PA: No Jewish connection to Israel
TV program says ancient Hebrews were Arabs, prophets Muslim

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Palestinian Media Watch


The Jewish people have no connection to Israel, the Hebrews of the Old Testament were actually Arabs, the prophets in the Bible were Muslim, Solomon's Temple was not built by Israelites but by Arab Canaanites, and the entire Bible is an invention of the Jews, according to a recent educational program aired on Palestinian Authority TV.

Two senior PA historians, Dr. Jarir Al-Qidwa, head of the PA public library and Arafat's advisor on education, and Dr. Issam Sissalem, senior historian and former head of history at PA University, were guests on the featured program and described in detail their assertion that Jewish history is part of a Zionist conspiracy. Both said any Jewish connection to Israel is actually a Muslim connection, even though Islam wasn't founded at the time of the biblical Hebrews.

According to a translation of the program provided by Palestinian Media Watch, Al-Qidwa explained "the Bible became an archival document, not representing what the Israelis and the first Jews were, but what they thought they were, what they imagined."

Sissalem then added, "We, as the Palestinian nation fighting for its freedom and liberation, must not focus too much attention on these false [biblical] legends. The history of our land continues more than 10,000 years. The land of battles and wars, [many] armies, tribes and commanders came through. I want to point out that we should not focus much on what is called the [biblical] Hebrew tribes, who are in fact Bedouin Arab tribes."

"[Jews] claimed that Solomon, may he rest in peace, built the Temple. Does the land testify to this? Solomon was a prophet and we see him as a Muslim and part of our [Islamic] heritage. ... There is no historical text that proves the existence [of the temple] or that it has a real history other than the Bible, and the Bible as we have previously mentioned ... was written based on ancient legends."

" ... The Quran came directly from the Prophet [Muhammad] ... while supporting all that preceded it in the [biblical] Prophetic inscriptions, that, as you noted, appeared in the Quran as Muslims believing in the one and only God, and these [the Hebrew prophets of the Bible] are part of our [Muslim] heritage. They have no connection to the Imperialistic Settlement Jews [Israelis] and nor to those that were destroyed."

"When the Zionist movement started to set in motion the Imperialist Settlement plan, it tried to base itself in the biblical legends; as we said, the Bible expresses a tradition of legends, that has no connection to history."

Al-Qidwa says the Temple Mount in Jerusalem is actually a "Zionist invention."

"No one said that the temple that was built in Jerusalem, neither the Canaanite nor Roman, no one said that it was in the place of the [Islamic] Al Haram," said Al-Qidwa.

A Palestinian viewer who called into the program expressed hopes that "Palestine will be for [Jews] a cemetery, Allah willing ...," to which both historians agreed.

Official Palestinian media and educational guides have long denied any Jewish connection to the state of Israel. At the Camp David peace summit in 2000, President Clinton was reportedly stunned when Yasser Arafat himself denied any Jewish connection to the Temple Mount and demanded complete sovereignty.

The official Palestinian text books assert that "treachery and disloyalty are character traits of the Jews and therefore one should beware of them." Jews are cast as Satanic, violent and cunning, as "thieving conquerors" who have stolen Arab land to which they have no connection, and they "must be fought and defeated," says one ninth-grade text.

In addition, when the Islamic Wafq was granted authority to excavate under the Temple Mount as part of the 1993 Oslo Accords, many in Israel charged the Wafq attempted to seize archeological evidence linking Judaism to the holy site.

According to archeologist Miri Tawil, "The Wafq claimed they wanted to build a new underground mosque in the area of Solomon's stables. The area of Solomon's stables was known by archeologists to have been rich in Temple-period remains and structures. Ignoring legal requirements that would have prevented them from destroying valuable Jewish archeology and artifacts, the Islamic Wafq made any hope of excavating these Holy Lands' treasures a lost hope."

"The Palestinians brought in bulldozers, front-end loaders, dump trucks, and stone cutters that poured into the underground chambers and made rubble of the historical temple area. Sculptures were covered over with cement, and a huge pit 200 feet long and 75 feet wide was created. The entire area was effectively stripped of its ancient remains."

"The Palestinian Authority is struggling with the challenge of creating a Palestinian national identity when no Palestinian national history exists," said Itamar Marcus, Director of Palestinian Media Watch.


Endnote by Right Enforcer: How can anyone possibly NOT condemn this? Putting things into perspective, when children are taught to hate, when they are brainwashed by society as a whole - how can there be peace? This indoctrination must change, and then, I can GUARANTEE, the Israeli's will offer peace. But unfortunately not until then...