Why were the Jews given Palestine?

For the record, the British Mandate and subsequent UN partition did not “give” Palestine to the Jews. It was split into two states initially, that were subsequently unified during the war of 1948 (when the Arabs tried to evict the Jews, and lost). Of note, the original territory consisted of Transjordan (now Jordan) and Palestine. So, Jordan today was also part of the mandate, and became it’s own Kingdom (it could easily have been incorporated as part of the plan back then, but wasn’t).

ok so why does the state of israel exist then?

Because they won the war in 1948.

why were all the outside powers supporting isreal? why not palestine?

Israelis.

sorry i had to edit that response ^

Well, not all the “outside powers” were supporting Israel. Barely ⅔ of the nascent UN voted in favor of the plan, and when war broke out in 1948, Palestine was supported locally by all of its Arab (and Persian) neighbors during the war. Moreover, it appears that the British, which were the de facto holders of the land before the actual partition were selling arms to the Arabs. The truth is that there was little support for either side (in terms of financial or military support). Who do you believe supported Israel at the time at the expense of Palestine?

Here is a good you tube video regarding this subject.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaezRqkRFrw

@boing that video was just super bias. even the video maker’s screen name icon had an isreali flag in the background. i think the word “fact” was being used lightly, or metaphorically.

one small example: he said no country allowed jews to flea the nazis. for example denmark sent its jews to neutral sweden to save them from the nazis

i am trying to get actual facts on this extremely complicated historical issue… that video was not exactly helpful.

speaking of the holocaust, why did the jews have to get an arab area, why did the UN and britian give them a chunk of germany. that is where the holocaust took place, right?

anyways, even if isreal needed to become a nation, they do not have the right to expand beyond their boarders (because no country should have expansionist policies in the modern day). still to this day the isreali government has expansionism policies…they are essentially provoking their neighbors. how can there be peace when they are not acting in accordance with international boarders?

don’t take that the wrong way, i am not siding or condoning either side. but isreal isn’t making any attempt to get along with its neighbors.

@alive There was no such state as Palestine, or Jordan or Iraq for that matter before the British split up portions of the old Ottoman empire into various territories. Jews were living in (what is now known as) Israel for a long time, so it isn’t like all the Jews from Europe were transported there in 1945 after the war. Many had arrived in the early 1900s and later.

As for your statement ” isreal isn’t making any attempt to get along with its neighbors.”, that isn’t quite true. Israel has long standing peace agreements with both Egypt and Jordan (two of 4 neighbors). Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy group in Lebanon that is a major thorn in Israel’s side, and Iran perpetually rattles its sabres at Israel. Hamas in Gaza has a charter that states it wants to eliminate the state of Israel. Wars by the Arab neighbors were started in 1948, 1956, and 1973. So, to be fair, Israel’s neighbors haven’t exactly been particularly welcoming, or even practical (except for Egypt and Jordan).

it sounds to me like you are taking for granted the area’s colonial past. why the fuck do we just accept that britian partitioned the area. that is the root of the problem. an outside colonial/imperialist force just decided without permission from the people who would get what and where.

the funny thing about israel and palestine is that our media and our government pass it off as a million year old rivalry between jews and muslims, when in fact all the fighting was caused by british intervention (unfortunately neither israel or palestine have their own ghandi’s)... i know that jews were living there already (so were muslims, obviously). the difference is they were living there in peace… and they already had established boarders. along comes the english army, and poof! instability.

re: hamas and hezbollah: they are extremist political parties. there are plenty of other people in the region who are not extremists. and the two groups gain in popularity every time israel boms shit in lebenon or in palestine. especially because everyone knows that israel cannot do this on their own, they are given US military weaponry and ammunition. so if they would use diplomatic means, instead of military means, perhaps negotiations would go more smoothly for them.

Glad to see your emerging impartiality on this subject. GA

@alive Sounds like you had already formed an opinion on this “question” in advance of asking it. Impartiality is not really the case as @alive isn’t even familiar with basic history (i.e. the Ottoman Empire covered the entire region for hundreds of years until its breakup after WW1). There were no boundaries, period. The entire Middle East and Africa have arbitrarily drawn borders. In fact, you could make that argument about pretty much every country on Earth. The only difference is when the boundaries were drawn. As an example, India and Pakistan are still fighting over Kashmir, or Iraq’s attempted invasion/annexation of Kuwait.

“Israel is a product of the U.S. and British imperialist policy of aggression. After World War II Israel could not have existed at all without U.S. imperialist fosterage, and it would never have dared to launch an attack against the Arab states without U.S. imperialist support. It is U.S. imperialism that has instigated Israel to attack Syria; it is U.S. imperialism that, in league with British imperialism, has threatened to reopen the Gulf of Aqaba by force of arms; it is again U.S. imperialism that has been supplying Israel with large quantities of arms in order to mount sudden attacks on the United Arab Republic and the other Arab countries. Facts have fully proved that U.S. imperialism is the back-stage manager of Zionism and the No. 1 enemy of the Arab people and the people of the world.” Chinese Government Statement

@RareDenver Is that meant to be a joke? China, source of all things true…

I don’t have a dog in this fight…but why aren’t we giving the American Indians back their land?