The accusation of colonization and occupation–a fabricated narrative from the 1960s–is now well-seared into people’s brains. Very few, if any, in the mainstream media are questioning the validity of such a claim. Nothing shows how wildly accepted the “Palestinian Narrative “is more than the recent artifact “returned” to the Palestinian authority. A 2,700-year-old spoon from the Assyrian empire was confiscated from its owner as a part of a criminal case. It was then given to the Palestinian Authority and described as a “historic repatriation.”
Let’s not miss the point here. A significant shift just occurred. For the last sixty years, the Palestinian narrative has been part of anti-Jewish propaganda to turn Israel into “Palestine” so that the rightful original and indigenous original occupants could return. The narrative has become truth, and now is the time to begin validating it with artifacts and antiquities. Enter “the spoon,” heralded as “an example of Palestinian cultural patrimony.” This will undoubtedly be followed by more artifacts to enrich the history of a people that never existed–at least until their introduction to the world by Yasir Arafat and the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) in the 1960s.
Jewish history has been rewritten to rob the Jewish people of their heritage, culture, customs, and, last but not least, their land: Eretz Yisrael! I wish the Palestinian Authority would be honest about their goals like PLO executive member Zahir Muhsein was in an interview for a Dutch newspaper in 1977, “The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct ‘Palestinian people’ to oppose Zionism for tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa. While as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.” He was very transparent and admitted that the Palestinian people were invented solely for political gain.
Let’s look at a few points made by the Bible as it pertains to Israel and the land.
• The Land ultimately belongs to God: God has granted the title deed to the Jewish people forever, but ultimately, it is His land:
Leviticus 25:23 KJV – “The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land is mine, for ye are strangers and sojourners with me.”
• The Land was given to Abraham and his descendants by God: God has given the Land of Canaan to the Jewish people ONLY through Abraham and his descendants:
Genesis 12:7 KJV – “And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land: and there builded he an altar unto the Lord, who appeared unto him.”
Genesis 13:15 KJV – “For all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever.”
• The Land grant was based on an unconditional covenant with Abraham: God made a covenant with Abraham, but only God passed through the split animals making it eternal, and God said, “I will,” making the covenant unconditional:
Genesis 15:12, 17-21 KJV – “And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him… And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces. In the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: The Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, And the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, And the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.”
• The Land grant was based on specific boundaries that should never be expanded: While the current size of Israel (about the size of New Jersey) is not what the millennial size (twice Texas) will be, even the specific boundaries of the more significant Israel are not expandable by one foot. There isn’t one country in the world that would have to abide by biblical boundaries and not try to expand its territory through war or other human means. Israel is unique in that regard:
Deuteronomy 2:4-5 KJV – “And command thou the people, saying, Ye are to pass through the coast of your brethren the children of Esau, which dwell in Seir; and they shall be afraid of you: take ye good heed unto yourselves therefore: Meddle not with them; for I will not give you of their land, no, not so much as a foot breadth; because I have given mount Seir unto Esau for a possession.”
Deuteronomy 2:18-19 KJV – “Thou art to pass over through Ar, the coast of Moab, this day: And when thou comest nigh over against the children of Ammon, distress them not, nor meddle with them: for I will not give thee of the land of the children of Ammon any possession; because I have given it unto the children of Lot for a possession.”
• The Land was to Abraham, then Isaac (never Ishmael) and then Jacob (never Esau): While the land was first promised to Abraham, the promise was repeated through his son Isaac and his grandson Jacob:
Genesis 25:5-6 KJV – “And Abraham gave all that he had unto Isaac. But unto the sons of the concubines, which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts, and sent them away from Isaac his son, while he yet lived, eastward, unto the east country.”
Genesis 26:3 KJV – “Sojourn in this land, and I will be with thee, and will bless thee; for unto thee, and unto thy seed, I will give all these countries, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father;”
Genesis 28:3-4 KJV – “And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people; And give thee the blessing of Abraham, to thee, and to thy seed with thee; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger, which God gave unto Abraham.”
• The Land grant is only based on God’s character, never on Israel’s performance: Israel was sent into captivity more than once, but God, while He disciplined the Jewish people, never rescinded on His promise:
Leviticus 26:44-45 KJV – “And yet for all that, when they be in the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, neither will I abhor them, to destroy them utterly, and to break my covenant with them: for I am the Lord their God. But I will for their sakes remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom I brought forth out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the heathen, that I might be their God: I am the Lord.”
• God’s promise to Israel is as unmovable as the universe He created: God gives the ultimate recipe for the guaranteed destruction of Israel and the Jewish people, but He makes it impossible:
Jeremiah 31:35-37 KJV – “Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, which divideth the sea when the waves thereof roar; The Lord of hosts is his name: If those ordinances depart from before me, saith the Lord, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me for ever. Thus saith the Lord; If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith the Lord.”
These are seven points out of many more I could make to validate this claim. I am well aware that a biblical defense of Israel’s right to the land will only work with those who hold the Bible as the inerrant word of God. My measuring stick has been the Bible for the last 40 years, and I know that one day I will have to answer to God, not for my salvation which I received 40 years ago as a gift from God through the atoning sacrifice of Yeshua of Nazareth, but for how I served and obeyed after He rescued me. Many Bible believers today do not see a future for Israel and buy into the false narrative of the Palestinians as an ethnic group. It is to them that this article is addressed.
We cannot change God, we cannot change His character, and since His promises and covenants are rooted in His character, we cannot change them either. What people can always do, though, is to study the facts of history alongside the promises of the Bible. If Israel weren’t in God’s plan, from a human perspective, we would have been long gone, but we still exist and are growing stronger against all odds. So, the Bible is one aspect of why we survived all the attempts at decimating us.
Add history, politics, and archeology to that foundational truth, and the case is a slam dunk for those who are honest and humble enough to admit it.
