Who Owns the Land?

     Israel? Palestinians and Hamas? Or...? 

     Activists around the world argue that Israel doesn't belong. Can that many opinions be wrong? Iran threatens a nuclear wipeout. Andree Seu Peterson settles the question in WORLD magazine.

* The UN voted Israel a state in 1947. 

* The old League of Nations mandated a "national home" for Jews. 

* Jews have the oldest and most documented claim to the land of any people regarding any land of any time - the Torah. 

* There is no "Palestinian people." There never was a Palestinian nation. "Palestine" designates a region, not an ethnic group. The Romans renamed the province of Judea 'Syria Palestina' to erase connection with rebellious Jews. No land ownership during the Ottoman Empire. The British used the term "Palestine" to denote a distinct political unit. 

* Jews immigrated in three waves starting in the 1880s. They found hygiene unknown. The land, deplorable. Dirty streets. Regions deforested; plateaus stripped of fertile soil. Jews moved in and made it a garden. 

* "Palestinians" now in Gaza and the West Bank are actually ethnic Egyptians, Jordanians, Lebanese, Syrians and other Arabs. 

* There are 22 Arab nations in the neighborhood in which Arab people may live. 

* Arab citizens enjoy the blessings of Israel's freedom, civic participation and prosperity side by side with Jews. Remove Jews and...?

* Jews have had presence while empires came and went: Assyria, Egyptians, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome, Muslims, Crusaders, Ottomans and British. 

* Israel does not insist on the mandate bequeathed by the League of Nations, which included large areas east of the Jordan. Israel has even given back portions of winnings in exchange for peace, such as the Sinai after the Six-Day War of 1967. Who does that? 

     Israel will have a state of its own because God made a promise to Abraham regarding territory "from the river of Egypt to the River Euphrates." God called it "an everlasting possession" (Genesis 17:8). 

     "This is my resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it" (Psalm 132:13-14).

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