Anti-Israel Propaganda “Own Goal” of the Day

Africa for Palestine recently tweeted the following photo and caption:

The statement is false on a number of levels.

The common reaction of many Israel advocates is to point out things like the 1929 Hebron massacre. This is a largely ineffectual argument, given the exact wording of the tweet, which mentions “before the invasion by East European Jews.” The haters would argue they are not referring just to pre-1948, but to the the immigration of Jews mostly from Europe in the late 19th century.

For a start, Jews did not “invade” then Palestine – those who were not already there from the time of the destruction of the second Temple immigrated peacefully (just like many Arabs did, along with those who came with the violent conquest of the land in the 7th century). The immigrating Jews bought land legally in this mostly desolate country; they improved the land, health & sanitary conditions, and the economy; helped their Arab neighbors, and generally improved things for all. Some Arabs even welcomed Jewish immigration.

They were also not immune to ill treatment before this immigration. For instance, Jews were massacred in 1834 in Hebron and Safed. And in his book published before the First Aliyah from 1882, Stirring Times: Or Records from Jerusalem Consular Chronicles of 1853 to 1856 Vol 1 (1878), James Finn writes of persecution of Jews in the Holy Land.

But more than that. The photo in the tweet is a huge own goal since it is a recent one.

You can clearly see it is in color and the photographer is a current one.

africa4palestine

In fact, this same photo has been used by others to show how peace is possible!

In other words, Jews and Arabs in present day Israel get along, as Africa for Palestine have inadvertently reminded us. Not always, of course, but it does happen for the most part. Jews and palestinian Arabs get along far less, but it also happens when the latter are not trying to kill and maim us.

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