No. Due to the persecution, Anti-Semitism, and pogroms in European nations during the late 1880’s, Jewish people were forced to leave their homes. Some began trickling into their ancestral homeland (now called Israel), legally buying land from the Turks who were “occupying” the land at that time. In his book, “The Innocents Abroad”, Mark Twain describes journeying to the holy land in the 1860’s. He describes a barren and desolate land that contains nothing but deserts, wastelands, swamps, full of neglect and contagious diseases. Once the Jews began returning to the land and transforming it into farms, Arab tribes followed in their footsteps. (Please note that Arab claims to being in the land from time immemorial are put to the lie not only by historical facts, but even by Mark Twain.)

In order to understand the legality of the modern State of Israel – a state based upon existing and centuries old historical ties to the land, as well as both International Law and global support – we need to look at some historical facts.
 
On November 2, 1917, Lord Arthur James Balfour, Foreign Secretary and past Prime Minister of Great Britain (the leading world power of its day), issued the famous Balfour Declaration that posits the founding of a national home for the Jewish people in the land of Israel. Its authors were referring to the Biblical borders of Israel - boundaries with which the English people were familiar from studying the Holy Book.

In 1918, with the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Britain and France were handed 5 million square miles to divvy up between the Arabs and Jews, with the intent of creating a Jewish Homeland. This territory was made up of the land that we now call Israel and Jordan.

In 1920, the San Remo International Conference – made up of the five leading world powers in its day - confirmed the Balfour Declaration and gave Britain the mandate over both sides of the Jordan River. King Feisal of Iraq, in the name of the Arab delegation to the 1919 peace conference after WWI, wrote: “Our delegation here in Paris is fully aware of the suggestions the Zionist Federation made to the peace conference. In our eyes they are modest and fitting, and we will do our best to have them accepted. We will welcome the Jews warmly when they come home.” Please note that the Arab delegation not only accepted the Jewish return but actually called it their return “home” – acknowledging the ancestral tie of the Jewish people to that land.

For political reasons, the British gave 99% of the land to the Arabs in order to create countries that did not exist before, and only 1% was given for the Jewish Homeland. In 1922, ½ of that 1% was further taken to create Transjordan. Most of the original British Mandate land was given to the Arabs, without population transfer of Arabs from the land designated for Jews. The original 45,000 sq. miles intended for a Jewish homeland by the international community was reduced to only 264 sq. miles.

In 1947, the United Nations Assembly ratified The Partition Plan, a decision that led to the declaration of the state of Israel on the tiny bit of land left for the Jewish homeland, with another state next to it for the Arab Palestinians. The 1947 Partition Plan was the first “Two-State Solution” plan offered to the Arabs, essentially giving them the very land they are fighting for now…but they totally refused it. The Arabs never accepted the UN Partition Plan and, led by Amin El Huseini, continued their terror attacks against the Jewish people. Huseini even met with Hitler in Berlin at the height of WWII in order to plan the extermination of the Jews in Israel and the east.

Immediately after the declaration of Israel’s independence on May 15, 1948, the armies of 5 Arab states invaded the fledgling country to attempt to murder all its Jewish residents. There were only approximately 700,000 Jewish men, women, and children, to fight the large, fully equipped armies of at least five Arab nations! After 8 months of fighting - miraculously – the infant state of Israel survived The War of Independence and a cease fire was declared.

During those 8 months - encouraged by Arab Leaders - about 650,000 Arabs freely chose to flee Israel to make way for the supposed “conquest” by the invading Arab nations. After Israel won that war, they found they could no longer return to the property they willingly left. During the same 8 months of fighting, about 850,000 Jewish people were forced out of the surrounding Arab countries and fled as refugees to the infant state of Israel – leaving homes, lands, belongings & businesses behind. Despite its limited resources, Israel absorbed ALL of these refugees, while the 22 Arab nations surrounding Israel would NOT absorb their own Arab brethren. Out of the 100,000,000 refugees since World War II, Arab-Palestinians are the only refugee group in the world that has never been absorbed or integrated into their own peoples' lands.

Bottom Line: The State of Israel was NOT acquired by stealing land from the Arabs.

Historically, only the Jewish presence maintained an “uninterrupted” national link since Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” 

Israel's position in the land exists under International Law derived from the Palestine Mandate, where the League of Nations and global world powers recognized "the historical tie between the Jewish people and Palestine," and called "for the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine."

A Jewish State suggests a Theocracy, but Israel is not a theocracy. Israel is a Democracy and it is the only FULL Democracy in the midst of 22 Arab countries who are not. It is governed by laws, drafted by a democratically elected parliament that is made up of BOTH Jewish and Arab Israeli citizens. It is influenced by Jewish values and adheres to many Jewish religious customs like Shabbat and Jewish holidays, similar to the United States and many other European nations who have a Christian heritage and celebrate Christmas or Easter.

In its Declaration of Independence, “Israel guarantees that its government will be for the benefit” of all its inhabitants:

• it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex;

• it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture;

• it will safeguard the Holy Places of all religions;

• it will be faithful to the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.

Israel has no state religion, and ALL faiths enjoy freedom of worship. The 22 surrounding Arab States have Islam as their official religion and, as of May 2011, have increased violence and persecution against Christians and other minority religions.

Israel is one of the most open societies in the world. As of Dec. 2010 out of a population of 7.7 million people, Jews make up 75.4% %, Arabs 20.4% and Other (Christian, etc.) 4.2%. Israel now has about 150,000 Christians, a population that has grown about 400 percent from 39,000 since 1949.It is the ONLY Middle Eastern country where Christianity is growing instead of declining.

The 20.4% of Arabs, who are Israeli citizens, is a slightly larger number than in 1948 when Israel became a country. The Arabs Israeli citizens have equal voting rights. In fact, Israel is one of the few places in the Middle East where Arab women may vote. In 2001, Arabs held 10 seats in the 120-seat Knesset and they have won as many as 12 seats in a single election. Arabic, like Hebrew, is an official language in Israel and more than 300,000 Arab children attended Israeli schools.

The Palestinian Arabs have been offered a state of their own – twice - based upon the same borders for which they now fight.

The first time a Two State solution was offered was in 1947 with the UN Partition Plan, which the Arabs flatly rejected, followed by five Arab nations simultaneously attacking the infant state (with only one airplane at that time) in order to destroy it. The second time was in June of 2000, when the Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered Yasser Arafat – the leader of the Palestinian Liberation Organization - 95 percent of the West Bank, all of Gaza, all Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem, Palestinian statehood, and the dismantling of most settlements. Arafat rejected this and the Palestinians launched the violent Second Intifada on Sept. 28, 2000.

Although Israeli settlements in the West Bank & Gaza were legal both under international law and the agreements between Israel and the Palestinians, in an attempt to show the international community and Palestinian Leaders their support for a Palestinian State, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in June of 2005 removed ALL Jewish presence from the Gaza Strip – as well as four settlements in the West Bank – at the cost of $1.7 billion.

• They removed 9000 Jewish settlers from 21 settlements in Gaza, forcing them to leave their homes, their 42 daycare centers, their 46 schools, their 38 synagogues, and to even uproot their 48 graves.

• It later cost Israel $870 million to resettle the former residents of the Gaza and West Bank Settlements.

• At a cost of an additional $500 million, they evacuated all IDF installations

• Then at an additional loss of $120 million annually from exports of flowers and produce, Israel left behind some of her largest & most productive farms and greenhouses for Palestinians to become economically prosperous and independent from aid offered by Hamas or the international community.

With Arab demands met regarding the so-called “occupation”, there was nothing to stop the Palestinians from using its central location, beautiful beaches on the East Mediterranean, and its established farms and green houses, to become a peaceful and prosperous Gaza - a world trade and commerce center. But instead of choosing peace, the Palestinians left the farms, fields and greenhouses fall into disrepair, rolled their rocket launchers to the border and intensified bombing of Israeli civilians. From Gaza, Hamas fired over 10,000 rockets and mortars against civilian targets in Israel between 2001 and June of 2008. There were over 3200 rockets and mortars from Gaza in 2008 alone, placing 1 out of every 8 Israeli CIVILIANS in mortal danger.

From 1948 till 1967 Arabs made no attempt to create a Palestinian state. Under Jordanian rule, Jewish holy sites were desecrated, 58 synagogues in Jerusalem were destroyed, and the Jews and Christians were denied access to places of worship. Under Israeli rule, all Muslim and Christian sites have been preserved and made accessible to people of all faiths.

Arabs began identifying themselves as part of a Palestinian people in 1964 only, on the initiative of Egyptian-born Yasser Arafat. The idea became a popular Arab propaganda tool after Israel re-captured Judea, Samaria and Gaza in Israel’s defensive Six-Day War of 1967. It was only then that the myth of a Palestinian nation was created and marketed worldwide. Jews come from Judea [now called The West Bank], not Palestinians. There is no language known as Palestinian, or any Palestinian culture distinct from that of all the Arabs in the area. There has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. Palestinians are Arabs indistinguishable from Arabs throughout the Middle East. The Palestinian National Charter adopted by the PLO states this fact in the first article where it clearly states: “…the Palestinian people are an integral part of the Arab nation.”

Despite all of its rhetoric to Western political leaders and media, history demonstrates that the Palestinian Leaders are less interested in Palestinian Statehood than in the total destruction of the Jewish state.

None of the Palestinian Refugees who now claim they must be allowed to return to Israel… ever lived in Israel. They are the children and mostly the grandchildren of those who fled in 1948. The estimated 650,000 Arabs who fled their homes in 1948 because of the war brought on by Israel’s Arab neighbors, have now grown into over 5 million people!

As of 2011, Israel’s population is only about 7 million people in total, with 20% already Arab Israeli citizens. If over five million hostile Arabs were to be absorbed into this tiny country, within one or two generations, Israel would no longer be a Jewish State, but rather, the 23rd Arab State.

IN the “U.N. Convention relating to the status of Refugees” - host countries are called upon to “facilitate the assimilation and naturalization of refugees” and to “make every effort to expedite naturalization proceedings.” Israel absorbed the over 800,000 Jewish refugees who were forced to flee the Arab nations in 1948 when the Arab states declared war on Israel. The Palestinian Refugees have not been absorbed into the Arab countries where they fled nor permitted to settle in these Arab countries by the Arab leadership of those countries. Instead, they have been forced into camps since 1948, where 60% of their support comes primarily from the US, and NOT from the oil-rich Arab countries.

Since the surrounding Arab nations have 640 times the land mass of little Israel and all of the oil wealth, there is NO reason why these Palestinian/Arab refugees cannot and should not be settled in the very countries that caused them to leave Israel in 1948. For these countries to refuse to do so show that their concern for their Palestinian brethren is only empty words, and that the “refugee problem” is kept alive as a political weapon to accuse Israel before the international community.

There is only ONE Jewish state. There are 60 Muslim countries, including 22 Arab nations.

One of the Key Things to Understand in this issue is the difference between “Occupied Territories” and “Disputed Territories.”

First, by using the term “occupation,” Palestinian spokesmen hope to create a political context to explain and even justify the Palestinians' adoption of violence and terrorism. Want to stop the terrorism? Stop the occupation.

Second, the Palestinian demand of Israel to "end the occupation" does not leave any room for territorial compromise & negotiations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as required by UN Resolutions 242 and 338.

The use of the term "occupied Palestinian territories" is also inaccurate and denies any Israeli claim to the land. Additionally, by presenting Israel as a "foreign occupier," the Jewish historical attachment to Israel is delegitimized.

Former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Meir Shamgar wrote in the 1970s that there is no practical application or “de jure” applicability of the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention regarding “occupied territories” to the case of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. This is because the Geneva Convention "is based on the assumption that there had been a sovereign state on the land who was ousted, and that it had been a legitimate sovereign [state]." BUT history shows that NO Sovereign Palestinian Arab State has ever existed on that land or in that region. The last legal authority over the “disputed settlement territories” was The League of Nations Palestine Mandate – Article 6 - which was incorporated into the UN charter as Article 80 in 1945. It called for the Jews to settle in that land.

THEREFORE – areas like the West Bank are a DISPUTED Territory, NOT an OCCUPIED Territory. This accurate and more neutral language of "disputed territories" puts the Palestinians and Israel on an even playing field with equal rights to negotiate their borders.

Interestingly enough, while so-called “oppressed” Palestinians were blowing up Israeli buses and restaurants full of Jewish civilians during the Intifada, it was discovered that none of the suicide bombers were Christian Palestinians who also lived in Gaza and the West Bank. Were the Christian Palestinians less “oppressed” or less “occupied” than the Muslim Palestinians or is there a different reason for the violence?

How can Israel, which occupies only 1/6 of one percent of Arab land, be responsible for all of the political problems and social dissatisfaction of 22 Arab countries?

How can 13 million Jews worldwide be blamed for the problems of 300 million Arabs, plus another 1.4 billion Muslims worldwide, who have brotherly ties to the Arabs?

Does the excuse of being “oppressed’ also justify all of the other violence and terrorism -committed primarily by Arabs &/or Muslims around the world - in London, Madrid, Mumbai, Indonesia, Scotland, Sudan, France, Russia, and elsewhere?

Israel's adversaries, and even some friends, assert that settlements are an obstacle to peace. Historically – all of the evidence points to the opposite conclusion.

Some examples:
• From 1949-67, when Jews were forbidden to live on the West Bank, the Arabs refused to make peace with Israel.
• In 1978, after Israel and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat began meeting for peace progress, Israel froze settlements, hoping the gesture would entice other Arabs to join the Camp David peace process, but no other Arab countries would join.
• In another Camp David summit in 2000, Ehud Barak offered to dismantle almost all settlements and create a Palestinian state in exchange for peace, and Yasser Arafat rejected the plan & began the violent Second Intifada from 2000 - 2005.

Israel also proved willing to dismantle settlements in the interest of peace but it made no difference.

• During the Camp David negotiations with Egypt, Sadat insisted that ALL settlements in the Sinai be removed. Israel did just that in 1982, even to the point of literally dragging Israelis out of their homes to comply with the terms of the agreement with Egypt, but other Arab nations did NOT make peace
• August 2005 – although Israeli settlements in the West Bank & Gaza were legal the Israeli Government again unilaterally FORCIBLY removed 9,000 Settlers from 21 Settlements and all Military bases from the Gaza strip - plus 4 settlements in the West Bank - at the overall cost of approximately $3 Billion. The Palestinians in Gaza responded by launching thousands of deadly rockets & mortars on the civilian Israeli population on its southern border.

In short, the historical record shows that with the exception of Egypt, and Jordan, the Arab states and Palestinians have refused to budge from their “all or nothing” demands, regardless of the scope of settlement activity

Approx. 1 in 5 Israelis are one of the 1.3 Million Israeli Arab citizens who live safely in Israel and would be allowed to continue doing so even when a Palestinian State is formed…even though Jews cannot live safely in Arab countries like Saudi Arabia, Libya, Yemen, etc. It would certainly be called racist if Jews were barred from living in New York, Paris or London; barring them from living in any part of Israel – especially in the West Bank, the cradle of Jewish civilization - would be no less objectionable.