nonsensical. And dangerous, because all too many otherwise good people take it literally. Jewish people never in history occupied all the so-called Holy Land, just as there has never been a time in history when the Holy Land did not have Jewish people living there. Palestine is supposed to be a mongrelizationof the Roman (Latin) word for the English “Philistines” who lived along the Mediterranean coast. Tyre and Sidon.

So who owns the land we once called the Palestine Mandate, but we now call Israel, the Occupied Territories (West Bank), Gaza and the Golan Heights? The easy one is Golan. Syria owned it before 19 and still lays claim to it. Gaza is easy, too. A narrow strip of otherwise worthless land lying along the Mediterranean coast between Israel and Egypt . No one wants Gaza. Not even the people forced to live there. Once under Egypt.

Today it’s under the Palestine Authority, a pseudo-Arab governing body headquartered in Ramallah. The Settlements. Ever since 1967, Israel has off and on, lately mostly on, added illegal settlements all over the area they conquered in 1967. I think it is pretty obvious the post Rabin Israeli government is doing ethnic cleansing in the Holy Land. Left to their own devices, there will be no Arabs living in the old British supervised League of Nations Palestine Manidae. A fait accompli.


[edit on 1/19/2007 by donwhite]