Who Was the First to Occupy Israel...the Jews or the Palestinians?

Tom: Thanks, Gary. If you’re a new listener to the program, we’ve been going through Dave Hunt’s book A Cup of Trembling, subtitled Jerusalem and Bible Prophecy. Now, Dave, last week we were about in chapter 8 of the book. We talked about a textbook, which is widely used in U.S. colleges. It’s called Politics in the Middle East, and for those who heard our program last week, it’s outrageous. It’s biased against Israel—it just defies description. Let me give you a couple of examples of what it presents as “historic facts.”

Now, again, I have two children in college. We’re paying…you know, it costs a lot of money to send your child to school, as all parents who have kids there, they understand that. So this is what they’re getting. A quote from Politics in the Middle East, again, this textbook: “Today’s Palestinian Arabs have much more of the ancient Hebrews’ blood than do present-day Jews.”

Another one: “Israeli leaders have rejected numerous overtures of peace by the Arab states.”

Another one: (This one…I can’t even get this out.) “The 1948 war was an Israeli unprovoked surprise war of conquest against its Arab neighbors.”

Dave: Tom, how anyone could say that with a straight face…how any author could make that statement, and how—you say this is in universities?

Tom: Throughout the country.

Dave: Wow! It is just absolutely contrary to the facts. And we lay out the facts in this book. You can get the facts anywhere. Go on the internet. Go to any genuine history book. Unprovoked attack? Israel declared its independence May 14, 1948. They were instantly attacked by the regular armies of six Arab nations.

We quote Azam Pasha, leader of the Arab League, on British…BBC. He said, “This will be a war of extermination. There’s not going to be a Jew left.”

I mean, the facts are so clear. I don’t know if we offer that book, Tom, but we ought to: Myths and Facts of the Middle East. And they just take things like this and go right down the list and give you the documentation. And I really think we ought to offer that.

Tom: I think we do, Dave. (laughing) I’ll check our catalog.

Dave: No, no. I know we do at The Berean Call, but I mean on this radio program…

Tom: Oh, okay.

Dave: Maybe we could offer it. But look. When the United Nations—first of all…Tom, I guess we’re in danger of going back over material, but let’s go back for a moment. In 1917, the British recognized that a homeland over there called Palestine was the homeland of the Jews. It belonged to them. The Balfour Declaration, 1917. In 1922, you had the Declaration of Principles by the League of Nations, predecessor of the United Nations. And it recognized that all of what was called Palestine—and we’ve explained where that name came from, that it’s not Palestine, it’s Israel—but all that was called Palestine belonged to the Jews. This was their ancient homeland. King David established Jerusalem as his headquarters—in Jerusalem 3,000 years ago. He had a vast kingdom. It was given by God. If anybody wants to believe the Bible, the Bible is the title deed signed by God himself to that land for the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It’s that simple. They were there for more than a thousand years before they were thrown out by Nebuchadnezzar. And yet there were always Jews there.

Tom: Yeah, there was always a remnant.

Dave: And they came back, and they lived there until they were thrown out again in 70 AD by the Romans. And then they came back. They’re there. You can read the history. There were very few Arabs. It was not until 741 that the Arabs conquered so-called Palestine, Jerusalem, and so forth. They conquered Jewish cities. In fact, the very city that they now call Medina down in the Arabian Peninsula used to be called Yathrib. It was founded by Jews, okay? They were all through this area.

But this was their land. They were there. And for these people now to call themselves Palestinians….

Palestine—that name comes from the Philistines. The Philistines were not a Semitic people. They invaded Canaan. It was called the land of Canaan—you can read it all through the Bible.

Let’s just turn for a moment—turn to Genesis 12: This is the land that God gave to Abraham, okay? He calls him out of Ur of the Chaldees, and says, “Come to a land that I will show you of, and…” Genesis:12:5And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother's son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and the souls that they had gotten in Haran; and they went forth to go into the land of Canaan; and into the land of Canaan they came.
See All...: “They [that is Abraham and Sarah, his wife] went forth to go into the land of Canaan and into the land of Canaan they came.” This is not Palestine. This is Canaan. “And the Canaanite was then in the land.”

Now the Canaanites were a people which God said He would have to wipe out in Genesis 15 because of their sin. And God would use the Jews to do that. And he would give them their land. He re-promised the land to Isaac and to Jacob. This is Genesis 26 and Genesis 28, and so forth, okay? Now it was not until the 640s that the Muslims—the Arabs—came into this land. But the Jews still possessed it. The Muslims held that land until 1917—the last group of Muslims to hold it was the Turkish Ottoman Empire. But there were many different groups. They fought one another. There were Caliphs who murdered one another. This was by no means a united kingdom. It’s amazing how it spread.

For example, the Dome of the Rock, built in 691-62 by Abd al Malik—why did he do that? Why did he build it over there? Jerusalem isn’t even mentioned in the Qur’an—not once! It never was a holy site for the Muslims. Well, it was because a rival Caliph had taken over Mecca, chased Abd al Malik out! He was supposedly the ruling Caliph, and so he fled to Jerusalem, and he built the Dome of the Rock. He thought, “Well, I’ll get people coming here instead of going to Mecca.”

But then, he took Mecca back! And so he abandoned the Dome of the Rock. At one time, by Muslims—Muslim attackers destroyed the Kaaba. The Black Stone was split, and the Kaaba was burned, and so forth.

And so, the Philistines invaded Canaan—this was the land of the Canaanites. They invaded Canaan from across the Mediterranean. They were not Semitic people. Now, the so-called Palestinians today, who claim to have been there, and claim to trace themselves back to their ancestors, they are a Semitic people. The Canaanites were never a Semitic people. And the Philistines are extinct today. And there is no way that the Arabs, who are a Semitic people, and who now call themselves Palestinians, can say that they have been there from the very beginning.

So now, we’re talking about a problem. What is the problem? The problem is the land. We have the land that God promised to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and their descendants. It was the land of Canaan. The Canaanites were to be destroyed. All right? And it became the land of Israel.

Now we have a people—they’re Arabs, they’re Muslims—they came up from the land of Arabia, from the Arabian Peninsula. They were not the natives of Canaan. They were not Canaanites. They’re not even related to the Canaanites. But they claim this land as being descendants of Ishmael. And—I think we’ve been through this before—Ishmael was the firstborn, Abraham’s firstborn. Well, if the land goes to his descendants, then surely it would go to Ishmael. Well, you would think so. Even though his mother was not Sarah but was Sarah’s maid. An Egyptian.

But God deals with that in Genesis 17. Even Abraham says, “I’m happy with Ishmael. He’s a good boy. I love him. Can’t he be the son of promise?” Read it for yourselves in Genesis 17: And God says, “No. This is not the son I promised you. This is the son of the flesh. You and Sarah schemed to get a son. But that’s not the son I promised you. I promised you a son through Sarah, and you will be the father of Isaac—Sarah will give birth to him about this time next year—and he is the one to whom I have promised.”

So God is called the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He’s never called the God of Ishmael. He’s called the God of Israel 203 times. Never called the God of the Arabs. Now that’s nothing against the Arabs, because He’s not called the God of the Americans, or the God of the French, or the God of anyone else. So it is very clear.

So here’s the problem, Tom. We have a title deed to that land given to the Jews by God 4,000 years ago. And the first piece of land that Abraham owned was the cave of Machpelah, remember? Abraham, in fact—we can document this from the Scriptures, if we read the Scriptures carefully, it’s very clear—he spent more than 100 years in the land of Canaan.

Now Islam is the problem! Islam says, “Oh no! Abraham and Ishmael built the Kaaba down in Mecca.” They were never there. That’s hundreds of miles away. No reason to go there. Abraham bought the cave of Machpelah from a Hittite to bury his wife, Sarah, when she died. Abraham was buried there. Jacob and his wives and so forth were buried there. Ishmael was buried hundreds of miles away.

The cave of Machpelah in Hebron, and Hebron, by the way, is where David was first crowned king. It has nothing to do with Arabs. Nothing to do with so-called Palestinians. Nothing to do with Islam. And yet the Muslims—the so-called Palestinians have taken it over. They built a mosque. They refuse to allow Jews and Christians to come to Hebron. They want to chase out every Jew that lives there. So this is the problem. The problem isn’t really between Arabs and Jews. The problem arose when Islam was invented by Muhammad with all of these false claims that this land belongs to the Arabs as the descendants of Ishmael.

Tom: Dave, I know people listening to the program—we’ve had comments from time to time that we’re just presenting the side of the Jews—the Israeli side—but you have continually…we have on this program continually said, “Look. What we’re presenting, you check it out.” As you said earlier today, Dave, this is in history books. You know, the Bible—anybody who wants to be objective about this can go to sources—I mean not just what we’re saying, although we’re referring to what we believe are really good sources—that they can come to know the truth about what is going on here.

Dave: Yeah. The primary source, of course, which I just cited, is the Bible. And that’s one of the things that really thrills me. When you read the Bible, you are reading about real people, real events, real places. Contrary to the Book of Mormon, as you know—I mean this is total fiction. Or the Bhagavadgita. The Qur’an has nothing like this to tie it to history.

So the Bible not only has prophecies and promises from God. It ties itself to history—definite places, definite events, definite people. You can trace them back archaeologically. And then, of course, we have valid history books—more recent history books.

Tom: Yeah, those who the Bible means nothing to them, or they have a bias against it—we’re at least saying, “Check this out historically. The facts are there.”

Dave: But Tom, the tragedy is—and you were just citing a book, a textbook in universities? They’ve rewritten history! They had absolutely no basis for what they say. And it really angers me that they would dare to do this, and it even angers me more that universities would pass this on as truth.

You know, Tom, I remember when…the first time we travelled behind the Iron Curtain—that was in really tough days back then. And I remember being in Czechoslovakia, I think it was—or was it Hungary? And…I think it was in Hungary, and I remember giving—very carefully—giving a copy of The Bridge at Andau to a resident there. I think he was a university professor—I don’t remember what he was. The reason…that’s by James Michener…the reason I wanted him to have that book—that was my only copy—was it was the story of a little village on the other side of a bridge at Andau, and this is where the Hungarians fled, over that little bridge across the Danube, into Austria during the revolution, when the Russians were wiping them out. And Michener stationed himself there, and he interviewed a number of these people. One of the interesting things he found out was they would stay up—now, I would speak to Christians about this, because you Christians, your children in public schools are getting lies, lies, and lies! And many of you don’t even know. You are not concerned enough to find out what lies they’re getting. Well, these people were just ordinary people—had nothing to do with the Bible or Christianity—they were concerned about the truth of history, the truth of their country of Hungary. And the communists, when they took over, rewrote the textbooks, rewrote the history of Hungary. And these parents—just secular parents—would stay up all night if necessary to find out what lies the communists had taught their children in school that day and to disabuse them of those lies. And I remember they would kind of share with one another, and you had to be very, very careful in those days—one father might say to another one, “When do you think is about the right age?” But he’s not saying…defining it. And the other father might say, “Well, I don’t think seven is too young.” What they’re talking about is “When would you start telling them the truth?” And the universities that we have today, that they are passing on myths, fraud! Passing it off as history! There should be an outcry in our country against this sort of thing.

Tom: Dave, you mention another book. This is in chapter 8 of your book, Voices from a Promised Land. And this book claims to…or gives a view from the so-called, as you mentioned, the so-called Palestinians. Now what makes this book unique, I think, is that the author is Jewish: Penny Rosenwasser. And she seems to be more than sympathetic toward the Palestinians and what they’re going through.

Dave: Well, Tom, yes, and she has many testimonies—people have been interviewed, and how their fathers and uncles and brothers, and so forth, have been imprisoned by Israelis, and the horrible mistreatment and how their homes were taken away, and they were chased out of Palestine by these Israeli invaders, and how the Israelis are occupying their land. Well, Tom, as I mentioned in the book, you know, you read this, and you think, Wow! It’s horrible. It’s horrible what the Israelis are doing!

But as you go on and on through this book, you never get the other side. There is apparently no justification for anything that Israel does. The Arabs, the Muslims, the so-called Palestinians—they’re painted as lily white, innocent of any wrong, and you begin to wonder, Now, are these Israelis really that bad?

But then, Tom, if you sit back, and you ask yourself some questions: Who is it that promised to exterminate the other side? Israel never said they would exterminate the Palestinians. Who is it that started the wars? Who are the suicide bombers? And what really happened when the United Nations partitioned Palestine, as it was called, in 1947, November 29, they gave 18 percent to the Jews of what the League of Nations had originally promised them. Much of it, because of oil interest, had been given by the British to the Hashemite kingdom to form Transjordan—it was on the other side, the eastern side of the Jordan River. In 1948, when Israel declared its independence, they were attacked instantly by six, as I said, six Arab nations, with tanks and planes, who swore—we can give you the records—who swore, over and over, they were going to exterminate the Jews. They didn’t want the Jews to have one piece of land. Why? Because Islam says it all belongs to the Arabs. And so long as Israel exists—has one square yard—it’s an affront to Islam. It says Islam’s a false religion. Allah is not God. The Qur’an is a false book. Muhammad is a false prophet. Okay?
So who’s going to exterminate whom? And it was in 1948 that Jordan took the West Bank. Now that was part of the land that was given to Israel, all right? Now they call the Israelis, and they say they’re occupying it today. No, this was land that was given to Israel in that small percentage of land. The Egyptians took what was known as the Gaza Strip. What did they do? They destroyed every Jewish place of worship. They set out to destroy. They chased every Jew out. No Jew could be a citizen in this area. They made it the death penalty to favor the Jews.

And you know that today any Palestinian who seems to want to give some recognition to Israel, they kill them! Now, isn’t this book a little bit lopsided? Why doesn’t it mention that? To leave all that out! And we have documented how the Israelis didn’t chase these people out.

Now, look, this is a war zone! You’re being attacked by people. They’re shooting at you, okay? Well, you’re going to shoot back. But in fact, the Israelis said, “We want the Arabs to stay!” They pleaded with them. And the Arabs who stayed comprise 16 percent of the voting citizens of Israel. They have full voting rights. Some of them are members of the Knesset! A Jew can’t even set foot in Saudi Arabia, okay?

Now why don’t they face the facts and acknowledge this? You get sermon after sermon in the mosques, it’s on the radio, it’s on television: Wipe out the Jews! Hatred of Jews! You don’t hear that in Israel against the Arabs and the Muslims. And that they have offered—they have offered peace! Look. Go back and read the records. It was Barak who offered Arafat almost everything including Jerusalem as their capital of their state, including control of the Temple Mount, and Arafat walked away. He would not take it because you couldn’t acknowledge the right of Israel to exist. Okay?

No, Israel has offered their Palestinian state many times—on one condition: They would acknowledge the right of Israel to exist. And they will not acknowledge the right of Israel to have any part of that land. There’s no coexistence with Israel.

And then books like this come out? And tell such lies! I’m sorry, Tom, I’m getting heated! I get angry!

Tom: Well, Dave, as we see this develop, it really has led to—anti-Semitism has been a part of world history—we can go back 2,500…we can go back thousands of years, but there’s a new anti-Semitism, which we’re going to talk about next week, that, again, it’s a mystery, as you point out in chapter nine.

Dave: Tom, when we talk about it more—it is a mystery. It is—why? These people are so hated. But the reason is because Satan must destroy these people because of the promises God has made. And if Satan can destroy these people, he’s won his battle with God because there would be no Second Coming. God has made promises. His integrity is tied to the survival and the blessing of the Jewish people—like it or not, this is what the Bible says, and we stand upon that for our salvation—but also for what it says about Israel.