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Contrasting Narratives: Israeli Perspective
I am an Israeli. The land of Israel belongs to my people.
According to religious tradition, our God led us to this land out of slavery over 3200 years ago. The land was given to us, as the people of God. We settled, farmed, and prospered. When the Babylonians took over our land, destroyed out temple, and carried us away as slaves, we still remembered where our true home was. We returned and built our second temple. The Romans destroyed our temple and renamed our homeland Palestine. Although our people were scattered throughout three continents, we still remembered where our true home was. Every year, at Passover, we remember saying, “Next Year in Jerusalem.”
Our scattered people endured many hardships over the thousands of years following our dispersal. We Jews were blamed for disasters in many countries. From the 1930s through 1945, the Nazis went so far as to try to kill all of our people during the Holocaust of World War II. But still, we remembered that we have a homeland.
We had support for returning to our homeland. In the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the British government supported our right to establish a homeland in the area now called Palestine. We knew what that land really was – our ancient homeland, Israel. In fact, Jews have always lived in Israel.
In 1947, the countries of the world saw and supported our cause. The United Nations partitioned Palestine into two separate states. The Arabs kept some land for themselves, but we finally had our homeland back. In May of 1948, we became a country again – the country of Israel.
Of course, the Arab nations could not accept this. Even though the United Nations, one of the most powerful international organizations, had given us this land, Arabs could not accept the fact that we had a right to be there. Six Arab countries attacked us almost immediately. In 1948 we won our War of Independence, and gained some land in the process.
The countries of the Middle East never stopped trying to take our land. Many wars followed. In 1967, we tripled our land in the Six Day War. To secure our land, we established settlements throughout our newly won territory. We were attacked by Egypt and Syria in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. We fought back, and this war ended with a peace treaty where we gave land in exchange for peace. We gave the Egyptians the huge expanse of the Sinai Desert and they promised not to kill us.
As the years have passed, we have changed this land. When my people arrived in large numbers, Palestine was desert and swamp. We have made the desert bloom, made the swamps prosper. Rich farms now profit where sandy wastes once stood. Bustling cities now prosper where swamps once decayed. We have tried to make peace with the Palestinians, but they will not compromise. During the Oslo Conference in 2000 we offered them 95% of the West Bank and
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Gaza Strip, but they refused even that. Instead, they kill innocent people – my friends, my family, my neighbors – with their suicide bombers. Palestinians have their children blow themselves up to achieve their goals. They insist that we leave, that we give up all we have worked for and rightfully earned.
This is our land. We have nowhere else to go.
2010-2011 Unit 3: Middle East - 130 Grade 7 World Cultures