You know, who's on first........? When you start out saying "Jews have owned all of the Holy-Land etc up to about 1900 years ago when the bloody and brutal Roman army....yada yada" I have to take some exception, especially when your thesis is about someone not knowing his history.

Prior to the Jews by about 1,000 years was the Canaanite with their city at Ebla. before that it is surmized the Sumerians extended their rule from Mesopotamia to this region. But this is part of the "who's on first" experience. The Hyksos people were the one's that brought Joseph to Egypt and they had a civilization with a major city at Ugarit and left a marvelous ziggarat to record their history there. The exodus from Egypt is supposed to be about 1275 BCE. Israel as a nation was then conquered and assimilated into the Sea People (Hebrew) population and became one people in about 1230BCE. The real estate was pretty secure during the age of the Judges and down from the reign of Saul, David, and Solomon in 925BCE. At that time the real estate was divided into Israel in the north, and Judah in the south. Sargon II conquered Israel in 722 BCE as a major feature of the Assyrian rivival. With the rise of the Neo-Babylonians at the fall of Ninevah came a dynastic succession that saw Nebuchadnezzar defeat Judah and exile what was left of the Jews in 587 BCE. This, of course, wass the Diasopora and it was during this period the Bible as it became known was redacted in an attempt to give a record of the Jews as their nation was in danger of not continuing. The Jews were allowed to return when the Babylonians fell to the Persians under Nabonidus in 539 BCE. As you can see, the real estate in question was under either Palestinian-Syrian or Persian hands for over 200 years. And what happened then, Cyrus the Great defeated the Persians and took the territory and under Antiochus IV instituted total Hellinization and totally abolished the Hebrew language and it wasn't spoken again until 1948 CE. This was Greek real estate until 63 BCE when the "bloody and brutal Roman army took it away from the Greeks.

So, your thesis inferring the Jews have owned the Holy-Land from time immorial until about 1900 years ago when those nasty Romans took it from them doesn't hold much water. I won't bother going into the Balfour agreement and the forming of Isreal here. I did want to point out that it is really peculiar how different groups of semitic peoples, that have everything in common except religions, can hate each other so and can attempt to spin history to fit claims of ownership to an otherwise unimportant tiny piece of real estate. And please, the Ottaman Empire had as much right to the Holy Land as anyone, ask Saladin. This goes back to the Abbot and Costello bit. And have a joyful and blessed Rosh Hashanah and may your cousins have a holy Ranadan season.

Publius