Where’s the Coverage? “Palestine was the Home of the Jew”
In August of 1947, a Middle Eastern leader wrote a letter to the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP). It read in part:
It is an incontestable historical fact that Palestine was the home of the Jew and of the first Christians. None of them was of Arab origin. By the brutal force of conquest they were forced to become converts to the Moslem religion. That is the origin of the Arabs in that country. Can one deduce from that that Palestine is Arab or that it ever was Arab?
[…]The Holy Places, the temples, the Wailing Wall, the churches and the tombs of the prophets and saints, in short, all the relics of the two religions, are living symbols, which alone invalidate the statements now made by those who have little interest in making Palestine an Arab country. To include Palestine and the Lebanon within the group of Arab countries is to deny history and to destroy the social balance in the Near East.
Who wrote this?
The Maronite Archbishop of Beirut, Ignace (Ignatius) Moubarak (sometimes spelled Mobarac, Mobarak, Moubaraque and otherwise).
UNSCOP was engaged in dividing the mandatory territories and, as Bashir Assad’s grandfather feared for his Alawite minority in Syria, the Archbishop feared for the Christians of Lebanon.
The letter continued:
What has the role of the Jews been in Palestine? Considered from this angle, the Palestine of 1918 appears to us a barren country, poor, denuded of all resources, the least developed of all the Turkish vilayets. The Moslem-Arab colony there lived on the borderline of poverty. Jewish immigration began, colonies were formed and established, and in less than twenty years the country was transformed: agriculture flourished, large industries were established, wealth came to the country. The presence of such a well-developed and industrious nation, next to the Lebanon could not but contribute to the welfare of all – the Jew is a man of practical executive ability, the Lebanese is highly adaptable and, for that reason, their proximity could only serve to better the living conditions of the inhabitants.
THE LEBANON DEMANDS FREEDOM FOR THE JEWS IN PALESTINE AS IT DESIRES ITS OWN FREEDOM AND INDEPENDENCE.
The letter is documented in United Nations records as part of Annex 9, “List of principal documents and written statements submitted to the Special Committee,” Section V, “Other Documents,” Number 45, “Memorandum submitted by the Maronite Archbishop of Beirut. Beirut, August 1945.”
The Archbishop had reason to fear. As Christians fear today across the Middle East… except in Israel. And yet… Where’s the coverage?
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