Invented People or Invented History?

Invented People or Invented History?


American pundits have spilled a veritable ocean of ink since Newt Gingrich's comment on the bogus nature of Palestinian nationalism -- Gingrich called the Palestinians an "invented people." But interestingly, Gingrich's American critics, on both the left and the right, are largely in agreement that Gingrich's error was not in denying Palestine's historic national existence, but instead his use of the term "invented people." All nationalisms are invented to some extent, they claim, and the Palestinians have simply invented theirs like everybody else. Perhaps they even borrowed from Zionism, like the Americans from the English, or the French from the Americans. That, goes the argument, does not make their claim inauthentic. And Palestinian nationalism may be a net good, a useful fiction, by tamping down pan-Arabism. It is true that nationalism is a human invention, and a rather late one at that -- a Western idea that slowly developed through the Middle Ages and took its modern form during the Enlightenment. By this standard, the Palestinians could not have been a nation in antiquity, but then neither could the Jews. But that doesn't mean that nation-states ought not to have some reasonable historical legitimacy, lest any group of people demand nationhood for any reason. And while the number of nations accepted by the United Nations continues to creep upward (193 at last count), that is still a tiny fraction of the tribes, clans, principalities, kingdoms, and empires that were the governing norm before the idea of dividing the world into nation-states took hold. Claiming a legitimate national identity is serious business, and it requires a legitimate historical basis. This was the heart of Gingrich's complaint, and it is the point his critics either avoid or brush over. And the Palestinians do not have legitimate historical claims to nationhood, as historians more qualified than I have demonstrated time and again. Or do they? What say the Palestinians? The Palestinians have never accepted the arguments of their better apologists in the West. They do not consider themselves an invented people like everybody else and so nonetheless legitimate and deserving of statehood. Accepting that line of thinking would also legitimize other "invented nations" like Israel, and the one thing that the Palestinians don't accept is the idea of legitimate Jewish nationalism. So the Palestinians are really in agreement with Newt Gingrich in this sense -- the essence of their rightful claim to the land must be historical or not be at all. So what is their claim? Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/01/invented_people_or_invented_history_1.html#ixzz1iKYhotfq