From Where Does the Jewish Nation Come?
The Jewish People’s Indigenous Rights
"Whereas recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country"
--Preamble, Mandate for Palestine (July 24, 1922)
Anyone who has studied the Bible would say the Jewish Patriarch Abraham was born in Ur, on the southwest bank of the Euphrates. Abraham’s family then migrated to Northern Syria, and from there, Abraham took his household and his nephew and migrated to Canaan, which is the modern State of Israel/Palestine. From that time on, the land of Canaan became the Jewish homeland. Three generations later, the Children of Israel fled a famine and settled in Egypt for a little more than 200 years, before returning to Canaan in the time of Joshua. There has since been a continuous Jewish presence in the land until today.
The other people who lived in the Land of Israel have all since disappeared: The Philistines, who migrated from the Mediterranean islands and settled along the Gaza coast up through Ashdod, the Canaanites, Jebusites, Hittites, Amorites, and the rest have vanished in the sands of time (despite some unfounded claims that Israel’s regional Arabs are descended from these nations). The Jews, even while in two thousand years of exile, have cried three times each day in their prayers, and in the Grace After Meals, and have shattered a glass at every wedding, remembering their exile and hoping for a full national return to their homeland and the restored rule of the Davidic Dynasty.
In 1920, the Jewish Nation was officially handed legal title to the land. At the Peace Conference in San Remo, Italy the Supreme Council of the leaders of the victorious allies, who liberated the territory of Palestine from the Ottoman Turkish Empire, transferred that title to the Jewish People. The allies had the right to do so under international law under the right of conquest that was the law up until this time.
The reason it was agreed at the 1919 Paris Conference that the Jewish People would receive the territory of Palestine, was because of the Jewish People’s historical national connection to the land. The Arab delegation, headed by Emir Feisal I signed his agreement to what was labeled at the conference as the creation of the Jewish National home that would be transformed into the new Jewish commonwealth.
With more than three thousand years of Jewish history in the land, you would think that the United Nations might recognize the Jews as being indigenous to Israel/Palestine. However, this is not the case. Jews are not recognized as being indigenous to Israel or anywhere else in the world. Even more surprising, according to the UNHCR Refworld World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Palestine, there are two types of Jews in "areas of Palestine occupied by Israel in 1967, namely the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and the Gaza Strip: There are "Jews and "Jewish Settlers.
Furthermore, according to Refworld, "Early in the 20th century, Zionist leaders began planning for Jewish settlement in Palestine, and the removal of the indigenous population."
That claim is certainly counter to what the founder of Modern Zionism Theodor Herzl wrote in his book Altneuland. Herzl envisioned the Jewish National Home as a utopia, where the other inhabitant of the land could only benefit from the Jewish return. More than sixty years since Israel was granted independence from the Mandate, Israel has not expelled any Arabs. The refugee situation, that has become the shame of the United Nations for the world body organization’s lack of action to apply UNHCR standards for treatment and resettlement of refugees, was created not by Israel, but by Arab leaders who urged their brethren to leave their homes and not return until Israel was destroyed.
According to Michael Snidecor, the Chairman of the Office for Israeli Constitutional Law, "It appears the Jewish People just popped out of the ground in Palestine in 1948. This article is so full of lies and half-truths."
Mark Lattimer, director of Minority Rights Group International, the NGO responsible for publishing the UN’s information on Indigenous Peoples, responded to Snidecor’s assessment of his article saying, "The question as to whether or not a particular people are defined as indigenous under international law is governed by a number of criteria, including subjective ones … My own organization lays particular store on self-identification, that is, the ability of a people to define itself as indigenous…The claim by one people to be indigenous to a state or territory does not exclude the claim of another people to be indigenous to the same territory.
"To my knowledge, neither the Government of Israel, nor Israeli NGOs, have traditionally been active in the UN forum for indigenous peoples."
However, this is changing. The Office for Israeli Constitutional Law has become what is believed to be the first Jewish organization to become a UN recognized Indigenous Peoples Organization (IPO).
OFICL Director Mark Kaplan says, "The Office for Israeli Constitutional Law will be sending a delegation in April to the 9th session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous People’s. We are working with the local regional councils in Israel to have their communities register as these IPOs. It takes eleven IPOs to be able to introduce motions at the conference, and we are planning on introducing motions that will help us secure our rights in the Jewish National Home."
"Our goal, according to OFICL Vice President, Wayne Poswell, "is to have a large Jewish showing at the conference. We want to work together with the other Jewish IPOs to present a unified agenda. Obviously, the more Jewish IPOs involved in the conference, the stronger our voice will be.
Dr. Snidecor concluded, "We would like to see all Jewish groups and organizations join us at the conference. We would be happy to help explain how to register, and have a voice at the UN to reaffirm our indigenous rights that were recognized ninety years ago in the Mandate for Palestine."
