Monday, 21st June 2010

The Dutch politician Geert Wilders has hit the bullseye:

‘Jordan is Palestine,’ said Wilders, who heads the third-largest party in Holland. ‘Changing its name to Palestine will end the conflict in the Middle East and provide the Palestinians with an alternate homeland...There has been an independent Palestinian state since 1946, and it is the kingdom of Jordan.’ Wilders also called on the Dutch government to refer to Jordan as Palestine and move its embassy to Jerusalem.

Wilders has spoken the big inconvenient truth. As a result, it is inevitably being dismissed as merely what ‘the right’ regularly says. So of course it's untrue, on the grounds that, by definition, everything ‘the right’ says is untrue. Yadda yadda.

But it is not untrue. It is correct. Anyone familiar with the history knows it is correct. Immediately after World War One, Palestine consisted of what is now Jordan, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza. The great powers dividing up the region decided that Britain should be given a mandate to administer Palestine and restore within it the historic Jewish national home. Within a couple of years, however, Winston Churchill, for reasons of realpolitik, gave away three quarters of Palestine to the Hashemite dynasty to found (Trans)Jordan (leaving all the rest to be settled by the Jews; but that’s another story).

So Jordan is indeed Palestine. As Camie Davis points out, the Arabs themselves repeatedly said so:

Jordanians, for decades, were avid proponents of the ‘Jordan is Palestine’ position. They used that position as justification for the annexation of the West Bank, arguing that Palestine was one single, indivisible unit, and that Jordan was the legitimate governing body of Palestine...

‘We are the government of Palestine, the army of Palestine and the refugees of Palestine.’ Prime Minister of Jordan, Hazza' al-Majali, 23 August 1959

‘Palestine and Transjordan are one.’ King Abdullah, Arab League meeting in Cairo, 12 April 1948

‘Palestine is Jordan and Jordan is Palestine; there is one people and one land, with one history and one and the same fate.’ Prince Hassan, brother of King Hussein, addressing the Jordanian National Assembly, 2 February 1970

‘Jordan is not just another Arab state with regard to Palestine, but rather, Jordan is Palestine and Palestine is Jordan in terms of territory, national identity, sufferings, hopes and aspirations.’ Jordanian Minister of Agriculture, 24 September 1980

'The truth is that Jordan is Palestine and Palestine is Jordan.' King Hussein 1981

Indeed, until 1970 the Palestine Liberation Organisation conducted terrorist operations against Jordan on the grounds that it was Palestine and the Hashemite minority was ruling the Palestinian majority. It was only after Jordan killed thousands of Palestinians in 'Black September' (and who in the west ever cared about that??) that Israel suddenly became the sole historic homeland’ of the Palestinians and Jordan was airbrushed out of the picture -- and the fabrication of ‘Palestinianism’ became the accepted truth.

But as 'Palestinian' politician Zouhair Moussein told the Dutch newspaper Trouw in 1977 (hat tip: Israel Matzav):

The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct ‘Palestinian people’ to oppose Zionism.

For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.

It is the west’s refusal to acknowledge this connection, and wholly to misrepresent instead both the history of the region and the causes of the conflict in the Middle East, which is one of the principal reasons why that murderous impasse continues to this day.

There can be no peace without justice; and there can be no justice without truth. Wilders has told the truth. With the west’s collective brain twisted beyond reason by lies, he will of course be vilified and dismissed for doing so. The bigger the truth, the greater the vilification and the more ‘right-wing’ the truth-teller becomes in order to neutralise his challenge to the lies.

That’s why the bad guys are winning.