From the River to the Sea, Palestine Indeed Will Be Free

Because “Palestine” is Israel.

Look at the map below. The Jordan River is on the east (i.e., the right, for those of you who took Woke Geography). The Mediterranean Sea is on the west (i.e., on the left). In between is a land mass. Most of it is “Israel,” with cities like Haifa, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Jerusalem, and Be’er Sheva. Some of it is sometimes wrongly called “West Bank” even though its real names are the regions of “Judea” and “Samaria.” On the southwest (the lower left) is a strip called “Gaza.”

Map of Israel, Judea, Samaria, and Gaza (VwM.Mwv/Wikimedia Commons) [This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license]

The day will come when, for once and for all, the Fatah and Hamas terrorist-driven “Palestine Authority” (on the “West Bank”) gets closed down so that the remainder of Judea and Samaria finally is reunified with the Jewish country, just as the eastern portion of Jerusalem and the Golan Heights have been. In other words:

From the river to the sea, Palestine indeed will be free — and one day all will be part of Israel.

The key to clearly understanding this concept — and the inevitable reality — is that “Palestine” is Israel.

Again: “Palestine” is Israel.

One more time: “Palestine” is Israel.

Have you never heard of a country or city changing its name?

Remember Rhodesia? It became Zimbabwe. Remember East Bengal? It became East Pakistan. Remember that follow-up East Pakistan? It became Bangladesh. Remember Peking? Better duck because it became Beijing. And in 1948, the name “Palestine” became Israel.

Remember Czechoslovakia? It became the Czech Republic. And they now are aiming to rename it Czechia, mate. Turkey is aiming for Türkiye. (Preferably before Thanksgiving.) Remember Swaziland? It became Eswatini. (Yeah, I missed that day’s breaking news, too.) Remember Ceylon? It became Sri Lanka. Remember Burma? It became Myanmar. (Nothing like a series of billboards extolling a close Myanmar Shave.) And in 1948, “Palestine” became Israel.

Persia became Iran. Siam became Thailand. (Why? It’s a puzzlement.) Dahomey became Benin. Upper Volta became Burkina Faso. Zaïre became the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Holland became The Netherlands. And in 1948, “Palestine” became Israel.

Ciudad de la Santísima Trinidad y Puerto de Santa María del Buen Aire became Buenos Aires. (Not hard to figure out why). In Austria, the city of Fugging finally adopted that spelling in 2021 (and, yes, for the reason you correctly assume). In British Columbia, Granville became Vancouver. Bytown became Ottawa. Fort Rouillé became Toronto. Ragusa, Croatia, became Dubrovnik. Lutetia became Paris. And in 1948, “Palestine” became Israel.

Samarobriva became Amiens. (The Samarobrivan Cathedral?) Cenabum became Orléans. Edo became Tokyo. Goka became Hiroshima. Oea became Tripoli. (Would the Marines sing about the “shores of Oea”?) Anfa became Casablanca. (Try “Anfa” for No. 2 or No. 3 on the AFI Top 100 Movies list.) Christiania became Oslo. And in 1948, “Palestine” became Israel.

Ciudad de los Reyes became Lima, Peru. Hansanju became Seoul, South Korea. Colonia Iulia Romula became Seville. (Who wants a haircut from the Barber of Colonia Iulia Romula?) Colonia Patricia Corduba became Córdoba. Turicum became Zürich. Beroea became Aleppo, Syria. (Gary Johnson might have become president of the U.S. if they had stuck with Beroea.) Eboracum became York, England. (Otherwise, would Frank Sinatra have been singing “It’s up to you, New Eboracum, New Eboracum”?) Duroliponte became Cambridge. Mamucium became Manchester. Dunedin became Edinburgh, Scotland. And in 1948, “Palestine” became Israel.

Swilling’s Mill became Phoenix. Yerba Buena became San Francisco. (Tony Bennett could have left his heart in Yerba Buena, too, as long as he remembered to take his wallet.) Fort Hoop became Hartford, Connecticut. Fort Christina became Wilmington, Delaware. Jernigan became Orlando, Florida. Terminus became Atlanta. Fort Dearborn became Chicago. Columbus, Iowa, became Cedar Rapids. Shawmut became Boston. And in 1948, “Palestine” became Israel.

Bronson became Kalamazoo. Imnizaska became St. Paul, Minnesota. (Ya betcha Bob it did.) Beverwijck became Albany, New York. New Amsterdam became New York City (but might have been New Eboracum City, as per above). Wachau became Winston-Salem. Losantiville became Cincinnati. And in 1948, “Palestine” became Israel.

Cross Keys, Pennsylvania, became Intercourse. (We report. You decide.) Fort Duquesne became Pittsburgh. Northampton became Allentown. (“Well, we’re at a Billy Joel concert here in Northampton, and I showed my ticket and got stamped in”?) Waterloo became Austin, Texas. (Do Austin bakeries offer Napoleons? Do their restaurants serve Beef Wellington?) Fillmore became Plano. And guess what name changed in 1948 from “Palestine”?

The name “Palestine” referred to Israel for 2,000 years. Go to this web link of the Encyclopedia Britannica:

Abraham Isaac Kook
chief rabbi of Palestine

Did Yasser Arafat have a “Chief Rabbi”? Does Mahmoud Abbas? Does Hamas? So why do authoritative scholarly works call this saintly man a “[C]hief [R]abbi of Palestine”?

We know that Gaza is apartheid, and Jews cannot live there. We know the Arabs under Arafat and now Abbas, the terrorist in a suit, are apartheid, and no Jews live there.

So why indeed do the Encyclopedia Britannica and every other scholarly work call HaRav Kook the Chief Rabbi of Palestine?

Because “Palestine” is Israel, and there was a simple name change in mid-1948.

Here is how Jews all over the world raised money for Israel before 1948.

And this:

United Palestine Appeal for the Jewish state, 1941 (Arthur Szyk/The Arthur Szyk Society/Wikimedia Commons) [This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license]

And this.

Here is the banner of Israel’s best-known English-language Jewish newspaper, the Jerusalem Post, on the day the new country’s independence was declared in May 1948:

THE PALESTINE POST

STATE OF ISRAEL IS BORN

Here and here is how Jews in America raised money for the Irgun underground to expel the British colonialists from Palestine to liberate Israel.

Here, a news item from October 1946: “American League for Free Palestine Inaugurates ‘[P]alestine Resistance Month’”:

“Palestine Resistance Month” was started today by the American League for a Free Palestine for the purpose of enlisting full public support in the “Hebrew fight for freedom.” The campaign was announced last night by former Senator Guy M. Gillette, president of the League, and Peter H. Bergson, chairman of the Hebrew Committee of National Liberation.

“We must choose between a British policy and an American policy,” Senator Gillette declared. He called on the American Government, which he said is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to maintain displaced Jews in “concentration camps,” to provide “a few trucks and a few ships, so that they may go home.”

Palestine is Israel. Palestine is a Jewish country. There is no Arab Palestine. There never was an Arab Palestine. The Jews fought to free Palestine, and they successfully expelled the British colonialists.

The Jews de-colonized Palestine.

Jews were indigenous to Palestine for 3,000 years. Moses brought the Jews there from Egypt. Kings David and Solomon reigned there. Samuel, Isaiah, and Jeremiah prophesied there. Jesus lived there and walked the land from the Galilee to the Jerusalem Temple. Jews always lived in Palestine. During the past 150 years, even more Jews immigrated there.

Are immigrants “colonizers”? If so, then Muslim and Arab immigrants to Europe are colonizers. Then Rashida Tlaib’s parents, Ilhan Omar of Somalia, Ocasio’s mother of Puerto Rico, and Bernie Sanders’ Polish father are colonizers. Then Muslim and Arab immigrants and “DREAM”-ers now in American colleges are colonizers.

A colonizer has a central patrimony and then colonizes other lands far off as satellites of the Mother Country to expand world influence. France colonized and took countries like Algeria, Libya, and Syria. England colonized so many places — including “the 13 colonies,” Canada, South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, the Falkland Islands, and India — that, at one time, “the sun never set on British soil.” When the French and British colonies were decolonized, the British returned to England, and the French to France.

By sharp contrast, Israelis live in Israel. Where else would they go to call home if not Israel? Have they colonized the Philippines or American Samoa? Have they colonized Crimea?

There is no Arab country called “Palestine.” There never was. Look it up for yourself in books and online, in microfilm and microfiche.

An Arab country by that name? Name one king or president or prime minister of such a country — ever.

Name the currency of an Arab Palestine before your time. Whose faces were on its paper bills before they fabricated the Big Lie beginning in 1964?

Name a single Olympic Games in which an Arab “Palestine” participated. What was its capital? Where were its legislature and judiciary? Name a single judge or legislator.

What are its borders?  Does it include Tel Aviv and Haifa? If not, then what are Rashida Tlaib and Marc Lamont Hill chanting? But it must include Tel Aviv and Haifa because, when the falsehood was first promulgated by Shukairy in 1964, he was talking about Tel Aviv and Haifa. At the time, Egypt occupied Gaza, so he had no aspirations to liberate that.

How can a “Palestine” country be composed of Judea and Samaria (the “West Bank”) and Gaza? Look at the map above. The two regions have nothing to do with each other. Hamas terrorists rule Gaza, and Fatah terrorists rule the so-called Palestine Authority. They hate each other and, whenever the opportunity arises, they murder each other in extraordinary numbers.

Look at the map above; they are not contiguous; they are on opposite sides. When Britain gave up its colony in India, the Hindus got India and the Muslims got a single country composed of Pakistan parts east and west of India. Soon enough, East Pakistan and West Pakistan broke into two separate countries.

The day will come when the Arab Muslim terrorists of Judea and Samaria, meanwhile based in an enclave they call the “Palestine Authority,” will earn their rightful expulsion by overplaying their terrorist hands, just as Hamas finally has done in Gaza. On “The Day After,” the question will be: “Now what? Who will take control?”

As with Gaza, Egypt won’t want them. Jordan does not want them. And the United Nations has proven in Southern Lebanon incapable of preventing a population from undertaking terrorist “governance.”

Only one polity will have an interest in stepping in and ensuring that the region is quiet and safe. That is Israel. On that day: From the river to the sea, Palestine indeed will be free.

Rav Fischer’s memorable two televised debates with a national leader of CAIR, the leading anti-Semitic Arab Muslim body in the United States, can be found here and here.