Exploring the “There’s no such thing as Palestinians” line of thought.

Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel, spoke these words in 1969: “There was no such thing as Palestinians. When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the First World War and then it was a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country from them. They did not exist.”

By this logic, there are no Canadians. You can change Golda Meir’s to focus on Canada and they easily become: “Was there ever a Canadian people before a Canadian state? It was either British or French before the war of conquest. It was not as though there was a Canada where Canadians considered themselves Canadians before it was split off from the British Empire. They did not exist.”

This rhetoric tool exposes the logical flaw, there were in fact the people who became “Canadians” in Canada before there was a Canada. And there were “Palestinians” in Palestine, otherwise who are the Israeli’s throwing out when Golda Meir referred to “and when we came and threw them out and took their country from them.”?

By this exact same logic, there are no Americans. There was no historic America, ever. There was no unified people with the American language. There is no ancient origin of an American state. Golda Meir’s assertion that “there are no Palestinians” utterly fails to explain why there are Canadians and Americans today.

By this same logic, there are no trans people. After all, everyone is born either a boy or a girl, right? There are no gun owners. No one is born owning a firearm, right? This rhetorical “argument ad absurdum” is pointing out that identities can, and do change.

It seems perfectly reasonable to say that before Americans were American they were British, Dutch, Spanish, or German, and that before Canadians were Canadians they were British or French. So why is it not equally valid that a Palestinian was once a Jordanian, or Syrian in the same way that Canadians were once French or Americans were once British.

Well, it’s the language of political power. If you can convince the world that the person who was born on the land that their family has worked going back hundreds and hundreds of years doesn’t deserve to be on that land, because the political entity that person identifies with didn’t exist millennia ago, well then it must be perfectly all right to take their land. Or as Golda Meir put it, “push them off and take their land.”

If the Palestinians are in fact “Jordanians” then Israel is obligated to turn over the West Bank to Jordan, as per the UN Charter of 1945 ““All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” However Jordan legally transferred their claim to the West Bank to the Palestinian Authority in 1988, despite some voices advocating for Jordan to re-annex the West Bank.

In 1970 Golda Meir refined her position somewhat: “I don’t say there are no Palestinians, but I say there is no such thing as a distinct Palestinian people.” By this logic, there are no Texans or New Yorkers, as every American is just an American, right? Every Quebecois is the same as a Newfoundlander or British Columbian.

Of course the breakup of “India” into Pakistan, and then the break up of Pakistan into Bengladesh, should illustrate that just because there were no Pakistanis or Bengladeshis, doesn’t mean that there never will be.

This is definitely a bit more nuanced, but her position further refined to this in 1972: “I said there never was a Palestinian nation”

And with that, we reach a point of truth and agreement. There was Syria, and there was Jordan. Before that there was the Ottoman Turkish Empire. There was the Roman empire. Nations rise and fall. But there never was a Slovenia, and now there is. There never was a North Macedonia, and now there is.

Today there may not be a Palestinian State, the two state solution peace process has been deliberately sabotaged by extremists of both Muslim and Jewish faiths. But there could be. Because at one point, there were no Americans, Canadians, Mexicans, Slovenians, or even Israelis. That’s right, there is no “ancient Israel” there was however, a Judea.

The Israeli’s cannot force a “one state solution” and annex the West Bank and Gaza, as the millions of Palestinian Arabs would then outnumber the Jewish citizens of Israel. Currently Israel enjoys a significant Arab Muslim minority, but would rather quickly cease to be a Jewish state if Muslims gained the political majority, hence the reason why Israel cannot simply annex the West Bank as the people come with it. Unless Israel decides to set up an “apartheid” system where Arab Muslims can live in Israel, but not vote in Israel, in that case annexation and a “one state solution” become viable.

Jordan has drawn their border firmly at the Jordan river. The thought of making 3 million new Jordanians who don’t have a common heritage with the “East Bankers” makes Jordan shudder, as this is not like the Berlin Wall falling and re-unifying East and West Germany. As easy as it is for a comfortable westerner like myself to say, “Well, they were Jordanians, let them be Jordanians again” that’s unfortunately not the reality for the West Bank Arabs.

But lets finally agree with Golda Meir, there are Palestinians, and despite not having a nation state called Palestine, that isn’t justification to “throw them off their land” as she put it. However that is exactly the policy of the Netanyahu administration, as one of the first acts of office was to immediately “legalize” 10% of the “illegal settlements” in the West Bank.

So this leaves us where we are today. If the Palestinian Arabs do nothing, illegal Israeli settlers push them off their land. If they fight back, the Israeli Defense Force protects the settlers, and the Israeli government “legalizes” the settlement. This leaves the Palestinians with two choices, cry to God and the international community to intercede, and so far neither God nor the international community have been able to impact Israeli policy, or fight back as they can. Quite simply, the world would be quite happy if, “there were no such thing as a Palestinian.”

Except, there are. And here we are. A “Two State Solution” may never come to be, as that would limit Israel’s ability to illegally occupy, then “legalize” the action after the fact. And most Palestinian Arabs will never accept a nation that has a requirement to recognize Israel’s right to exist.