Comment by codersfocus | Hacker News Reader

Comment by codersfocus | Hacker News Reader

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Damn, even Osama bun Laden got the Jewish conquest of Israel wrong.

The British did not “hand over” Israel — the creation of Israel was a multidecade effort on the part of Jews since Hershel published his pamphlet in the late 1800s and the first meeting of the World Zionist Congress (1890.)

In the interlude, they tried a lot of stuff including simply offering the Sultan money for Israel, but I’ll skip to the British part…

A lot of lobbying and money was involved in getting the first Jew to ever be elected to British parliament also made the governor of “British Palestine” the year they got it from the Turks (1918.)

Thus marked the start of the “first Aliyah” where Jews around the world funded the purchase of land for young Jews to come and create Kibbutzes (self sustaining communities.)

Look up what they got up to in one of the first and largest Kibbutzes (manufacturing a lot of guns n ammo.) It’s a museum you can even tour today.

As Sun Tzu says, the pinnacle of war is to win without fighting and I see that so many people don’t really know about the creation of Israel, even though it is one of the most impressive feats of conquest (by Sun Tzus metric.)

A strange nit to pick but even then your details are wrong.

1896 - Herzl's pamphlet to Rotschilds[1] calling for an Israeli state in either Palestine or Argentina

1897 - First Zionist Congress calling for establishing a Jewish state in Palestine

1917 - British sign Balfour declaration in a letter to Rotschild promising a jewish state in Palestine [2]

1918 - British defeat ottomans and drive them out of the Levant with help of Arab partisans promising them an Arab State. The arabs were betrayed.[3]

So barely 20 years between First Pamplet and Congress and the Balfour declaration. Also note that British had already promised Palestine to the Jews before it even came to their possession.

I would add that in 1914 the population was 94% arab. By 1948 after the British flooded in Jewish migrants mainly from Europe and the Americas, the population became about ~65% + arab and 35+ Jewish. And the just-formed UN (mostly controlled by Western countries and their friends) handed over 60% of the land to the Jews with Palestine split into 2.

So for all intents and purposes "British handed over Palestine to Israel" seems to be an accurate summary.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Der_Judenstaat

[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balfour_Declaration

[3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMahon%E2%80%93Hussein_Corres...

Yes, the colonial playbook was in vogue at the time. But it was far from bloodless. Far from peaceful. Maybe you should read more yourself.

It's shocking to me to read that the creation of the modern Hebrew state was bloodless. Search word nakba. :-/

They said "far from bloodless".

My comment was in agreement with the parent. Or do you mean something else by the use of the plural pronoun 'they'?

It read like you are in disagreement and trying to educate the parent about the Nakba even though they expressed knowledge on the issue e.g "Yes, the colonial playbook was in vogue at the time..."

If your comment was a reply to the parent of the parent it makes more sense in my mind.

> the first Jew to ever be elected to British parliament

If anyone else was taken aback by this, Disraeli and a couple before him had to take an oath affirming their Christianity before being seated and are bureaucratically regarded as converted. Although the first openly Jewish member to take his seat was Lionel de Rothschild in 1858, who was not Herbert Samuel, the person being referred to. Samuel was the first Jew to serve as cabinet minister and to lead a major party, though.

This was glossed over in my US public education. Lots of 'it's complicated, don't worry about it.

It didn't hand over the entirety of it but it did make a case for dividing the land[0].

Note that this was occuring at the same time that zionist militants [1] (self proclaimed terrorists who would later become part of the IDF) were fighting the british authorities and even trying to align themselves with the Nazis.

Also worth mentioning that the zionists could never have defeated the Ottomans themselves.

I guess it comes down to what you consider "handed over".

Was there a concerted effort to create a state? Yes.

Did the British help them achieve this aim? Yes.

[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peel_Commission

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehi_(militant_group)

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