Are the Jews, who have lived in the Land of Israel for 3500 years, more than 2000 years before the first Arab appeared in the area, really to be considered “colonizers” of the territory from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean sea? It’s true that in the nineteenth century and in centuries before, more Arabs than Jews had been living “from the river to the sea,” but what significance should we give to the low numbers of Jews in the Land of Israel before they began, because of the Zionist movement, to steadily rise again? Jacob Sivak, a Canadian professor, considers that question here: “The Jews Are Not Colonizers in the Land of Israel,” by Jacob Sivak, Algemeiner, September 6, 2025:
A friend recently forwarded a podcast, Environmentalists Against War, by the economist Jeffrey Sachs. While mainly about global geopolitics, Sachs also touches on the Middle East. He questions the Jewish connection to the Holy Land by pointing out that before the start of the modern Zionist movement in the late 1800s, Jews constituted only five percent of the population of Ottoman Palestine.
It occurred to me that today, Canada’s indigenous people, the First Nations, also represent about five percent of Canada’s total population (42 million). Yet, despite the small percentage of their numbers, nobody disputes their indigeneity and their connection to the land.
Why are the First Nations numbers low in relation to the total population of Canada? Well, after centuries of mistreatment by European colonialists, including genocidal conflict, outbreaks of European-introduced infectious diseases, policies of forced assimilation (for example, residential schools), and large-scale immigration from Europe and beyond, the wonder is that they and their culture and traditions still exist. Indeed, some, such as the Beothuk of Eastern Canada, no longer do.
I recently learned a new word: self-abnegation, which is, “The denial of one’s own interests in favour of the interests of others” (Collins English Dictionary). The comment by Sachs is a good example.
A prime instance in my mind would be a 2017 Haaretz article about Mark Twain’s 1869 book, The Innocents Abroad. The book describes a voyage that Twain (Samuel Clemens) took to Europe and the Levant in 1867, aboard the ship Quaker City.
The Haaretz author, Moshe Gilad, questions Twain’s description of the desolation and unpeopled nature of Palestine, “a hopeless, dreary, heart-broken land.” Heaven forbid that Twain’s description should provide support for the Zionist agenda by suggesting that Palestine was empty and desolate.
Gilad explains that Twain’s visit to the Holy Land coincided with a period of serious economic difficulty. Many residents were riding it out in neighboring countries such as Egypt. That is why, he said, it appeared to be so unpeopled. (The Palestinian site Palestine Remembered makes a similar argument in pointing out that Twain’s visit took place during a hot Mediterranean summer.)
What about the experiences of the Jews of the Holy Land in the mid-1800s? Most of them lived in urban centers: Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed, and Tiberius. Why were their numbers low?
In 1834, Jews represented half of the inhabitants of the town of Safed (Tzfat) in Galilee. That same year however, the land that is now Israel was caught between Egyptian and Ottoman rivalries — and local Arabs took it out on the Jews of Hebron and Safed….
So yes, Jewish population numbers were low in the Land of Israel during the mid-1800s. But there were extenuating circumstances. In the final analysis, the Jewish people never abandoned the Land of Israel, neither physically nor spiritually. They are not colonial settlers. They are indigenous. In 1939, Martin Buber wrote a letter to Mahatma Gandhi contesting Gandhi’s view that Palestine belongs to the Arabs. Buber said “By what means did the Arabs attain ownership in Palestine? Surely by conquest and, in fact, a conquest by settlement.” Who are the colonialists?
The Jews are no more the “colonizers” of the Land of Israel than the First Nations of Canada are the colonizers of that country. Both peoples were reduced to 5% of the total population by foreign conquest, by persecution, and by disease. The First Nations in Canada were conquered by European settlers, were persecuted by being forcibly converted to Christianity (chiefly Catholicism), and died of diseases brought by the Europeans. Jews were conquered in their land by many other peoples — the Greeks, the Romans, the Byzantines, the Arabs, and the Ottoman Turks. Many Jews were killed by those conquerors, while others left the Land of Israel to settle elsewhere, from the Iberian Peninsula in the west to Poland and Russia in the east.
But the Jews did not forget “Zion or Jerusalem.” When the conditions were more propitious for a return to Zion, because of the League of Nations’ creation of the Mandate for Palestine, many Jews did return to their historic homeland. Many more — millions — would have done so had they not been murdered by the Nazis. The First Nations did not “colonize” Canada. And the Jews did not “colonize” the Land of Israel.
somehistory says
God spoke to Abraham and showed him the Land that He was promising to the man’s offspring. Since God owned the Land, He could give it to whomever He wanted to give it.
He chose Abram, changed his name to Abraham, and promised the Land because Abraham had such great faith in His God, the God of his forefathers.
Somewhere around 430 (going by memory of the number; might be wrong) years later, Joshua led the Jews, also known as the Israelites and Hebrews, into the Land and it came to be called the Land of Israel.
This is written history and has been proven by the efforts of archeologists who have dug down through the years of dirt and artifacts, finding many things with ancient writing which agrees with the Bible and also with the ancient writings of other nations….Assyria, Babylon, etc….
The Land belongs to the Jews.
mgoldberg says
There is an entire history written and lived that shows the Jews were in and given the land of Israel forever. The loss of the land to conquerors is the history of the world, and the return of a long defeated people is a miracle indeed, but one predicted to occur, and that aside, the Jews, were offered a sliver by those who ‘colonized’ the area they once owned and lived upon, but those ‘colonizers’ refused any such accommodation, ever. That is the reality. The ‘colonizers’, the arabs, the muslims, forbade any compromise except on where the land would be theirs and Jews could be Al-dhimma, or 3rd class citizens. Now, over the course of the gossamer 2 state solution dilusion, the muslims flat out said no Jews would live in their land, called Palestine- which is the height of gall- since that was the name given by the Romans to the land of Judea for the Jews erased. Now the colonizers wish to erase the Jews again.
Wellington says
Yes, calling the Jews colonizers in what is now Israel and surrounding areas is a ludicrous assertion, if not an evil one. But, and for the record, the ultimate colonizers in all of history, and who did so little good at the same time, are the Muslims. Just look at what Muslim imperialists (oh, forgot that only the West was imperialistic) did in India alone, never mind the historic homeland of the Jews, North Africa, what the Byzantines used to govern, etc.
Stunning how in an age when so much proper information can be accessed so readily there still remains this gigantic lacuna respecting all the harm that Muslims over many centuries did to “other places,” including of course what is now Israel. And Muslims are still doing harm in places like Nigeria and certain neighborhoods in the Bronx. But I digress.
The hypocrisy marches on in our era, made all the more inexcusable because there is access aplenty to counter this hypocrisy more than ever before (and which is another way of saying so many remain in stupid mode—the modern Western MSM comes to mind here, never mind completely idiotic political parties in the West like the Labour Party in the UK and the Democratic Party here in America).
Matters remain very fluid and the West is in deep, deep trouble for no good reason.
gravenimage says
+1
Kosh's Shadow says
The Jews did colonize Israel, when it was Canaan, something like 3500 years ago.
gravenimage says
Did the Jews Colonize Israel?
……………………………….
Over 3,500 years ago? Maybe so. But Jews have lived in Judea longer than virtually any other peoples–certainly,*far* longer ago than Islamic invaders.
Troybeam says
God promised the Jews a home and gave them Israel, promise made, promise kept now going on for thousands of years.
Shame on the author of this insane idea of colonizing Israel. Go back and read scripture.
maurice yacowar says
At the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria U Vic prof Beth Stuart lumps the Armenians , Palestinians and our Residence School students together as victims of genocide. Including the Palestinians is an insult to the two groups that truly were. In fact a delegation of Canadian Chiefs recently went to Israel to express their support. They view Israel as their model for a people surviving centuries of oppressive colonization, yet emerging to revive their own language, culture and identity. For Stuart genocide is the Jewish threat to the Palestinians, not — reality check — the Palestinian plan, seen in Hamas’s constitutional pledge (Article 7) to eliminate world Jewry and the Palestinians’ rejection of coexistence since 1948. Gallery management appears content with Stuart’s lies, e.g., infanticide is the Israeli program not (as demonstrated) Hamas’s, etc.