What Could Israel do to End the Stalemate

 

The Western World constantly holds Israel responsible for the failure of the two state peace option which is at the center of every attempt to make peace between the Arabs residing in the areas under Arab semiautonomous control, also known as the Palestinian Authority (PA). The problem is not that Israel had not offered sufficient concessions in order to reach peace. The Zionists are blamed for the lack of peace as they keep drumming the drums for Israel to take the lands. Their claim that the Arabs will be better off under Israeli rule, though likely true, foes against the leftists’ demands that Israel must be held responsible and until the Arabs accept their peace offerings then Israel obviously has not done enough to soothe the Arabs. There is a simple problem, and that is the difference between what the Europeans are selling and what the United States is selling and what the PA and its Arab ruling elite desire. First off, the Western World needs to understand that as long as they continue to reward the PA with monies and full out support, then its leaders who benefit the most from this situation will force the situation to appear hopeless and the Israelis are encroaching on Arab sacred lands and must offer more. The leaders are cagy as they never exactly define what they demand as more. Is it a state of their own? Obviously not, as they could have had that really easily for the nineteen years when Jordan illegally occupied the lands they today claim is all theirs including the Temple Mount and Old City as they sit in what has become known as East Jerusalem. Israel does not want to surrender these lands as they realize just as sure as if the Islamic State held these lands that every vestige of Jewish historic presence would necessarily need to be uprooted and destroyed. That gives us a hint as to why no peace can be fashioned that the PA can be willing to accept.

 

Israel could offer everything the world claims the PA desires, which is interesting because the PA has never made a claim that would end the incessant demands for Israel to surrender more and to give more. The thing is these demands are not necessarily true as the Arabs will not have become satiated even were Israel to give them everything they have demanded. Even meeting their every demand as interpreted by the rest of the world it would not be sufficient. Israel could unilaterally surrender all the lands just as Israel did with Gaza and the PA would gobble up the lands and continue to demand that Israel is on precious Arab historic lands. That would not be sufficient. The problem is the Western World’s definition of the PA claim being limited to the areas which Jordan controlled is too small a claim. The PA demands total removal of Israel from the lands originally held by the Ottoman Empire. The PA has no desire for a two state solution or even a one state solution where they are rewarded for their intransigence with a reward of all the lands and even then they would not form a state. They would start to demand that the lands they now controlled be made into a perfect Islamic area and that would be insufficient. The PA will never bring themselves to form a state as they would then have to claim they are satisfied with the state they will never realize. The Palestinians want a zero state solution. They want Israel destroyed and to climb atop the rubble and demand more as their real claim is everything from the River to the Sea to become the center from which the next Jihad will be launched. They want their area with Jerusalem as its capital to be the central pillar in a new caliphate which will stretch across the entirety of the globe. They further will demand that their areas which would necessarily now hold equality with Mecca and Medina and would cleanse the area of all undesired entities. For the record, that would mean Christians as well as the Jews would need to be removed. The entirety of the area would even need to be cleansed of even the wrong kinds of Muslims. If the area is to serve as the center of a world caliphate, then it must be made clean and pure. That is why the PA is only interested in what must be termed a zero state solution as their area is to serve as the central capital of the New Caliphate. That is the reality which nobody is willing to identify as the heart of the reasons that no peace can be reached with those who promise to continue the struggle until, and there lies the problem, the PA has never and never can or will define what they demand as they know not what would be sufficient to be worthy of their idealized claims and therein lies the problem.

 

The problem goes far further than just the PA demands as the Muslim groups throughout Europe, northern Africa and beyond into the Americas where they are demanding rights and privileges all set towards spreading the areas of society under their control or influence. Every bank offering Islamic loans has bent a knee to Allah and thus has surrendered. It is just a matter of time before they come completely under Sharia and can only use Islamic approved loans and practices. The secret is the entire world is their oyster and the PA desires to be the pearl stealing the top spot from Mecca and Medina and centering it on Jerusalem. Or, if Jerusalem does not please the rest of the Islamic world, then at least Damascus would suffice, which did serve one offshoot of Islam as their location for the Haj to be met and performed, as Mecca and Medina were off limits and Jerusalem held insufficient nice weather being located in a desolation which had spread over the lands. We now know today that the desolation which held the lands surrounding Jerusalem was in response to the lands not being in the hands of the chosen people, the Jews. This has been made even more evident with the return of the Jews and the fruitfulness the lands have provided Jew and non-Jews alike. The fact the lands which belong unto Israel only produce for the Jewish people has stood the test of time as every occupying power from the Babylonians to the present day has proven incapable of getting the lands to produce without it being populated primarily by the Jewish People. Populated primarily by the Jewish People does not necessarily mean a majority as it means as a place where the Jewish People can work the lands and meet their obligations in serving Hashem. The PA would rather the lands become a fetid and putrefied wasteland of no value or use to any sane people; yet, the PA would sacrifice the lands of milk and honey, when the Jews are present, into the barren wastelands resembling the nuclear wastelands describes in so many futuristic novels. That is the PA solution; the Zero State solution.

 

One need look no further than the destroyed greenhouses left with the Arab workers who had assisted the Jews in fulfilling a multi-million dollar per year industry providing goods for the Europeans. These were the greenhouses of Gaza which could have produced such wealth and profits but as they had previously belonged to the Jews, these multi-million-dollar ultra-modern greenhouses were ransacked and destroyed with terrorists ripping out the PVC piping and metal pipes in order to fashion weapons of war from them. One can only wonder how long it took the terrorists of Hamas and Islamic Jihad to learn that PVC pipes make equally poor rockets as they do launching tubes. About the only good use such items have is as a bomb casing and even then they are not a sufficient fragmentation device. Still, the greenhouses and residences and every last vestige of the Jew had to necessarily be destroyed as anything less would only serve as a reminder that at one point Islam did not rule over these lands, and such a thought must never be allowed by modern Islamic rulers. As the Islamic State barbarians have provided ample proof that they have wantonly wreaked havoc while destroying every last vestige of ancient precious works as the fact they predate Islam is a thought they are unwilling to admit. This was even proven in spades when while Egypt was under the rule of President Morsi there were discussions on how to best remove such icons as the Sphynx and even the Great Pyramid as artillery was known to have proven to be insufficient. The inability of Islam to recognize anything predating Islam despite the Quran actually stating that Christianity and Judaism existed before Islam has proven too difficult for the leaders of the Islamic State and their followers leading them to destructions reminiscent of the Mongol hordes. The PA also suffers from a similar malady as they have used heavy construction equipment upon the Temple Mount in attempts to destroy any remnants of the First or Second Temples, the Temples of Solomon and Herod.

 

Arab Palestinian Sets Self on Fire Attempting to Throw Molotov Cocktail

 

This will be the symptom of Islamic preeminent thinking as they spread their contorted form of modern Islam connoted by the acts and wanton destruction in its wake wherever it has raised their black flag signaling their conquest. The current extreme of Hamas and Islamic Jihad who have made the claim of their intent to destroy every vestige of Israeli existence by simply setting about destroying all inferences that any civilization other than that which Islam built ever existed upon any location on earth is just as evil and horrific as the destructions carried out by the Taliban of the ancient Buddhas or the Islamic State destruction of Palmyra. Both show the inability of Islam to permit any inference that it is not the only force ever to exist and the beginning and end of all that is, was or ever will be. Such belittles the history of man and the accomplishments made in the name of science. The Church took a similar stand against science and eventually lost as it brought on the Reformation which challenged the very right of the Church, then named the Catholic Church, which has stood until modernity, to reevaluate its stance against science which led even the most backwards, flat-earth believers to slowly be dragged along as science broke down wall after wall until the light of day and scientific advancement shone through to even the darkest corners. Now there is Islam threatening to force mankind into yet another Dark Ages and this time there will not be any celestial rock striking the Earth leaving behind a winter which lasts for a third of a decade before finally lifting to put mankind back into an age nobody should desire return. Unfortunately, such has not bothered the Islamic State and would not bother the PA, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and others if it served to place the entirety of the world under the banner of Islam. Destroying much of scientific knowledge rendering mankind back to an age where darkness filled not only the night but also crept ever slowly into the day until the last spark of scientific curiosity was surrendered to Allah, then it would be for the better as surrender to Allah is what Islam is all about. No free will, no freedom to discover, no freedom to be unique, no freedom of thought; only the Quran and the knowledge contained within would be accepted under such a state and that alone would force the deaths of tens of millions from starvation and disease that currently are preventable, but that does not matter as long as everyone has surrendered to Allah even if that requires their surrender of their life for Allah as that is the ways of Allah, to worship death and shun life.

 

 

The difference between the Islamic State and Hamas is negligible and Hamas was born out of the PLO just as was Fatah with Hamas being the religious Jihadi wing who have only grown more violent and more extremist while Fatah began as the Statist (Fascist) Jihadi wing which has from necessity slowly but irrevocably drifted into a religious Jihadi entity who have become all but identical to Hamas. Where Fatah’s goal is the destruction of Israel with the death visited on as many Jews, Christians, Baha’i or any other non-Sunni Islamists while Hamas matches that bet and raises it to hunting down and slaughtering every last Jew on the planet before setting into the final purification through Jihadi slaughter of all non-Sunni/Shia on the planet. The efforts put forth by Western governments and organizations to try and differentiate between the good Muslims and the bad Islamists is a game bred in futility as there is only one Islam in the final equation. There is this odd occurrence in Islamic neighborhoods which goes something like this: the Muslims who first establish the neighborhood are middle class and do what they must to assimilate while still practicing a benign form of Islam which repeat quotes from the Mecca Quran. The neighborhood grows and at some point things begin to change. The call to prayer creeps backwards from 7:30 AM to around 4:15 AM while the final call to prayer creeps from 3:30 PM to 10:45 PM and with each five minute increment the volume jumps a good five to ten decibels. That is quite a fair jump especially when it approaches 100+ decibels (rock concert and almost jet engine range). Sermons by the Imam become more radical or a new Imam arrives and produces the same result with the former Imam obediently following the new Imam and translating his decisions to those who do not speak Arabic. While this radicalizing of the prayers and the Mosque and all other Islamic activities, there is another effort to grow the outreach to the youth to strictly follow the teachings of the new more radical Imam. The lessons turn to how Islam is superior and must become the sole religion and political entity and the youth are instrumental in achieving these goals. All the while more and more verses from the Medina Quran start replacing the milder Mecca Quranic verses until the services become radicalized calling for Jihad. At some point along the way there will be one who objects and let us just say that person was the last person to resist the new order. The violent Jihad will have replaced the quiet and peaceful Jihad. Now Islam is preparing to take their proper place as the dominant religion and political force. They will infiltrate certain areas of the governance starting with the education departments where they inject critical Islamic views and practices in such a manner as not to startle parents but to get their children acclimated to Islam. They will demand that local branches of banks implement Islamic lending practices which, contrary to some have claimed, still permits interest but instead of being a percentage applied over time, it is a set price for a loan of so many months where paying it off early does not save money and there are penalties for late payments. The bookkeeping for Islamic financing is easier and requires nothing more than looking up the fee for the loan on a chart when the loan is taken and that’s that. Soon women walking in the neighborhood are required to wear head-covers, and then more modesty, and more modesty, and then require male relative escorting them and the women who do not comply must be harlots and are treated as such. Rapes of non-Muslim women becomes commonplace to the point that every non-Muslim girl whether modestly dressed or not is rape target if not escorted by sufficient male forces to prevent such. This may require five or more men escorting any non-Muslim women. This acts as an incentive for women to convert to Islam at which point they are married off to a Muslim man and if lucky remain in their native country and if not they find themselves as part of a harem where as the only white woman being treated extremely poorly as the outsider who does not belong. They may even end up dead. The entirety of what Islam uses to impel and compel a slide from Islam is peace, just read the Mecca Quran which is all about cooperation and coexistence, to eventually the Medina Quran, which is all supremacy, violence and destruction leading to replacement of governance with Islam, as Islam is about surrender to Allah which includes surrender to the whims of the Imams. A simple summary can be read here with numerous links offered in comments which answer many of the questions one might have, all in all our readers have grown this essay into a complete history.

 

The end result is that an Islamic oriented community is little different than any other community in a new land. The first immigrants are coming to escape the old ways or seeking a better life in the new lands be it Australia, the United States, China, Italy, Spain, New Caledonia or wherever and their highest desire is to be accepted, to fit in. They manage to do just that and this lays the foundation for the next influx that are mostly interested in a better life but are less inclined to completely melt in the melting pot. They refuse to melt entirely and begin mild agitation. These immigrants bring another group behind them and this group has sufficient numbers to make-up half of the community and they brought the old world with them. Now you have confrontation between the old world and the new world. In the past the old world was willingly discarded in favor of the opportunities and progress the people of each group had managed to make. With the Islamic neighborhood the first big wave which now made-up half the population arrived with as much if not more money than the existing community. This gave them weight that was not at the disposal of most other second wave immigrants. These newer arrivals slowly but inexorably moved the community towards being more radicalized. Eventually these newer members of the society were found to be activist instigators and influence peddlers. They actually had paid position from the homelands to sway the youth, use the youth spying on their parents to find where the resistance was and eradicate them by heavy persuasion or even violence, but not quite to the point that law enforcement were involved, or at least rarely. These newer arrivals and the continuing flow of newer arrivals drags the community towards an offensive group which demands preeminence and take over one area of the political arena after another. They start with education and flow on to housing where they can provide their own with the best places and begin through assigned housing and other actual government programs of which Section 8 housing to convert new neighborhoods to Islam. The end result is the Western World, Europe in particular (which some have apparently figured out, even more than those who read the above article, though we like to believe it made a difference, that this is the threat) is the threat that the entirety of nations are coming under Islamic control and if steps are not taken soon, and these might even lead to open confrontations, which may not be as bad as the alternatives, then entire nations such as Great Britain, Germany, Hungary, Finland, Sweden (who probably deserve what they get after their threats and declarations concerning Israel) and who knows where else, just look for Islam jumping ugly and you will know and that is where to start. Pushing back against the Medina Quran and demanding Islam live by the Mecca Quran ( see link) as given above and learn and then use what you learn to see where your city might be and whether you need be concerned. Our claim is be afraid, be very afraid, but do not let that ruin everyday life, just demand that your style of life not be destroyed by foreign fanatics; it is that simple, so go for it.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

What is the Source Driving the Stabbing Intifada?

The experts have come out with their reasons for the current violence claiming that the Stabbing Intifada or the Intifada III and many of them completely miss the mark claiming that it is all about Arab nationalism. The actual attackers who are arrested will very likely give a plethora of reasoning for why they attacked Israelis hoping their targets were Jewish. Some will claim they did it to force Israel to give the Arabs a state. Such reasoning has so little reason and logic to it that one must question what the underlying reasons exist. Some will claim they did it simply to kill Jews because the Jews are the enemies of Islam meaning their reason was religious. Many would give completely different excuses or reasons if they were questioned on every Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday for three weeks. What you would only hear on the rarest of occasions was that they really were not sure why they tried or succeeded in murdering an Israeli. Due to the constant drumbeat of incitement in all forms of media and especially on the social media and entertainment, they saw killing a Jew as a way to fame and financial security for the family plus gained honor for their family. What is not taken into consideration is what the reality is in the entire Arab/Israeli Conflict, and that is the fly in the ointment.

Arab Palestinian Youths Armed and Ready
for Taking Their Place as Islamic Soldiers
in the Holy War Against Israel, the Jews
and the World, in That Order

Whenever there is an Intifada, it is the result of increased incitement mixed with actual attacks by terrorists with a clean record as far as the Israeli authorities’ records thus not considered affiliated with any of the terror entities. A small number of these are over a short period of time coordinated with concentrated glorification blended with celebratory remembrances of terror heroes from previous Intifadas complete with the naming of parks, streets and other events or celebratory naming with possibly the honoring with speeches and sermons for the terrorists who are committing the current murders. This would have the effect ripe for others to be given the slightest impetus to go and commit their own attacks against Israelis. Since the initial attacks were committed using knives, then knives became the weapon of choice until there was the incitement calling for vehicular attacks and then some vehicular assaults began to happen. There were even some shooting attacks even without any raw instigation aimed at such but they were rewarded with recognition right along with the stabbers and drivers who targeted Israelis. The real defining forces behind the Intifada are also those who define the reason behind the need for such tactics. Why the individual attackers went out has no effect on the reasons that the conflict continues without any solution, and that is the reason that these youths are ending up in hospital and worse, giving their lives for something they do not even understand. They are risking throwing away their lives for a cause defined by the few people at the top of Fatah and Hamas who both have only two actual aims for their continuing the conflict; the complete destruction of the Jewish State of Israel followed by the eradication of Jews world-wide while also placing the entire world under the yoke of Islam. I know, nobody thinks about conquering the world since World War II and the Cold War as that proved that such was an impossible task as the Roman Empire failed, the Greek Empire Failed, the Persian Empire failed, the Mongol Empire failed, the British came close through colonization as did Spain, France, Portugal, Netherlands, and other colonialists and neither did the Ottoman Islamic Empire succeed in conquering the world. Probably the closest any nation had come to conquering the world would be American culture.

The problem is nobody bothered to tell the Muslim world who believe that they will one day rule Andalusia replacing Spain and Palestine replacing Israel then take the Balkans followed by Rome along with the rest of Europe which is part of the reasoning behind the refugee invasion into Europe. The refugees have a fairly significant number of Islamists intermixed with the real refugees, the exact percentage is unknown but our belief, and this is pure conjecture, that somewhere between fifteen and twenty percent of the refugees. The majority of these plants into the refugee numbers are likely of two varieties, those who will lead instigations immediately causing disturbances hoping that the other Muslims will act as Islamic warriors and join these disturbances and possibly continue to cause disruptions even without the lead of the instigator planted amongst them. The other instigators are more likely planners whose jobs will come into play later when they work alongside the Imams who will be sent to lead the congregations of the new Mosques which will be started across Europe in every neighborhood from the smallest hamlet to the largest megalopolis such as London, Paris, Dresden and Marseilles. In most of these cities there are churches and even potentially Cathedrals which will be used as Mosques, a sad but obvious future just as the Hagia Sophia was converted into a Mosque by the Ottoman Empire.

Hagia Sophia Mosque as transformed
by Islamic Conquerors was once the
Greatest of Cathedrals in the World
Until Constantinople fell to Islamic forces

The story in Europe has already been written and it is easy to read even today. Go into the Cathedrals and if they are open they have next to no parishioners. The same is true in the churches across Europe. In the previous communist nations, the Warsaw Pact nations there might be some who are going to their churches but most of them are far older and will dwindle over the coming decades. Meanwhile the Islamic women are producing babies and the Christian women will often end up marrying a Muslim man because he has drive and charm and something he believes in and that is an interesting aphrodisiac. Within the next few years Europe will accommodate their new arrivals and start slowly adopting Sharia. Get it straight that it is not called Sharia Law; it is just Sharia and is instrumental in changing lands from any religion to Islam. Don’t believe us just look at the entirety of the Middle East and across North Africa (MENA) and all you will find are pockets of beleaguered and desperate Christians; if you find any, you will find no or negligible numbers of Jews because they had already been sent out with only the old and the foolish remained behind. Now it is the time for the Christians to be finished off, to be given the inevitable choice Sharia eventually leads to, convert or die or if you take one of the early choices, run for your life possibly escaping in the dead of night with maybe two small suitcases leaving all else behind. The Christian numbers have been eroded across all of the nations in MENA until they can no longer offer real resistance to becoming Dhimmis under Sharia which eventually ends with convert or die. That law has already been applied to Saudi Arabia and will be followed by Iraq and the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) nations of the Arabian Peninsula. There are already churches across Europe and in the United States who have dissolved their congregations, if you can call the few they held a congregation, and these congregations are either finding a new congregation or slowly losing their religion altogether. This has happened and the Europeans who paid any attention saw it happen but that was close to a century ago and has not been as necessary in modern times. It has occurred over the last few decades, say about seven decades, where Jordan started the drive and the Arab Palestinians accelerated the driving out of the Christians from Bethlehem and Nazareth as well as less well known Christian communities within the areas controlled by Arabs within the area of Israel controlled by the Arab Palestinians or their sympathizers within Israel proper.

Bethlehem is the perfect example city as it was peaking around eighty percent of the population was Christian just half a century ago. They lived what might have been called a blessed place of contentment and protection under Jordanian occupation. Slowly it started and the city appeared to be slowly losing its Christian population. Many of the women, or at least far too many for the health of the community, were marrying Muslim men. The Muslim men often had more than one wife and they were producing babies at twice the rate or more than the Christians who were beleaguered and being slowly assaulted. After the Six Day War the Christians had a period of relief but still their numbers were waning while there were more and more Muslims. Once the Oslo Accords gifted Bethlehem to Arab control the die had been cast. The Arab Palestinians began a concerted effort to force the Christians from Bethlehem and the rest of their autonomous zones, areas which have been constantly expanding as they push the Christian and Jews from entire areas and replace them with Muslim families. Today it was Bethlehem; so will it really be Marseilles in the upcoming years?

Marseilles with a beautiful cathedral
gracing its skyline which unfortunately
will be used eventually as Mosque as Islam
becomes the dominant religion and force
throughout Europe replacing all other religions

It all appears innocent at first until these tactics of throwing stones through the display window every other week and the glass shop keeps raising the price as he knows your window had become a form of the Jizyah, the Islamic tax which non-Muslims must pay in order to be protected from the ravages of the young and easily molded youth who are otherwise attacking individuals or throwing stones through display windows and stealing merchandise often brazenly right in front of the store owner challenging them to say something. Should a store owner actually protest they will find their store soon ransacked and then they themselves will be marked for attack and be made fearful wherever they go? Eventually it all builds up and either the Christian family packs what they can carry and flee before they end up dead like their friend, and almost every Christian knows of a friend who simply disappeared or their mangled body was discovered in a very public place one morning. As the church loses patrons they eventually are forced to sell and the Muslims have the ready monies that is why there is the Jizyah has been collected towards, the down payment on the church, business, and home of a Christian who sees the writing on the wall and flees.

There is one place in all of the MENA areas where the numbers of Christians is growing and their congregations are quite healthy, and that is Israel within the Green Line. These Christians are raising their families and attending their churches as Christianity is flourishing in Eretz Yisroel because of the Jews being in control and accounting for over two-thirds of the population and control the schools and other media with the exception of social media which is replete with Islamic incitement and Islamic outreach designed to force young Christians from Christianity and into the Islamic fold and once there one is kept under control until the entire congregation has been converted, scared away or eventually murdered. This is what is in Europe’s future and also after that will come the United States unless people realize the hole left in their lives where once there was fulfillment gained from believing in something and having a congregation as your community. Work will never create a community anything like or as strongly bound as a congregation which prays together and shares their beliefs. That is the lost element which could have saved Europe and the United States and why Israel will only grow stronger as the Jews are rediscovering their faith and the powers of faith in Hashem as he does indeed work miracles if only the people stop and notice, but who can stop and notice anything with the hectic schedules most people and their children spend their time running around trying to be complete. Religion filled that empty spot and provided that sense of fulfillment that so many are seeking in all the wrong places. Trust that I understand this first hand as I used to run from one replacement to the next and thankfully finally found the item I had unsuccessfully and blindly sought, and I found it is my religion where it had been all along. It is like hiding in plain sight which is often the darndest thing to find as so few look at what is right in front of them as in the picture above, the symbol of faith which once was the glue which held Marseilles together is the Cathedral right in the center of town as lectured above. When that Cathedral has been converted to a Mosque then all is lost and there may be no turning back. The choice is there for everyone in the western World, they just need to awaken in time.

Beyond the Cusp

Who were the colonizers of MENA Pre-World War I?

 

We hear much talk by the mainstream media and especially the leftist editorialists about how the deprived victims the Arab populations of MENA (Middle East and North Africa) who were subjugated beneath the imperial European (and presumably American) colonizers. Exactly who were these colonizers and for how long had they exploited the citizens of MENA’s lands? Well, according to the liberal and mainstream media story line as they infer, though never quite say outright, were England, France, Italy and Spain. Further, there will be implications of over a century to potentially many centuries these colonial powers ruled over most of the MENA nations with many remaining under colonial control after World War I and even after World War II with the old dynasties lasting through 1970 or even 1979, and the most brash might even claim that there is a colonial power still ruling in the Middle East to this very day, though this last claim is as big a lie as they come. Perhaps a closer look is in order to get an honest picture.

 

Let’s begin with when the nations in MENA first came under imperial control and were placed under the presumed onus of foreign rule. Colonial rule came to the MENA nations in an early period which many of us first heard referenced when we studied the Bible. Perhaps some of the earliest colonial powers are not exactly what many of us would ever consider to be colonial powers yet as these were rulers who conquered other nations and subjugated them, these were the original colonialists. Terms can be applied to situations which most of us never would have considered applicable but when you are weaving a lie it is easy to go overboard in your definitions and apply modern terms to ancient events. The Egyptians would have been the first of the colonial powers many of us knew about despite there were others close to the same age such as the Hittites, Minoans, Mesopotamian, Persian and even Israel under Kings David and Solomon. All of these predated the better known Greek and Roman Empires and dates back to the ancient beginnings of China and Mayan cultures. A handy little timeline can be seen below. For the purpose of choosing a start date, why not begin around the year five-hundred which is after the fall of Rome and the Western Roman Empire while the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantine Empire was limping into the future feebly.

 

 

Timeline of World Civilizations 3700 BCE through 1700 CE

 

 

All the most ancient empires have fallen and for the most part there was peace with each city moving forward loosely attached to Constantinople across the entirety of MENA though the farther west one went across northern Africa, which had less the ties to the Byzantine rule. This left this area ripe for the pickings and a harvester was about to enter the scene. Shortly before the year seven-hundred a new force emerged under the banner of Islam and began its spread heading initially into the heart of the former lands of Babylon, Persia and into Egypt. There was little resistance as the Byzantine Empire was crumbling and unable to field a credible defense. Jerusalem fell in April 637 to the forces of the Rashidun Caliphate. The conditions for the surrender were understood to be the conquering Islamic rulers would give guarantees of civil and religious freedoms for the Christians under the rule from Jerusalem in exchange for Jizya, a tax on non-Muslims given in exchange for their protections which also included the Christians acceptance of Dhimmitude, a form of subservient lower class citizenship which was to be protected and tolerated and condoned. The spread of Islam took place largely in three stages, the first during the life of Mohammad, Next under the first four Caliphs, and finally under Umayyad Rule which was the basis for the Caliphate (see map below).

 

 

Expansion of Islam Across MENA and threaten Europe before Ottoman Rule

 

 

After the spread of the Caliphate which continued what was technically an empire which implied colonization over territories beyond the initial founding under Mohammad which was centered around Medina, the beginnings of Mohammad’s power, and included the Mecca region which Mohammad took partially as it was the closes power base, the Meccan rulers denied Mohammad’s claim to rightful ruler and had chased the early Mohammad from their territories as they rejected his preaching and teachings and determined he was a corrupting influence. The Caliphate had followed particular lines of succession which had split early after Mohammad’s death which formed the duality which still splits Islam into competing camps of Sunnis and Shiites. For the largest part the Sunni Muslims outnumbered and were the stronger camp though never quite capable, or more likely never made an effort to unify belief as beliefs can be near impossible to be completely defeated thus any effort would eventually prove fruitless and not worth the efforts expended. Instead the Sunni simply kept expanding their empire and largely tolerated the Shiites unless attacked and given no choice. When the two sects did engage each other the Sunni proved superior defeating and often killing the Shiites and their rulers in battle. The Caliphate continued to rule their lands after and expanding conquering Spain and headed into Frankish territory, early France, where the Caliphate reached is furthest advance. After taking Granada they advanced to the next major city, Tours, where a decisive battle turned the tides in the year 732 CE finally having a definitive defeat of the Caliphate forces. The battle victory is credited to Charles Martellus (the Hammer) Martel, who lost a mere thousand to fifteen-hundred of his forces, would later in history be granted the title of savior of Christianity. The vanquished was Abd Ar-Rahman Al Ghafiqi who was slain during the battle along with an estimated twelve-thousand of his warriors.

 

Beginning at the beginning of the fourteenth century the Ottoman Empire began to make its presence felt which would eventually lead to their conquering the entirety of the Caliphate at their most powerful. Until this point the Caliphate ruled over the near entirety of MENA and had spread into Spain and southeastern Europe. The map below shows the advances and periods of the Ottoman Empire conquering the Caliphate, bringing an end to the successions of Caliphs and temporarily ending the violence between Shiite and Sunni camps. The Ottoman succession follows the lineage of Ottoman Beylik who initiated the spread and domain of his family tribe in the year 1300 as his aim was likely like everybody before them, to conquer the known world. The expansions continued from his death in 1359 through 1451 when the next ruler of the Ottomans who expanded the borders notably during his rule through 1481 was Medmed II. He was followed by Selim I (1512-1520) and Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-1566). There was expansion beyond this period where the Ottoman Empire reached its apex before its fortunes began to wane.

 

 

Ottoman Empire Ascending from 1300 through 1683 includes Golden Age of Islam

 

 

The Ottoman Empire caught the Caliphate as it was in retreat after having lost Spain (Andalusia) during the Christian Reconquista which was part of the campaign to rid Spain of its Moorish Muslims as well as the Jews and any other group which was not Catholic and sworn fealty to the crown. This period of the Christian Reconquista was a logical following from the victory at Tours by Charles (the Hammer) Martel and spanned an area of time stretching from its earliest uprisings in the north and northwest in the Battle of Covadonga in the summer of 722, a full decade before the battle of Tours, but this revolt was the very beginning of the end of Islamic rule in Spain (Andalusia). The battles continued until finally the signing of the Treaty of Granada on November 25, 1491. This was the end of the fighting with the turning over of the city of the final southern coastal towns of Granada. It was during the final push that King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile that the infamous Spanish Inquisition was initiated. The Spanish Inquisition lasted from November 1, 1478 through to July 15, 1834. The Inquisition was the attempt, a rather thorough and successful attempt, to convert, drive out or otherwise deal with any residual Moorish or Islamic followers remaining in Spain along with ridding Spain of its Jews who either fled with the Muslims or were chased eventually across all of Europe ending up in Russia and Poland for a while until the Czar’s pogroms drove them into Poland and Germany which set the stage for the Shoah, the Holocaust.

 

There were other adventures which came from Europe somewhat as a response to Islamic Caliphate advances leading up to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. These were known as the Crusades which were an attempt to retake the Holy Land after the initial fall of Jerusalem in April 637. There were four separate crusades which took separate routes reaching the Holy Lands and gathered the troops from various countries, kingdoms and City-States they passed through and could find willing, or sometimes less than willing, forces to join in their ‘holy’ missions. The Crusader routes and periods of duration (shown below on map) began in 1095 with the First Crusade which continued until 1099. The Second Crusade began in 1147 and lasted until 1149. The Third Crusade was initiated in 1189 going into 1192. The Fourth Crusade began in 1202 and terminated in 1204. They had limited success and resulted in making some groups and individuals very wealthy, so much so that they remained in the Middle East despite having to live under Islamic rule. As far as having a definitive effect on the course of history, it is doubtful and at best might be credited with a residual effect of engaging forces which otherwise could have assisted with the attacks on Constantinople but not on events thereafter.

 

 

Crusader Routes I through IV spanning 1095 through 1289

 

 

The Ottoman Empire final began to weaken while the European powers were feeling the results of the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and soon the industrial revolution. While these events were transforming Europe the Ottoman Empire mostly rested on their laurels and stagnated which would cost them as they began to be surpassed by Western technology and discoveries and inventions which led to superior weapons of war. There were three stages of decline for the Ottoman Empire as indicated on the map below. Parts of the Ottoman Empire were held by them for just over a half century, and were under Islamic Caliphate before that for another seven-hundred to almost a thousand years. The final areas of the Ottoman Empire finally fell during World War I and became the Mandate lands from which Iraq, Lebanon, Transjordan (currently Jordan), Syria and Israel were formed. The European colonialists held lands which were formerly under either Ottoman or Caliphate colonial rule for well over a century while the Europeans held these lands for periods of merely a decade or less to the longest being at most a century and those are the exceptions.

 

 

Ottoman Empire in Decline 1800 through 1914 and Start of World War I

 

 

The next map depicts the lands as they were held by European nations after World War I had established their claims in the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. The area outlined in red depicts the mandate lands decided by the San Remo Conference in 1922. These demarcations were proposed initially by the Allied Powers of Great Britain, France, Italy, Japan and Russia. The United States observed the negotiations but was not a direct signatory as the United States desires no holdings, colonial states, mandate responsibilities and was hopeful that they could have assisted in ending this horrific war and had already made their feelings known concerning the restructuring of Europe and the redrawing of boundaries, founding independent states out of the Austria-Hungarian Empire. Eventually the United States was coerced into adding their approval of the Mandate System which many viewed as the most tenuous of the treaties despite the signature of King Faisal signing as the representative for the Arab League.

 

 

Colonial Structure Post World War I defined by Treaties from initial surrender in 1919 through the San Remo Conference setting up the Mandate System in 1922 plus Sykes-Picot redrawing of much of the Middle East

 

 

The final map below depicts the independent states and their dates when their current governments or their freedom from European colonial rule came about. These dates are meaningful as it puts to a lie the claims you will likely hear about how these nations were under colonial rule and only recently gained their independence. There will be other lies which will be half-truths or misinformation by giving one impressions knowing the reality is totally different.

 

 

Dates that the MENA nations received their independence after colonial rule many since the times of the Persians or even earlier

 

 

The actual history which needs to be remembered is that many of these nations have been ruled by outside forces since the very early ages of civilizations while others were once inhabited by a nation which either was destroyed in history or faced a natural disaster which placed their population, that which survived, within another culture where they assimilated and disappeared from history though they often brought skills with them which benefited their host nation which likely made them more welcome. One example of the last occurrence was the Minoan civilization which resided on the Isle of Santorini in the Mediterranean Sea. Everything was going along really great as they had their religion and held their sacrifices, one of which is of interest if you know your Hebrew Bible. The Minoans had a spring ritual which was intended to bring fertility to their crops, their herds, their people and to benefit all parts of their society. In this sacrifice they had to prepare a feast using newly born calf boiled and then roasted and brushed with a preparation made from the calf’s mother’s milk. Anyway, the Minoans were happily fishing and enjoying the wonderful Mediterranean weather until the ground rumbled and the caldera erupted all but destroying the entire Island which has slowly resurfaced in the ensuing years. Santorini is located between the Greek mainland and Cyprus in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea (see picture with map insert below). Santorini is still a dangerous place and potentially threatened with another eruption. Like most volcanoes, it is not a matter of if but of when the next devastating eruption pours forth and erases all traces of human development or existence as the Island may be blown completely apart only to rise from the Mediterranean depths with a whole new look and geography just as it has done throughout all of history. The homes and island is beautiful and a jewel glittering in the Mediterranean Sea and we can only hope it continues to glitter from the lights on the porches of the homes and not from lava belching forth from out of the sea.

 

 

Volcano Thera Caldera Santorini Island Ancient Home of the Minoan Civilization until Eruption just ruined their day

 

 

When we look at the history of MENA nations one need remember that much of the area was also the cradle of civilization and as such had a distressing habit of spawning great civilizations which came, expanded as far as they could reach, overreached or had a number of bad years or the next great civilization either defeated and overran their empire or the two had a merger of sorts as exampled by the Greeks being subsumed by the Roman Empire which did not exactly destroy the four Greek sub-Empires as much as they incorporated as the Greeks saw an advantage of being the center of education and philosophy while the Romans knew of the Greek intellect and their ability to fashion weapons. That is not to say there were not conflicts, but somehow both civilizations influenced each other for the better. But even before Rome, before the Greeks, before the Persians there were the Babylonians, the Israelite Kingdom, the Hittite, the Egyptian and the Mesopotamian Empires. Each ruled and the areas of MENA can be said to have survived as best the individual tribes, city-states, empires, nations and peoples could be expected. There were the Ancient Empires which lasted from prehistory through the Greeks of Alexander. Alexander the Great was the last of the ancient empire builders and his would be the first of the new age empires, the actual colonialists of history. From here many empires claimed to be setting out to conquer the world but they also knew that dream could not be realized in one’s lifetime. Even here the states of MENA faced the Greeks followed by the Romans then the Byzantines as Rome broke into two Empires, the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantine; and the western Roman or what became the Holy Roman Empire. Even European nations became colonized as there were the intra-European empires such as the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, Charlemagne, Napoleon and eventually the Nazis. After the Byzantine Empire collapsed there was the Caliphate followed by the Ottoman Empire, the two main Islamic Empires. During their time in power there were still the Mongols who came to conquer the world and instead converted to Islam by in large. China and India had their effect on the nations of the Middle East and also set up that area for who could take control of the trade routes. It was because of lack of access to these very trade routes which launched the European age of colonization which is the final or modern stage. Where the age of European conquest began in the late fifteenth century with Columbus and the other explorers heading to lay claim to the new lands in the Americas, then started an age of conquest as the natives were not as advanced when it came to warfare. The one advantage of living in the most contested lands in the world is you build up some formidable weaponry and tactics which the native tribes of the Americas were of no match.

 

The lands which form MENA were already colonized by the Ottomans who had a number of other cultures which also fought with their colonizers as all had a common bond which was Islam. This made these lands too much of a threat plus the Europeans had learned to have a healthy respect for the Ottomans and the followers of Islam through the Crusades and the wars which were barely able to constrain the Ottomans from sweeping across Europe. Much of that was due to the King of Poland and Lithuania John III Sobieski who came and relieved the city of Vienna from the Ottoman siege and brought that offensive to a conclusive end. Still, there was little attempt until into the nineteenth century before any assaults were waged on a by then weakened and almost backward sclerotic empire. Taking fair stock on the years of actual colonialization we see that the MENA nations, of which Syria is no exception except like Israel there was an Assyrian Empire which did not extend to anywhere near as vast an area as the more well-known colonizing empires, otherwise Syria has been a colony of somebody for a very long time. The ancient Empires spanned a good three-thousand years or more depending on sources. The middle empires which include the Roman, Byzantine, the Caliphate and the Ottoman Empires lasted almost two-thousand years. The final age was the European age of colonization of the MENA area which lasted less than two hundred years and when we speak of the Middle East itself it is even shorter barely making a century with Syria being far less and Iran almost untouched by the European colonizers. So, when the news reports tell of how these poor nations have been colonies for near an inestimable time and have not tasted freedom until only the most recent of times and even then most were brutal dictatorships, there is some truth. The problem is for the vast majority we were talking of Biblical era and pre Biblical times all the way through the Greeks and to the Roman Empire after the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire these lands were ruled by Muslims for the majority of the modern ages.

 

 

Mandate of San Remo for French and British including actual treaty demarcations for each nation

 

 

The Europeans only poured in at the end of the Ottoman Empire as it fell with the final areas which included Syria not falling until World War I thus not becoming a colony of the Europeans until around 1920 and with the areas of Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Israel they were not colonies as much as protectorates being held secure from invasions by the British and the French starting in 1922 with the enactment of the San Remo Conference. The above map shows the League of Nations proposed British and French Mandates with the demarcations for Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Transjordan and Israel. This mandate was carved from the remains of the Ottoman Empire where the nation of Turkey was what would remain as the originator of the entire Ottoman Empire while these areas above plus Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Yemen and Oman were brought into being and Saudi Arabia gained complete and uncontested control over Mecca and Medina. These maps and dates should arm those wishing to have the truth behind their arguments readily available to speak to what exactly Europe owes the refugees and victims of colonial rule when in reality it is the Arabian Peninsula, the originator of the Caliphate, and Turkey as the original source for the Ottoman Turks who founded the Ottoman Empire. The Europeans as far as Syria is concerned were a brief caretaker that lasted barely twenty-six years, exactly the same as it did for Israel and Israel has only had to take in over one million Jewish refugees from across the lands that make up MENA as many of them drove their Jews from their lands during the late 1940s and through the 1950s with some from Ethiopia and Russia coming even later and still taking in the Bnei Menashe from India and Israel will continue to take in Jewish refugees from the world over and has also taken in other refugees including but not limited to the Vietnamese boat people and Christians seeking refuge from persecutions. It makes one wonder how many refugees have been taken in by Saudi Arabia, Kuwait (who after the Gulf War which freed them from Saddam Hussein thanked the Palestinian workers for the support which Yasser Arafat lauded on Saddam Hussein and flew every last one back to the Palestinian Occupied areas of Judea and Samaria), Qatar (whose Al-Jazeera news service so gallantly praised and supported the uprisings in the hopes of placing the Muslim Brotherhood in charge of as many nations as possible and almost won Egypt and really urged on the war in Syria until it turned so very ugly) or Bahrain. One might expect these wealthy nations to assist their Arab brothers and sisters but nary a word from them except to demand that Europe do their part because the Europeans had colonies in the area for an average of fifty years compared to the one thousand year rule of Islam as the Caliphate and the Ottoman Empires. Europe should offer to take in refugees one for every twenty that the nations of the Arabian Peninsula give refuge to, that would be fair and proportional but don’t hold your breath.

 

Beyond the Cusp