Talk:Palestine

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[edit] PALESTINE NOT A COUNTRY?? WHO IS THE KID HERE?

So the country is now being called a region? For hundreds of years pre-Israel the concerned area of land was and even today is known as Palestine (UN). To call it a region is rather funny, how can a region then not posses countries? Asia is a so called region, rather a continent due to its size and bears many countries. If Palestine was a region, surely it must bear countries likewise, but that is rather false, since Palestine was and is a country. Please revise the writing; I will soon add meaningful information to this article, as most of the key writings are sourced from israeli materials and writers whom of many do not see nor accept the existence of Palestine as a country prior to the formation of the Israel state or after.

It is also worthy to note that the 1917 flag of Palestine is banned in Israel, another attempt by Israel to disfigure the past of Palestine. This article heavely represents the special views of Israel and not the world.

I will soon be uploading a flag and rectifying the heavily biased opening and tone used in most of this article with more soothing and factual information. It is also worthy to note that the Jewish people only saw Palestine as Israel through out history and all other countries always referred to the concerned piece of land as Palestine. To deny this is to deny history.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by [[User:{{{1}}}|{{{1}}}]] ([[User talk:{{{1}}}|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/{{{1}}}|contribs]]).

I agree that Palestine is opressed and deprived of rights but please keep in mind that Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and not a battlefield, so feel free to edit but please maintain equality while doing so, direct attacks at any state or person will be considered vandalism. Add only what is fact. Thank you. (Ahnaf 11:46, 11 September 2006 (UTC))

This article talks about Palestine the region , not the proposed state that doesn't exist yet but will apparently choose palestine for its name. So any additions which will talk about this state are meaningless and irrelevant to the article, and won't be included obviously. The article you're actually looking for is here: State of Palestine. Amoruso 13:20, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Palestine means the WB and GS, not the history

Robin Hood 1212 20:39, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

No it doesn't, who said? --Vjam 22:12, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Palestine does NOT exist as a country!! It NEVER was a country! Before Israel captured the Gaza Strip and West Bank, those areas were part of Egypt and Jordan respectively!!!!

Ermmm, neither did hundred of countries that nowaday exists. Countries are (or should be)the reflection of the people's will. That there was no modern state called Palestine doesn't change the fact that that land was called palestine and was inhabited by arabs since hundred of years before the Aliyah. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 62.101.171.15 (talk • contribs).

Palestine is a historical geographic region. It is not a country and never has been. If you suggest to discard its rich history (that goes millennia before the Arab conquest in the 7th century) and start with today's situation on the ground, that would be completely unworkable idea. But even if we follow it, I suspect that you won't like the result. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 00:59, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Humus sapiens, are you suggesting that that we should turn the clock back to before the Arab conquest of Palestine in the 7th century? Just want to check. --SandyDancer 00:56, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sanremo

[Sanremo] is the Italian city where the conference was held, at least according to Wikipedia. If this is incorrect please post here before reverting. Arker 01:18, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Palestine has NEVER been a country

Palestine does NOT exist as a country!! It NEVER was a country! Before Israel captured the Gaza Strip and West Bank, those areas were part of Egypt and Jordan respectively!!!!

History has not stopped or ended -- it is still in the making. Just because a country did not exist in the past does not mean it cannot come into existence. For example, there was no "India" before the British colonization. One could say that India had never been a country before the British captured the peninsula. The Indian peninsula were made up of many fractured kingdoms, and then the British came and conquered them one-by-one, ultimately united the territories under a single administrative entity. Over a long period of time, an unified Indian identity arose out of the British colonization and rule, and India -- then a new national identity, a new country -- demanded independence and self-determination.

What is the moral of that history lesson? New national identities (i.e., nationalism) almost always arise out of foreign occupation and oppression: a nation that did not exist in the past but comes into existence in response to the occupation and oppression by a foreign power. History has not stopped or ended. It is still repeating itself. -- ktchong 17 August 2006

Prore to the establishment of the Irish free state there was never an indepented country of Ireland this does not mean that people recondised it as a seperate country to britian. The suitwhich of northern Ireland is the excat same as Palestine a mase expsermension of on enthinic group so it can be replaced with a nother and a fictional country created and people live the lie for so long the belive in it.

Prier to the establishment of the Irish Free State there was never an independent country of Ireland this does not mean that people recognized it as a separate country to Britain. The state of northern Ireland is the exact same as Palestine a mass expsermension of on ethnic group so it can be replaced with a another and a fictional country created and people live the lie for so long the believe in it.

Can anyone provide maps showing Jewish immigration and settlement patterns in this region prior to the establishment of the country of Israel? Thanks! --TimeDog 23:37, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Maps are available at passia.org. --Ian Pitchford 02:59, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Infact only 5% of the population in Palestine were jewish prior to the heavy immigrations before the early 1900's, they were a minority for many hundreds of years. Infact Jewish people are a minority worlwide only bearing 18 million people. It is good to note than non of the Israeli "leaders" are Palestinian born, all originating from Europe, US and other countries.

Palestine was and is a country and will remain so, to see it otherwise is unfactual, ignorant, biased and an attemptive move to change history.

How about the term "Nation" instead of country, it refects the, shall we say mixed opinions on the topic of palestines statehood. It cannot be argued that there is no Palestinian nation, as the term nation is essenttialy one of self identification, if a distinict group considers its self a nation it essentialy is. Country is impercise anyways, in my opininion Nation, State, or Nation-State are more relavant terms for discribing any "country".24.69.65.202 16:18, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Eretz Israel

Have removed this from the intro and replaced with the Herbrew translation of Israel. "Eretz Israel" is not in any sense a translation of Palestine, and doesn't belong there. --Vjam 16:13, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Sure it is, for more than 3 millennia. Let's keep in mind that we are talking about the region here. If this is confusing, let's return this article its earlier title, Palestine (region). ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 09:31, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Humus Sapiens, you really do have an agenda, don't you! --SandyDancer 00:58, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

What belongs in the brackets is direct translations of the title, not alternative names which have been used at one time or another. There seems to be a perfectly good Hebrew word for the which can be used here, so why should wikipedia prefer an alternative that so clearly come with an agenda (ie it is primarily (according to Wikipedia) a religious concept and connotes (an aspiration to) sovereignty by a religious group).

I don't think this issue shows up any confusion as to whether we are taling about a geographic region. "Palestine" is, in any language, a geogrpahic region. "Eretz Israel" is ideological, and should not be presented as a neutral translation. It surely ought to be obvious that if you're choosing to translate "Palestine" as (basically) "Israel" then questions of neutrality arise. --Vjam 17:06, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

ארץ ישראל is not translated as Palestina. —Aiden 20:45, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

The hard fact (vs. opinion) is that the Hebrew toponym for the region throughout long Jewish history was/is "Eretz Israel". Serious encylopedias reflect facts, whether certain editors like them or not.
See Hebrew interwiki.
What about Jerusalem (Hebrew: Yerushalayim; Arabic: al-Quds...)? Are you going to argue for another "translation" of Arabic name? ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 06:58, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

According to this website I found, "Eretz Israel" is frequently used by Israelis in the context of arguments challenging Palestinian claims to nationhood and their right to land east of the Jordan River. [1]. Dionyseus 07:17, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Like it or not, the fact is that since the times of ancient Kingdom of Israel, "Eretz Israel" is the Hebrew toponym for the region. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 09:02, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

No, the fact is that it is a Hebrew toponym, and not a neutral one or a direct translation. "פלשתינה/Palestina" is clearly a more direct translation. "Eretz Israel" is no more a translation into Hebrew of "Palestine" than "Holy Land" is a translation into English.

What's important here is the difference between a translation on the one hand and a synonym or euphamism on the other. What's not okay is to take the latter and present it as if it were the former. If you have a good argument for saying that an exception should be made in this case, then you should state it. --Vjam 14:44, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Vjam. Dionyseus 14:46, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I also agree with Vjam --Oiboy77 19:38, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

One can spell in Hebrew (or any alphabet) anything, but that does not negate 3 millennia of history. The 3 points above are still unanswered. And this is not a vote. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 20:55, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

The article links to the History of ancient Israel and Judah as part of the History section; how could "Eretz Israel" not be a toponym? Is "Eretz Israel" some different territory? Jayjg ^(talk) 21:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, no amount of someone's dislike for a term can change the facts on the ground. "Eretz Israel" is not a "synonym", nor a "euphemism", but the Hebrew name for this region. Pecher ^Talk 21:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Jayjg: What's not in dispute is whether "Eretz Israel" exists as a toponym, or to what land it refers. The issue is that it is not a translation of "Palestine", since it comes with additional political/theological connotations, and there exists a perfectly functional Hebrew word ("Palestina") which comes without this additional meaning.

Humus sapiens: I haven't answered your above points because they are really just assertions not raising much to be answered. The answers I would give are 1) No 2) Why? and 3) Al Quds is a translation of Jerusalem - if you were to use it in an English or Hebrew sentence, you would clearly be borrowing from Arabic for some reason, so this is not a parallel case.

The claim that "Eretz Israel" is in some sense a translation (I assume this is a claim that is being made) needs standing up. --Vjam 22:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Where is the logic: Arabic:Al-Quds (and not Urusalim) is a "translation" of English:Jerusalem, but Hebrew:Palestina (and not Eretz Israel) is a "translation" of English:Palestina.

You are entitled to your POV but encyclopedias should reflect historical facts. A traditional 3+ millennia-old toponym Eretz Israel is not going to be replaced with Palestina (which is far from being politically-neutral) because of your political preferences. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 22:48, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Al-Quds is not a translation of Jerusalem into Arabic; it is the Arabic name for Jerusalem. Humus, prior to 1948 Zionists spoke of a dream of Eretz Israel but they referred to the land as it existed then as Palestine. Homey 23:01, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Humus, for your claim to be valid then the Hebrew word פלשתינה cannot exist historically yet it was in wide use prior to 1948. Homey 23:12, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Just as Al-Quds is the Arabic toponym for Jerusalem, Eretz Israel is the Hebrew toponym for the region in question.

Why are we suddenly limiting our scope to 30 years of the British Mandate and discarding 3+ millennia of the Jewish history? BTW, here is an evidence that Eretz Israel was used to disambig Palestina. As a compromise, I'm going to add both. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 02:10, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

By your argument, we should add (Arabic: فلسطين‎ Filastīn or Falastīn) to the top of Land of Israel. Are you agreeable to this? I think I've presented a more reasonable compromise in my latest edit. Homey 04:16, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I support this version. --Vjam 08:24, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Aiden who didn't like it. I think it should be within the paretheses, so I added that Eretz Israel is a Biblical term. See if this works better. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 20:40, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I've given Land of Israel the same treatment since both articles should handle the question in the same manner. Homey 21:25, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Not really. The issue is that it shouldn't be presented as a translation. Eretz Israel ≈ Palestine. Palestina = Palestine. So it shouldn't be parentheses, and it certainly shouldn't be first. Plus the way you've put it is as if being a Biblical term somehow makes it better. Will alter to something I think is more realistic. --Vjam 21:13, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Mot only "amongst Jews". Let's think how we can improve this. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 21:35, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Humus, should Land of Israel include a translation that reads: (Arabic: فلسطين‎ Filastīn or Falastīn) ?Homey 21:22, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Eretz Israel is a historical & Biblical term. What does Arabic Falastīn (c. 7th century) have to do with the Hebrew Bible? But if other editors are OK with it, I won't remove it. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 21:37, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Humus, either it's a historical and biblical term or its a general toponym, you can't have it both ways. And it seems to me that one-way translation is never possible, so I this goes a long way to proving my earlier point. And if it's not a translation then why do you want to put it first in the translation list?

Also think "related concept" sounds a bit vague, but will leave it there for now since my brain is frying in the heat. --Vjam 15:47, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Eretz Israel is a historical term, a Biblical term and a toponym. If 3200 years of history don't fit into some artificial frame, too bad for the frame. BTW, I feel that we are not that far apart, so let's work together to find a sensible compromise. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 23:28, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

If A in one language is translated to B in another language, it must be the case that B can be translated back into A, or the original tranlsation was not accurate. That's not an artificial frame, it's just regular logic.

Here's the main points of dispute, as I see it:

1) "Eretz Yisrael" is not an exact translation of "Palestine" (I get the impression we are agreeing on this part).

2) By convention, the reader is expecting to see, in the parentheses in the first sentence, exact translations in relevant languages.

3) So, it's my view that "Eretz Yisrael" shouldn't be in there. However, I don't think it's so serious if it is, provided steps are taken to ensure that no-one is misled into thinking that "Eretz Yisrael" and "Palestine" are translations of one another. This means (not necessarily an exhaustive list):

a) "Eretz Yisrael" should not come first in the list (I am still keen to know why you think it should)

b) The English translation "Land of Israel" should be included, - this makes it clear that the translation is not "Palestine".

c) Some (brief as possible) reference to it being a Biblical/Jewish/Religious concept should probably be included. Think the wording may need some discussion - does Biblical give too much of an impression of a kind of ceremonial usage?--Vjam 16:53, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Your wording is more or less OK with me. I made a minor edit, hope you and others won't find them objectionable. We are dealing with proper nouns here, so the word "translation" should be used with caution. Cheers. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 05:06, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

No, I'm not happy with this because:

1) "transliteration" seems designed to give the impression that we are not dealing with an actual Hebrew word, which is false.

2) The impression is given that "Palestina" is a transliteration from English, which clearly can't be the case.

3) "Palestina" may have originated as a tranliteration from Latin (I'm guessing this), which isn't unusual for a word, so why mark this out as if it is?

4) This is not a usual place for etymological information, so unless you can give a compelling reason, this is extraneous. --Vjam 09:55, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I accept the current version as a compromise. BTW, there is nothing wrong with transliteration, it's a common practice for Noun#Proper nouns and common nouns. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 22:03, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Jerusalem is not directly translated to Arabic as al-Quds; it is the common name for the city in Arabic, which is why it is listed in the Jerusalem article. In much the same way, it makes no sense that we should translate a Latin word into Hebrew when the Jews already have a common name for the region they've used for 3,000 years. —Aiden 22:08, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi Aiden. No, it is a translation. "name for the city in arabic" (in this case) = translation. It's not a requirement that the two sound similar or have the same literal meaning (cf "Germany" <---> "Deutschland"). The difference with "Palestine" compared to "Ertetz Yisrael" is that the two do not mean exactly the same thing, which has been gone over above.

Regarding your recent reverts, your premise is false. Wikipedia does not necessarily prefer the most commonly used name for a thing. See, for example Western Wall or Republic of China. In any event, in the present case, what is the most commonly used translation would be the question. --Vjam 22:18, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

"Eretz Yisrael" is not just a "biblical term", but also a modern-day term. Also, what does a "related concept" mean? It's another name for the same territory. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:19, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Aiden - please discuss you proposed change in talk, since it goes against what has been settled here, and please avoid breaking WP:3RR.

Jayjg - I agree, please feel free to try a more suitable formula. --Vjam 07:40, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I have; it is simply another Hebrew term for the same area. Jayjg ^(talk) 15:02, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Okay, that does fine for me. --Vjam 15:41, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I do not know enough about this stuff, so I am coming to talk, but it seems strange to me to have Eretz Yisrael listed as the Hebrew word for Palestine in this article, but not corresponding Arabic or english word for Land of Israel. It should go both ways, shouldn't it? Either the foreign language sections for both articles should be basically the same, or if Palestine doesn't belong in Land of Israel, I don't see why Eretz Yisrael belongs here. My 2 cents.--Andrew c 13:14, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Andrew, Eretz Yisrael is a historical and Biblical name for the region based on Torah, while Palestine is a secular name given by the Romans. "Filistin" is not an accurate Arabic translation of this Biblical concept. —Aiden 23:47, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm totally confused. If "Filistin" is not an accurate Arabic translation of the biblical concept, how is the biblical concept an accurate translation of "Filistin". If the word "Palestine" is not synonymous with "Eretz Yisrael", then there is no reason for "Eretz Yisrael" and Land of Israel to be included in the opening translation section. Here is a compromise proposal. Keep the opposing terms out of each article's translation section. Instead, replace with a see also link somewhere in the artlce, or a sentence that included the corresponding link and perhaps a little background (such as "A term to describe a similar region, but not identical region/concept is....) But as it stands, it boggles my mind that one thing can be a synonym for the other, but not vice versa. Including "Eretz Yisrael" in the translation section of this article is misleading if the information that Aiden provided is correct (that they are different concepts, and that the terms do not translate into each other).--Andrew c 18:12, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

The key to this argument lies in the first sentence itself "Palestine ... is ONE of many historical names for the region"... How could there be two Hebrew versions of ONE name. Yes, "Eretz Israel" is a name for the region... but it is a different name from "Palestina" and therefore irrelevant to the first sentence. This discussion bemuses me. 69.140.65.251 03:02, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

And there's another clue further down the page on the image of the stamp [2]. The Hebrew text appears to say Palestina (or something very similar). Could someone confirm? 69.140.65.251 12:19, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

The Hebrew word for "Palestine" is ארץ אשראל The transcription of the Latin word was imposed by the British. When the Jews protested the first letters of the two words where added, but the Jews showed their oppostiion to this by ponouncing them as "ay". Erets Israel refers exactely to Palestine. That there are different connotations is irrelevant. Note the difference between the Land of Israel and the State of Israel, Palestine and the State of Palestine. Maybe in the future Palestine will refer to the area of the State of Palestine, but for the time being Palestine and ארץ אשראל refer to the very same thing.

The Hebrew name for this geographic region is the "Land of Israel" (ארץ ישראל Erets Yisrael). The Hebrew name "Palestina" only refers to the political borders of the British Mandate of Palestine. Even then the official Hebrew name of the British Mandate was: "Palestina of the Land of Israel". --Haldrik 08:33, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

All names should be included, contextualized, and linked within reason. An example of what is missing here is a distinction that is notable only in Hebrew, there are two spellings of Palestine/Palestina (invented by Palestinian nationalist publishers in 1911 -- in Hebrew -- of the Palestine paper of Jaffa), since at the time Palestine - Eretz Israel (פלשתין א"י) was gaining ground internationally and locally, non-Zionist Palestinians distincted themselves with the spelling of פלסטין. This was copied and today there is a mix within Israeli media of both with varrious and sometimes even conflicting ideologies backing the same spelling (the latter of which is missing from the page BTW) although the difference is not noted at all in English or Arabic... Anyway, this is just an example that separating ideology from history is not always educational, and can be done in more than one way, like simply posting all views known.

[edit] Israel

Israel is a sovereign nation, and sections of this article imply that the Palestinians claim to all of Israel is recognized by the world and the United Nations.

Jeff —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.74.70.152 (talk • contribs) .

That statement you are adding is a gross oversimplification of a complicated issue. I think this article and the Israel article already cover the points you mention. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 06:47, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

According to Jewish accounts, the kingdom of Israel lasted about one hundred years from around 1030-1020 BCE until approximately 930 BCE-920 BCE when it split into the independent kingdoms of Israel and Judah. These independent kingdoms (lasting about two hundred years) were destroyed around 720 BCE by the Assyrians. So the independent kingdom of Israel (according to their own accounts which are not substantiated by archaelogy or reliable historical records) lasted for 300 Years.

2668 years later they come back and claim it is their land .....

sounds perfectly reasonable to me ....

The Europeans were criticized for establishing colonies in Africa, Asia, the Middle East etc.

and they eventually left all those places ..... but somehow it is okay if Jewish people colonize ::land...

The only other country that still has colonized regions (China stills occupies Tibet, Eastern ::Turkestan, etc.) is strongly criticized by most people for continuing its imperialistic policies...

but if your Jewish you are given a free pass.... to steal land...

sounds perfectly reasonable to me .... oops Oh My God.. what am I saying...am I criticising ::Israel? Isn't this anti-Semetic? GASP!24.6.23.248 13:09, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Israel is not an nation, it is a state, and the U.N. certainly makes that clear, thats why we are seeing Jewish lobbies attacking the U.N. so much.

[edit] coming to talk regarding Eretz Yisrael

I don't know why editors have been mentioning talk in their edit summaries when I posted yesterday about this with no response. It seems to me that either Eretz Yisrael is a synonym for Palestine or it isn't. If it is, then the corresponding terms should be in both this and the Land of Israel articles. If it isn't, then neither should be in either article. As it stands, Eretz Yisrael is in this article, but Palestine is not in Land of Israel, which to me seems extremely biased. So how can we fix this? I made some suggestions above. I think the best thing is to not say that the terms translate into each other in the opening sentence, but instead, further down the paragraph, mention the relation of each term to the other in BOTH articles in sentence format. How does that sound as a compromise? Another suggestion would be to simply remove both terms from the opposite article, however, efforts to remove Eretz Yisrael from this article have been reverted (though I'm not sure why), and efforts to put Palestine in Land of Israel have been reverted as well. So what gives? Can we talk this out.--Andrew c 20:56, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

This has been already discussed, pls. see above. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 22:12, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I am very stupid. Can you please hold my hand and show me where on talk this has been discussed. I cannot find it anywhere. Thanks--Andrew c 22:56, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I do not believe that you are stupid. Please see the section #Eretz Israel above. Also, reading both articles would help to get familiar with the subject. BTW, synonym does not mean equal. Cheers. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 23:22, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi Andrew. As you can see above, my position is similar to yours. A compromise which I find basically acceptable has been reached. This was only between a few users and, of course, nothing on Wikipedia is necessarily forever. Nontheless, I feel that any further changes should be done through talk and address why that compromise is not acceptable. I'm not immediately sure what I think of your proposals above - will get back.

Humus (and others): I still think a more satisfactory formulation than "a term for the same area" is needed. "Hebrew", "religious" and "historical" all seem to have hit opposition. But what's there currently seems to me to as good as putting nothing - it doesn't really shed any light for the reader. Any formualtion should also be as short as possible. --Vjam 16:24, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Ok, let me see if I get this right. "Eretz Yisrael" is a term with 2 different meanings. One) for Israelis, it refers to the same basic region as what we often call in english as Palestine (and what this article is addressing) and Two) it refers to a biblical concept described by the article Land of Israel. Therefore, because of the common usage of the phrase in Hebrew, it can be seen as a synonym for Palestine because they both refer to the same basic area. However, Palestine, being a diminutive phrase given to the region by the Romans in the 2nd century, does not equal the biblical concept because the history of the term "Eretz Yisrael" predates "Palestine" by a millenium. So therefore, it seems strange to me that the english article Land of Israel is wikilinked in the opening translation section. I still think the best solution is to explain all this in sentence format. Point out that "Eretz Yisrael" often is used to refer to the same region as Palestine in contemporary Hebrew culture, but the phrase also has a more historic, biblical meaning, as described by the Land of Israel article. I think this still needs a little work, but thanks everyone who slowed it down and notch and reviewed the past debate for me. I honestly appreciate it.--Andrew c 18:13, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

This is less than sensical. Eretz Yisroel is not a synonym or a translation of Palestine (region). Geographically they share overlap, but much of historical Palestine is outside Eretz Yisroel (Gaza up to Ashdod, called Eretz Philistim in the Bible), and the far southern Negev. Also Eretz Yisroel existed outside of the region Palestine, crossing into Syria and Jordon. Further you'd have to get into a big discussion of various opinions on the borders of Eretz Yisroel, the fact that Eretz Yisroel outside of Ezra's Jerusalem (smaller than the old city) is Eretz Yisroel D'rabbanan right now, and discuss the difference in the religious term Eretz Yisroel (Land of the Jews) and the modern Hebrew usage Eretz Yisrael (Land within Medinat Yisrael). If Eretz Yisrael is mentioned it should be mentioned in a part about religious feelings for Palestine, like, "Orthodox Jews regard much of Palestine as holy due to its overlap in large part with Eretz Yisroel, a region requiring special levels of piety for Jews to halachicly dwell in and some apparently eccentric behavior regarding vewgetables and fruit. Zionists call Palestine "Eretz Yisrael" in order to give their movement some historical justification." I'm of course being silly, but you see the point. 88.155.104.53 09:34, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] new section for Monowiki

This requires citation; also weasel wording needs scrapping or backing up here:

"...as an insult to the now conquered Jews. In what was considered a form of psychological warfare, the Romans also tried to change..."

Who considered this a "form of psychological warfare" ? When did they consider it?—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Monowiki (talk • contribs) 21:03, 31 July 200.

[edit] Map needs to be renewed

The "Current Map of Israel" needs to be renewed. Gaza is no longer under Israeli occupation.

Good point. But it doesnt really have "final" status yet. --Haldrik 06:32, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] fully sourced demographic material

Those who are deleting sourced material from either Katz, Pipes, Mark Twain, De Haas and so on, please stop doing so. The fact you don't like it, don't give you persmission to delete it. I'm talking about the known WP:POV pushers who remove sourced material here. Amoruso 13:56, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Editors are obliged to write their own material for Wikipedia citing reliable sources. A direct quotation must cite the source from which you took it. Katz is not a reliable source but if you want to check what he says copies of his book are very cheap second-hand. --Ian Pitchford 14:15, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Are you talking about Katz's book ? I have it right here beside me and I'm quoting directly from it. (Have it in two langauges, 3 differnet versions right here). Katz is a reliable source of course. And I've checked the secondary quotes as well just to be sure. Hence, stop your vandalism immediately or be blocked. Amoruso 14:48, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

You should throw away Katz and go to a good bookshop and buy yourself some modern history books. Nearly everything you copy out of Katz is discredited by modern scholarship. For example the population of Palestine was already in the 200,000-300,000 range by 1800 (Bacchi's estimate was 275,000). It declined a bit during the middle of the century then recovered by the end. When the Ottomans started doing censuses in 1878, the population was over 230,000 (McCarthy, Population of Palestine). The worthlessness of the game of quotations can easily be shown by quotations saying the opposite. For example Ahad Ha'am wrote in 1891: "From abroad, we are accustomed to believe that Eretz Israel is presently almost totally desolate, an uncultivated desert, and that anyone wishing to buy land there can come and buy all he wants. But in truth it is not so. In the entire land, it is hard to find tillable land that is not already tilled; only sandy fields or stony hills, suitable at best for planting trees or vines and, even that after considerable work and expense in clearing and preparing them-only these remain unworked" (Alan Dowty's translation of "Truth from Eretz Yisrael"). Of course one can be sure without looking that this quotation is not presented by Katz, because Katz wanted to present the racist viewpoint that the inferior Arabs neglected and destroyed Palestine until the superior Jews returned and repaired it. We don't need that sort of rubbish here, thank you. --Zero^talk 14:46, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

That the Canaanites originated in the Arabian peninsula was the normative view of archaeology from the 19th century until the 1960s at least. I'm not sure that is still the case, but currently I'm lacking a good source. Certainly some of the Canaanites originated there. --Zero^talk 14:46, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

if you have soruces Zero that apply to the WP:RS sources you can use them. Katz's last version of the book is very modern and verified. There's no doubt among historians that the land was mostly desolate. of course you find a fringe view here and there. The cannaties thing needs ref too, we're writing an encyclopedia here, not your personal WP:POV - do not blank out sourced material that you don't like. I repeat, you're endlessly violating wikipedia policy again and again. Amoruso 14:51, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Keep your cherry-picked "quotations" out of Wikipedia. --Zero^talk 14:54, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Keep these kind of comments out of discussion pages. Try not to vandlize pages again in the future because there's WP:RS that you don't like, especially when it's based on secondary sources as well. Your continuing vandalizm is disruptive. Amoruso 15:01, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

btw, your vandalism is even more staggering since the "citations" you brought here don't contradict what I said. 200,000 around 1800 then further decline, then rise again. Your comments are are ridicilous and your attitude is so distruptive that it's not even funny. Amoruso 15:15, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] in conclusion

I can emphasise that Zero0000 reasoning is made in bad faith and his allegations were already proven false. Yes, Shmuel Katz is a former politician and belongs to the right wing part of the map. Many others, like Yehoshua Porath who is cited in the article, are also politicans - Porath is a member of an exteme left political party. Katz is a WP:RS historian with credentials fully cited on google scholar, appreciated and discussed, referenced his works fully and never had a critic question its authenticity or sources - on the contrary, his books are regarded in the highest historical accuracy. Furthermore, the quotations are based on secondary sources, fully verified and reliable and objective. Furthermore, there are also citations that have nothing to do with Katz, for example Pipes, but Zero has vandalised them as well. Lastly, the claims are not even controversial, proven by Zero's comments himself. Echad Haam saying at the end of the 19th century that the country is not desolate is exactly what Katz has said that in the middle of the 19th century already between 50,000 to 100,000 people. These are official estimates. There may be other estimates that have 100,000 people more. Even this 200,000-300,000 estimate which we don't if it's reliable doesn't refute anything that Katz said except perhaps the last sentence contradicting it to a certain extent. In fact, if this is the highest estimate in existence, it even strengths Katz's thesis, and especially the issue of the population up until the ottoman empire. Amoruso 01:58, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

not to mention that Zero0000 has refuted himself by saying that in 1800 the population was 275,000 and then in 1878 it was 230,000. Interesting. Perhaps he should research more on reliable sources next time. Amoruso 02:09, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

btw Mccharty also denys the Armenian genocide because of his loyalty to Turkey and is obviously biased towards muslim and arab ends, which is the reason he is cited in Palestinian cites as propaganda. Amoruso 02:14, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Silly Amoruso, Porath was once regarded as a left-winger but he had a famous conversion to the right. And stop making up things. There were no "official estimates" in the middle of the 19th century. And your "refuted himself" comment just shows you are unable to understand. Why do you keep embarrassing yourself like this? --Zero^talk 02:56, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

ignoring useless personal attacks. the information will therefore be added and any deletion of it will be regarded as vandalism by Zero0000 which should prompt blocking. btw, it's true that Porath made a shift towards netanyahu at the time, but it's irrelevant, since at the time of this comment he was on his most extreme left. Further irrelevance from you then. Amoruso 03:13, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Katz et al

If the text is properly attributed and is described as a quotation or paraphrase, then it is not a copyright violation. A violation is when person A is attempting to pass off person B's work as his or her own. If full credit is given to the author, as well as the source, it does not violate the copyright to the best of my understanding.

Secondly, Shmuel Katz was quoting others, whose texts are verifiable and reliable; the text you removed contained no opinons of Katz's own, so his own political beliefs are irrelevant for that portion.

Thirdly, please see Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Partisan, religious and extremist websites. The fact that someone has beliefs does not exclude them from being a WP:RS, unless they are “Widely acknowledged [as an] extremist or even terrorist groups”, and then can only be used as a source about their belief. Shmuel Katz does not fit that mold, and as such is eligible, especially in light of his source being a collection of other sources. Thank you. -- Avi 14:58, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Wholesale copying of material (including references) from a webpage without (a) citing that page and (b) checking the sources is a copyvio, plagiarism and a violation of Wikipedia policy. We cite reliable sources so that others can go and check them. We don't hide the true source by slightly re-writing material to make it appear that we're citing the original sources ourselves. It's fundamentally a question of honesty. The works cited by Katz might well be reliable sources, but his work is certainly not a reliable source for them. BTW when was the Irgun not a terrorist group? - see Perliger, Arie and Weinberg, Leonard (2003). Jewish Self-Defence and Terrorist Groups Prior to the Establishment of the State of Israel: Roots and Traditions. Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, Volume 4, Number 3, pp. 91-118. --Ian Pitchford 15:24, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

The Irgun was a terrorist group according to everyone except the Irgun. Would we care if Al-Qaeda claimed to not be a terrorist group? Katz was not only a member but its chief propagandist. He remained a propagandist for the extreme right all his life. If Katz is a reliable source then every seource on the extreme right is reliable. --Zero^talk 10:06, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm copying straight from the book. I can use for reference any sources but I have the actual book and can quote you anything you want from it, versions, pages, everything. I'm usually using the Hebrew versions for my own comfort but I have the english versions as well, and btw, permisson from the author. Your allegations as proven as false . Please stop your vandalism. Amoruso 22:04, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Shmuel Katz is also an Israeli historian and journalist, and appears to be plenty reliable for the purposes of Israeli history. -- Avi 18:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

So you agree to all writings by the propaganda chiefs of terrorist organizations being used in articles on Israeli history? --Ian Pitchford 18:36, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Beitar and Etzel is a political organization with militant activities in the 1940's. Since then members of Etzel (and Lehi) have already had 2 prime ministers + the current PM the son of a prominent beitar member and, + the entire likud party in its bulk and a big part of kadima today. Etzel is the mainstream of Israeli right, and is no way a terrorist organization. Needless to say Katz was never a "terrorist" or a fighter himself. In fact, anyone old enough and belonging to the right wing of the map will belong most likely or be affiliated with Beitar and Etzel. Your comments are entirely irrelevant, a violation of wikipedia policy, and you are advised , again, to cease your consistent vandalism and blanking. Most of the historians are affiliated with political parties or have showed support or even run for parliament, 90% of them belonging to the left wing or even the extreme left wing, usually communist wing. Amoruso 22:08, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Katz doesn't qualify as a historian and was chief propagandist of an extremist organisation. Evidence from him is not credible. Copying material from a source without attribution is plagiarism. I thought you were a lawyer. --Ian Pitchford 17:50, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

That is your personal opinion. However, Katz is much better known for his role in politics and as a historian. According to your line of reasoning, anything written about Cuba by Che Guvera or Fidel Castro is not reliable. For that matter, anything written by that radical extremist anti-Tory George Washington should also not be reliable. -- Avi 19:13, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Plagiarism is not a matter of personal opinion, and you don't become a historian by claiming to be one. If you look at the article as it stands there is no indication that material has been copied from Katz. We're obliged to use reliable sources, not to hide the fact that we're copying material from unreliable sources. As the policy states "exceptional claims require exceptional evidence"; propaganda sources like Katz are used precisely because the material can't be found in standard reliable sources - such as decent history books. --Ian Pitchford 19:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

It's very simple to check. My library has Katz's book. I have placed it on hold, and will take it out this week, and confirm whether or not the quote is in the book; if it is, that's all that we need. That's the reason why we cite sources, so that we can verify them. -- Avi 20:03, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

That wont make him a reliable source or make plagiarism acceptable. --Ian Pitchford 20:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Properly sourcing quotes and paraphrases prevent plagiarism, and there is really no issue about his reliability in this regard -- Avi 20:17, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh yes, someone does not lose historian status just because you do not believe he is one either . -- Avi 20:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I suspect we're talking past each other. Do you know what plagiarism is and what you would be checking in Katz's book? --Ian Pitchford 20:27, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I will be checking the the text quoted in his name, or paraphrased and properly attributed to him, is there; and that sources quoted here as quoted in Katz, are referenced in Katz with the references here. This is for the "Demographics" section of the article. Please point out examples of what you consider plagiarism in this article. Thanks. -- Avi 21:31, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Well exactly. Do you know from looking at the article what is actually supposed to be from Katz? --Ian Pitchford 21:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Ian I suggest you open a dictionary and read what plagiarism is. You're embarrassing yourself. Also, your repetitive accusations about Katz are embarrassing and have been all refuted already. Btw, I can get you permission from Katz himself is you wish. Amoruso 04:16, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, I've opened a dictionary: plagiarize. "to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own: use (another's production) without crediting the source" [3] Here's your edit [4] quoting Alphonse de Lamartine, Volney and De Hass. Where do you indicate that the material is copied from the Katz and not from the original sources? All of it is copied from Katz (1973) pp. 106-109. --Ian Pitchford 17:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I think every intelligent person could have understood that this is based on Katz since I wrote his name quite a few times. Anyway, per your request, I added more references to his book. The thing is I have permission to use it the way I did + I've previously checked the secondary sources and therefore one can use them directly - credit was given to Katz for the analysis in the beginning. The secondary sources are listed very throughly at the end of Katz's book and he encourages and in fact provides readers with the access to those books, so it's all been verified. But it's now academic anyway, since the refs were added. I respect your admiration for Katz and your diligent care to protect his rights. Amoruso 18:24, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] state of palestine

this issue is dealt in the current times section. One can add info there although I don't see a reason fot a template. both templates might be used if one wants. btw, for these editors I refer you to the correct page in the disambuigation page : [5]Amoruso 22:17, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Compare State of Palestine and State of Israel. Palestine refers to a geographic term. --Haldrik 22:21, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Stuffing the history section

Please stop stuffing the history section with nonsense about Canaanites being the earliest inhabitanats - as explained in History of Palestine there were the Mousterian, Yarmukian, Ghassulian and Natufian cultures well before the Canaanites and the Hebrews didn't arrive at the time of Moses - what about Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? All this is covered quite well in History of Palestine etc so there is no need to stuff this article with half-truth history when the article is primarily about Palestine as a geographic region. Kuratowski's Ghost 00:33, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] פלשתינה

פלשתינה is not the Hebrew word for Palestine.
It does not occur in the Bible, nor in the talmud.
Neither is it the Israeli (a k a Modern Hebrew) word for Palestine. It is only a possible transcription of Palestine;
פלסטינה being the other.
This alone shows that it is not Hebrew. It was imposed on the Yishuv by the British. If you search פלשתינה in the Israeli wikipedia, you are redirected to ארץ ישראלט If you are not convinced to and read the archive of discussions forst. Wikipedia was not started two months ago.

Later in the article "we" write: The Hebrew name Peleshet (Hebrew: פלשת Pəléshseth), usually translated as Philistia in English, is used in the Bible to denote their southern coastal region. The Assyrian emperor Sargon II called it the Palashtu in his Annals. The Philistines seem to have disappeared as a distinct ethnic group by the Assyrian period, however the name of their land remained. During the Persian Period, the Greek form was first used in the 5th century BCE by Herodotus who wrote of a "district of Syria, called Palaistinêi" (whence Latin: Palaestina, whence English: Palestine). The boundaries of the area he referred to were not explicitly stated, but Josephus used the name only for the smaller coastal area, Philistia. Ptolemy also used the term. In Latin, Pliny mentions a region of Syria that was "formerly called Palaestina" among the areas of the Eastern Mediterranean.

That is in its place. But since neither פלשתינה nor פלסטינה do belong to the ancestry of the Englsih term Palestine. For the rest, look up the Hebrew wiki. -- previous post anonymous unsigned.

The Hebrew form פלשתינה came into use with the Hebrew documents referring to the British Mandate of Palestine. Previously, Hebrew simply used the term ארץ ישראל Land of Israel, so to speak "Israel-Land". The British Mandate documents combine both together as one name, פלשתינה א״י Palestina of the Land of Israel. --Haldrik 20:41, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

The topic of the Palestine article is about the various placenames and borders of this geographical region. The shifting meanings and forms of this name reflected in the etymology are pertinent. Especially the forms currently in use in Hebrew. --Haldrik 21:04, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

The current name of the region is ארץ ישראל . The name imposed by the British never caught on. In an article "The Mandate of Palestine" פלשתינה א״י would be the proper Hebrew name, but only there. Have a look at this poster1925 -- it is a poster vor the Palestine Exhibition / Palästina Ausstellung / Ta'aruka haErets Israelit 1925. Even during the mandate ארץ ישראל was the Hebrew name of the area of the Mandate. Go might go to this site with lots of Jewish journals in German that show that the region is called "Palästina" in German and ארץ ישראל in Hebrew.

If still not convinced that the Hebrew word for palestine (region) is ארץ ישראל and both פלשתינה and פלסטינה being just transcriptions, have a look at these book titles:

http://catalogue.bl.uk/F/I64MBCXXF3ALXQ8CKR1EHJYG2GHJKK5JHCES8CY8ND3644891K-32842?func=full-set-set&set_number=050835&set_entry=000010&format=999 http://catalogue.bl.uk/F/I64MBCXXF3ALXQ8CKR1EHJYG2GHJKK5JHCES8CY8ND3644891K-32823?func=full-set-set&set_number=050835&set_entry=000008&format=999 http://stabikat.sbb.spk-berlin.de/DB=1/CHARSET=ISO-8859-1/IMPLAND=Y/LNG=DU/SRT=YOP/TTL=1/SID=a5317907-3/SET=1/SHW?FRST=1 http://catalogue.bl.uk/F/I64MBCXXF3ALXQ8CKR1EHJYG2GHJKK5JHCES8CY8ND3644891K-32809?func=full-set-set&set_number=050835&set_entry=000006&format=999

This was in no way imposed by the British but is the pre-modern name of the area, later turned national struggle (first from British then Zionist) adopted then and today; even by some Israelis. It is as Hebrew as modern Hebrew gets, in both spellings, the latter one of which is nationalistic Palestinian BTW coined in Jaffa by Palestine newspaper in 1911. As for the German posters etc. it is because of confusion that lead to the two Hebrew spellings that some began avoiding one term, Eretz Israel, over another, Palestina. Golda Meir's statement of her 'also being Palestinian' would not have been such an event were Israelis calling themselves Palestinians, much in the same way that some Arab Jews became Mizrachim it is ideological. There contexts should be made clear. ````re

[edit] Hebrew: פלשת Pleshet

פלשת refers only to the coast from Akko to Gaza (or something like that), not to Galilee, Samaria and the Judean Mountains. It word comes from the same root as is explained further down. This information does not belong to the first line. [anonymous]

The Romans used the name of the coastal region (= Pleshet), to refer to the entire region. The name is topical to this article, which discusses the shifting names and borders of this geographical region. --Haldrik 05:14, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

The Romans used a word derived from a word of the same root as Pleshet. They never used Pleshet. The proper information is giving further down in the article. There it makes sense. Not in the first line. -- unsigned

Actually the Romans did use the word "Pleshet". The Latin word "Palaestina" is originally identical in meaning to its cognate "Pleshet" and refers to the Gaza Strip only. Only after the Bar Kokhba Revolt did the Romans reuse the Latin word to officially refer to other regions outside of "Palaestina". --Haldrik 02:36, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Canaan כנען

the Hebrew Bible (a k a the Old Testament) calls the land most of the time see Catholic Encyclopedia or go to one of the many online bibles and count -- and report the results in the footnootes to this aricle!

Of course. Nevertheless, the Hebrew cognates are necessary elements in the etymology of the word "Palestine". The article is about this name, and other names, and the shifting borders of this geographical region. --Haldrik 05:43, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Retenu

Immanuel Velikovsky suggested that the ancient Egyptian name for Canaan-Israel-Palestine, Retenu, was the Egyptian version of Hebrew Artsenu, "Our Land." Das Baz 20:15, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] suggestion

Palestine should lead to Palestine (disambiguation) and not to this page. This will minimize a lot of the recent vandalism and prevent confusion. Amoruso 14:51, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Information Bias

I would like to emphasize the importance of including Pre - Roman information about the region Palestine. The reason for this is that so far, the presentation lacks a neutral point of view.

From the Palestinian perspective, they are always accused by Jewish Zionist, such as writer Katz, for not being indigenous population in the Land of Palestine and therfore giving a pre-text for unconditional Jewish immigration to the land.

The fact is that most Palestinians and Lebanese, to this matter people of the Levant, are proven to be related to Pre- Roman time populations like the Canaanites. It is not true that 7th Century Muslims Arabs ethnically cleansed the region or uprooted its existing population.

Furthermore, many of the tribes in Syria, Palestine, Jordan and Lebanon are related to semitic tribes that have orignally moved to the area in the 3rd milliniem. These are scientificaly proven facts.

Finaly remark, concerns the Demographics. The title "The Question of Arab Immigration to Palestine" is biased. Arabs were already there! Who is questioning that except zioinist writers for there own political agenda! Almaqdisi 22:40, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Notice the coastal land of Philistia, from which the name "Palestine" derives. - this is what is says on the legend of the picture. Well, I say notice how biased this is - they´re basically trying to suggest that this name Palestine is not to be given importance. --213.190.195.101 23:01, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Nothing of what you said is biased information. The philistine comment is simply factual, you're reading things that aren't there. We're not talking about fantasies but about facts. Like mentioned, nobody is blanking the pre-roman times - they are important for Judaism actually of course. Simply if one writes it, it should be accurate with the article about history of palestine - it should be in harmony with that article. The early people of Palestine have nothing to do with Arabs btw. Amoruso 23:26, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, 7th Century Arabs did not ethnically cleanse the people of Palestine, nor Lebanon, nor Syria, nor Egypt, etc. The populations there became rather arabized. In specific, people of the Levant in particular were speaking a language that was close to Arabs in Mecca and Medina with whom they were very freqnetly trading. There is no question that the Palestinians are related to the people who existed in the area before the Arab rule starting in the 7th Century. Finally, Canaan, Ghassan, Adnan, Kahtan are all Arabian tribes after all. Almaqdisi 23:44, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

No, there's nothing between them and arabs. Arabs are primarily Hamitic, with a relevant Semitic contribution. The arab conquest in Palestine started in 638, long after many empires came and went. Immigration of Arabs started as well at differnet periods of their control, mostly during the very late ottoman empire - these are the Palestinians. Obviously no relation at all to Canannites or Philistines etc. Amoruso 00:20, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, this is wrong info again. Umar Bin Khattab who entered Jerusalem peacefully gave a covenant to the Palestinians that their Churches are not touched, etc... you can find this info on the web, [6]. However, many of the Paletinians later converted to Islam. You are saying that Arabs came in the Ottoman Period. Who was living in Palestine in Abbasid and Umayyid periods? Where did these people disappear. It is Jews who immigrated to the Area in the late 19th Century. You should question that and not Arab existence in Palestine.Almaqdisi 00:32, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

To answer your question, when the Crusaders came to Palestine after 460 years of Arab and non-Arabic Moslem rule, they found an Arabic-speaking population, composed of a dozen races (apart from Jews and Drupes), practising five versions of Islam and eight of heterodox Christianity. Arabic became the dominant language and Islam the predominant religion but that's where it ended - the people were the Syrians, the Persians, the Egyptians as Moslem converts or as Christians or Jews... and the Arabic language was simply how they assimilated the place to their empire. It has nothing to do with origin of a people. Those Arabs that resided in Palestine never saw themselves as living in a nation. Jews on the other hand have been living in Palestine forever and contiuously and always saw the region as a nation-state, and not as seperate villages. Amoruso 00:43, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

As to where people went, they didn't really go, simply there was nothing to do here. A garbage area, desolate, a war zone and with all the diseases, swamps etc - as katz wrote "in the 19th century when hundreds of years of abuse had turned the country into a treeless waste, with a sprinkling of emaciated towns, malaria-ridden swamps in its once-fertile northern valleys, the once-thriving south (Negev) now a desert, the population too had dwindled almost to nothing." Amoruso 00:46, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, nationalism is a new idea anyway. The Arabic population you mention that existed at the Crusade time was called by other Arabs at the time "The Arabs of Filistin". For example, although Saudi Arabia is a new State. There has never been something called Saudis at the time of the Prophet Muhammad either. Prophet Muhammad never claimed he is a Saudi! However, people called him and other Arabs in his area Hijazi. And until this day, people from Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia are called Hijazi. Hijaz is the name of a geographic place similar to what Palestine meant for Arabs! On another issue, Jews existed in minorities all over the world, and not only in Palestine. Besides, many Palestinians in Hebron for example who are Muslims now claim they have Jewish ancestory!

This is all very interesting, but not relevant IMO. It's not a political article, simply there's an accurate description of the history of people from time immemorial and pre-historic times at the history of palestine article. It doesn't contain any interpreatations. Just to your remark, yes Jews lived in exile in the diaspora but the idea of a nation state for jews is not new at all, it might be new for the conquering arabs in the middle east and the rest, but it wasn't new to the Jews who tried to re-create that state whenever they could. Like you said, Arabs of filistin seems accurate - they didn't have their own name for a nation state there and such notion never would have came up to them. Amoruso 00:57, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Anyway, the article talks about the Jewish population at Roman time and fails to mention other non-jewish population, mainly arab/arabian ones. Even today, the population in Palestine is at least half non-jewish. Arabian tribes existed in Palestine long before the Islamic conquer of Palestine in 638. Many examples of these tribes include the Nabateans in Jordan/Palestine and others from Syria, and others in Palestine too. The article should include the following citation in demographics:

According to a number of historians and scholars the majority of Palestinian Arabs, are descendants of the ancient Jebusites and Canaanites. In 1902, the British anthropologist Sir James Frazer wrote in his book The Golden Bough:

"The Arabic-speaking peasants of Palestine are the progeny of the tribes which settled in the country before the Israelite invasion. They are still adhering to the land. They never left it and were never uprooted from it." ^[1]

Almaqdisi 01:33, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Who are the number of historians and schoalrs who cite this nonsense : "According to a number of historians and scholars the majority of Palestinian Arabs, are descendants of the ancient Jebusites and Canaanites." It is simply factually wrong. I know it's not nice to hear but it's the truth. Note btw he says Arabic speaking even at the time after the invasion, not Arabs... they're simply not Arabs and even the pro arab sources won't make such a ridicilous claim. Arabs came at 638 not before. this is fact. Amoruso 01:41, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, Muslims came in to Palestine in 638. Arabic and Arabian tribes existed in Palestine, Syria and Jordan long long before. This is the fact. These Arabs were Christians, and before were Peagans! Almaqdisi 01:57, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

All true, almost : Muslims came in to Palestine in 638. ~~Arabic and Arabian~~ tribes existed in Palestine long long before. This is the fact. These ~~Arabs~~ were Christians, and before were Peagans! Amoruso 01:59, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Whatever! You need to take a course in the history of ancient Arabia and Syria!Almaqdisi 02:03, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

No, I don't. Amoruso 06:08, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Demographics

The sourcing of Katz is totally wrong, and this author says nonsense and only promotes zioinist agenda. This Land was one of the most fertile in the region and one of the most inhabited and populated. Please include in that section the following:

"The Arabic-speaking peasants of Palestine are the progeny of the tribes which settled in the country before the Israelite invasion. They are still adhering to the land. They never left it and were never uprooted from it." ^[2]

Almaqdisi 05:56, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Many of Fraziers views in the Golden Bough have been discredited his ignorant comment about Arabic peasamts being from pre-Israelite ppl being only one tiny piece of this. Kuratowski's Ghost 03:27, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

It will be better to say where you copied this paragraph from. google. for example. If [7] Amoruso 06:02, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Go ahead and argue this ... supposed national continuity between the ancient Philistines, Jebusites, or Canaanites and modern Palestinian Arabs.... on history of palestine article. it's nothing to do with demographics section. Amoruso 06:07, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

After King David conquered the area during the Iron Age, all Canaanites (south of Lebanon) either assimilated into the dominant Israelite culture or went extinct. Jews are the surviving remnant of the Canaanites. Hebrew is the local dialect of the Canaanite language. There are no other Canaanites in this area after the Iron Age. Any Palestinian who claims to be a "Canaanite" is infact claiming to be a Jew and cant be an Arab. --Haldrik 06:17, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Using "Canaanite" as it is most commonly used in the Bible i.e as the name of juat one of the Seven Nations of Canaan, all the "Canaanites" were conquered by the Israelites. Using "Canaanite" in the wider sense of all the Seven Nations of Canaan - Canaanites, Jebusites, Perizzites, Hivites, Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites - the Girgashites according to tradition fled to Egypt and the others were all conquered by the Israelites and their remnant became the division of the Jewish people known as the Nethinim. The Nethinim ceased to exist as a separate group sometime during the second Temple period. If one includes as "Canaanite" all nations said to descend from Canaan then those north of the Israelites were eventually conquered by the Assyrians and absorbed into the general "Syriac" culture, some of which was later absorbed into Greek culture. Kuratowski's Ghost 03:27, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Haldrik, it depends on how you define Arab. Arabs are those who have origins in the Arabian Peninsula, or those who speak Arabic. In any case, Canaanites have origins in the Arabian Peninsula, and many of the tribes in Palestine and Jordan including Nabateans for example are Arabs by language and origin at the same time.

"It depends on how you define Arab". By "Arab", I dont mean anyone who speaks Arabic. After all, many Jews speak Arabic. By "Arab", I mean people who genetically descend from the (various) peoples of Arabian Peninsula. For example, the Nabateans arent Arabs, they are Arameans from the north (like Abraham was) (also they spoke Aramaic and not any of the Arabian languages). --Haldrik 06:51, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

The following statement is based on a misunderstanding of the stupid Encarta article: "Canaanites have origins in the Arabian Peninsula." Rather, the Canaanites dont come from the Arabian Peninsula. The Encarta article is poorly worded and ambiguous, so those who misread it can be forgiven. It said, a "migration" from the Arabian Peninsula "became" "Canaanites and Amorites". What it means is: Canaanites refers to the peoples who lived in the southern part of the Levant and Amorites to the peoples in the northern part of the Levant. There was already a local population in the Levant who had been living there since long before, but later there may have been an Arabian migration who mixed in with it. By mixing in, these Arabian immigrants "became" Canaanite. Etc. Nevertheless, even this Arabian migration is just a guess, not a fact. It is one of several suggestions to explain how the local (non-Arabian) Canaanite population came to incorporate foreign influences during the Early Bronze Age. By the way, the influences arent Arabian influences, but the suggestion is that Arabians who had trade with the northern part of the Fertile Crescent may have brought these northerly (non-Arabian) influences with them. --Haldrik 06:51, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

There are many archeologists who believe there was no Arabian migration into Canaan, and that the foreign influences simply result from trade alone. In any case, the indiginous Canaanites arent from the Arabian Peninsula. --Haldrik 07:01, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Finally, it doesnt matter where the Canaanites came from because all of these Canaanites became Jews or went extinct. (The Lebanese Canaanites became Phoenicians and survive to this day as Maronite Christians.) Everytime you say "Canaanites" have a right to this land, what you'r saying is, modern Jews (who the Canaanites assimilated into) have the right to this land (while Arabs dont). --Haldrik 07:07, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, the supposed national continuity of Jews is in question. They are the one who came from thousands of miles to the region to claim ancestry. It is not the Palestinians who did. Almaqdisi 06:23, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

No offense Almaqdisi but this argument of yours makes as much sense as saying that the japanese are descendants from moon people and so on. It's just not based on anything. It's not your fault since you're just quoting from certain places but it's the situation. Again, try arguing it in the article of the history, no problem. Questioning the national continuity of jews is a bit difficult simply because unlike others Jews always had a vast amount of cultural and closely related communities and history perseverance all connected with Israel, and of course continuing connection between those in Israel and those in the diaspora. Of course one can claim just about anything, and Palestinians surely have. They even said that Jesus was a palestinian and moreover, The Hebrews of the Bible were Arabs. This is the sort of thing that the world learnt to accept from Arafat throughout the years. Amoruso 06:30, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm just referring you to 2 simple facts that refute this continual theory of palestinians-cannanites : (1) a little thing called archeological evidence (2) the first time this connection "was made" was in 1964. guess why. Amoruso 06:40, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

If the Arab-Speaking population in Palestine has nothing to do with populations that existed before the Islamic conquest in 648, then the Arab-speaking population in Lebanon has nothing to do with the Canaanite Phoneicians, and the Arab-speaking population in Egypt has nothing to do with the ancient egyptians. I have looked every where, and could not find any source which claims that major ethnic cleansing occured in Egypt or the Levant on the hand of muslims after their conquest of the region in 648. Moreover, old Arab historians including Ibn Khaldoun classify the Canaanites among Arabian tribes who moved from the peninsula at the time of severe droughts. Together are the Kahtanites, Ghassanites, Adnanites, etc... Any body who is interested should check the hundreds of year old Arabic texts on the subject. Anyway, this is what the Arabs are familiar with since hundreds of years. Almaqdisi 07:24, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Probably some of the Palestinian Christians are "Canaanites". In other words, they are the descendents of ancient Canaanites who became Jews who converted to Christianity and who resisted the Arab Muslim invaders. These Palestinian Christians may be "Canaanite". --Haldrik 07:29, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

The pre-Arab populations of Egypt survive today as Coptic Christians. The pre-Arab populations of Phoenician Canaan survive today as Maronite Christians. The pre-Arab populations of Syria survive today as Assyrian Christians. The Arab Muslims were imperialist colonialist invaders. These Christian communities are the remnants of those who resisted the Arab Muslims. --Haldrik 07:35, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. Well said, I was writing something similar about the maronites and the copts during an edit conflict now. Well put Haldrik. Amoruso 07:39, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, the Levant area did not become majorly muslim but until few decades during the Ummayyid period. Many of the muslims of Lebanon and Palestine have been Christians before. They converted just like many people converted in the Arabian Peninsula. Until today's modern age, Arab Christians still exist. For example, the Tamimi family in Hebron, one of the largest Palestinian families there was Christian. They later converted. As a matter of fact, the chief of that family Tamim ibn Aws Al-Dari traveled to meet with prophet Muhammad to ask him what he says about Jesus. He later become one of the closest to the Prophet and this family in Palestine is one of the largest families in the whole west bank that extends even to Nablus.Almaqdisi 07:45, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

These traditions are important to verify. But in any case, when they converted to Islam, as Muslims, they intermarried with the Arab invaders, left the Christian gene pool, and mixed into the larger Arabian gene pool. So even with regard to specific Palestinian Muslims who claim such ancestry, the percentage of the genes which can be traced to "Canaanites" (ie, to Jews!) is probably small and may be negligible. --Haldrik 07:51, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Well Haldrik, true. There is no single population that did not mix after all these thousands of years. This of course also includes the Jews who mingled with populations even outside the Levant area to places as far as the USA! The mingling of the Arabs/Arabic speaking people, etc have been limited to the middle east area with some mingling with the Crusaders.. This is why some Palestinians have blue eyes and blond hairs! However, if one look at the typical Jewish face, it does not resemble that of the people living in the middle east suggesting that their genetic pool has been very much inflitrated. Almaqdisi 08:04, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

But Almaqdisi, you were the one who claimed the "Palestinians" come from the "Canaanites". But now you seem to agree. Palestinians dont come from the "Canaanites". Palestinians come from Arabs, Nabateans, and European Crusaders. They arent Canaanites. --Haldrik 08:11, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

"A typical Jewish face does not resemble that of the people living in the middle east". To a large extent, physical features are simply adaptions to a climate. For example, people with light skin color (less pigment) will tend to die off because of skin cancer if around the strong sun near the equator. Oppositely, people who have dark skin color (more pigment) will tend to die off because of vitamin-D deficiency around the weak sun near the arctic. Jews adapted lighter skin color in the north. Oppositely, some of the Aryans who migrated into India in ancient times became as dark as some of the darkest Africans. (I've heard in a lecture, that skin color can change from "black" to "white" in ten generations.) Many features are just adaptations. --Haldrik 08:19, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

And adaptation isnt just about avoiding death. Features with advantages in a climate may reproduce more often and simply eclipse other genetic lines. So that many genes can just disappear. --Haldrik 08:32, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

In order not to assimilate, Jews till this day marry between themselves. Those that don't indeed "die out".

I think the problem is not the claim that the arab people intermarried etc, but some Palestinian leaders actually made claims that they ARE the Philistines and at some other times that they ARE the Cannanites, and even that they ARE the Hebrews ! (not kidding) etc. There's a reason why all these claims are being made, and the main motive here is to try to disconnect (temporarily) the Palestinians and the Arabs. Because one would have little sympathy for the general Arab empire who came to the region and inflicted what they inflicted on the indigenous population of the time. Amoruso 08:09, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I was just wondering how is it possible that Ashkenazi Jews to claim that they are from the Middle East, since people with blue eyes and blonde hair cannot be indigenous to this part of the world. But of course it´s in their benefit to create this myth (one of the many zionist myths) in order to colonize this part of world.

... Physical features are simply adaptions to a climate. For example, people with light skin color (less pigment) will tend to die off because of skin cancer if around the strong sun near the equator. Oppositely, people who have dark skin color (more pigment) will tend to die off because of vitamin-D deficiency around the weak sun near the arctic. Jews adapted lighter skin color in the north. Oppositely, some of the Aryans who migrated into India in ancient times became as dark as some of the darkest Africans. (I've heard in a lecture, that skin color can change from "black" to "white" in ten generations.) Many features are just adaptations. --Haldrik 08:19, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Genetic testing has shown the Jews are from the Mideast. --Haldrik 18:39, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Haldrik and Amorosu, the point is that the Human beings living in Palestine before the the establishment of Israel are decendands of Pre- Islamic conquest populations. They are not the Canaanites. They eveloved from them and they are their descendandts which means in their parent hood tree, Canaanites are there. Muslims did never massacre people in this area. Arabic spread here just like it did in Spain among its indigenous population. The facts are simple. Jews when they had a kingdom on this land, where not the only ethnicity. Just like today's State of Israel. You have half the population still Arab if we count the Arabs in West Bank and Gaza and the 1948. It is very natural and more healthy for people to mingle. The fact that Jews do not want to mingle with other populations is their problem. Mingling does not remove the rights of the people in Palestine. There is no need to fake up history to justify bringing more Jews to Palestine. You should first study if all Jews are indeed Israelites anyway! Second, whatever the case, this does not give Jews any right to establish a state here on the cost of another existing population. Simple. Back to this Article. The article here is biased, and non factual in many parts. "The Question of Arab Immigration to Palestine" for example is a non neutral statement. The Arab existence in Palestine is not a question. It has been a fact, before the Islamic conquest, and they took over the Byzantines as muslims after 648! If there was any immigration of any sort into this area, it was the Jewish immigration.Almaqdisi 17:56, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Haldrik, are you saying people in Arizona should turn black in the next ten generations. Saudi Arabia is the hottest place on earth along with Arizona, and I do not see the Saudi's as black as African or indians!Almaqdisi 18:05, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

The American Indian populations in Arizona have gotten a nice tan. That's about the ideal for that particular climate. Future descendents of Europeans can expect similar. (It's not just about heat but about ultraviolet radiation etc.) --Haldrik 18:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Arabs - by definition - arent Canaanites. --Haldrik 18:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Palestinians didnt evolve from Canaanites. There were no Canaanites in this area except Jews. After the Bar Kokhba Revolt, many Jews were forced to settle around Galilee. In the vacuum left behind, many Nabateans moved in. The Christian ancestor of the Tamimi family from Khevron probably descends from the Nabateans. There is no connection between Palestinians and Canaanites. --Haldrik 18:50, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Arab Muslims from the Arabian Peninsula simply invaded the Levant. --Haldrik 19:00, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

True. Happened during Islam, and also before Islam. Because they are two contiguous lands that have been blending into each other for thousands of years.Almaqdisi 19:33, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso and Haldrink. Please read this: http://www.apomie.com/arabhistory.htm Almaqdisi 19:40, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi, unfortunately the website you gave is wrong. It misuses the word "Arab", applying the modern sense of "Arab nations" wrongly to the ancient world. For example, the website is false when it calls "Iraqi Sumerian civilization" one of the "Arabs’ Semitic ancestors". The Sumerians absolutely arent Semitic, and even more so arent Arab. The whole website rests on falacies and is academically worthless. --Haldrik 01:20, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Haldrik, I just wanted you to know that earlier Arabs existed in the Levant in the Byzantize and Roman times. We disagree on the Pre-Roman time. But that is fine. I just hope that you know that the The Kingdom of Ghassan, the Nabateans are examples of famous Pre-Islam Arab civilizations that existed in the Levant. Notice that Damascus is north of Jerusalem. Note that The Kingdom of Tadmor (or Palmyra) existed and that Palymero in 9th Century BC. Around the same time of the Late Canaanite period. Note that the old Arabic texts and poetry are rich of such documentationsm of old Arabian tribes in Arabia and the Levant. Almaqdisi 02:29, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi, if you notice, Haldrik is an expert on the issue. So just citing web-sites doesn't seem serious. I also stopped discussing it, because clearly Haldrik has more knowledge than both of us. Haldrik is surely correct about all he's saying on the issue of ancestry. As for what's currently on the article, it's all factual. The question of modern Arab immigration is real, the fact that the country was mostly desolate for centuries is real. Amoruso 02:52, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, the point is that this article should be called the Jewish History in Palestine. It does not talk but about the Jewish situation in Palestine through history. Also, it has been known and refuted by many, even Israeli writers, the fallacy of empty Palestine before the British mandate. It is simply not true, and mostly those who said that were orientalists that had bad intentions. The Levant area, and not only Palestine, was populated and is the most fertile place in the Middle East. Arabs lived the deserts so how comes they did not inhabited these cities. Who took care of these cities for all that time. There has been continuous populations in Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Nablus, Nazareth, Ashkelon, Jafa, Akko, Hebron, Gaza for all the Islamic period time. Many muslim scholars were from these regions. The conclusion is that this article is VERY BIASED. Should be changed to the Jewish History or the Jewish Story in Palestine. It is certainly not the History of Palestine. As for Haldrik's knowledge, I am not putting his knowledge down, but I think he does not have the complete picture. There is no question that the Arab History in Palestine is long, and combines Islamic and Pre Islamic periods. You should read the story of Umar Bin Al khattab who was the one to include Jerusalem under the Caliphate. You should know that the Caliphate spread from Portugal to almost China in 50 years. There has been mass conversion to Islam. Certainly people's blood remained the same, they only changed faith. Many of them did convert. Read about how Islam entered Egypt. You will see that Islam presevered the previous cultures, and that people only changed faith. Anyway, I am not interested in keeping this discussion. But future will surely prove you wrong again. Almaqdisi 03:17, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Like I said, what Haldrik says is absolutely correct. And the article is only factual. Nobody took care of the cities, it's why they looked so shite because of all the destruction and neglect. I'm sure you have a different view that fits your personal wishes. .If you have reputable sources that suggest something, one can certainly add them to the article. The article as it is is very good, but one can always add more sources and information. And to refute your allegation, article is not at all about Jewish history in Palestine. in fact, it starts since the roman times, so after the Jewish rule. Even though Jews kept continuos presence and influence in Palestine ever since, omitting the rich jewish history before the roman times certainly doesn't show it's focused on jewish history. Amoruso 03:33, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Amorosuo, do not contradict your self. You have already mentioned that Palestine was desolute. How comes there has been Jews since ever then. However Jews there have been, there was definitely 100 times muslims in the area! There is 10 million Palestinian in the world, 5 million already in Palestine. This proves how empty Palestine is! I wonder how many Egyptians here were at the turn of the Century. Rather what was the world's population at the turn of the Century?? Certianly the world is now 5 to 7 times its size then! Gouch the world was so empty!Almaqdisi 03:47, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

There are no contradictions. Jews were present throughout the years but unforuntately at the time of the Ottoman empire depicted in the article, the country was mostly desolute and this is because of the continuous oppression and carnage that the Muslims and the post-muslim rulers have inflicted on this area. There were few to none people for centuries. Out of these, very few were Jews, very few were Arabs. The continuos presence referred to the entire roman, byzantine and so on periods. Amoruso 03:54, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, most muslims and Arabs will disagree with this statement. Jerusalem was visited by every muslim enroute to Mecca. this was a tradition followed after pligirm taking place in Mecca. Jerusalem was empty in the eyes of Jews becuase there presence there was negligible. Therefore I agree with only one thing, that Palestine had a negligible Jewish presence for centuries. This is the most accurate description I can give.Almaqdisi 04:07, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Nice fantasy Almaqdisi , and now continuing with facts : The feeling of so many nineteenth-century visitors that the country had been waiting for the return of its lawful inhabitants was made the more significant by the shallowness of the Arab imprint on the country. In twelve hundred years of association, they built only a single town, Ramleh, established as the local subprovincial capital in the eighth century. The researchers of nineteenth-century scholars, beginning with the archaeologist Edward Robinson in 1838, revealed that hundreds of place-names of villages and sites, seemingly Arab, were Arabic renderings or translations of ancient Hebrew names, biblical or Talmudic. The Arabs have never even had a name of their own for this country which they claim. "Filastin" is merely the Arab transliteration of "Palestine," the name the Romans gave the country when they determined to obliterate the "presence" of the Jewish people.

Sir George Adam Smith, author of the Historical Geography of the Holy Land, wrote in 1891: "The principle of nationality requires their [the Turks’] dispossession. Nor is there any indigenous civilisation in Palestine that could take the place of the Turkish except that of the Jews who-- have given to Palestine everything it has ever had of value to the world."7 This blunt judgement was entirely normal; it aroused no objections and offended no one. It was a simple statement of a unique and irrefutable fact. The Arabs' discovery of Palestine came many years later. (katz).

Amoruso 04:23, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh shit - you mean my ancestor's didn't live in Palestine 4000 years ago??... I guess I'd better pack and leave then... I need to find a place my ancestors did live millennia ago... can anybody give me directions to the location of the Garden of Eden? How's the real estate market there? Ramallite ^(talk) 04:36, 20 September 2006 (UTC) By the way, Katz-man, if you read anything other than Katz, you might find a thing or two that will refute most of your ideas. But then again, why would you ;) On a serious note, making the issue of whether modern Palestinians have ancestry in Palestine that extends to the time of Abraham a political one is pretty pathetic. Most of us are definitely not Arabian peninsula material, but even if we were (which we're not), so the hell what? Should all non-Indians be kicked out of North America? How sad... Ramallite ^(talk) 04:36, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso. Well any tourist or visitor who want to look into the ancient history of Palestine upon his visit, will go to the Arab areas becaase there is where all ancient stuff is located. For names, hebrews used the same names the Canaanites had, even the word Jerusalem is not Hebrew but rathen canaanite. And since you know Hebrew and I hope Arabic, you know what Jerusalem means in Arabic and Hebrew. all original Hebrew words are mostly very close to Arabic, including numbers, prounouns, names at the most. You say Ertz, we say Ard, you say Kodesh, we Say Kudus for Jerusalem, etc..... The arabs never view the Canaanites as different and view them as semitic Arabian tribes anyway. The Presence of Jews in Palestine has been very limited and close to none for centuries. This is the fact. The Turkish ruled Arab population, there was no Turkish population in Palestine.Almaqdisi 04:37, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Consider this also: http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story414.html Almaqdisi 09:15, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

All these Palestinian fantasies are really interesting but are academically and factually worthless. It's tough but you should admit that Palestine was only a land sacred and important to one people - Jews. Empires came and left. One of them was the Moselm Arab empire who ruthlessly conquered entire areas and enforced itself on indigenous population - this population includes Copts, Maronites, Kurds, Druzes and Jews. It doesn't include any "Palestinians". Sorry. This is a good page that's better to read than "palestine remebered" - it's also succint. [8] And another one : [9] for this explanation :

Palestinian claims to be related to the Canaanites are a recent phenomenon and contrary to historical evidence. The Canaanites disappeared from the face of the earth three millennia ago, and no one knows if any of their descendants survived or, if they did, who they would be.

Sherif Hussein, the guardian of the Islamic Holy Places in Arabia, said the Palestinians' ancestors had only been in the area for 1,000 years.9 Even the Palestinians themselves have acknowledged their association with the region came long after the Jews. In testimony before the Anglo-American Committee in 1946, for example, they claimed a connection to Palestine of more than 1,000 years, dating back no further than the conquest of Muhammad's followers in the 7th century.10 And that claim is also dubious. Over the last 2,000 years, there have been massive invasions that killed off most of the local people (e.g., the Crusades), migrations, the plague, and other manmade or natural disasters. The entire local population was replaced many times over. During the British mandate alone, more than 100,000 Arabs emigrated from neighboring countries and are today considered Palestinians.

By contrast, no serious historian questions the more than 3,000-year-old Jewish connection to the Land of Israel, or the modern Jewish people's relation to the ancient Hebrews.

“...[the Palestinian Arabs'] basic sense of corporate historic identity was, at different levels, Muslim or Arab or - for some - Syrian; it is significant that even by the end of the Mandate in 1948, after thirty years of separate Palestinian political existence, there were virtually no books in Arabic on the history of Palestine.

I could go on but this is not a discussion board. Ramallite, I've actually read many books including all the references that Katz made - he's simply articulating the truth best and some of his great work is also available on the web.

Oh, and Ramallite, we're not talking about politics here - being kicked out etc. Wrong page... Amoruso 09:37, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Well Jews were a minority in this area for centuries and no historian can argue otherwise. Even in today's time, Jews are not the majority in the Palestin (region). There is no monuments what so ever showing the glorious Jewish times and you describe. I only see the one and the only Dome of the Rock shining all over Jerusalem which I doubt was built by Jews. This land at Ottoman times had a governer and people living in it. It has never been deserted as you keep claiming. It was only deserted from Jews I agree with that, but Arabs have been here Christian and Muslim under Ottoman Rule... Tje ancestry of Jews coming from Poland and Russia should be questioned. Even today, 40% of Jewish Israelis have not beeen born in Palestine. 80 Years back, most Jews were not native to Palestine. This is enough for me of a proof that you are not native to this land. Do not keep trying relating your self to this land because you do not belong to it. Something should be done about hijacking this article by Pro Jewish Fanatics. 70.251.82.76 10:11, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Hello brain-washed, delusional unsigned member. As for monuments, well the Dome of the Rock was indeed established on ruins of the Temple and it's sad. But there are numerous historical monuments like synagogues and churches (for christians...) and ancient structures and tombs and caves and forts and fortresses and magnificent archelogical finds. Most importantly perhaps there are the modern monuments who will be here for many years. So you shouldn't be frustrated, becaue this land was never part of original Arabia, so it's not a big loss for you. You lost Spain and you lost Palestine. Amoruso 10:56, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Whoa! Amoruso, you are simply being offensive and provocative - you have the right to do on a talk page I suppose, but it isn't going to do you any favours, mate! Chill out! --SandyDancer 11:53, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

SandyDancer, and yet you dont admonish the anonymous user for being "offensive and provactive"?! Your injustice is disgusting. --Haldrik 21:20, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

you're right, I was doing it jokingly, but I apologise if the unsigned member got offended. Amoruso 12:05, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

amoruso, I agree with the anonymous writer. Moreover, Ottoman statistics in 17th century talk about 300,000 inhabitant in Palestine. If you look today at the Old City in Jerusalem, there is like 24,000 people living there. this si the most what the wall-ed city an tolerate. Many of the old cities in Palestine were walled and 300,000 is an excellent figure for a small land like Palestine which only 17% Arable lands. Moreover, read:

(removed possible copyright violation) Amoruso 20:01, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi 18:21, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

That wrong information is from the link you provided isn't it ? You're not supposed to quote whole sections like this as it's a copyright violation and it's distruptive. That's why you have the link. Anyway, it's complete bull of course. Your population stats are of course wrong too, see article. Amoruso 20:01, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, this link http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story414.html is discussing facts! I am sorry that Palestine has been deserted from Jews for centuries. Arabs were present here of course, this is why you had that part of the Ottoman Province. Please only comment on the Jewish population in Palestine in the Demographics section, and only mention your supportive statistical numbers in each century to show me how much Jews existed in Palestine for the past 14 centuries. Do not talk about the Arab population there because there was no Arab living in Jerusalem, or Nablus, or Hebron, or Akko, or Gaza or Bethlehem or Nazareth, etc for the past 14 centuries!!!! Moreover, enjoy reading this other one, no need for me to paste it here as you say: http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story559.html

Almaqdisi 20:14, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Not interested in reading B.S links, but thanks anyway. Amoruso 20:50, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, this is not BS! This is an article written by Justin McCarthy cited in the article. But it seems the truth that is clear like the sun is very painful. Almaqdisi 21:18, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi can you help me out ? I'm trying to edit the Jesus article. It seems it doesn't mention that Jesus and his disciples were all Palestinians. Amoruso 21:52, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

I will try to help out. Regarding Jesus, since it happened in Palestine, he is Palestinian! Simple! Almaqdisi 23:13, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, not that simple since it wasnt called Palaestina yet. ;) --Haldrik 00:07, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

For those interested in the ethnicity of the Canaanites, I recommend the book by Killebrew. It's a new book and I havent read it myself yet, but I'm familiar with the author. She is an extremely sensible archeologist. She approaches the evidence critically but doesnt get carried away by wishful thinking. In past controversies in archeology, Killebrew has tended to make cautious judgments that were later shown to be correct. I cant wait to read this book myself!

Ann E. Killebrew, Biblical Peoples and Ethnicity: An Archaeological Study of Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines, and Early Israel 1300–1100 B.C.E. (ISBN 1-58983-097-0).

SBL gives the following abstract for the book: "Ancient Israel did not emerge within a vacuum but rather came to exist alongside various peoples, including Canaanites, Egyptians, and Philistines. Indeed, Israel’s very proximity to these groups has made it difficult—until now—to distinguish the archaeological traces of early Israel and other contemporary groups. Through an analysis of the results from recent excavations in light of relevant historical and later biblical texts, this book proposes that it is possible to identify these peoples and trace culturally or ethnically defined boundaries in the archaeological record. Features of late second-millennium B.C.E. culture are critically examined in their historical and biblical contexts in order to define the complex social boundaries of the early Iron Age and reconstruct the diverse material world of these four peoples. Of particular value to scholars, archaeologists, and historians, this volume will also be a standard reference and resource for students and other readers interested in the emergence of early Israel. Ann E. Killebrew, Assistant Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies at The Pennsylvania State University, is a seasoned field archaeologist." (http://www.brill.nl/default.aspx?partid=18&pid=23802) --Haldrik 00:06, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

A less expensive edition of this book can be found here. --Haldrik 02:05, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

"An Archaeological Study of Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines, and Early Israel". Which one of those are Palestinians ? Amoruso 00:29, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Haldrik. Will check that out, it sounds an interesting work! Amoruso, I do not know why you are unable to get facts right? Can you deny that many Jews converted to Chrisitianity in the Roman time. Can't you understand that many Christians, included those who were Jewish, also converted to Islam when Jerusalem came under the Caliphate. Can't you later understand that these people coming from that geographical place were called Palestinians for centuries? No question that today's Palestinians are the offsprings of many who have inhabited this area including Jews themsevles. Explain to me why after 3000 years, we still have 16 million Jews in the world? Don't you know that Jesus came to the Israelites? The world Palestinian means people who are the offsprings of natives of Palestine. Hebronites are people who come from Hebron, New Yorkans are people whose origins are from New York. Why do you find it difficult to understand the meaning of Palestinian. Even Jews were called for centuries Palestinians in Europe! More over, today we have Jews but not necessarily Israelites. Just like Canaannites vanished as an identity, Israelites vanished as the Canaanites did. Their religion remained. Jews are only those who believe in the Jewish faith and need not be offsprings of Jacob. Many Jews are not Israelites! Read this interesting article also: God promised the descendants of the prophet Abraham the 'Promised Land', why are Palestinians defying the Almighty's prophecy? http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story418.html

Almaqdisi 01:15, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

So what you're saying is that there are no palestinian people. Amoruso 01:28, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, Amoruso, the Palestinian people are part of a bigger culture in the Levant. For example they share a close accent with Syrians Lebanese and Jordnanians. Under the umbrella of Islam, all these ancient ethnicities which existed under the Roman and Byzantine time blended to produce a more homogenous culture of similar values and almost the same spoken language (Arabic). Different faiths still exists like Christians, Muslims and Jews, and among Muslims Christians and Jews other sub divisions. But more or less, we have and share the same culture/value of the Levant area. Our marriage culture, celebrations, food, traditions, etc are similar to others in the Levant. We need not have to be a race to claim a right in Palestine. We are simply a continuation of man's existence in this land. No question that our DNA ancestry reflects the history of mankind in the area. Islam was a big blending machine by the way. Anyway, we are all the son of one father, Adam and Eve! The fact that Jordan is a state and Syria is another is simply due to political influences rather than due different races. For example, cities are called different names to identify their geographical position, and they have different mayors due to different local interests and potentials in each city. It does not mean that the people in the two different cities have and must be different in all aspects.Almaqdisi 02:54, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

But basically you're saying there are no Palestinian people. So even according to you, there's no nation Palestine. Local populations can still live where they are if they accept Israel and Jewish culture, which is dominant in Palstine now. Just like Moslems enfornced their culture over their subjects. Generally, what you're saying that all those that live in the region are Palestinians -no problem, that includes all Jewish immigrants of course, because many Palestinians came from modern arab immigartion along the time of the zionist aliyahs - that's documented and un-disputed. Not to mention there should be no problem for the Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria (and Gaza) to stay just like Arab towns in Israel are there with no disturbance. No reason for terrorism, suicide bombing and fanatic islamic genocide by people who seem to be a part of pan-arabism and not just local peaceful population of a group. Also you're saying Palestinans=syrians=jordanians. Well no problem then, you don't need 22 states of the same people. Nobody else has it... you know there are Germans and Turkish and Italians living all around the world - but they have 1 country. From what you're saying you already have alteast 3. So there's no problem. Amoruso 21:47, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, this is a political debate now and I do not know how it will help us organizing the Demographics part. But let me give this short reply brielfy by saying this logic is rejected. Your statement would be true if the Jewish population existing now in Palestine was from within Palestine and native to the land. It is not. It has been documented even in this article that most Arab population existing in Palestine at the end of the Ottoman time and before the British mandate and before Jewish first and second ALiyah started to happen, that this Arab population was native to the land, and that most of them were born in the same place their parents and their grands fathers were born. Another point, is that the immigrating Jews took the place of existing Arab populations. Most of the Jewish communities exist where prior Arab populations that were native to the land existed. These are well documented facts. Moreover, why should this native population leave their local villages and cities and move to others places simply because Jews want to take over the place. This is a rejected logic. The State of Israel denies the right of return to millions of Palestinians who are currently refugees. For example, 20% of the Palestinians in the West Bank are refugees and ask the right to go back to their original homes, lands and towns in Jaffa, and Akko and Haifa, etc. The logic that these Palestinians are the same in culture as those in the West Bank does not mean that they loose their right to go back to their original homes and villages in Jaffa, Akko, etc... How about those who live in Jordan or Lebanon, or Syria, etc?!

In the last war between Lebanon, almost one million Lebanese departed the south and they returned after the war. Why are the Palestinians not allowed to return.

Finally, I mention again and again that there did exists a native Arabick-speaking population in Palestine. It was native. They are not recent arrivals from other places! This is a false statement. Jerusalem old city was never empty, same for Nazareth, Hebron, Nablus, Jaffa, Haifa and all other main cities in Palestine. The ottomans were governing this area and go and read the history of Palestine and Lebanon in the Ottoman period. There were people in the land. Thier was a native Jewish population too. But most Jews came through a sequence of aliyas orchestrated by the zionist organisations and mostly during the British Mandate time. They took the place of the local Arab comunities. They had various paramilitary groups that was classified to be "terrorist" even by the British. The very first people to be labeled "terrorists" were Jews and not Arabs. Almaqdisi 23:12, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi, you're right it's a political debate and this is not the place for it. I'll just say that all your comments have been refuted time and again. Palestinians are not native to this land - most of them immigrated at a very late stage and this is very documented. The only people who maintained continuos presence in the area are the Jewish people. The only people who defined this area as a nation were Jewish people. Palestinians like you said are no different than other Arab populations. The Arabs have violently conequerecd large parts of the world. Their land is Arabia. But Palestine, Spain and other regions were conquered. Indigenous people have suffered. Kurds in Iraq, Druzes in Syria, Maronties in Lebanon, Copts in Egypt and the Jews in Palestine. Most of these minorites are either too scared or too accustomed to be living as dhimni in their own homeland. The Jews though many in exile and after genocides gathered together and restored their nation in their only homeland. The local Arab population was encouraged to stay - in fact right in the declaration of indepedence. Even the right wing Zionist Revisionist Zabotinksky wrote than in any future state the vice-president should always be an Arab. That was what Jews felt. But the Arab population didn't see this way and repeatedly massacred the local jewish populations in Jeruslaem, Safed, Mozza, Hebron and other places. Eventually, 7 Arab states invaded Israel in order to commit genocide with its people, much encouraged by the local Arab population. 400,000 Arabs fled during this attack. 900,000 Jews fled from the Arab lands. The Jews are now all Israeli citizens while the Palestinian Arabs were treated very badly in the Arab states for them to gather anger against Israel and wish to destroy it in the future. Israel did not commit revenge in the local population that stayed but rather after a while granted full citizenship to those Arabs who are now regular Israeli citizens who receive full social care and rights and vote for the paraliment - even though their representatives like to support Syria and Hizballah and Hamas and not the State of Israel. As for the terrorist , that's simply wrong - Jews fought the british and didn't go around targeting children like Palestinians do these days. Before that, During the fightings between Arabs and Jews, both sides sometimes attacked civilians too - The Jews retaliated for attacks on them. It's a very big difference. Regardless, there were Arab terrorist groups at the time. Amoruso 03:53, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

At the start of the Modern Period, there was a native population of Arabs, but it was small, and a native population of Jews, but it was small. During the Modern Period, there was massive immigration of Jews and Arabs who felt strong kinship with the native ethnic groups. (There are other ethnic groups present who are neither Jews nor Arabs, but these havent pulled in populations from outside the region as dramatically.) The Jews tend to feel the region is a uniquely sacred and ethnic Jewish homeland and they are returning to it. The Arabs tend to feel the region is a small part of a larger sacred Islamic empire and ethnic Arab territory and they are relocating within it. These ancient concepts of identification with the land are complicated by modern concepts of nationalism and citizenship, that distinguish Israeli Jews from other Jews and Palestinian Arabs from other Arabs. Nevertheless the past concepts of land and identity that these ethnic groups inherit remain primary and vigorous. --Haldrik 02:47, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

(I'm deleting the repetion of my above text because it is unnecessary. The above reflects a thoughtful exploratory statement after numerous edits, with an effort toward balance, neutrality and thematic flow. --Haldrik 03:28, 22 September 2006 (UTC))

Immigration only explain why the number of Jews increased dramatically. But for the native Arab population, the numbers increase because of the high birth rate. For exmaple, after 1948, only 200,000 Palestinian arabs remained in the newly declared Stat of Israel. They are now more than 1.4 million and are called "Israeli Arabs". The reason they increased in number is not due to any immigration, or Aliyas as the Jewish case, not at all. They increased due to better birth rate and improved mortality rates. Therefore the idea of immigration is only advocated by zionist writers to justify their immigration to Palestine and their settelement in the land. This is the fact.

How much people where there in nearby Lebanon? Surely less than a million before 1900s. Can some one give me a number? Today there are 5 million Lebanese in Lebanon, and maybe more than 10 millions outside Lebanon. So these are natural numbers. The land was not abandoned! Facts are simple. Most Palestinians present in Palestine keep family tree in an old Arabic tradition, and most of them will trace their families by names for at least 200 years back! Remember that the whole World population by the end of the 19th century was less than a billion! Almaqdisi 03:07, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

The land was not abandoned but it was sparsely populated. --Haldrik 03:28, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi, arguments that are motivated by hate rather than by compassion will not endure. Whoever builds their hopes on hate, everything they build will vanish into nothingness in the end. --Haldrik 03:28, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Haldrik. I strongly agree with this statement. "Almaqdisi, arguments that are motivated by hate rather than by compassion will not endure. Whoever builds their hopes on hate, everything they build will vanish into nothingness in the end". I am trying to find out facts and present them at this page. The best is to include two seprate secions in Dempgraphics. One that gives Census information from official governemtns present in Palestine at various times. Other section which includes statements by visitors, whether they were zioinsts or arab historians, british, or American. Let the reader decide. Wikipedia objective is to present all the relevant info to the reader even if some of it sounds conflicting. The reader judge. Almaqdisi 03:34, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

As long as you don't delete material, you can always, like anyone else, add anything you want if it's sourced, reliable and verifiable. That's wikipedia policy. Everything should be added in the same section of demographics. Instead of engaging in political debates, you can certainly add more information to the article if it's relevant etc. Amoruso 04:03, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Amoruso, I will work on this. Almaqdisi 04:07, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Section divider

As entertaining as much of the above debate is, let me try to clarify some things:

The family origins of Muslim and Christian natives of the land between the river and the sea (LBRS for short) can be easily traced based via both family name and family tree. For example, if a "Majali" has lived in LBRS for decades or more, that individual would still be regarded as Jordanian because Majali is a Jordanian name and a Majali family member would most probably have roots in Jordan. Same is true for families with roots within LBRS. So unless one is prepared to either bring up a genealogical study of the current family names of LBRS, or bring forth a reference that does, one is in no position to make any grand proclamations about the history of demographics in the area.
It is in the interest of one party to belittle the claims of the other to LBRS. Many publications have been brought forth that argue that there was massive Arab immigration into Palestine (and why not, Palestine was a beautiful country compared to, say, Transjordan). Other scholars have refuted and even ridiculed the quality of data that supports the mass Arab immigration theory. In reality, immigration or not, in our culture you usually remain identified to your region of origin, which again is easily traced using your family name and family tree. The more scientifically sound studies do not support the mass Arab immigration theory. Even if it existed, it would not have made the immigrants 'Palestinian' automatically; far from it. Either way, this argument is futile. The current native Jews, Christians, and Muslims of LBRS are here to stay. No peoples of the world have to prove that their family tree extends more than 50 years in a particular land in order to have basic human rights there. Insisting that the Muslims and Christians of LBRS have proof of presence going back not 50 but 5000 years in order for their basic human rights to merely be considered (let alone recognized) is degrading, psychologically dangerous, and inherently racist (in my opinion).
Statements like "The Arabs tend to feel the region is a small part of a larger sacred Islamic empire and ethnic Arab territory and they are relocating within it" may be gross oversimplifications. The Arab culture is traditionally a lot more rooted in ones own region of origin, and internal migration between Arabic-speaking countries is not as common as one might think (especially as it is illegal for a citizen of one Arab League country to obtain citizenship of another Arab League country). Furthermore, notwithstanding the recent resurgence of radical Islam, the peoples of the levant are traditionally secular. This is also true regarding the early Zionists. In either case, it is the data that counts. Without actual data, people are free to propagate and teach their kids to believe whatever is more comfortable for their own ideology for them to believe. But it doesn't make it true.
Some scholars believe that Zionism created not one but two national movements: Israeli and Palestinian. Other scholars site evidence (which is very easily obtained) of Arab Palestinian nationalism taking shape towards the closing years of the Ottoman empire and/or the arrival of the colonial (British) powers, or sometimes even before. For example, Muslim clerics in Jerusalem were heavily defensive about European intrusion in their lands and affairs as early as the 1700s, and protested this strongly to the Ottoman authorities. An Arab nationalist newspaper appeared in LBRS (Jaffa I think) in the first decade of the 1900s; it was called "Filasteen" and it heavily criticized the Zionist movement. Again, what's really the point of arguing about this? Most of the people from these eras are dead.

So you're also admitting it's recent. At any case, it's recent. Major notion of Palestinians being a seperate nation didn't come before 1900, in other words it came along the time that the Zionist movement started being practical. This is not a coincidence. Amoruso 07:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso writes: "many Palestinians came from modern arab immigartion along the time of the zionist aliyahs - that's documented and un-disputed". Actually that is not reliably documented and is heavily disputed. And remember that many who came soon went back to their original areas. And even those who stayed (however few or many their numbers), due to Arab culture and tradition, would never have been called "Palestinian", at least not until a generation or two had passed and even then, would still be regarding as 'originally of so and so roots'. But if it makes you feel better to think that most Muslims and Christians in LBRS right now are recent immigrants, that's fine. It makes me feel better to think that rich chocolate cake is fat- and cholesterol- free, so do whatever works for you.

Nice funny comment, but just saying it's disputed etc is not enough. The data is undisputed. It's in the statitistics. Amoruso 07:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso writes: "you don't need 22 states of the same people. Nobody else has it..."". Let's assume you are correct and the Palestinians=Syrians=Jordanians. By that logic, a Venezuelan=Peruvian=Argentinian for the same reasons (similar ethnicity and language). So I'll make you a deal, if you convince the Latin Americans during my lifetime that they don't need the 20 countries they have, and that they should all aggregate into Brazil and give the rest of the continent to the Eskimos (or any other people of your choosing), I'll buy you your whiskey for a decade. You are completely missing the point: as Haldrik said, traditional roots and belonging to the land has been recently complicated by European notions of citizenship and nationality, but a native's loyalty and love is for the land, not for the passport. I am now labeled a 'Palestinian' because my roots are in LBRS, not the other way around. You can change the name of my "nationality" to anything you want, it doesn't change my loyalty and attachment to the land.

Well one thing Brazil speak a different language than the rest of the south american countries. For another, they also have different rich histories and very different cultures. This is not a case of one people who were divided due to political power shiftings along the same FAMILY !!!! (see abdallah/faisal...) and who share the same language, FLAG, culture, ideas and so on. Arab states were also ONE in the past (syria-egypt-and almost libya), jordan-iraq... and I don't remember Palestinains throwing molotov bottles on cars in the west bank during Jordan's occupation, and when they did try a coup in 1970 it was to rule JORDAN ! So don't whitewash these facts. What you say is exactly this - your love is for the land, for the village, NOT for a nation - therefore you can happily live in an autonomy, other state affiliation (like Jordan) and not as a seperate political state. Amoruso 07:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Lastly, Amoruso writes: "Not to mention there should be no problem for the Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria (and Gaza) to stay just like Arab towns in Israel are there with no disturbance." The problem is not the "Jewish town", the problem is that Israeli authorities forcibly expel non-Jews from lands in the hills of LBRS and build Jewish-only settlements where non-Jews would not be allowed to live. Such hate-based segregation just cannot be sustained in the 21st century (or maybe it can, who knows?).

This is ridicilous. When did 10,000 arabs were expelled and thrown out with their cemeteries (with dead jews from terrorist actions and with holocaust survivors), parks, schools, garden, work places, synagogues (mosques) like in gush katif ?? yamit ?? ofira ?? homesh ? sa nur ? Dugit ? Amona ? Jews are the ones being thrown out and expelled because Arabs are killing them. Amoruso 07:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

In any case, I'll make you another deal: I will be very happy for you and your countrymen to have free access and rights to live and work permanently (with citizenship) in Nablus, Jenin, and Tulkarm if I and my countrymen can have the same rights in Jaffa, Haifa, and Akko.

This is what's happening - you have 1.5 almost million palestinains living happily with all the rights (and more ! they don't have to do army service) in Israel. Jews can't do the same without being murdered in Palestinian territories - oh yes, unless they're very sympathetic to the Palestinian Authority/Hamas and don't make any criticism or anything, they might be allowed some 50 people of neturei karta or tali fahimas. Amoruso 07:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

On one final note: a Palestinian diplomat recently made note that, traditionally and even now in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it is always the occupier who hates the occupied more than the occupied hates the occupier. I am recently noticing a lot of hate-based rhetoric and arguments (and emergence of new "f*** the Palestinians" articles on Wikipedia). I hope we all can work to change this culture from one of putting the other down to one of mutual respect and with the common goal of making a great encyclopedia. Ramallite ^(talk) 04:17, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

The dispute is whether who's the occupying force. I see the occupiers as the Arab Legions as a whole and in all the area not of Arabia. Arabia is like the United Kingdom - and since they have relinquished their force on India, Hong Kong , Palestine and so on, so should Arabia. The fact that Arabia split into differnet political sub categories should not change this. At the very least, Jews should have the little strip of what you call LBRS, and what I call Western Eretz Israel. And a final note, this is NOT a political forum, I didn't reply to everything you said, and I won't reply to more of it I think... because it's just not appropriate, and we had the same discussions before on user page. And who really has time for this anyway now, and it's just not relevant, and we can just read the sources etc. Amoruso 07:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Ramallite! Your points were very clear, honest, and have rigorous thoughts into them. It will be of a great help to make the Demographics section Academically sound. So far, it is confusing and anybody can say anything if there are no official census information that can be put in context and that can be relected to their same timeline and not be compared with today's perception of how much is populated and how much is underpopulation. One may need for example to check how much was the population of Egypt for example? Syria? Arabia with all what it includes today of states? etc. It is my understanding that the World's population was less than a billion before 1900. Therefore, this Data should be studied in that perspective. Today one Building in New York may include all the residents inside Jerusalem's old city. In the past days, people were living fortefied walled cities, no technology, no medicine, high mortality rates, all these are factors that are neglected when one consider numbers like 400,000 or 700,000. Almaqdisi 04:37, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

"The current native Jews, Christians, and Muslims of LBRS are here to stay." Of that there is agreement. Clarifications of ancestry are for historical accuracy. "Some scholars believe that Zionism created not one but two national movements: Israeli and Palestinian. Other scholars site evidence of Arab Palestinian nationalism taking shape towards the closing years of the Ottoman empire." I suspect. Egypt is the first Arab nation to embrace European-style nationalism, being inspired by the French nationalism of Napolean. Followed by Iraq and Syria. Palestinian nationalism seems to not have existed (in any significant sense) until after the founding of the State of Israel. As such, Palestinian nationalism is still in the process of taking shape. Notable influences include of course Zionism, the experience of the expulsion of the PLO from Jordan, the previous King of Jordan's famous declaration, "Jordan is not Palestine", which effectively divorced the Arabs of the Westbank and left them with an orphaned identity, plus the Iranian influence of murder-suicide as a form of religious martyrdom. --Haldrik 05:03, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

But are there reliable sources regarding ancestry? We know the Jews are tied to the land, but do we have data of genetic testing on the local non-Jewish population? I always bring the example that, for example, native Hebronites have green eyes (something not typically found elsewhere in the middle east south of the levant), and we have some red-heads too and fairer-skin. I seem to recall reading about genetic tests on the current Palestinian Arabs, confirming to a large extent that we are not the descendants of Arabian Arabs but more a mix of all the peoples who lived in the LBRS over the centuries. But lacking such data, any other assertion remains pure speculation; a case of the powerful re-writing history. As for Palestinian nationalism, there is an excellent book by Rashid Khalidi (whom you may respect or vilify depending on your own biases), Palestinian Identity, which I'm sure you are familiar with. If not, it's definitely a good read even if you don't like the guy. He definitely has good examples of pre-Zionist "nationalism" and in fact, one of his central arguments is that the notion that Palestinian nationalism only formed after the Zionist influence is a myth. Ramallite ^(talk) 05:18, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

oh, and we would much rather be of orphaned identity than be citizens of a country like Jordan, believe me, although sadly everybody needs a passport to travel. Ramallite ^(talk) 05:24, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

"Do we have data of genetic testing on the local non-Jewish population?" Yes. The initial genetic testing suggests the local population is generally a mix of Arabs from the south and Nabateans from the north. Nevertheless, the statistical method developed so far is good at identifying the ethnicity of large groups of people, but not too helpful for indentifying the ethnicity of an individual. Much more testing is needed. It really is fun! --Haldrik 05:45, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

I just want to point out that the genetic evidence is limited, and caution is necessary when interpreting it. For example, when looking at some of the same evidence in a slightly different way, it suggests that 70% of Jews and 50% of Palestinian Muslims have the same father who lived during the Neolithic Period. --Haldrik 06:40, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, Eretz Yisrael is not Palestine (region). Eretz Yisrael is much more than that. If current Israelis managed to occupy more lands in the middle east, then their logic will continue to be the same, and they will continue throwing arguments about this and that. If they did not pull out from Sinai, they will mention that Sinai is Holy etc. The same argument you are mentioing here applies too many places not only Palestine. The Israelite culture vanished just like Canaanites and avolved to other cultures and other religions. Jews did not vanish because a Jew is one who has Jewish faith. You will not consider someone who is a descendant of Jacob a Jew if he is a Muslim or a Christian. Not all Jews are Israelites. Many People in today's Palestine (region) will defintely have in their family tree some one who was Israelite, why because they are native and never left the place. For example, the Israelites in Nablus (Samaritan) over centuries became muslims and christians, few of them remain on the Jewish faith. They never call themseves Jews because they say we are from the Children of Israel. For them a Jew is a descendant of the tribe Judea. For muslims and christians in Nablus, they think they are Jews simply because their only Holy book is the old Testament. However, they also say we are Palestinians in culture and language and reject the idea of State of Israel and zionism. For me, these are more original and have more rights than most Jews who claim simply becuase they have Jewish faith, that they are descendents of Jacob. This argument does not hold specifically that many Russian Jews are converts.

Do you believe that many of the muslims Egyptians were at one point Coptic. Again, Islam spread from Arabia in 50 years to Portugal and China, does that mean that Arabs replaced and uprooted the whole Area from portugal to China in 50 years!!? NO! People just accepted this new faith and over the years in some parts of the world were Arabized in language because it just was the language of business and science as Today's english. This part is known today as the Arab world, the non Arabic-speaking part is the muslims world!

For example, in today's Persian, more than 60% of the Vocabulary is Arabic. Same for Turkish! The buttom line, the muslim Arabs did not do what zionism did (uprooting and denying right of return). Furthermore, the History of Arabs or more accurately (Arabians) is much much before Islam in the Levant. But anyway you do not like this idea too. Almaqdisi 07:48, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

This is my personal definition of Erets Yisrael.

1. A potential area of land biblically promised to Abraham and his descendents, which seems to correspond to the land of the trade routes between Mesopotamia and Egypt.
2. Any part of this area, which happens to actually be under the sovereignty of the descendents of Yisrael.
3. The State of Israel, being the land currently under Jewish sovereignty now (including the territories but no longer Gaza). As such the State of Israel approximates the land of the ancestors of Israel. The land of the ancestors of the Jews (the Kingdom of Judah) is Jerusalem.

Jews dont have any ancestral lands outside of the current border of the State of Israel, and no ideology to acquire any land outside of Israel --Haldrik 08:29, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Haldrik for this helpful info. In Quran, it is mentioned that Moses 'Musa in Arabic' commanded the Children of Israel to move to the Holy Land that God (Allah or Elohim) has granted the Children of Israel (Beni Israil in Arabic). I am not sure if the Holy Land as mentioned here is the same as Eretz Yisrael because Moses was in Egypt at the time, which means that Egypt is not part of that Land. Almaqdisi 08:39, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Egypt isnt part of Erets Yisrael. They border eachother. --Haldrik 08:58, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks again Haldrik! Almaqdisi 09:12, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Your description aboive Almaqdisi is BS. There's no doubt among scholars and researchers (including genetic tests) that the Jews are the Hebrews, it's the same thing (composing the tribes of Jehuda, Binyamin and Levi) and not because of religion but because of ethnicity. This is why Jews have a right for a nation in their homeland. And they're the only ones who made this claim for thousands of years over Palestine. As for Eretz Israel, the Promised Land went from Sinai to very far. In practice, the land of the United Monarchy was smaller and eventually the land of Judah itself was far smaller than that. The heart, the cradle of our nation, is the Judea region where David first came to Hebron and later estbalished Jeruslaem as the eternal capital of the Jewish people after conquering it from the Jebusites and building the city as we know it. That's why this land is holier than all other parts of Eretz Israel. The other parts of settlement were also in the Palestine region with a few tribes on the eastern side of the river and a few tribes further up north in today's lebanon. Amoruso 00:31, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, you can never deny that many of the Hebrew Jews converted to Christianity and later to Islam! Otherwise, explain the very low number of Jews since Roman times! Even today they are only 16 millions. In addition, Judea is what is now the West Bank, and you have no right in that Piece of Land what so ever. It is not part of Today's Israel. If you think it is, then this Jewish invasion to Palestine is the same as the crusaders and is faith based no more no less. Further more, Hebrews were invaders, they invaded this region coming from Egypt. People have been there before the Hebrews and others were there after it. Therefore the History of this land is not exclusively Hebrew as you think. But I forgot that you are the Chosen People you know, and we should pack and leave, also ask those in south Lebanon and in the Jordan valley on the eastern side, and evey body in neast Jerusalem and the west bank to do so and leave their ancestors land. I think this means that the people of south Lebanon were not indigenous and happen to be also coming to this region during zioinist times, and this time probably they came from Turkey or Greece!!

Amoruso, let's talk serious. The Arabs are not to be questioned about there presence. They are there, and as the statistics in this article show, only 6% of the land had Jews by 1900. Those who should be question are the Jews who moved from thousands of miles after 1900. Almaqdisi 06:11, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi, I can refer you to political discussion boards if you like. This is not the forum for this talk. Just to answer your "question", As to the "low" number of jews, it's because Jews don't encourage conversion like Islam - Jews went through genocides from Roman times to Nazi times, and so the people is at its number - which is not small for a people at all in comparison to other peoples, it's an ok number. Jews didn't convert much, it's why we survived in our homeland. Yes, there were people before us in Eretz Israel but now they're no longer. Arabs are newer invaders and their homeland is Arabia, Palestine is one of their empirical states. Jews were in Arabia too you know, yet aftrer being massacred there, we don't claim it - you can have that. Amoruso 15:19, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, I understand. But I think still this does not explain well this low number. Because other populations went through genocides. For examples, mongols, crusaders also invaded Palestine and Crusaders massacred 70,000 a huge number in that time context. Christianity did not come of vaccum. Remeber that among the very first Christians were Jews. Furthermore, the Arabian Peninsula itself had Christian and Jewish population which converted too. Much of the Jewish population left north to the Levant at the time also. Again I remind you, that the Arab/Arabian history with Palestine go back to thousands of years. The fact that this is not emphasized in the bible is because neither David, nor Solomon, nor Jesus, nor Moses were Arabs. But they were there! Arabian peninsula and the Levant are almost the same geographically. Always there has been imigrations towards the north because it was more fertile. This was specially true due to droughts in the 3rd millinium BC. Assuming you are not convinced with Arabian existence in Palestine before Islam. That is fine. The Arabic Speaking population in Palestine evolved from the pre islamic populations (whom you mention non of them were Arabs) and from newly comers muslim Arabs of the 7th century. Almaqdisi 20:05, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Most Palestinian Christians descend from the Nabateans, who mass converted to Christianity around the start of the Byzantine Period. Of course, some Christians descend from ancient Jews. Their percentages are probably small but certain to exist. I havent heard of any genetic tests yet about the Palestinian Christians. Obviously they are very interesting. (My guess is something like 60% Nabatean, 15% various Europeans/Armenians, 10% Samaritans/Jews, 5% Assyrian, 5% Coptic, and 5% Arabs -- being Christians from Arabia who had never converted to Islam. Muslims have a history of punishing and murdering Muslims who convert to Christianity. I expect near zero Arab Christians from Muslim converts. I'll wait for the genetic testing tho.)--Haldrik 07:30, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

My goodness, what other nation would agree to go through such meticulous lab-rat testing? In the meantime, what about Palestinian Muslims converted from Christianity or Judaism, I wonder... Haldrik are you getting enough specimens? I feel so cheapened now (pretty standard, sigh) :) Ramallite ^(talk) 03:44, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

"What other nation would agree to go through such meticulous lab-rat testing?" Definitely Iceland. They love this stuff! :D --Haldrik 07:08, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Hmmm. Perhaps one way to estimate the percentage of Palestinian Christians who descend from ancient Jews is to test the Palestinian Christians for the "Kohen gene" and extrapolate from that, for a very rough approximation. (Apparently, Jewish Kohanim can be distinguished from Samaritan ones.) --Haldrik 08:12, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Regarding Israelites. Jews are Israelites. Jews include the twelve tribes of Israel, all of them being the citizens of the Kingdom of Judah. The Kingdom of Judah is in the southern part of Israel (the modern geographic area of Judea including the southern part of the Westbank). The ancient capital of the Kingdom of Judah is Jerusalem. Its kings were from the tribe of Judah, which was prominant in the south. Other tribes in this kingdom's territory include Binyamin, Shimon, and the sacred tribe of Levi. However, when the Assyrians destroyed the northern kingdom, mass refugees from all the ten tribes of Israel fled to Jerusalem, so that Jerusalem came to include all twelve tribes. Thus there are Jews today who trace their ancestry to these other tribes. The Samaritans descend from the survivors of the Ten Tribes of northern kingdom, who remained in the area, didnt joined the Kingdom of Judah, and thus arent Jews. Both Jews and Samaritans are Israelites. Genetic testing shows the Samaritans are descendents of Israel (including Kohens) and Assyrians. (I've heard in lectures that Israel became the official name of the modern state, in part to include the ancient Samaritans too.) --Haldrik 07:30, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mark Twain

It is quite ridiculous to have THREE separate passages from Mark Twain. There were actually hundreds of travel books describing Palestine during that century, and even works of a scientific nature. Twain had no particular skills in judging Middle Eastern landscapes. One passage is more than enough. It is also ridiculous to disallow palestineremembered.com while allowing Shmuel Katz. Either allow all propagandists or allow none. (However, this particular article in palestineremembered.com is quite reasonable.) -— The preceding unsigned comment was added by Zero^talk 09:00, 2006 September 24

Mark Twain is a notable eyewitness of a disputed period. All the quotes from Twain can be consolidated into one block tho. --Haldrik 09:20, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Indeed Mark Twain is a very important source. The difference between Katz and Palestinerememberd.com is that the first one is WP:RS and the second one isn't, but WP:RS is a policy Zero you never seemed to understand. Amoruso 23:48, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

The Golden Bough is not a reputable source. Not only is the historian of religion outdated, ethnicity isnt his area of expertise, and even his religious theory for which he is famous was shown to be wrong. A more credible scholar is need here. --Haldrik 09:31, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

I have just checked that section and looks fine to me. Almaqdisi 23:01, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, if you remove Palestine remebered, then there should be at least a mention that his info is out of context. Twain believes that the whole middle east area is desolate. He mentions also that greece which is several times larger than Palestine has also 800,000! This must be put in context. Almaqdisi 01:23, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

you can only add RS that criticize him. The quote from the cia operative concerning nablus is biased but it's RS enough for balance. Amoruso 01:32, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Do not you consider that an RS that criticise him scientifically? Or becuase it is from Palestineremebered.com ? I can found similar stuff elsewhere if Palestine remembered is the issue. Truth is every where and cannot be hiden. Almaqdisi 01:56, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

the site is a personal non encyclopedic site. if you find a similar claim in a serious book, and you read it yourself and checked the quotation, then it's ok. it's hardly truth. Amoruso 02:20, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Okay, no problem :) Almaqdisi 06:12, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Same goes for Golden Bough! Find a similar claim in a more serious book (by today's scientific standards). :) --Haldrik 07:00, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Kuratowski's Ghost, do not remove cited info please. If you do not believe in the info, I do not believe also with most of what Katz is saying because it is simply not true and refuted by facts on the ground and by Ottoman and Arabic History of that period. Leave what was written about Palestine in that period. Let the judgment be to the reader! I am not removing any of your cited information there. Almaqdisi 06:31, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Haldrik, most of what is cited in Demographics is based on orientalists who were having bad intentions and reporting for a new wave of colonizations that swept throughout the middle east and north africa. Much of what they wrote turned out to be non factual. To add to this, many of those who visited Palestine were also zioinists or part of the zionist aspirations to capture Palestine. They mislead Jews throughout the world. By today's standards, all these citations should be re-evaluated for accuracy and bias. They were after all observations and not census based information. There were no Census centers in that part of the world in the 18th century or the 19th century. But for sure there were people! Therefore, it is not reasonable to keep arguing about external links. Then when references are given, we start discussing their seriousness. The seriousness of Katz and Twain has been questioned by other zioinst writers any way. If any of you wish, let him include a cited reference that refutes Sir Frazier's work. But his cited and qouted statements should stay in the article. Otherwise, this whole idea makes no sense. Almaqdisi 07:07, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso and Haldrik, if you do not have the book "The Innocents Abroad By Mark Twain" at your local library, you can acces it on google scholar at http://books.google.com/books?id=R6aUNYWE_oYC&pg=PA3&lpg=PR5&dq=mark+twain+palestine&sig=camHxQjd2QU-xbHvJoSeYkIC-mw Almaqdisi 07:25, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Mark Twain was a neutral observer, not a Jew. He's one of the most repsected american writers in history. His view of Jews was complicated. While he appreciated their successes, he wrote some anti semitic articles in his youth and later belittled their part in american civil war and was criticised for it. In general, he was appreciative of Jews' zionist aspirations and gained much respect for the jewish race, but he's a very reliable source as his journals of travels are treated with utmost importance in scholars works. there's an article about mark twain and jews here : [10] Katz quoted other observers who are not known for any love of Jews at all, but on the contrary. Some say Twain was an anti semite too [11] Amoruso 07:38, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

But Amoruso, please read his books, and indeed he believes that Greece was 800,000 and underpopulated, and also Syria and Damasuc is deserted etc. The point is that this Land was for practical purposes and in that time scales, is populated. But anyway, just have a look on the book. Meanwhile, I have many Arabic texts including some written and cited by quite old arab historians, and for some reason they keep mentioing the word "Arab canaanite". I want to dig more in what this terminology exactly meant to pre-islamic arabs. I will read the link you sent, thanks. Almaqdisi 07:47, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Nazi supporters quote these alleged quotes by Twain, showing he had no point to put a favourable view for Jews (!) So I imagine if he said something so favourable about Jews in the sense that the land is "waiting" for them, then it must be true :

"In the U.S. cotton states, after the war... the Jew came down in force, set up shop on the plantation, supplied all the Negroes' wants on credit, and at the end of the season was the proprietor of the Negro's share of the present crop and part of the next one. Before long, the whites detested the Jew.

The Jew is being legislated out of Russia. The reason is not concealed. The movement was instituted because the Christian peasant stood no chance against his commercial abilities. The Jew was always ready to lend on a crop. When settlement day came, he owned the crop; the next year he owned the farm - like Joseph.

In the England of John's time everybody got into debt to the Jew. He gathered all lucrative enterprises into his hands. He was the King of Commerce. He had to be banished from the realm. For like reasons, Spain had to banish him 400 years ago, and Austria a couple of centuries later.
In all ages Christian Europe has been obliged to curtail his activities. If he entered upon a trade, the Christian had to retire from it. If he set up as a doctor, he took the business. If he exploited agriculture, the other farmers had to get at something else. The law had to step in to save the Christian from the poor-house. Still, almost bereft of employments, he found ways to make money. Even to get rich. This history has a most sordid and practical commercial look. Religious prejudices may account for one part of it, bit not for the other nine.
Protestants have persecuted Catholics - but they did not take their livelihoods away from them. Catholics have persecuted Protestants - bit they never closed agriculture and the handicrafts against them. I feel convinced that the Crucifixion has not much to do with the world's attitude toward the Jew; that the reasons for it are much older than that event ...
I am convinced that the persecution of the Jew is not in any large degree due to religious prejudice. No, the Jew is a money-getter. He made it the end and aim of his life. He was at it in Rome. He has been at it ever since. His success has made the whole human race his enemy.
You will say that the Jew is everywhere numerically feeble. When I read in the Cyclopedia Britannica that the Jewish population in the United States was 250,000 I wrote the editor and explained to him that I was personally acquainted with more Jews than that, and that his figures were without doubt a misprint for 25,000,000. People told me that they had reasons to suspect that for business reasons, many Jews did not report themselves as Jews. It looks plausible. I am strongly of the opinion that we have an immense Jewish population in America. I am assured by men competent to speak that the Jews are exceedingly active in politics. ("Concerning the Jews," Harper's Monthly Magazine, September 1899)

Amoruso 07:49, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, it is true that Jews have been mistreated. No one question that. I would like to tell you also that in Latin American, Lebanese and Palestinians are viewed to be agressive buisinessmen that are greedy and would like to own everything. So things happen. But as far as what is going on the ground in the 18th century, this how the world was. Over all, it was underpopulated and in no way we can interpret these hundreds of thousands numbers to today's millions. You mention you are from Jerusalem, well if you go out to the Eastern part and enter the old city. You will observe that this place can never hold more than 20,000 people. Today I believe it is around that number. My grand father told me that Beit Hanina which is now two minutes in the car from Damascus gate for example, was for them a four five hours trip. For example, I am not sure if you are aware of that, but among Palestinians there are dialects, a Jerusalemite has a different dialects from a hebronite and so on. Today, because of easy communications and travel (at least until 10 years back before makhsooms), the common dialect now is getting more unified and people are sharing the same accent almost, except rural areas. Moreover, no question that among Palestinians who will tell you my origin is Albanian, or Turkish, or Iraqi, but most of these were really present at cities only like Nablus, Jerusalem, sea cities like Jaffa and akko, etc. However, the rural population like the many little villages surrounding Ramallah and Nablus and Nazareth and Hebron, etc. These are always proud that they have been present in the land to as long as their memories and family tree writings can describe. No one was moving to a village, but to cities during the ottoman time. Therefore, Palestinian villagers, falla7een, are quite pure in that sense much more than those who were present in cities. Almaqdisi 08:20, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

What you said about the old city proved how not populated the place was. David built his city in a differnet place altogether, and if you have any people you live outside this small area which is only 1km square. This is the reason that when Jews became too many they started building neighbourhoods outside the city walls, that weren't there before. In other words, you can't deny that Jews built this country. A lot of the country on the shores and in the north were all swamps. Malaria was present in the valleys and in the places the first agricultural settlements were built. They were there because the place was empty. This is undeniable fact. Sure there were small communities in nablus and in other cities, but in general the country was dead. The small communities are represented in the numbers given, but it's very small compared to the numbers of other places - the country was in many ways dead not only because of lack of people but because of the deadly mosquitoes who took up these parts. You can go to Safed and see the work of the Jewish doctor who treated malaria to the arab citizens, the few that were - they called him "The free doctor" because he didn't take any money for the treatments... then with hard work from the pioneers, the country was slowly built again. Amoruso 08:38, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

But Lebanon is as beautiful as our country is, and it had similar total population and also thheir cities increases, and they built new neighbourhood all over, etc. No one denies that Jews did new constructions, and stuff when they came in the early 20th century. But, what we do not find pleasant is denying the other. This is the whole point. Again, Lebanon is an example, it has the same culture, climate, and they managed to have a nice job done. Also, any city you visit in the ancient world, like Istanbul, population used to concentrate around the center in Istanbul, but now Istanbul extends to places considered, 100 year back, very very far from Istanbul. This is a world wide phenomena that you talk about, do not forget that. Almaqdisi 08:57, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

What do you mean - same happened ? I think you're proving the point. Amoruso 09:00, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, what I meant is that this would have happened any way even without Jewish imigration. Nablus which had only 20,000 people and also concentrated around its old city, is now having more than 200,000 people and expanded to 10 times its previous size. The same also for Greece! Its cities has also expanded beyond its one century back limits, and its population stands now at around 11 million Almaqdisi 09:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

This happened because of the Jewish immigration... Arabs started to fear that there will be a new political entity that will be more western non islamic and different. That's when Palestine was discovered and they took the interest in the region. I agree with you in general. Amoruso 09:07, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Again, I am not denying that the new Jewish immigrants required new infrastructure etc. And since they were coming from the Western world, they were quite advanced in the tools they were having and not present in the middle east. Let me give you an example, A Mizrahi Jew was not as much trained as the non mizrahi. This part of the world was entering a dark period by the late Ottoman period. There is no one denying that. But again, we should be fair. Looking at neighboring countries, it is safe to say that the local palestinian population would have done and expanded its citie limits anyway. Populations all over the world were increasing due to medical advances, etc. Almaqdisi 09:13, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

No, the Palestine region specifically was sparse and ruined. Baghdad and Damscus were thriving Moslem centers. This is the whole point. It's this region which was seen as very neglible to the Arabs until Jews came in masses with national aspirations, and so they starting doing the same, during which reversion of history also took place. Amoruso 09:19, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Anyway, this is what it sounds to you. Not to me of course. But I hope that at least now things appear more in context. The world's population was low, and Palestine as has been reported in the article was one of the most populated provinces of the Ottoman empire. Almaqdisi 09:23, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I realise you're gonna repeat that forever, but it's just not true. Damascus, Baghdad, Cairo - these were the great, at times glittering, political and cultural centres of the Moslem Empire. Israel was nothing for them, not to mention Jerusalem which didn't even had a designation as high as a sub capital like Ramle etc. Amoruso 09:29, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Neither Mecca did. Never it was a capital and it has not had more than 30,000 people at the same time, 19th century. Almaqdisi 09:32, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Check it out! Greece: 800,000 [12] Almaqdisi 11:44, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I just added more news. According to Justin McCarthy, in the early 19th century, the population of Palestine was 350,000. Almaqdisi 12:12, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Still a very small number considering than in Roman times there were millions of people in Palestine (Jews). Amoruso 01:15, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I do not think there were millions of ancient egyptians living at the same time? But in anyway, it sounds to me that the logistics required and the medicine required to maintain millions of people living at the same time in the same small geographic place like Palestine is pretty outstanding. But it might have been a possibility. I need to dig more into that. See for example this estimate of the world's population throughout the ages. [13] Almaqdisi 01:31, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, 200 million in the world and 3-10 million in Palestine makes you realise how fertile this land actually was, and this was after the Roman massacre. So you can begin to understand what went through this land. Amoruso 01:44, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, this land was not solely Jewish you have to understand. When Jews retuned to it from Babylon it was also populated! But in any case, keep this non census based info to the back. Putting it upfront makes no sense especially that it is by a propogandist!. Almaqdisi 01:52, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Almaqdisi, if you have other information on early demographics you can add it. this section is sourced and it precedes the census in 1900. nobody is arguing the numbers have inflated in time. It's not "by a propogandist", numerous sources are mentioned in the section. you don't like it but that's what the sources have said, sorry. and nobody says the population was all jewish of course. but certainly you can see what happened after the second exile. The first exile was very brief. Amoruso 01:55, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

The early period fails to mention anything non Jewish, and is not reliable therefore! Especially that there was no Jewish kingdoms whatsoever! You need to rethink this part, or make the early period more fair if you want to include it. Or at least bring more reliable source. I will keep things as you left. Will keep the early stage upfront, but it is your duty to make it fair, and I call on others to do so too. No time for cat and mouse games! Almaqdisi 01:55, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Only one source talks about 3 million jews. the other don't mention it was jews. It's not about jewish population, it's about the time when the land prospered. Romans completely destroyed the country when they conquered it. And later it went from destruction to destruction. This led to the neglect and the state of the place . By the late 19th century, the country was again more populated no doubt. I think the article shows differnet views now on the issue of the late population. if you have other sources taling about early populaton go ahead. Amoruso 01:59, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, I did. Almaqdisi 07:43, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Ok, good. I replaced katz's quote in the end like you did, as he deals with both early and modern in that paragraph. Amoruso 11:14, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Good for me too. Let the readers decide how to interpret and comprehend all this interesting data and info for that periond of time. I have also looked at the new references you added and the Early period arrangement sounds fine to me. Almaqdisi 11:22, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

cheers.

Amoruso 11:27, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

cheers from here too Almaqdisi 11:37, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Holy Land in the Qur'an

I am unable to find that "The Qur'an refers to the geographic region in various ways." and that it is mentioned four times. I am using this search engine and can see only one in 5:21. Where are the remaining 3? Thanks. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 06:41, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Hello Humus, thanks for asking. I am working on this now and I am thinking to include it in the Holy Land article too. Please allow few hours and I will prepare it. If you need to revert my edit until then, it is fine. Almaqdisi 06:43, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Take it easy, no hurry. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 07:01, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Humus, please go to the Holy Land talk page to find them. Or click here [14] Almaqdisi 08:20, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks much. I responded there. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 10:49, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] UN Partition - serious re-write

I've made major changes to the "UN Partition" section. I've acted on the principle that the history of partition belongs here in this article and not somewhere else.

I believe that what I've written is a reasonable description of events, and conforms to NPOV.

There may be people who will object ...... here are a few parts which may be controversial, or are only partially referenced:

1) I've said the Zionists always intended to seize the land of Palestine. Benny Morris is convinced of it: "Righteous Victims", p. 49: For decades the Zionists tried to camouflage their real aspirations, for fear of angering the authorities and the Arabs. They were, however, certain of their aims and of the means needed to achieve them. Internal correspondence amongst the olim from the very beginning of the Zionist enterprise leaves little room for doubt.

2) I'm not denying that Israelis felt under real threat in 1948, and I'm not claiming that Israel and Jordan were in cahoots. (Although the latter is a claim being made by Benny Morris in 2002 "The Road to Jerusalem : Glubb Pasha, Palestine and the Jews"). I'm claiming that Israel was not in much danger in 1948, based on the fact that the Zionists were very well armed, well practised, and the only serious army they faced didn't intend to fight.

3) Some Zionists claim that Israel never promised to let the refugees back, either when accepted as a member of the UN or at other times. Unfortunately, I can't immediately lay my hands on what I've collected previously. As best I understand it, Israel was definitely going to allow the refugees back, and has failed to do so. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tomrawlinson (talk • contribs).

I find the latest edits horribly POV. Besides, this article is about a geographic region, not the Arab-Israeli conflict. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 23:29, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Who the Hell is Kathleen Christison?

There was only one interesting thing I could find about this person. She writes for the anti-Israel website "Counterpunch". Not quite a reliable source when you quote someone who denies Israel's right to exist.

~~Opinions don't have to be reliable. They simply have to be noteable or significant enough for inclusion.~~ Okay let me start again, that didn't come out right. The fact that someone is biased doesn't mean they're not a reliable source. Opinions often come from people who are biased. For example, Asher Ginsberg was a zionist so he is similarly a biased sourced. But his opinion is noteable and significant enough to be included. I don't know if this applies to Kathleen but the fact that she's biased doesn't mean her opinion should be excluded. You're welcome to write the article on Kathleen so people know more about here Nil Einne 07:56, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

I saw your comments and wrote an article on Kathleen Christison, but it was deleted per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kathleen Christison -- Kendrick7 20:23, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

The book of Christison quoted here was published by a major university press, which would seem to establish a sufficient standard. In any case, we are only naming Christison as someone who made a specific observation: Twain described Nablus without mentioning almost all of the 20,000 population. This is something that anyone can check. Twain's book is on the web, and the 20,000 figure comes from a peer-reviewed paper in an academic journal. So the claim is correct and there can be no reasonable objection on the grounds of dubious information. --Zero^talk 03:09, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

I'll add: the reason it is hard to find criticisms of Twain as a demographic source is that the professionals in the field don't regard it as worthy of refutation. That's why criticism of Twain only appears in a book that is about perceptions of Palestine rather than about the population of Palestine. There were hundreds of travel books written about Palestine by visiting Westerners in the the 19th century and Twain's book is only notable because Twain is famous. Real demographic studies use sources like the Ottoman tax registers. --Zero^talk 03:31, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

You're right, Kathleen Christison is not a reliable source at all, we don't even know who she is. It should probably be removed. Anyway, I see now per above that the article concerning her was deleted for NOT BEING NOTABLE - therefore it's removed of course, we can only cite notable people. [15] Amoruso 13:14, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup needed for the section "Demographics in the late Ottoman and British Mandate periods"

This section is full of non-academic sources. I have provided two academic sources to help with this endeavour. Furthermore, Alexander Scholch's work is full of concomitant population figures that could add to what is a sloppy article full of non-academic sources - such as mark Twain. For the sake of credibility, I hope that this entire section be reviewed and purged of spurious sources and "data." —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 128.227.202.15 (talk • contribs).

Yes, the article is full of non-academic nonsense cherry-picked from travelers' tales by known propagandists. One thing about your additions: the 1920 figures were based on estimates that were not very accurate. The 1922 census figures would be better. It's a nice quotation, though. --Zero^talk 03:21, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Would you like me to try to learn wiki formatting to post some data from some of the detailed (summary) charts in Scholch's work to fill out the section? And yes, the 1920 source is a very interesting one indeed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 128.227.202.15 (talk • contribs).

Of course you should make yourself a username and start editing. By the way, sign your comments with four tildes: ~~~~ even if you don't have a username. That will timestamp them. --Zero^talk 06:38, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

The section came after a lot of work from many editors, all verified and reliable sources, except maybe some a couple of genetic quotations.. Amoruso 11:54, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

No harm from including new material in this section. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 12:10, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Zero however doesn't like adding stuff like we do, he likes removing stuff. I don't think he ever added anything to wikipedia. Amoruso 12:13, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Sources have to be reliable, which eliminates Katz et al. --Zero^talk 12:16, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

He's reliable per WP:RS of course, not per WP:ZERO0000 which is not yet a policy. Cheers. Amoruso 12:21, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

I see that this section seems to reflect the problem in the article. There are very clear examples of non-academic work and yet, some of the arguments above are calling for the addition of more of the same. I would guess that, in more 'politically-charged' wikipedia such as this one, there would be a need for a moderator to just remove contributions to improve the overall quality and to control 'propaganda.' This section of the article desperately needs more deletions in an effort to improve its quality. As of now, this section looks like a soup of credible sources and information mixed with non-academic additions with the intention of influencing the opinions or behavior of people, rather than impartially providing information.

Ill start adding to the contribution to knowledge by adding some charts with figures. Another equally important effort is to cull the section of its weaker additions.

Also, Ill settle on a username (edit- username created). It was simply my intention to only contribute to a few articles. However, I see that this is important here. I'll work on learning your rules today. Wood345 14:54, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

The policy is very clear: WP:V "Articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Sources should be appropriate to the claims made: exceptional claims require stronger sources.... English-language sources should be given whenever possible, and should always be used in preference to foreign-language sources, so that readers can easily verify that the source material has been used correctly... In general, sources of dubious reliability are sources with a poor reputation for fact-checking or with no fact-checking facilities or editorial oversight. Sources of dubious reliability should only be used in articles about themselves." Katz and Mark Twain are not known for their peer-reviewed contributions on the history of Palestine. --Ian Pitchford 15:10, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Excellent. On another note, I realize now, after figuring out how to make a table in wikipedia's format, that the table that I just entered is very large and bulky. It was small in the text. If I could figure out how to put it off to the side with a pop up, I would. Another solution could be to split it in half and make two side by side tables (cities 1-5 & 6-12). However, after entering all that data, I'm just spent. Is there a way to make this mass of data less bulky?

That table is from Ben-Arieh and taken from Scholch's work. Please review it for yourself and decide whether you feel it contributes to the article. Thank you. Wood345 16:18, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Dear User:Wood345, thanks for your input. I am not a fan of Mark Twain neither or Katz and I think that their writings have been misused here. As it is evident, the demographics part have parts that contradits each other. I agree with User:Ian Pitchford on this issue, and I worked hard few months ago to bring more reliable academic sources to this section. Particularly because Mark Twain and Katz are taken out of context, see this [16]. Please continue to contribute to this article. Also, I wonder if you can have a look at the article Palestinian people. All the best in your Wiki journey Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 20:12, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

It's too bad you feel that way. Palestineremebered is not a WP:RS since it's a personal web-site, and it's a politically motivated article about Twain, not Katz (how can he be taken out of context?). Twain is such a respected writer that we can trust what he saw as reliable. Of course there are myriad of other travells who saw the same desolation but he's one of the most noteable figures. Amoruso 20:23, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, I appologise if this sounds bad. Also, I am not also implying that we should start blanking material here. I would love this to be better organised though. I will have more on this later, I am quite busy. Cheers to all. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 22:31, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, this section has changed considerably since this morning. There's quite a bit of new information on here, some in smart looking charts. My concern is to make sure sources are scholarly. Personally, for the sake of creating an organized, propaganda-free, section with the quality of data that meets the standards of Wikipedia's rules and those of scholars worldwide, I have no problem if the League of Nations article I submitted is removed with all material that is not scholarly, accurate, or otherwise does not fit the terms listed above by Ian Pitchford. Mark Twain might be a respected writer, as mentioned by Amoruso, however, his abilities as a writer have nothing to do with his abilities as an accurate demographer. If Twain and other non-academic sources are to be purged, then so should the Herbert Samuel /League of Nations source go with it, as it is deemed inaccurate. Lets work together on making this article scholarly.Wood345 01:55, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

There are no accurate estimates of population at the time so laregely scholars can relate to the observations of travelers at the time. Many did and therefore it made that material interesting and valuable for wikipedia. He need not be a demographer, just have a pair of eyes, notebook and an extensive verfiable tour that took place of the land. There's also no necessity to cite him directly , many academic sources used him as reference. Amoruso 01:58, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Excellent. Then we can all agree that Twain is a non academic source of information for a section on demography and that we should only site scholarly sources of informaion that either provide solid demographic evidence, when it is available (as Amoruso mentions), and solid academic analysis when the demographic information requires an estimate. There are many such academic and peer-reviewed estimates. This should streamline the article, greatly increase its academic content, and improve its readability. I also standby the claim I make above vis-a-vis Herbert Samuel's link. Fantastic. Let's continue to work together on making this article about academic contributions to demographics.Wood345 02:30, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Quite so. When we have the results of scholarly study, we should favor them over other writings. This does not ignore the testimony of travellers at all, since academic demographers are perfectly aware of them and know how to interpret them better than we do (in any case, we are not supposed to do interpretations). As for the ability of individuals to estimate population by looking around, it is well known that they can't do it. There are some graphic examples given in the statistics collected by Kemal Karpat. For example, for the vilayets of Erzeroum, Van and Bitlis around 1880, three different visitors or residents estimated the Muslim population at 528,000, 567,575 and 280,000. The actual census showed the Muslim population was 821,476. This degree of inaccuracy, or worse, is normal when populations are estimated by amateurs without actual counting. I've been to most places in Israel but if I had to estimate the population just based on my observations I'd have to admit that I had hardly any idea. That was just as much true in Mark Twain's day as it is today. --Zero^talk 06:51, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Disagree. Obviously Mark Twain's writings are very notable and very valuable info to this article. Wikipedia cites all sources relevant and famous as long as they're reliable and verifiable and obviously Twain meets this criteria. We can't ignore the desolation he saw when talking about the demographics of Palestine - seems to be extremely relevant and not warrant of censorship. Amoruso 10:57, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Zero's paragraph shows just some of the dangers of using non-scholarly sources. Twain, for example, might have been a good satirist and fiction author, yet his abilty to make a proper demographic analysis is not acceptable by any peer reviewed source as a stand-alone source on demographics. Leaving this information here because it is, as Amoruso states "interesting and valuable for wikipedia" is also problematic seeing how we are not in the buisness of performing original research. There are two credible and academic sources concomitant to Twain already in the article. These sources are also very close in demographic estimates. The research, clearly, is already performed by proper academics within the same time-frame as Twain's visit. These figures simply must be stated, along with summaries of their demographic findings. Of course, if this was a section where we were doing our own original research, then all of these traveler's accounts would be pertient. However, this is not the place for such original research. It obfuscates the article and it is against wikipedia's own policy of proper sources (as mentioned by Ian Pitchford), policy against original research, and more importantly against the policy guarding against adding non-academic additions with the intention of influencing the opinions or behavior of people, rather than impartially providing information (which I believe is called POV?). In an effort to find a compromise, maybe this could stay in a new section called "Personal Accounts of Travelers to the region in the 18th and 19th centuries?"Wood345 13:40, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I think instead of deleting any material, we can instead collect Mark Twain and any other Tale traveler observations under a title saying so. They should be put in their appropriate context. I have copy pasted this same section to Demographics of Palestine. Please see if this makes sense and if we can work things and organise it better there without the necessity to delete information from any of the sources. We just need to put things in context really. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 19:13, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I think Avraham is correct, it has nothing to do with the context. Greece could have been depopulated too, it's not context, it's simply another issue altogether. Amoruso 19:45, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Re: Twain, is there any reason to bring in Greece over an excerpt from Huckleberry Finn? The only reason I can surmise, is to subtly bias the reader against the paragraph about Palestine, with the idea, somehow, that Twain's writing about Greece will discredit him, and anything that follows. There is nothing about Twain's writing about Greece that can be considered context about Palestine, any more than his writings about A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court will have bearing on his writings about Greece. I am afraid this is a sublte example of tyring to add a POV in an edit, as opposed to adding material that relates to Palestine. -- Avi 19:51, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't see a pressing need to have anything but scholarly sources in this section. This is meant to be an encyclopaedia, not a collection of travelogues. Palmiro | Talk 20:04, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

That's a separate issue. Perhaps Twain doesn't belong here at all, perhaps he does. But if he does, only the part that relates to Palestine does. -- Avi 20:20, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Since when is mark twain observations as a traveler in palestine not a WP:RS and who will decide who is schoalry enough and why and how is it not relevant. Those who want to take out this material don't make a very convincing case at all. There's no harm in using as many relevant sources as possible and obviously Twain is VERY relevant like I explained above. Amoruso 21:23, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Twain is being used here precisely because his impressions of Palestine in the 1860s are unreliable and biased against the Palestinian Arab population. In fact the economy of Palestine was booming at the time Twain visited as Gad Gilbar has explained: "The late 1860s mark the beginning of a new period in the economic and social development of Ottoman Palestine. During the 45-50 years prior to World War I Palestine's economy underwent a process of modernization and growth... The modernization and growth that resulted from the increase of inputs of the factors of production, including technological changes, were not only expressed in an increase in the national product, but in important structural changes as well in the sectors of agriculture, manufacture and services, in the patterns of consumption and savings, and in the distribution of capital and incomes.. At the root of these economic and social changes was... the fact that at the time Palestine's economy became increasingly linked to the world economic system... visible foreign trade in current prices more than tripled over a span of about 50 years." Gilbar concludes that "the bearers of this growth were primarily local Arab-speaking Muslims and Christians". Gilbar, Gad G. (1986). The Growing Economic Involvement of Palestine with the West, 1865-1914. In Kusher, David (ed.). Palestine in the Late Ottoman Period: political, social and economic transformation (pp. 188-210). Brill Academic Publishers. ISBN 9004077928. --Ian Pitchford 22:49, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

If Mark Twain and Katz remarks are going to be used here to give the impression that Palestine is a Land with No People for People with no Land. Then I strongly recommend their removal. Else, they have to be put in context! Tale Travelre and an Irgun member! Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 22:51, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Ok, in summary, Mark Twain is not a WP:RS because there are accurate estimates of concomitant population, which is contradictory to your earlier statement that There are no accurate estimates of population at the time so laregely scholars can relate to the observations of travelers at the time. This reference and others like it breech WP:RS by not conforming to the subsection Beware false authority

Authority of authors Prefer authors with an established reputation in the field where Wikipedia uses them for reference.

Mark Twain is a satirist and a writer of fiction, not a respected demographer.

These references are also in breech of

Exceptional claims require exceptional evidence

Claims not supported or claims that are contradicted by the prevailing view in the relevant academic community. Be particularly careful when proponents say there is a conspiracy to silence them.

There is no conspiracy to silence these claims. This account is problematic because Twain's work seems to indicate that the 350,000 people do not exist in Twain's time, or that there are much less people than 350,000 living in Palestine. Verified and peer-reviewed sources indicate that there were 350,000 people in the area concomitant to Twain's visit. Thats what needs to be said in a section on demographics, not the musings of a satirist and fiction author.

Self-published sources

Main article: Wikipedia:Verifiability A self-published source is a published source that has not been subject to any form of independent fact-checking, or where no one stands between the writer and the act of publication. It includes personal websites, and books published by vanity presses. Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources.

Exceptions to this may be when a well-known, professional researcher writing within their field of expertise

Twain's work is also in breech of this portion of WP:RS as well. His accounts cannot be considered verified or subject to any form of independent fact-checking. He is also not a well-known, professional researcher writing within their field of expertise.

If we were doing original research or if we did not have good population estimates, then this information would be valuable. Since There are no accurate estimates of population at the time so laregely scholars can relate to the observations of travelers at the time is clearly wrong and we do have accurate estimates of population at the time, it is clear that we need to use these and expunge the article of all non-scholarly sources, including the Herbert Samuel link I contributed earler.Wood345 23:17, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree very much with User:Wood345 reasoning and with his insight on this Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 02:32, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I disagree (again). First these figures you claim to be accurate are not accurate figures, they're all very doubtful. We have a first account of a respectable person who had no reason to lie and wasn't biased who wrote an extensive journal of his experiences in Palestine. He's very notable and it's in fact cited in many books and studies about Palestine and its demographics. There's no reason to censor it. It being Twain's OR is of course not WP:OR and it certainly applies to WP:RS since it's an account of what he saw. Of course all other sources are reliable as well - Shmuel Katz is conveying the opinion of demographers or historians from Josephus to Volney etc - there's no reason to censor any of them. The reader can decide which sources he prefer. This is how wikipedia works. In fact, if there's OR it's the suggestion we should pick whatever citations we like and drop others on lame excuses that some are more scholary and some can be dismissed very unconvincgly. Bottom line is there's absolutely no harm in representing the reader the entire scope of material available - There's no more detailed and notable account than Mark Twain on the subject. Amoruso 02:39, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, I doubt that Mark Twain is the only one. McCarthy who compiled the Ottoman official data contradicts most of Mark Twain's impressions. After all these were his impressions. Finally, there are still much to look into like [17], and possibly this too [18]. Also, I do not see why are you not interested in having a separate article on the Demographics of Palestine (region). Don't you think it is worthwhile, there we may allocate a section to all these Tale Travelers including Arab ones of course for whom there are many estimates and discription of the Holy Land. I hope that some are avaibale in english, but if not, I will just add these reference with mentioing (Arabic only) Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 02:54, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I have no problem with such an article actually, but it needs to be in coordination with this one, that's all, perhaps remove all this and then link there, fine with me. Anyway, Twain's book is cited by many scholars, for example also in the book called "Jews" By Rudolf Steiner, George E. Berkle (Professor Emeritus from Massachussets Boston) [19] obviously we're on not a position to dismiss him when he's used by scholars constantly. Amoruso 03:00, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Of course Mark Twain is well respected. They are just having an award in his name as I saw on TV yesterday on PBS. However, what we are saying here or what we think is that he might not be an authority on this particular subject. And that his remarks on a Desolate Palestine fits very well on a section that we may articulate and basicly prepare to collect the impressions from various European and Arab travelers. What makes me feel uncomfortable about his remarks is that they contradicts more reliable and more official Data. Moreover, they have been consistently used by those who believe in a "Land with no People" slogan. I think this requires from us therefore a position of resonsibility when dealing with Twain's input. See this also [20]. I will take out sometime to read it before contributing more to this section. Cheers Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 03:05, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

In the book 'Jews' the citation brought is of course the desolate one, so he's respected on this particular subject - see above. also, I think Benny Morris quoted him. And also we still didn't quote many other travellers like Herman Melville who after a visit there in 1860 said Jerusalem "is besieged by an army of the dead." etc etc - lots of sources. Most importantly, there's a misconception here - the sources don't contradict. There WERE people but the impression was desolate because the land was no longer cultivated, it was full of malaria and it was neglected. Yes there were Bedouin tribes and so on and there was some people in towns including Jews but not a lot - it's this info which is interesting and informative. Amoruso 03:16, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Finding a citation of Twain hardly addresses the serious breaches of WP:RS described above. Take, for instance, Herodotus' routine citations go hand in hand with a knowledge of exageration and historical fantasy along with fact. Finding a citation has nothing to do with providing any proof of credibility or addressing any of the serious breaches of WP:RS.

Amoruso, McCarthy and Scholch's data is respected as accurate estimates of population concomitant to the time of Twain's visit. These works are peer reviewed, look at large sources of data, are respected within the academic community, and, of course, meet the requirements of WP:RS. It is time that you present facts for these doubts considering that your entire argument rests upon demonstrating that There are no accurate estimates of population at the time so laregely scholars can relate to the observations of travelers at the time.

Please submit evidence in accordance with wikipedia policy. Thank You.Wood345 05:27, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

You don't seem to understand WP:RS since Mark Twain's book meets the criteria without any question. It's not one citation, look at the google scholar link, it's many. Most scholars write that Ottomans had one census not accurate and it's all just guesses that you provided. You may file an RFC on the subject of twain if you wish. Amoruso 05:32, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

You have failed to address a single point - most importantly demonstrating the breaches of Twain with WP:RS or proving There are no accurate estimates of population at the time so laregely scholars can relate to the observations of travelers at the time. Your lack of facts and use of the special pleading rhetorical fallacy is telling. It is also telling that in describing

Exceptional claims require exceptional evidence

Claims not supported or claims that are contradicted by the prevailing view in the relevant academic community. Be particularly careful when proponents say there is a conspiracy to silence them.

Wikipedia warns us to Be particularly careful when proponents say there is a conspiracy to silence them. There is no conspiracy, only a desire for proper sources.Wood345 05:43, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

There's nothing exceptional about Twain's account. It's the most notable and detailed account of Palestine demographics at the time. I find myself repeating themselves. I still don't understand why you feel it's important to quote the fact I said about no reliable sources of the time because the Ottomans only had one census and the fact that Twain's book is no "breach" at all of WP:RS no matter how much you repeat it. Amoruso 05:53, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

For example, Daniel Pipes writes : "Obviously because, in this instance, the Ottoman figure is patently absurd. A good deal of responsible, if impressionistic, counting of the Palestine population had been done by that time, and the general consensus among Western observers was that the Jewish population of Jerusalem alone was something more than double that of the official Ottoman figure for the Jewish population of the whole country."[21] any estimates were made on ottoman stats therefore open to debate and therefore the more sources the better. Amoruso 05:57, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

anyway, you can read about why it's impossible here:

"The major conclusion is "The nature of the data do not permit precise conclusions about the Arab population of Palestine in Ottoman and British times""[22]

As in legal matters, eye witness accounts seem more reliable than any "expert" opinion and on this btw Volney is just as an expert as well as other cited by Katz. Amoruso 06:07, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Katz is a propagandist whose works are not cited by any reputable scholar; he has no expertise, no academic qualifications and has never held a post in an academic department of history or any other disicpline. He does not publish journal articles or scholarly material in peer-reviewed outlests. Twain is a novelist with an anti-Arab bias; not a demographer. Pleae abide by WP:V and cite only verifiable "third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Sources should be appropriate to the claims made: exceptional claims require stronger sources.... English-language sources should be given whenever possible, and should always be used in preference to foreign-language sources, so that readers can easily verify that the source material has been used correctly... In general, sources of dubious reliability are sources with a poor reputation for fact-checking or with no fact-checking facilities or editorial oversight. --Ian Pitchford 10:46, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't really know anything about this dispute, but with regards to Mark Twain as a reference, it is rather common to somewhat weigh the need for scholarly credentials with the notability of the source. If we could find the sources, we could explain whatever biases or nineteenth century sensibilities Twain may have held but I would think his opinion would be benficial to the article. I'm sure he did not have any enlightened beliefs about Muslims but his attitudes towards Jews were more of the "Jews may be evil rascals but I am not rascist because I have a Jewish friend" variety.- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 10:56, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso has already deleted these peer-reviewed sources on Twain's unreliability: "Kathleen Christison was critical of Twain and said that in Nablus the city had a population of 20,000 Arabs and a few hundred Samaritans (B. B. Doumani, The political economy of population counts in Ottoman Palestine: Nablus, Circa 1950, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol 26 (1994) 1-17.) yet Twain described the Samaritans at length without mentioning the Arabs at all.(K. Christison, Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy, Univ. of California Press, 1999; p20.) Hilton Obenzinger says that Twain doesn't mention Jews much either but shows no "'racial' animus" and adds that "his apparently unvarnished construction of Palestine is as partial and prejudiced as any of the other creedal travellers. (American Palestine: Melville, Twain, and the Holy Land Mania, Princeton University Press, 0691009732, p. 49). --Ian Pitchford 11:14, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Amouruso. Amazing. Not one effort to address.. Amoruso, McCarthy and Scholch's data is respected as accurate estimates of population concomitant to the time of Twain's visit. These works are peer reviewed, look at large sources of data, are respected within the academic community, and, of course, meet the requirements of WP:RS. It is time that you present facts for these doubts considering that your entire argument rests upon demonstrating that There are no accurate estimates of population at the time so laregely scholars can relate to the observations of travelers at the time.

The other thing ignored in this weak effort to attemt to fit clearly biased work is that the complaints of the Ottoman figures are that they are underrepresented not overrepresented. In other words, these census figures are criticised for not counting enough people - making Twain's observations even more incredulous. No matter, we have two academic sources who poured through multiple sources of data to come up with acurate estimates.

The application of relative standards of credibility on sources that meet your particular worldview would be one thing, but failing to address the authors academic work at all is very telling, especilly when the critique of the Ottoman figures works against your point.Wood345 13:10, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Ian pitchford, Kathleen Christison was simply not notable we only cite notable people or professors etc. An artilce about her was deleted hence conensus wiki policy. Wood345, I don't know why you copy pasted the same thing after I refuted your allegations above. The article I provided clearly shows why it's impossible to have an accurate statistics of the era and therefore eye witness accounts of notable figures like Twain are of course very valuable and adhere completely to WP:RS, WP:CITE and WP:V. Your suggestion that this actually an argument against is your personal WP:OR and it's illogical - the more sources the more comprehensive picture is available and it's advisable and serves the purpose. I'm not the one who wants to remove anything from the article except when it doesn't talk about the article or except when it's by someone no one knows who she is - other than that I don't want to remove anything - the more RS the better. I'm actually troubled by your excuses to censor information and it's becoming difficult to assume WP:AGF with you since this is a very weak non existant demand of you to delete well sourced material on the subject, quite disturbing and confusing. whether these two sources are allegdly peer reviewd or not it has no bearing on the subject in question. wikipedia cites as many RS sources as possible and Twain is one of them. Ian pitchford, I'm afraid you're being untruthful about Shmuel Katz too who I showed many times he's been used constantly in books about the conflict, he has full credentials from the universty in South Africa and he's very respected scholar. please see google scholar here [23] your hostility towards him I'll advise you to trim it down, it doesn't reflect well on you and it's pretty amateur talk - it also exposes the fact you don't want him because you don't like him which is rather very very poor argument. In fact it's also completely useless argument since Katz is only brought as a secondary source where he talks about historians like Josephus, Volney and other notable figures for this article. I suggest you stop your crusades to censor information and not to resort to lies either please. Cheers. Amoruso 18:24, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Amouruso, you have still failed to address a single point I mention above - most notably - no facts from your attack of McCarthy and Scholch's data. I have to cut and paste because my points are ignored. It is clear that this issue needs to be resolved by authorities. As WP:RS states Be particularly careful when proponents say there is a conspiracy to silence them. No one is trying to censor anything, we are concerned with what are breeches of WP:RS.Wood345 18:56, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

No Woody, it's you who failed to address the points. I can also copy paste. Wood345, I don't know why you copy pasted the same thing after I refuted your allegations above. The article I provided clearly shows why it's impossible to have an accurate statistics of the era and therefore eye witness accounts of notable figures like Twain are of course very valuable and adhere completely to WP:RS, WP:CITE and WP:V. Your suggestion that this actually an argument against is your personal WP:OR and it's illogical - the more sources the more comprehensive picture is available and it's advisable and serves the purpose. I'm not the one who wants to remove anything from the article except when it doesn't talk about the article or except when it's by someone no one knows who she is - other than that I don't want to remove anything - the more RS the better. I'm actually troubled by your excuses to censor information and it's becoming difficult to assume WP:AGF with you since this is a very weak non existant demand of you to delete well sourced material on the subject, quite disturbing and confusing. whether these two sources are allegdly peer reviewd or not it has no bearing on the subject in question. wikipedia cites as many RS sources as possible and Twain is one of them. Amoruso 19:04, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Nonsense. We cite peer-reviewed books by academics such as Christison, Gilbar, Obenzinger in accordance with WP:V. I suggest that you stop deleting such sources. Obscure, biased works by Revisionist politicians are not suitable sources for Wikipedia articles. With regard to Google scholar Rrburke has pointed out to you elsewhere that "Those 564 are raw Google search hits, not Google Scholar citation hits. The citation hits in Google Scholar are here. There are a total of six, and none appear to be from scholarly journals." Colin Shindler writes of Katz's activities: "A founder of the Land of Israel Movement and a former high-ranking member of the Irgun, Katz had originally been appointed a Minister of Information in Begin's government. His attempts to propagate both a Revisionist interpretation of the previous thirty years and a hard-line version of contemporary events were consistently blocked by Dayan." Clearly, Katz is a politician who seeks to justify right-wing policies, not a scholar of any kind. I note that you fail to provide evidence to support your claim that he is a "very respected scholar" depite the fact that you have been challenged dozens of times by numerous editors. --Ian Pitchford 19:09, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I think you're acting in bad faith again. I have no intention to remove any sources. We concluded here on talk that this Kathleen person is a non notable person and therefore should not be included and I removed her and her only - if by mistake something else was removed, I apologise. I also don't mind including her quote although it seemed pretty silly since nobody knows who she is and it's wrong to just quote anons - see above about her article being deleted from wikipedia for not being notable. I find it troubling that you keep lying (I would say mistaken per WP:AGF but it seems you repeat this depsite being showed the opposite over and over again) that I haven't provided evidence where evidence is provided here time and again. 6 google scholar links are a lot for goolge scholar history books and all of them are scholarly of course. I showed how people like Christopher Barder relate to Katz. Why are you pitchford more qualifed than Christopher Barder ? Did you also "gain a Foundation Scholarship in History at Pembroke College, Cambridge, and were you also for some years both head of history and politics at an Oxford Tutorial college, as well as a tutor for the University of Bath." Taking Barder as an example If he uses him as a source so can wikipedia [24]. Katz is a scholar from the university of Johanesburg who knows a lot of the conflict and has written history books in regards to it. He's cited thoroughly, yes in those google links you can find many articles concerning his book and many positive looks on him as a biographer and historian (people relate to him as historian as here[25]). This is all the facts you've been presented with and you choose to ignore and make your OR about his being in the etzel ( (why do we care that Dayan blocked his iniatives according to this writer? it has nothing to do with it-are you saying we shouldn't quote him because has political opinions ? WTF. And even if he was criticized on scholary basis , not in your quote - it means nothing... According to Efraim Karsh we should remove all citations by Benny Morris then).). So what... this is israeli society and yes he's a zionist belonging to the right wing map. It's allowed. You don't have to be post zionist, anti zionist or generally left wing sided to be included. Now this is all anal of course because Katz only relates to Volney and such historians so why don't you attack Volney now instead of just making things up ? You're just trying to find excuses for deleting sourced material and it's pathetic no offense. Cheers. Amoruso 19:18, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I had to laugh when I read "Kathleen person is a non notable person and therefore should not be included", since I distinctly recall that you repeatedly inserted on Palestinian Exodus quotations from people who you can't even identify. --Zero^talk 03:39, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

You're simply repeating spurious claims that have been addressed by other editors on the Palestinian refugee talk page here: [26]. Katz is not a "a scholar from the university of Johanesburg ", he simply attended the university according to his Knesset page [27]. Katz has written accounts of people he knew in the Revisionist movement and justifications of Revisionist policies. This H-Net review congratulates him on his "journalistic account of Jabotinksy's life" [28]. According to Shindler, Katz was "a loyal adherent". Please find verifiable sources to back up your claims. Katz, as a politician involved in one side of ther debate, and particularly in spreading Revisionist ideas and interpretations, is not a reliable source for this article. Indeed, according to Ofira Seliktar, Katz "contended that the Palestinians were recent arrivals to the land of Israel and did not deserve self-determination." The man is an extremist; not a scholar who carefully weighs the evidence for a particular interpretation of history. --Ian Pitchford 21:13, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Ha ? You don't address the issue there. Yes, he has political views. Porat for example run for Meretz. People in Israel are usually politically affilated. The fact you think these opinions are not worthy is of no interest. You're been seriously ridicilous as there's no doubt like I proved above that Katz has written a very notable and serious book about the conflict. He's been quoted by many scholars, something you failed to even relate to. Seems very low and bad faith from you to try to divert the conversation to the character of Shmuel Katz or his political opinions as if it's even remotely relevant. Everything Katz says is backed by references and we have cited his references on historians like Volney and Josephus and writers like Twain (who are very WP:RS like expalined, Wood) and it's perfectly all right no matter what you think of him. Amoruso 19:18, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Katz is a politician and not qualified to address such issues. As a propagandist any references he gives are not credible. --Ian Pitchford 19:22, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

False. Yehoshua Porat is a politican as well and is quoted extensively. What you say has proven to be your false personal opinion and that's it. He has full references and it's perfectly all right to use his book as a secondary source, nobody ever claimed he misquoted references. Amoruso 19:35, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

You have no such refutations. Also, you repeatedly accuse others of censorship, (among not addressing the other points) hence the reminder. McCarthy and Scholch's work as peer-rewieved isnt 'alleged', its fact. You contradict yourself. You yourself bring criticism of Ottoman figures (not of McCarthy and Scholch's work - which is what is necessary in your argument) in how these figures are low population estimates - in other words, there are more people there than counted - in an effort to give support for a personal account of a satirist and fiction authors description describing an empty land.

Isn't the fact that Porath is Professor Emeritus of Middle East History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem somewhat relevant? Katz is a nobody. In fact he's not even very significant as a propagandist or poltiician let alone anything else. --Ian Pitchford 19:39, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I think by saying "nobody" when he his book is quoted by so many writers/scholars/historians clearly shows your extreme bias by this point... you need as an adult to accept opinions of people you don't like without calling them names. Katz is a man of practice so he didn't stay in the university but if he used references for what he said then it's only a secondary source and there's no need to censor him except to meet your political bias. Why are you trying to avoid the issue ? Are you questioning the references ? If not, please kindly shush. Amoruso 19:45, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Just for fun, I'll recall that even the "Irgun web site" calls Katz a propgandist (twice), see [29]. --Zero^talk 03:39, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

the Jewish population of Jerusalem alone was something more than double that of the official Ottoman figure for the Jewish population of the whole country

Yet somehow, despite this contradiction, Twain still represents a valid source for you. Twains tales of an empty land or underrepresented demographic data.

I do not understand how to bring the relevant authorities here, but this discussion has obviously reached an impasse and needs an authoritative referee. However this is accomplished, please someone make this happen. Wood345 19:27, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Wood345, you failed to address a single point or attempted to prove why we should remove historians like Volney or eye witness accounts like Mark Twian. Cheers. Amoruso 19:31, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Amouruso, I've mentioned this at length with Twains incongruency with scholarly population estimates from peer rewiewed authors like McCarthy and Scholch and the numerous breaches of WP:RS using Twain as mentioned in my 23:17, 19 November 2006 among other posts. Moreover, your efforts to try to make Twain fit are filled with rhetorical fallacy, contradictions, and clear bias on what you choose to defend and what you choose to throw out of the article. This conversation has officially reached impasse and needs the intervention of the appropriate authorities. Somone please make this step happen. Wood345 19:53, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

You haven't explained even a bit why he's not a WP:RS and you're still failing to address the issue except throwing allegations that are a clear violation of WP:AGF. Please refrain from this behaviour in the future. Cheers. Amoruso 19:37, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I'll add Woddy345 two things - one is that the fact Twain is not a demographer etc is not grounds for his removal. Wikipedia uses many source even from popular culture - it's what makes wikipedia sch an extensive encyclopedia by using as many sources as possible as long as they're reliable and verified, and by reliable it doesn't mean we have to believe Twain or have Twain's credentials as a demographer - it means that we trust Twain to have written what he saw and that what he saw is notable enough in discussions over Palestine which cerainly is. I hope you can see that. second as to adminstrators etc - this is a content dispute and it's not determined by any higher power. I do believe the general consensus would be not to remove information that's cited directly to sources and concern the issue. Amoruso 22:10, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

There is a consensus to remove Katz and Twain. We should get on with this. --Ian Pitchford 22:49, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Hardly, we have a consensus to keep them perhaps. The funniest is you mention Katz while nobody questioned him but you and we established he only was used for secondary sources. What you'er actually asking is to remove the historian Volney and other notable historians for your political bias. Amoruso 23:19, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, this article cannot be infinite in size. Now, if you may note, that I can easily flood that section with reports from Arab travelers whom will simply contradict most of Twain's speculations. There is just so much of that material. This is not my purpose though, I would love to see a concise and accurate section that is closest to truth. I do not see Twain any close to anything realistic here. His observations only represent his mood while on this trip. Is Twain giving any numbers of estimates for Palestine. I know he mentioned about 800,000 for greece. Do you find any numbers we can use for him in regard to Palestine? Was he a demographer also, and how he got his numbers. There is really no space just to qoute just any body here. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 22:56, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Any notable accounts of Palestine would be welcome. There's no need to be a demographer in order to be included in the Palestine article I'm afraid. Amoruso 23:19, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Twain's detractors are included, but Twain's impression is notable both for his own standing and because it is one of few that detail that period. If there are really very many other equally notable sources to that extent that space would become an issue, then perhaps we should have a discussion about how best to summarise the multiple accounts. Let me know, Tewfik^Talk 06:16, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, but Twain's account is not "one of the few that detail that period". In that period of time there was a large industry of travel books written by Western visitors to the Middle East. If you go to an old enough library that you will find dozens of examples; in total there were hundreds. Twain's book is only remembered because Twain is famous. As for the reason that Twain is notable, that doesn't work either since Twain is notable as a writer (the most common description is "humorist"), not as a historian, demographer, anthropologist, or any other relevant scholarly role. --Zero^talk 03:39, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Amouruso, it is not suprising to see how you have not been able to discredit McCarthy and Scholch's work on demographics for Palestine concomitant to Twain's visit. It is also not suprising how you have failed to address my numerous points on Twain's multiple breaches of WP:RS listed in my 23:17, 19 November 2006 among other posts. What is suprising is your tactic of accusing me of failing to explain his breaches WP:RS when I do so explicitly. Your efforts to make Twain fit are filled with rhetorical fallacy and embarrasing contradictions, namely using an example to show the problems of Ottoman statistics stating that they are undercounted, in an effort to keep the travelogue of a satirist who describes a depopulated area. If, in fact, your motives arent politically biased, then you will not have any problems with myself or Almaqdisi adding "reports from Arab travelers whom will simply contradict most of Twain's speculations." I assume then that you wont attempt to meet each conflicting report with a flexible and relative definition of who is or who isn't "notable."

The resulting illegible quotation soup, however, is really inconsequential. WP:RS is clear on this issue. As I state earlier there are accurate estimates of concomitant population, which is contradictory to your earlier statement that There are no accurate estimates of population at the time so laregely scholars can relate to the observations of travelers at the time. This reference and others like it breech WP:RS by not conforming to the numerous points I list 23:17, 19 November 2006. Since there are scholarly sources on the issue, the problem of cluttering an already messy section becomes mute. Seeing how you have failed to make even one attempt to discredit two peer-reviewed, respected, and scholarly concomitant population estimates negates the need for this discussion in entirety. The only problem here is, the clutter found within the article. This clutter can be fixed by adhering to the use of only scholarly and peer-reviewed sources when they are available in developing a coherent and readable summary that can provide the average reader with an accurate summary that is accepted by the academic community.Wood345 17:32, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

By the way, Im having difficulty in assigning Wikipedia:Requests for comment or Wikipedia:Requests for mediation for this section. I havent had much time to figure out the process needed for this. Hopefully, I'll figure out the proper process shortly.Wood345 17:37, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I just found some interesting excerpts "Justin McCarthy and Kamal Karpat have shown that travelers' and consular reports are not reliable.."(3)

"New evidence...indicates that the city's (Nablus) population indicates that the city's population at the time numbered at least 20,000, more than twice the frequently cited figure. This revision raises serious doubts about the veracity of hithero commonly accepted population figures, most of them based on contemporary estimates by Western observers..." Moreover, when compared to the available data for Nablus from the 16th and the late 19th centuries, it seems that the pattern of Nablus' demographic development differs from the proponents of Ottoman decline and modernization theses have argued. Instead of decreasing during the so-called dark ages of Ottoman decline in the 17th and 18th centuries, Nablus' population increased significantly; and instead of growing robustly during the so-called period of modernization in the second half of the 19th century, it appears to have leveled off." (3)

"Demographic studies on Palestine are also politically sensitive. ¹² A few years after the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 1967, Ben-Arieh, acutely aware of the Palestinian demographic 'problem,' wrote that it was highly important to...provide basic knowledge about the density of the population of the country before the beginning of modern Jewish settlement'." In choosing among the estimates made by various European travelers, Ben-Arieh then usually picked the lower, rather than the higher, figures. In the case of Nablus, for example, he dismissed the estimates of 14,000 for mid-century by Orelli, and of 20,760 for 1881 by Falsher, and settled on substantially lower figures. He does not, moreover, cite Reverend John Mills report of being told by an official in Nablus, not long after the regional census office was established, that the city;s population ranged from 20,000 to 25,000 in the mid-1850's".

"Underreporting (the census) could be used as a means of increasing the popularity of and patronage obligations and profit to a local notable if he deomonstrated the power to reduce the tax burden. Undercounting also meant that more peasants could stay on the land and continue producing the agricultural comoddoties that were the most profitable source of income to the urban elite" (5).

"the general population, especially the poor, exerted pressure for undercounting from below, for they had equally powerful motivations" (5).

"Undercounting, therefore, was a serious problem. ...it is clear that the population of Nablus increased considerably by the time the 1849 count was taken" This rise, probably the result of both population growth and increasing urbanization, must have started no later than the mid-17th century and continued through the 18th, precicely the time when the population was supposed to be at its lowest because of "ottoman decline." and "lack of security. Whereas it is unlikely that the population grew in a smooth upward curve, it would have been impossible for all the growth to have occured between the early 1830's and the mid 1850's..(10).

"in short, it seems that the demographic development of Nablus does not fit the theme of Ottoman decline.." (10).

There is a reason for the necessity of using academic analysis rather than using cherry-picked travelogues. It is summarised below.

"The task of assessing trends in the demographic patterns of Jabal Nablus during the third and fourth quarters of the 19th century is complicated by shifting administrative boundaries, changes in the definition of the registration unit, ..etc.etc."[30]

These figures by Israeli scholar Yehoshua Ben-Arieh are part of the millieu of data sources used by Scholch in arriving at population estimates. Schloch looks at this data in context with many other sources of data. In an effort to try to bring more data into an article with "data" from traveler's reports, I thought it would be a good idea to paste a data source, out of context, just to show a breakdown of population to add to the article. Unfortunately, this data seems out of place now and might be politically motivated.

Unfortunately, as it stands now, even if this data is politically motivated, it unfortunately seems to give balance to this article. This problem, the extrordinarily low point of quality where this article is, where the addition of what one scholar says is a low estimate and politically motivated to show low population, seemingly gives a sense of balance to this article. This situation makes it even more apparent how desperately this article needs some serious work.

The idea of attempting to correct this complexity by using the travelogue of a satirist is absurd. It is especially absurd when Ottoman figures are routinely shown to be low figures - specifically because Twain's depictions paint a picture of a desolate region devoid of people. Even Israeli historians show this clearly isnt the case. To use Twain's figures is patently a violation of several rules, and in violation of Amouruso's own assertion that the Ottoman figures are underrepresented. I have found that this underrepresentation is both true and found a described political motivation for the description of low figures. In order to improve this article and defend agaisnt propaganda, we must expunge all non-scholarly works and works with clear political motivations in order to arrive at a clear picture of demographics for palestine. Especially needed to be removed are unverified conflicting sources of data that seem to contradict the repeated evidence for underreporting, not overreporting. Twain's depictions are in clear conflict with academic analyses and give the politically motivated implication of an empty land. In order to be neutral, it is important to give population figures for the corresponding years. There are various academic sources of information for these figures. Lets select one (most likely McCarthy) and work towards clarifying this article free from political bias.Wood345 21:07, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Morris as a source

In "Righteous Victims", Morris give~s a description of that period. I am sure you can have access to this book. If not, I can give the numbers and some details (with page reference) but I have only the French version. Regards, Alithien 14:11, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I will look into that, thanks Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 13:49, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Again POV issues

Some one added [31]. It gives the impression that

1- Desolation was a fact. Something that can be contradicted very easily by many sources

2- That there was an Arab immigration just as there was Jewish immigration, something that is discussed in a separate section and can be correct/incorrect.

These edits are obviously POV and are removed. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 03:13, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Nothing pov about it... it's good sources and deals with the demographic issue. restored. if you start questioning hard evidence like photos etc it'll be time to remove the refuted and highly ridicilous sir james fraser already. Amoruso 10:26, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

No, it is complete POV. It is a zioinist website. And talks about what you believe in from Desolation which is proven wrong. Stop your PROPGANDA User;Amoruso. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 11:50, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Please maintain a cool head. In fact, it's propoganda to say it wasn't desolate. The photos add a lot and it's a good source. Amoruso 11:52, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Saying the country is Desloate when Ottomans show otherwise is the Propoganda. I am not sure what you are talking about. If Mark Twain's impression stay here, that is his impression. But his wrong ill informed judgmenent about the structures inside al-Aqsa mosque are not acceptable. Better sources are needed for his ridiculous claims. The temple stood 700 years before. You better find better resources than Mark Twain's in that case. In the Palestine article, his impressions only represent himself and are already shown to contradict major facts like the Ottoman statistics which clearly shows 411,000 people at least. According to Bernard Lewis who studied these, and myself, these Ottoman statistics are even an under estimate since many peasants escaped Taxations. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 12:02, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

The reader can decide for himself from the differnet sources then. I'm not removing anything. Ottoman stats were obviously corrupt though. Amoruso 12:04, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, it is the best thing available at hand for the moment, their credibility is not questionable and they are not politically charged statistics. One should note here that the Ottoman statistics is mostly based on Tax registries, hence this is the reason we believe it is an underestimate of the actual status. But in anycase, we let the reader decide, but at the same time trying to avoid as much as possible politically charged statements. Cheers Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 12:09, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

By the way, adding the word Arab after Caliphate was a smart edit to resolve the issue here. But I thought you were not considering the Ottomans as a Caliphate. I should tell you that I am very acquainted with Turkey and Turkish and hence found it quite interesting that one may sometimes claim that Ottomans were not a Caliphate. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 12:12, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

I did not claim otherwise, but the period as in history of palestine and other articles deal with the Arab caliphate. Perhaps now you can undo your edit, because it's confusing. Amoruso 12:18, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Let me try to correct it then, have a look and let me know if I screwed up Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 12:26, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

AFAIK, Mamluk aren't Arab caliphate. Personally I think this should be removed as I'm not aware of a categorized "Caliphate Period". So it should mention only the Arab Caliphates IMO. Amoruso 12:33, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, Mamluks spoke Arabic just like did the Ayyubid and are therefore considered Arabs. But If we will talk about blood keenship, then things become hard and you have to look at each individual case. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 12:44, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

The language is not what determines whether there are Arabs or not. Jews speak Arabic and they're not Arabs, same here. It's a differnet period. There's the Arab caliphaet period, then Mamluk then ottoman. All history books relate to this like that. Amoruso 13:11, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

What is the ethnicity of Mamluks, in Arabic Mamluks means that owned as they were people raised for military purposes who later managed to rulse. The Ayybids for example also spoke Arabic, but if you want to consider them part of Kurds then this is also another issue. Many Arabs today in Egypt may be in origin Mamluks or Turks, if you do not which to use the most common definition of Arabs, then there will be a big problem really. Mamluks ruled from Egypt. Ottomans ruled from Istanbul, so it is safer to say that Ottomans are not Arabs, but not quite correct about Mamluks. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 13:17, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Regardless, the Mamluks have their own section. This section doesn't deal with them or ottomans and shouldn't mention them there. Amoruso 13:39, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

I think it should be okay now. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 13:42, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't think btw that Mamluk used a caliph system. Amoruso 13:45, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

We can simply say the Islamic rule, what do you say? remove Caliphate if it will generate troubles.. Almaqdisi ^{talk to me} 13:51, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

"Arab Caliphate" is a common used term already in other articles too and in general, which is why the earlier version was better ;) Amoruso 13:56, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

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