The recent letter, “How are Jews not an indigenous people of Israel,” oversimplifies the complex and long history of the Levant and Palestinian people.
Judaism indeed originated in the Levant. The history and culture of both the Jewish diaspora and Palestinian people is richer and more complicated than the letter revealed.
The author misinterprets the meaning of indigenous. Having ancestors who hailed from a region 2000 years ago is not what makes a person indigenous. The occupying power moves further into your land, destroying your traditional food sources like bison or olive trees, and forcing you from your home. It is an erasure of your culture, history, and even your life. Indigenous people all over the world share in a very similar struggle.
Zionism was a response to the antisemitism in Europe. Theodore Hertzl felt that antisemitism couldn’t be fought and the best way to be safe from antisemitism was to have a Jewish state. Letters in the Jewish Archives show Zionist leaders asking Britain if they could colonize Palestine.
The suffering of the Palestinian people began before the Nakba in 1948. It began with the British Empire and the issue of the Balfour Declaration. Zionist paramilitary groups formed. Founder Avraham Stern of Lehi a Zionist paramilitary group that contributed to the Deir Yassin Massacre believed Arabs to be a slave race.
The two-state solution meant that thousands of Palestinians would have been displaced from their homes. Even if the two-state solution was accepted, the Nakba would not have been avoided.
Since the Nakba, Palestinians have faced increasing violence from the Israeli government. Since Oct. 7, more than 18,000 civilians have been killed. Half of whom are children.
Whitney Lee Geertsen, Ogden
