We all realize that conflicts such as the Arab-Israeli crisis don't occur in a vacuum.

Consider just one example. It's considered responsible standard procedure to learn the history of antisemitism as part and parcel of any complete study of the Holocaust.  Without knowledge of the history of antisemitism, especially the two-thousand year history of Christian antisemitism, one can never truly understand what fueled the catastrophe in Europe.  Without the larger context, one would only be seeing the more immediate causes of Hitler's Final Solution, remaining blind to the roots of the antisemitism that made it possible to achieve.

Similar principles need to be applied understanding the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Sadly, the element conspicuously absent from most one-sided pro-Palestinian diatribes against Israel is historical fact. Why?  Because an accurate reading of the historical record is the key to debunking the mythology that partisan proponents of the Arab-Palestinian dilemma base their presuppositions in.

What is being referred to when we speak of “the mythology” supporting the Arab-PLO-PA-Palestinian position in the disputed territories?

Myths such as the fictitious role of the state of Israel as a colonial movement of imperialistic Western society.  Myths such as ancient Jewish Judea and Samaria being part of some fairy-tale Arab homeland rather than the homeland of the Jewish people for over 3,000 years.  Myths that claim the Jewish people 'stole' the land from contented Arab settlers rather than point the finger at the pan-Arab community that ordered their people to flee in 1948 -- despite repeated requests from Jewish leadership that residing Arabs remain and settle in peace.  Myths such as the establishment of the state of Israel being the 'cause' of the original Arab refugees rather than tracing guilt back to the oil rich Arab nations who encouraged the creation of 'refugee camps' in the first place.  Myths that the 'alien' Jewish people suddenly immigrated into the land 'after 2000 years,' displacing ‘the Palestinian Arabs’ with the ‘new’ Jewish state, while Arabs are portrayed as being native there for millennia.  Myths that turn fledgling Jewish efforts of self-defense into 'massacres' just as the recent defensive military initiative in Jenin was fraudulently labeled a 'massacre' in April 2002.   Myths that revolve around the strategically coined term, 'Palestine,' a Roman corruption engineered as a displacement substitute for the original Hebraic terms 'Judah and Ephraim' in an historically documented effort to disassociate the land from Jewish ownership, transferring ownership in concept to Rome in 136 CE.   Myths that there is no place for 'homeless' Arab 'refugees' to live in when the nation of Jordan was delegated as the original territory (Transjordan) for a 'Palestinian state' back in 1947.  Myths that arise from the omission of historical facts concerning all previous international plans for dual statehood that Israel accepted and the Arab world systematically rejected—refusing to acknowledge Israel's right to exist.

The omission of much documented information has facilitated the myth of today—a complex system of politically loaded, mythological assertions that the world has largely bought into.  An intelligent system of mythology that can lay claim to such infamous successes as having elevated the pioneering terrorist Yassar Arafat to the stature of legitimate statesman and Nobel Prize winner as well as maintaining the pan-Arab political strategy that put over 600,000 innocent Arab refugees in harm's way in the first place. The injustices done to the Arab Palestinian refugees have only been perpetuated by the Arab world's refusal to acknowledge the Palestinian state which was already established in 1947—now known as the nation of Jordan—a year prior to Israel's claim to statehood.

But perhaps most repulsive of all the myths is the perception of the Islamic jihadist 'hero' that has been fabricated: disguising oneself as a genuine non-combatant--even as a rabbi on a busload of Jewish girls coming back from camp--then blowing yourself up alongside innocent men, women, and children.  This perception has been 'sold' to innocent children in grade school--from kindergarten on up--as a legitimate form of freedom fighting.  This is treachery, perfidy at its baseline worst, the very signature of Evil itself. 

And yet, there are many in your community who believe that Israel is the "root cause" of the conflict in the Middle East.  Let there be no mistake, you have been successfull manipulated by the genius behind the successful dissemination of these myths and more.  It could be argued that public opinion has not been so thoroughly persuaded of such enormous lies since the Propaganda Minstry of the Third Reich persuaded Christian Europe that the Jewish community there was inherently evil and deserving of liquidation.  We must resist being persuaded that evil is good and good, evil.  What we did not do as Christians then, we must do now.  We are called to resist such evil.

Do not be decieved by your leadership who may use their pulpits to persuade you against the validity of Israel's existence and the extortionist facade of land-for-peace deals.  The Islamists do not want land.  The Islamists do not want peace.  They want the annihilation of Israel.

All but alone in doing so, Winston Churchill warned of what lay ahead in 1930's Europe.  As writer David Brudnoy has put it: "We have no Churchill today, but thanks to the Internet and other means of mass communication, we know what’s coming: a combined Arab, European, and United Nations drive to delegitimize Israel and submit Jews to a 21st-century Final Solution."

Next:  Facts Behind the Myths...