The Jews were not given the land in Israel and the Jewish part of the land was purchased from the rich Arab landowners at a premium price.

The Jews were not given the land in Israel and the Jewish part of the land was purchased from the rich Arab landowners at a premium price. During testimony in front of the British Peel Commission January 12, 1937 The Hajj Amin el-Husseini, the intractable opponent of Zionism, a Jew-hater who killed over 12,000 Jews in Bosnia on par with Hitler, admitted under questioning that no Arab land was stolen; no Arabs were wiped out, no villages destroyed. Rather, the Jews bought hundreds of thousands of dunam (about ¼ of an acre) of land from willing sellers, often from absentee Arab landowners. During the war of Independence in 1948. Then 5 nations waged war on them and got their skull handed to them. At that point, they earned it. Countries have tried to knock them off the hill, but Israel keeps winning, so, yeah, it's their land now. Deal with it. And sweetie, Hamas is a terrorist group. Innocent people are being slaughtered by Hamas...and then they hide behind innocent people as Israel fires back. It's surprising to see an American eat up Hamas's propaganda so easily. You're a liberal arts major aren't you?

I would be hard pressed to identify any (non third world, anyway) country today that exists without any change in "ownership." To me, the Native American Indians were in North America first. The Europeans "conquered" the country, built it up, more people came, land was partitioned back to the American Indians (reservations), where they (reluctantly, I'm sure) exist. Now, what would happen if the Native Americans decided that they wanted more of their homeland and started lobbing missiles into Oklahoma City? Do you think the US Government would just sit by?
The bottom line is that all these people in the Middle East can make claims and justify their land rights, depending on a point in time in history. Right now, there is Israel and there are surrounding Arab nations. The Arabs (and their derivatives) need to stop trying to destroy Israel and other terrorist acts and try and co-exist. It is pretty clear to most even-minded people that Israel has been living under constant threats and, given the fact that they haven't nuked their enemies, has been showing considerable restraint. The Palestinians (which isn't even a real "nation" by the way, if one reads history) have some land to call their own and it is called Jordan and so does Israel, which took care of the million Jewish people expelled from Arab countries, The Arabs countries confiscated their land, which is 4 times the size of Israel and are holding assets totaling over 15 trillion dollars. Amen.

I find it comical that people you are likening Israel's existence to that of a theoretical invasion of Indian reservations (Palestine) by the US Marines (Israel) ... as:

1) 30 odd percent of the Israeli population are Muslims and Christians, who live in an environment far more free than any Islamic equivalent...most of which either have or will fight for and defend their country in the IDF.

2)Islam really only came to be in the 6-7th century, prior to which most of the region were either Jewish or Christian.. The Quran uses most of the Old testament as its base, all of which, came to be in the time of Mohammed who was simply a descendant of Ishmael (Abraham's son)...so with this in mind, how are the Jews, equivalent to Indonesians invading Australia? ... In reality they are equivalent to Australian Aboriginals...Every Muslim that exists today is a descendant of something else... What's more, structures like the Western Wall and the Old city of Jerusalem predate Christ, whilst buildings sacred to Islam like The Dome of the Rock (built 691 AD...) came long after.

3) If we really want to be pedantic, one of the most holy cities in the Islamic faith - Medina, was a mainly Jewish before it was Islamic and 700 Jews were beheaded for not converting to Muslim faith and their wives and daughters taken as slaves and abused.

In regards to Gaza however, In 2005 Israel pulled completely out of Gaza, in 2006 when the Palestinian Arabs were able to vote in a legislative election for the first time in ten years, they chose Hamas, a genocidal terrorist organization that drew its popularity from its unwillingness to even entertain the thought of peace with the Jewish State.

The 2006 election showed once again that the root cause of terrorism lay in a culture where political popularity came from killing Jews, not from bringing peace.

Hamas’ ability to carry out more spectacular terrorist attacks, employing motivated Islamist suicide bombers, gave it the inside track in the election. Where Western political parties might compete for popularity by offering voters peace and prosperity, Palestinian factions competed over who could kill more Jews. And Hamas won based on its killing sprees and its unwillingness to water down its platform of destroying Israel. If occupation were the issue, then the less territory Israel “occupied”, the more peace there would be. But the real world results of the peace experiment have led to the exact opposite outcome.

Israel’s withdrawals from Gaza and Lebanon did not lead to peace, they led to greater instability as Hamas and Hezbollah exploited the power vacuum to take over Gaza and Lebanon, and used that new-found power to escalate the conflict with Israel. The less territory Israel has occupied, the more violence there has been directed against her. The goal of the terrorists has never been an Israeli withdrawal and a separate peace, but the perpetuation of the conflict, and the elimination of the Jewish state.

Half a year after Israel withdrew from Gaza, Hamas swept the Palestinian legislative elections. Another half a year after that, a Hamas raid netted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit as a hostage. Barely a year after Israel had withdrawn from Gaza; Hamas had found a way to bring Israeli soldiers back into Gaza for a renewal of the conflict.

Cut off from attacking Israel directly by a blockade, Hamas deepened its investment in long-range weapons systems, even while complaining that its people were going hungry. After its takeover of Gaza, it significantly improved its weapons capabilities. In 2004, it had achieved its first Kassam fatality killing a 4-year-old boy on his way to a Sderot nursery school, but by 2006, its capabilities had so dramatically improved that it was able to launch its first Katyusha rocket at Ashkelon, the third largest city in Israel’s south with a population of over 100,000.

As the volume and range of Hamas’ rockets increased, Israel was forced to take action. In 2004, Israel suffered 281 rocket attacks. By 2006, that number had increased to over 1,700. In 2008, the number of rocket and mortar attacks approached 4,000 triggering Operation Cast Lead, also known as the Gaza War.

Operation Cast Lead destroyed enough of Hamas’ stockpiles and capabilities to reduce rocket attacks down to the 2004 and 2005 levels, but another dramatic increase in attacks in 2012, with over 2,000 rockets fired into Israel, combined with the smuggling of Fajr 5 rockets capable of reaching Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, forced Israel to carry out a series of strikes against Hamas in Operation Pillar of Defense.

Both times Israel did not choose a conflict of opportunity, but reacted to a disturbing level of Hamas violence, and had nothing to gain from the conflict except for a temporary reduction of violence.

The same is the case of Operation Protective Edge which Hamas launched over 15,000 rockets at Israel - No Nation in history would tolerate such attacks without a strong response to defend its population from death and destruction. Any other nation, the response would have been much worse and the destruction would of been almost total. Putin would of wiped Gaza of the map, in less than 72 hours and nobody could challenge him.

"We have to undue the decades of nonsense that the peace industry has fermented, which led us to the position where the world thinks we the Jews are occupiers in our own land.

If something is false and it is repeated enough times it becomes sort of common wisdom.

We have to undo that."

I have long said, this isn't about land, but extermination of a religion and culture not accepted by another. I have actually asked the question, what if there was no 'holy land'. Say a natural disaster, dissolving the place into nothing. Would you still fight? Well, the answer was chilling and saddened me greatly. The answer was over and over, "we have the right to kill all non believers". I've read and re-read everything, from both sides, also, non-biased writings. I come to the conclusion that Israel must protect herself in every way possible or face genocide. Those in power rejected all and any attempts to recognize Israel's right to exist. Don't start with who was there first, because when you look at it, there have been many successors and each took their place with the right to rule. So that argument is mute. Israel is the rightful successor, having won in war. Many times. Sadly, it will continue, because when one culture wants another's elimination, there is no talking. I hope Israel does not repent, or give up any more land, because they will only make themselves vulnerable. Might I remind you, on 911, there was one who wished our extermination, right here in America. This will continue until education and humanity replaces a hatred, for no other reason, than to not accept that you exist.