Originally Posted by Peter Jones
The modern unrest in that region started when Israel was arbitrarily created out of other people's land in 1948. No compensation was offered or even contemplated, and no acceptable arrangements were made for rehousing those people displaced. Israel has behaved ever since with total contempt for its non-Jewish citizens, who really epitomise the term "second class citizen". If they wanted to inflame sensitivities they could hardly do a better job. Who knows, perhaps they do.
The "modern unrest" has long and deep roots in history. Israel was NOT arbitrarily created out of other people's land - Israel's land was returned to its original owners. While there may be some debate about the efficacy of that decision given all that has transpired in the region since the Jews first had the land taken from them by the Arabs, there really can be no debate that the Jewish people were the initial owners and that they have had possession of that land off and on throughout history.

The region was initially called Judea and inhabited by the Jews until the Romans conquered and renamed it Palestine. Later the Arabs conquered it and had primary possession for the next 1000 or so years. There was always at least a portion of the Jewish people who longed for return to what they considered holy land. More recently Britain was granted Palestine for the express purpose of returning it to the Jewish people. That's when the Arabs decided it was "their" land and that the Jews should be purged from the area. Rather than carrying out their original mandate, Britain attempted to stem Jewish immigration to the region until other countries started making demands in support of Jewish immigration after the Holocaust. Eventually in 1947 the UN stepped in and attempted to "split the baby" into Arab and Jewish states. The Jews would have settled for that, but the Arabs refused and there has been conflict between them pretty much ever since.

In many respects it's difficult to take sides, or to fail to see some merit in the positions of each side - what would the US response be if all of a sudden Native Americans decided they were going to take back "their" land and that they were going to do it by force? Would their early treatment by the US government play any role in justifying such action? There just are no simple answers to this kind of conflict...