PA leader Mahmoud Abbas is being mocked by a number of bloggers and journalists for his latest gift to the Saudi king in his ongoing attempt to distort history and delegitimize Israel.

It seems there is no limit to the lies and outright chutzpah of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who on Sunday presented the king of Saudi Arabia with a strange gift: a framed copy of the front page of a 1932 edition of The Palestine Post.

One might wonder what Abbas, who denies any Jewish historical ties to Jerusalem and reportedly complained to the Saudi king about continued Israeli violations of Palestinian land and holy sites, was trying to convey with this gift. Was he insinuating that the newspaper was actually owned by “Palestinian Arabs” in a Palestinian state?

“Wonder if they’re pointing to a 1930s typo,” David Brinn, managing editor of The Jerusalem Post, quipped on Facebook in a caption for the photo. On Twitter, he wrote, “I wonder if he’s a subscriber.”

“Do you see the expression on the King’s face?” commented blogger IsraelShield. “There is a reason he is looking so uneasy. He is probably embarrassed by the utter stupidity of Abbas. See, The Palestine Post was a Jewish Zionist newspaper.”

The Palestine Post was founded in 1932 by Gershon Agron, who, among other Zionist positions, had served as envoy of the World Zionist Organization and was a member of a Jewish Agency delegation. The paper was renamed The Jerusalem Post in 1950, two years after the establishment of the State of Israel.

There never was a Palestinian Arab state. Indeed, Jews living in the Land of Israel were considered Palestinian Jews. As Jewish settlers worked the land and literally made the desert bloom, many Arabs from the region migrated to Palestine to avail themselves of the new economic opportunities.

In 135 CE, Judea was renamed Syria Palaestina by the Romans after they crushed the Bar Kokhba Revolt.

During the period of Ottoman rule (1517-1917), “Palestine” referred to the land south of Syria, and many Ottomans and Arabs living there referred to the area as “Southern Syria.”

During the British Mandate, “Palestine” also included present-day Jordan.

It was not until years after Israeli independence that the Arabs living in Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip were called Palestinians. In fact, Arabs cannot even correctly pronounce the word “Palestine” in their native tongue, instead referring to the area as “Filastin.”

The word “Palestine” or “Filastin” does not appear in the Koran. The term “peleshet,” meaning migratory or land of invaders, appears in the Jewish bible no fewer than 250 times.

By: United with Israel Staff
(With files from Israellycool and Jewish Virtual Library)

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