About

Sandra Gaza Budak

“A land without a people for a people without a land”

Was and is, the oft used Zionist quote for the excuse of annexing Palestine as the Jewish home land.

Although today there is a movement   amid right wing Zionism to move away form the quote.The quote is most

often attributed to Israel Zangwill. What Zangwill actually wrote, in the New Liberal Review in December, 1901, was “Palestine is a country without a people; the Jews are a people without a country.” Zangwill, who had visited Palestine, knew that it did contain a population, although a relatively small one. What he meant by calling it a land without “a people” is that there was at that time no people or ethnic group identifying itself as any particular national group and that it was underpopulated as most travelers at the time (i.e. non-Palestinians) agreed.

Zangwell attribute the quote to  Lord Shaftsbury, who writing  to Foreign Minister Aberdeen that Greater Syria was “a country without a nation” in need of “a nation without a country… Is there such a thing? To be sure there is, the ancient and rightful lords of the soil, the Jews!”In his diary that year he wrote “these vast and fertile regions will soon be without a ruler, without a known and acknowledged power to claim dominion. The territory must be assigned to some one or other..There is a country without a nation; and God now in his wisdom and mercy, directs us to a nation without a country..

But there was a country and a people, a rich vibrant culture was thriving in the land of Palestine.So much so that those early tourist of the 19th and in the early year of the 20 th century had their hearts stolen by  it.So much so,  some submerged themselves into the life lived there to the point of wearing the clothing style of the inhabitants of Palestine.In this blog I hope to show what Palestine was like through the words of the people who lived there  and who travelled there, bring it to life throiugh photographs and pictures.

I should point out that some of the writers enthusiasims for this magical place were curbed by the preconcieved societal more of the time they lived in, and thier writings do reflect this.It was a different era than what we live in today. but when one sorts  the wheat form the chaff, one can find gems of what life in Palestine was like before the arrival of the Zioinists.

“A land without a people for a people without a land”
Was ans is, the oft used Zionist quote for the excuse of annexing Palestine as the Jewish home land.Although today there is a movement   amid right wing Zionism to move away form the quote.The quote is most often attributed to Israel Zangwill. What Zangwill actually wrote, in the New Liberal Review in December, 1901, was “Palestine is a country without a people; the Jews are a people without a country.” Zangwill, who had visited Palestine, knew that it did contain a population, although a relatively small one. What he meant by calling it a land without “a people” is that there was at that time no people or ethnic group identifying itself as any particular national group and that it was underpopulated as most travelers at the time (i.e. non-Palestinians) agreed.Zangwell attribute the quote to  Lord Shaftsbury, who writing  to Foreign Minister Aberdeen that Greater Syria was “a country without a nation” in need of “a nation without a country… Is there such a thing? To be sure there is, the ancient and rightful lords of the soil, the Jews!”In his diary that year he wrote “these vast and fertile regions will soon be without a ruler, without a known and acknowledged power to claim dominion. The territory must be assigned to some one or other..There is a country without a nation; and God now in his wisdom and mercy, directs us to a nation without a country..But there was a country and a people, a rich vibrant culture was thriving in the land of Palestine.So much so that those early tourist of the 19th and in the early year of the 20 th century had their hearts stolen by  it.So much so,  some submerged themselves into the life lived there to the point of wearing the clothing style of the inhabitants of Palestine.In this blog I hope to show what Palestine was like through the words of the people who lived there  and who travelled there, bring it to life throiugh photographs and pictures.I should point out that some of the writers enthusiasims for this magical place were curbed by the preconcieved societal more of the time they lived in, and thier writings do reflect this.It was a different era than what we live in today. but when one sorts  the wheat form the chaff, one can find gems of what life in Palestine was like before the arrival of the Zioinists.