One thing Obama won't change

[makingmusic476]

I never understood the idea that Jews "stole" the land from the Palestinians. Palestine was never a nation to begin with. The Palestinian/Israeli territories had been controlled by various empires for thousands of years, the last being the Ottoman Empire from 1516-1917.

The Jewish people started emigrating back to their former homeland as early as the 12th century, once the crusades had come to an end and the region somewhat stabilized. The number of Jews making the home journey increased after 1492, when Jews were expelled from Spain

The amount of Jews heading back to the "Holy Land" began increasing even further near the end of the Ottoman Empire's reign, when the Zionist movement began. Jews began to migrate to the region surrounding Jerusalem around 1881, and were legitimately buying land from the Arabs of the region. This continued up until 1917, when the Ottoman Empire was defeated by Britain and it's allies in WWI, thus placing much land in the Middle-East in the hands of the British.

The British then decided that the Jews should eventually have a nation of their own, as by this time many Jews inhabited the land of Israel, and since no governing body existed in the region, they decided (in 1947) to divide the region between the Palestinians and Jews, creating two nation-states.

However, this plan never worked out, as no compromise between the groups could be reached. The British eventually decided they would pull out of the region, but the newly created United Nations decided to go ahead with the original plan, attempting to divide the region into two nation-states. They also decided that Jerusalem would be held by the UN, to prevent hostilities over which of the two sides "owned" the city.

The Jews accepted this plan, but the Arabs did not. In 1948 the state of Israel was created. The Arabs got pissed, and just a short while later, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon, and Syria attacked Israel.

I don't really understand how Israel can really be seen as the bad guy in all of this. I also don't understand how Palestine deserves this land anymore than the Israelis, or why they want the Israelis expelled from the region. Jews have been there for thousands of years, much like the Palestinians, and there has never been a state of Palestine before.

A two state system is the only thing that could work here. I've seen Israel make many attempts at this, withdrawing from some regions, talking with Palestinian leaders, etc. but groups like Hamas just keep on attacking, and then the Israelis attack back.