Setting history straight

    History can be approached in multiple ways — through religious texts like the Torah for Jews, the Bible for Christians and the Quran for Muslims. Even those who are atheists can look to history books for evidence of the deep-rooted connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel.

   The Torah explicitly mentions the presence of Jews in Israel, tracing their presence back thousands of years. There's also Biblical reference to the birthplace of Jesus in Jewish Bethlehem, challenging the notion that Palestinian Muslims have a historical claim to the land before the Jews.

  Jerusalem is never mentioned in the Quran, the term "sons of Israel" appears more than 43 times. Notably, "Palestine" was imposed by the Romans as a punishment for the Bar Kokhba revolt.

  Arabs, in 1947, had the opportunity to establish a Palestinian state through the U.N. Partition Plan, which the Jews accepted despite receiving less land and fewer resources. However, the Arabs rejected the plan and opted to wage war. When the Jews emerged victorious, 156,000 Arabs remained within what became Israel.