UPDATED: Reuters Rewrites Rulership of West Bank

By Published On: August 12, 2008
UPDATE: To its credit, Reuters has corrected the erroneous language.

Today’s Reuters story about Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s peace offer to the Palestinians gets wrong the basic history of Palestine.

The piece, “Palestinians reject proposal by Israeli PM,” asserts:

Under the proposal, Israel would return to the Palestinians some 92.7 percent of the occupied West Bank, plus all of the Gaza Strip, according to Western and Palestinian officials briefed on the negotiations.

The Ottomans are one of many former rulers of what is now referred to as the West Bank
ottoman map.gif

In fact, it is impossible to “return” West Bank land to the Palestinians, as they never were the sovereigns of this territory.

Before 1967, when the West Bank came into Israeli hands, the territory was ruled (and annexed) by Jordan. Prior to that, it was under British rule. Before that, it was Ottoman territory. The Egyptians ruled for some time, as did the Mamluks, the Crusaders, Arab Caliphs, and a number of other ancient empires.

But the Palestinians are not on this list. So while the West Bank could technically “return” to Jordanian or British sovereignty, it could not, however, return to Palestinian sovereignty.

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