Questioning Holocaust Curricula: The 21st-Century Scopes Monkey

It is hard to imagine more of a mockery being made of America’s public education system than occurred in the 1925 case Tennessee vs. John Scopes. The “Scopes Monkey Trial,” as it came to be known, found substitute biology teacher John Scopes guilty of violating a state law banning the theory of evolution from being taught in public schools. The Butler law, which passed overwhelmingly in the Tennessee state legislature earlier that year, made it illegal to present "any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals.”

The American Civil Liberties Union persuaded John Scopes to challenge the Butler law as a test case to determine its constitutionality. The guilty verdict was later thrown out by Tennessee’s Supreme Court on a technicality; hence the statute was never fully tested. It did, however, set a precedent as to the degree which government can intervene in the academic freedom of public education.

Fast forward to today. Five states: California, Florida, Illinois, New Jersey and New York have enacted laws requiring teaching of the Holocaust in public classrooms, while an additional ten states have issued executive regulations recommending Holocaust studies be included in their respective curricula. The Simon Wiesenthal Center—ironically, same organization poised to build a “Museum of Tolerance” on top of the historic Muslim Mamilla cemetery in Jerusalem—defines the Holocaust as "the destruction of some 6 million Jews by the Nazis and their followers in Europe between the years 1933-1945. Other individuals and groups were persecuted and suffered grievously during this period, but only the Jews were marked for complete and utter annihilation."

It is not necessary to parse words; the Holocaust refers to singular Jewish suffering, while giving a patronizing nod to other groups persecuted by the Nazis. Singular study of the Holocaust comes at the omission of any other World War II-era genocide or mass persecution: the Japanese occupation of China and other countries in the region, the releasing of the atomic demon upon millions of Japanese civilians, the internment of Japanese-Americans in concentration camps, or the millions who died at the hand of Soviet president Josef Stalin, then a US ally.

Stalin waged a campaign to erase Chechnya and Ingushetia from existence, deporting 1.4 million people from these regions in the western Soviet Union between 1941 and 1944. Most were accused of being Nazi collaborators, although evidence shows they were targeted due to a series of anti-collectivization rebellions against Soviet rule. On February 23, 1944 alone, approximately 387,000 Chechens and 91,000 Ingush were forced from their homes.

The BBC reported in 2004, that young Chechen men were taken from the front lines and sent to forced labor in Siberian gulags, their medals, decorations and papers confiscated. Civilians were rounded up and taken to Kazakhstan and other central Asian republics. According to Mohmad Musaev, head of the Chechen National Archive, Russian soldiers massacred many villagers rather than going to the expense of deporting them. Seven hundred people were burned alive and others were drowned in mountain lakes. A 2002 PBS series reported that an estimated 30 percent of Chechen deportees died en route to resettlement or within their first year of exile.
In 1957, Nikita Krushchev re-established Chechnya and Ingushetia as an autonomous republic, allowing survivors to return, only to find their homes taken over by neighboring Russians.

Most people are unaware of the Chechen genocide, while the Holocaust has two internationally recognized days: Yom Hashoah, falling in April or May in accordance with the Hebrew calendar and International Holocaust Remembrance Day, designated as January 27 by the United Nations General Assembly, the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. The same U.N. resolution rejects denial of the Holocaust and condemns discrimination and violence based on religion or ethnicity.

If “discrimination and violence based on religion or ethnicity,” is to be condemned, then why such silence regarding the Chechen genocide, or al-Nakba, the catastrophe during which 750,000 Palestinians were driven out of their land to establish the modern Jewish State?

Aside from the fact that the victims in these cases were predominantly Muslim, the answer lies in the proximity of Holocaust Remembrance Day to Israeli “Independence Day.” Any mention of the Palestinians killed or displaced in 1948 runs contrary to the month-long media blitz of pro-Israeli propaganda using the shield of the Holocaust to silence those critical of Israel’s policies.

Holocaust studies are only serving to mask the ongoing 62-year ethnic cleansing and genocide of Palestinians by generating unconditional sympathy for Israel. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, “Every member nation of the U.N. has an obligation to honor the memory of Holocaust victims and develop educational programs as part of an international resolve to help prevent future acts of genocide.” If that is the goal, Holocaust curricula are failing miserably.

Instead of condemning oppression, Israel apologists routinely use the Holocaust to defend the cruel treatment of Palestine’s original inhabitants. Paula E. Hyman, a professor of modern Jewish history at Yale Uni¬versity, has accurately observed:

“…it (the Holocaust) reinforces the sense of Jews as an eternally beleaguered people who can rely for their defense only upon themselves. The invocation of the suffering endured by the Jews under the Nazis often takes the place of rational argument, and is expected to convince doubters of the legitimacy of current Israeli government policy.”

While it may not be illegal yet, questioning the agenda behind Holocaust education in the United States earns the dreaded label “Holocaust Revisionist,” akin to the even more feared “Holocaust Denier,” first cousin to the infamous “Anti-Semite.” The climate in which the Holocaust is being shoved down the throats of our nation’s school children is comparable with 1925 Tennessee and introducing ideas contrary to the approved curriculum of Holocaust studies is the 21st Century’s Scopes Monkey. The sole purpose of this teaching is for our youth to accept Israel’s legitimacy without question, a non sequitur based on sympathy for Jewish suffering during the Holocaust. Zionist indoctrination is never logical, but thanks to our complacency, it is effective.

Israeli Environmental Terrorism: Nothing Sacred in the Holy Land

“The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.” Jews and Christians alike have commandeered this prophecy from the Old Testament book of Isaiah to fit their respective Zionist agendas: for Jews, the establishment of the state of Israel; for Christians, the transfer of all Jews to Palestine so that Christ may return to earth. The verse is superimposed on photographs of kibbutzim gardens in vile propaganda used by televangelists and in slideshows seen in small country churches. After all, who better to take care of the Holy Land than God’s own Chosen People? In the 62 years since Israel was created, hard-working Jewish immigrants have turned the land from a barren desert into a veritable oasis fit for Abraham, Jacob, David and Solomon.

Right.

With respect to the nearly 800,000 Palestinians that were forced to flee their homes upon the establishment of Israel in 1948, the Jewish State’s wanton destruction of the environment in their absence merits condemnation as well. The land once known as Palestine began suffering detrimental and irrevocable changes in the early 1950s when Israel’s fledgling government drained the wetlands surrounding Lake Huleh, north of the Sea of Galilee, for a housing project. Once the lake was dry, the Palestinian Painted Frog that inhabited the wetlands became extinct. The last reported sighting of the small amphibian was in 1955. Today, many other species are facing extinction due to Israel’s gross disregard for the environment.

Israeli fish farming is killing off coral reefs in the Red Sea, threatening unique species of fish and other marine life. According to coral ecologist Dr. Yossi Loya, five million fish are bred in cages each year without permits, a $20 million per year industry protected by the Israeli agriculture lobby. Coral reefs in Aqaba and along the Sinai Peninsula continue to thrive, as Jordan and Egypt do not permit large scale fishing off the Red Sea coast.

Meanwhile, Israeli corporate greed is threatening another natural wonder, the Dead Sea. At a 2009 regional conference to address the dramatic decrease in Dead Sea water levels, it was determined that industrial development would need to be abated. Israeli company ICL Fertilizers/Dead Sea Works responded by increasing potash production in their Dead Sea facility by 30 percent.

In 1999, Israel’s gross abuse of natural resources led a group of concerned citizens to form Zalul, a watchdog organization that monitors the effects of industrial dumping. According to the group, 500 million tons of raw sewage are discharged into the Mediterranean Sea annually, mere miles from public beaches. Israel’s Ministry of the Environment issues licenses to the culpable corporations, effectively granting permission to dispose of waste in such a manner.

In addition to industries, several municipalities, including Acre and Ashdod, have no properly built sewage treatment plants, contributing to Mediterranean Sea pollution. In the Tiberias municipality, a malfunctioning sewage treatment plant caused the closure of seven beaches along the Sea of Galilee in 2007 after Israeli Health Ministry officials found double the allotted amounts of fecal bacteria in the water for the second time in as many months.

While Israeli citizens have been adversely affected by the government’s failure to adopt responsible policies, Israel’s environmental racism and wholesale environmental terrorism against Palestinians and neighboring countries are far more sinister. In March 2009, Israel was forced to compensate Jordan for polluting the Yarmouk River with oil waste and sewage, contaminating the Kingdom's water supply. Eleven years ago, water contaminated with sewage was pumped from Lake Tiberias into Jordan.

In the West Bank, illegal outposts and unauthorized settlements pump sewage into rudimentary pits. The village of Deir Sharaf served as a dump for Israeli settlers until 2005, despite its close proximity to underground wells on which tens of thousands of Palestinians depend for drinking and sanitation. In Ya’abad, close to the city of Jenin, most residents work in wood-coal factories that pollute the air with rank smoke. The same industry exists in Egypt, although workshops were moved out of town for the health of the residents. Such a move in occupied Palestine is impossible because the Israelis control the area outside the city limits, prohibiting construction.

The human rights organization Yesh Din released a report in December 2009 citing 69 complaints of olive groves being damaged or destroyed during the past four years, 27 of which occurred between January and October 2009. The Israel Defense Forces issued a statement that the olive harvest had passed “quietly,” despite hundreds of Palestinian trees being reported destroyed. Not only are the centuries-old olive trees vital to the livelihood of Palestinian villagers, they possess an almost spiritual quality so the loss to farmers is tantamount to losing members of their immediate families.

It is worse still in Gaza. Even before the Israeli blockade, Palestinian fishermen were prohibited from sailing more than five kilometers out to sea, rendering the immediate coastal area devoid of fish. The Israeli military routinely destroyed wells serving refugee camps in Gaza. International Solidarity Movement member Rachel Corrie wrote of sleeping in front of the wells with fellow activists to prevent their destruction before she was murdered in 2003 by an Israeli bulldozer driver.

Also in 2003, the Israeli military began bulldozing the Gaza side of the internationally recognized “Green Line,” which is the site of one-third of Gaza’s agricultural land, according to a United Nations report. Israel continues to raze olive and fruit trees, farmland, irrigation piping, homes, greenhouses and wells; anyone found within this Israeli-imposed “buffer zone” risks being shot. At least 13 Palestinian civilians have been killed and 39 injured in border regions in and outside of the buffer zone this past year, including women and children.

It is not just the human toll that has devastated Gazan farmers. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) reported in September 2009 that 35,000 cattle, sheep and goats, as well as one million birds and chickens were killed during Israel’s nearly four-week assault on Gaza dubbed Operation Cast Lead. The animal carcasses, along with chemical agents used by the Israeli army, contaminated the water. According to the farmers, chemical-laden water now dehydrates trees rather than quenching them.

Earlier, during Israel’s 2006 simultaneous bombardments of Lebanon and Gaza, the Jiyeh power plant serving southern Lebanon was hit, resulting in a 15,000 ton oil spill, devastating local fishermen along with the ecosystem. Millions of dollars of infrastructure was destroyed in Gaza, exacerbating the already grave situation concerning water supply and sanitation.

Such problems resulted in the March 2007 disaster in the village of Umm Naser when a sewage reservoir burst its banks, killing two elderly women and three children, while destroying 200 homes. International development agencies had been prevented from entering Gaza to upgrade treatment facilities or build new ones. Palestinians continue to suffer severe power shortages and just last month, Israeli forces opened dams, flooding areas of the already ravaged Gaza Strip.

Israelis have duped the international and religious communities into believing their claim to Palestine is based on a belief that the land is holy—that their spiritual and emotional connection to this land reaches across millennia. Through the willful decimation of the land’s natural resources along with its native inhabitants, the Zionist establishment has proven that in the Holy Land, nothing is sacred.

Letter from an Ultra-Zionist: My Exchange with Congressman John Boehner (OH-8)

I received the following letter from Congressman John Boehner (Ohio-8th District):

Dear Tammy,

Thank you for contacting me regarding our Israel. (Yes, he did use the word “our.”) It is good to hear from you.

H.Res 867 was introduced by Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen on October 23, 2009 and referred to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. H. Res.867 would urge the President and the Secretary of State to oppose unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration of the “Report on the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict” in multilateral fora. The resolution would further consider the “Report on the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict” or the Goldstone Report, to be biased and unworthy of further consideration or legitimacy. The resolution further supports the Administration’s efforts to combat anti-Israel bias at the United Nations and reaffirms support for Israel and for Israel’s right to defend its citizens from violent militant groups and their state sponsors. This resolution passed through the House on November 3, 2009 by a vote of 344 to 36, with 22 Representatives voting present. I voted for this resolution.

I am a strong supporter of Israel and always have been. This besieged nation is the oldest democracy in the Middle East and its stability and ability to defend itself are essential to a lasting peace in the region. Israel is surrounded by many countries which have never recognized its right to exist (with the exception of Egypt and Jordan). These neighbors have gone to war with Israel five times with the sole purpose of annihilating the Jewish state and have pledged time and time again to maintain this adversarial position.

My support for Israel does not mean that I ignore the tragic loss of life on both sides. I can assure you I am closely monitoring this situation. This is a matter Congress is paying a great deal of attention to, and we will continue to suppport President Obama’s efforts to encourage and facilitate peace.

Please rest assured I will keep your thoughts in mind should I have the opportunity to vote on legislation addressing this issue. Thank you again for contacting me with your thoughts. Pelase don’t hesitate to inform me of your concerns in the future. To sign up for email updates, I invite you to visit my website at http://johnboehner.house.gov/Forms/Form/?ID=89.

Sincerely,
John A. Boehner

I replied with the following:

Congressman Boehner:

Thank you for contacting me regarding Palestine.

Your support of HR 867, effectively dismissing the Goldstone Report as “biased and unworthy of further consideration or legitimacy” is appalling. Judge Richard Goldstone serves as a trustee of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and is a self-proclaimed Zionist. His report concluded both Israel and Hamas committed grave breaches of international law. Therefore, claims of bias are baseless, showing how far the House of Representatives will go to whitewash Israeli war crimes.
If you define democracy as a state with an elected government, then Israel may qualify. In the broader sense--the one where democratic ideals include life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all people, regardless of race or religion--then Israel falls painfully short.

Israel is currently holding over 10,000 Palestinian prisoners in its jails, including women and minors. Ha’aretz, a leading Israeli newspaper, published the report of a European fact-finding mission to the prisons. It was discovered that 88 percent of the inmates were being held without formal charges, trial or hearing. Is this your idea of a democracy?

In a true democracy, freedom of religion is extended to all citizens. Israel has often denied Christian and Muslim pilgrims alike from worshipping in their respective holy sites. Muslim boys and men aged 15-40 have at times been barred from Friday prayers by Israeli authorities arbitrarily.

Moreover, it is historical fallacy to cite Arab countries as the aggressors in Israel’s wars. Prior to 1948, the Irgun and Stern gangs waged a terror campaign against British forces in Palestine, as well as targeting Palestinian civilians. The King David Hotel bombing killed 91 British personnel, injuring 45. These same gangs, led by Menachem Begin (who would later serve as Israel’s Prime Minister) massacred over 100 Palestinian men, women and children in the village of Deir Yassin on April 9, 1948. Small wonder that when Israel was established the following month, Arab neighbors attempted to thwart the total depopulation and subsequent obliteration of some 500 Palestinian villages, courtesy of the new Israeli army.

In October 1956, Moshe Dayan launched combined air and land assaults into Egypt’s Sinai peninsula.

In 1967, Israel launched a pre-emptive strike into Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. It was during the six-day course of this war that Israel also attacked the USS Liberty, an American ship. Thirty-four American sailors died and an additional 172 were wounded. Israel claimed the Liberty was mistaken for the Egyptian El Quseir, a ludicrous excuse as El Quseir was 180 feet shorter and very differently configured. The Liberty had her name clearly written in English, while the Egyptian ship would have displayed Arabic script. Surviving sailors testified that it was a deliberate attack, unless you wish to doubt the words of the American servicemen you claim to so vehemently support. As an intelligence gathering vessel, Liberty was likely to intercept real time evidence of the massacres committed by Israel in the Golan Heights, enough motive to destroy the American ship.

The Yom Kippur War in 1973 stemmed from Egypt’s desire to regain the Sinai Peninsula lost in the 1967 conflict, as Syria tried to recapture the Golan Heights.
Israel launched a full-scale invasion of Lebanon in 1982.

It is apparent the only thing you are monitoring is the flow of money from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) into your coffer. Your position itself is not surprising; however, I was shocked by your audacity to spend 42 taxpayer cents on mailing me pro-Israel propaganda. Let me make it clear that I am not buying.

Sincerely,

Tammy

The Myth of Anti-Semitism

There is no label that strikes more fear into the hearts of political figures, journalists and the general public than “Anti-Semitism.” To be labeled an “anti-Semite” can mean the end of a career, the failure of a business or being shunned by friends and colleagues.

“Anti-Semitism” is a term that was coined in Europe during the latter half of the nineteenth century. Prominent Jewish scholars used it to characterize the emerging theories that “Semitic” races were inferior to “Aryan” races. Despite the fact that Arabs are Semitic, the term is now exclusively understood to mean “prejudiced against or hostile toward Jews,” according to all major dictionaries.

A similar phenomenon occurred with the word “holocaust,” referring to the period of Nazi rule in Germany from 1933 to 1945 during which Russians, gypsies, Jews, homosexuals, political opponents of the regime and prisoners of war were systematically executed. Today, visitors to Auschwitz, one of the many concentration camps built throughout Nazi-occupied Europe, find little tribute to any group other than Jews; Israeli flags litter the grounds and signs are written in Hebrew. “Holocaust” is now exclusively understood as Jewish suffering.

The prolific Jewish writer and convert to Christianity Israel Shamir, explains the use of the Holocaust and the Anti-Semitic label in his 2001 essay “The Third Dove:”
“The Holocaust Industry is but a branch of the Anti-Semitism Manufacture, a two-pronged weapon: it pumps money from Gentiles and forces Jews into obedience to the leaders of the community.”

Shamir describes how Jewish organizations such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) not only profit monetarily from incidents of “anti-Semitism,” but how these establishments use it to bully the rest of America into silence regarding Israeli war crimes. The anti-Semitic misnomer is used to label anyone critical of the Israeli government or expressing the least bit of sympathy for the Palestinian people.

Shamir concludes his essay, “…scoundrels still use anti-Semitism as a weapon, but now most of these scoundrels are Jewish.”
So where does anti-Semitism in America occur at present?
Certainly not in our government. While Jews comprise roughly two percent of the American population, 14 Senators and 31 House members are Jewish; almost 8 ½% of Congress. Jews have served in prominent cabinet-level and advisory positions under both Republican and Democratic presidents, often with disastrous foreign policy consequences.

Bush’s influential advisers Paul Wolfowitz, Doug Feith and Richard Perle, strong supporters of Israel, long argued that removing Saddam Hussein from power was a critical prerequisite for Middle East peace. President Obama’s chief-of-staff, Rahm Emanuel, helped maintenance Israeli Army jeeps during the 1991 Gulf War. Before him, Emanuel’s father smuggled weapons to the Irgun militia, the same group responsible for the 1946 bombing of the King David Hotel as well as numerous attacks on Palestinian civilians.

“Anti-Semitism” is non-existent in churches where an estimated 15-18 million Evangelicals espouse the doctrine of Christian Zionism, the guiding principal of which states all Jews must migrate to Palestine in order for Jesus Christ to return to earth. John Hagee, the founder and pastor of Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas boasts more than 19,000 active members and he is broadcast in over 200 countries. Hagee established Christians United for Israel (CUFI) which currently has 146,000 members and holds an annual “Night to Honor Israel,” coinciding with the Jewish feast of Sukkot, celebrated by his church.

It certainly doesn’t exist in our schools where material pertaining to the Holocaust is introduced to children as young as 7 and students learn Hannukah songs while traditional Christmas carols such as Silent Night are shunned as a violation of separation between church and state.

“Anti-Semitism” cannot be found at political demonstrations where police from New York to Chicago to Los Angeles allow pro-Israeli demonstrators free reign to heckle pro-Palestinian activists. Yet let a Palestinian protester confront the Israeli camp and law enforcement officials will shove, use nightsticks and threaten arrest. At a recent fundraiser for Friends of the Israel Defense Forces, an Israeli and his three year-old son approached pro-Palestinian activists; the child shouted “I hate you.” Ironically, it is the Palestinians who are maligned by Western media as teaching their children to hate.

The Jewish Internet Defense Force (JIDF) is in the process of ensuring “Anti-Semitism” doesn’t exist on the Internet. Or any material critical of Israel, for that matter. The JIDF is attempting to shut down Palestinian advocacy groups on social networking websites such as Facebook and Twitter. They are also flagging individual Youtube accounts for various offenses such as “uploading hateful videos” or targeting users who have “hateful videos” listed as their favorites. “Hateful videos” are those which depict last year’s assault on Gaza. The JIDF inundates the administrators of these websites with abuse reports and terms of service violations so that the accounts are shut down and videos removed. However, little to nothing is done when people post such incendiary comments such as “Nuke Mecca with pork grease” on popular message boards.

Another Internet tactic is the manipulation of search engines which list the ten most popular searches of the day. On December 11, 2009 Yahoo listed “Hannukah” as number one while “Adolph Hitler” came in at number seven. Oh my! There is so much anti-Semitism that Hitler is still the seventh most popular keyword search in Yahoo. Or so they want us to think.

Finally, anti-Semitism doesn’t exist in Bahrain, despite the fact that the nation does not recognize Israel. The Bahraini Ambassador to the United States, Houda Ezra Ebrahim Nonoo, is a Jewish woman. Since her family emigrated from Iraq more than a century ago, several members of her family have had successful political careers in Bahrain, including a cousin who was appointed to parliament.

Refusal to recognize or support Israel has nothing to do with being “prejudiced against or hostile toward Jews” and everything to do with rejecting occupation, oppression and the myriad war crimes carried out by the Zionist state.

"The Third Dove" by Israel Shamir can be read in its entirety at: http://www.israelshamir.net/English/Third_Dove.htm

The King-Crane Commission: Required Reading Buried Under 100 Years of Zionist Propaganda

“Down with American Imperialists.” This sign, or one of its variations, can be seen at protests and demonstratons throughout the world. U.S. policies have given credence to it, fueling legitimate hatred in countries like Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine and others victimized by America’s lust for oil and support of the Israeli military juggernaut. Yet less than 100 years ago, the United States was admired in the global arena as a bastion of justice and freedom. Furthermore, Zionism—the belief that all Jews are entitled to a “homeland” in Palestine—was condemned in an official document.

The King-Crane Commission is relatively unknown, buried under a century of Zionist propaganda and attempts to discredit Dr. Henry Churchill King and Charles R. Crane as Nazi sympathizers. On the contrary, Dr. King was one of the best known educators of his time and served as the director of religious work for the YMCA in France. Mr. Crane was selected as part of a special diplomatic mission to Russia and was U.S. Ambassador to Chinafrom 1920-1921. In 1919, after World War I and the break-up of the Ottoman Empire, President Woodrow Wilson apppointed King and Crane to head the Inter-Allied Commission on Mandates in Turkey.
King and Crane’s mission was to record the wishes of the people in the former Ottoman territories regarding their desired form of government and the degree to which outside intervention would be accepted. President Woodrow Wilson’s July 4, 1918 address provided the backdrop for their objective:

“The settlement of every question, whether of territory, of sovereignty, of economic arrangement, or of political relationship upon the basis of the free acceptance of that settlement by the people immediately concerned and not upon the basis of the material interest or advantage of any other nation or people which may desire a different settlement for the sake of its own exterior influence or mastery.”

It was in this spirit that King and Crane had embarked on their 42-day tour of Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Mesopotamia (Iraq) and Asia Minor. The commission conducted conferences throughout the region, gathering opinions on such topics as territorial limits, independence, form of government, choice of mandate and Zionism.

The King and Crane Commission examined responses from religious, political and social/economic organizations and found overwhelming support among the Muslim population in Syria for an American mandate, as opposed to Britain or France, should it be determined that the fledgling government needed external assistance. The reasoning behind this preference was summarized in the final report as “…the nearly universal recognition of the fact that America sought no additional territory…” Article 4 of the General Syrian Congress, convened that same summer in Damascus, supported their finding:

“…And desiring that our country should not fall a prey to colonization and believing that the American Nation is farthest from any thought of colonization and has no political ambition in our country, we will seek the technical and economic assistance from the United States of America…”
While there was some disagreement in the territories as to the choice of mandate, there was nearly universal opposition to Zionism. The General Syrian Congress unanimously passed articles opposing partitioning Palestine from the rest of Syria. Leaders at that time grasped all too well the strategy of “divide and conquer”; they also understood the Zionist ambitions of setting aside Palestine as future Jewish state.

Prior to their journey, King and Crane had been lobbied by pro-Zionist groups and were, by their own admisstion, “pre-disposed in its favor.” However, during conferences with local Jewish representatives, it became apparent that their goal was the “practically complete dispossession of the present non-Jewish inhabitants of Palestine by various forms of purchase.”

Further investigation revealed something far more sinister than acquiring the land by mere “purchase.” Statements made by British officials increased the commissioners’ misgivings about the entire Zionist project. In their final recommendations, King and Crane wrote:

“No British officer, consulted by the Commissioners, believed that the Zionist program could be carried out except by force of arms. The officers generally thought that a force of not less than 50,000 soldiers would be required even to initiate the program…Decisions requiring armies to carry out, are sometimes necessary. But they are surely not gratuitously to be taken in the interest of a serious injustice.”

King and Crane also took into consideration the status of holy sites in Palestine: “The places which are most sacred to Christians—those having to do with Jesus—and which are also sacred to Moslems, are not only not sacred to Jews, but abhorrent to them.” The Commissioners went on to reason that it was neither logical nor prudent to place these most holy sites in the control of a Jewish authority.

Finally, King and Crane concluded that the implementation of the Zionist plan would be contrary to the aforementioned principle outlined by President Wilson, whereby nations have a right to self-determination free from external pressure. Nine-tenths of the population surveyed, including Muslim and Christian groups, were against Zionism. Their final recommendation read “…This would have to mean that Jewish immigration should be definitely limited, and that the project for making Palestine distinctly a Jewish commonwealth should be given up.”

It is nothing short of tragic that in the 90 years since the King-Crane Commission, subsequent American leaders have abandoned the principles which led President Wilson to embark on that diplomatic effort in the first place. The common sense and mutually beneficial policy of non-intervention was rejected in favor of big oil and strategic interests. The opportunity to forge an allegiance with emerging governments eager for freedom and self-determination was squandered in favor of the perpetrators of ethnic cleansing and genocide, from Deir Yassin to Lebanon to Gaza. And America will continue to pay the price.

The entire King-Crane Commission Report can be read at: http://www.atour.com/government/un/20040205g.html