The Palestinians are news both by their internal and international frustrations. The words Palestine and Philistine have a similar sound even though one is a proper noun and the other an adjective. Both stand for long-time irritants to their Jewish neighbours. Modern Palestinians are Arabs, some Christians, most Muslims, whereas the ancient Philistines were people from the Mediterranean islands who settled on the eastern coast of that sea and threatened the Hebrews living farther inland. The stories of Samson and the Philistine temptress, Delilah, and of the shepherd boy David's encounter with Goliath are well known.

Angles 'n' Attitudes William Bothwell Before going further into the continuing adversarial relationship, one notes that the term 'philistine' has acquired a cultural as well as an ethnic significance. It has become an epithet for those whose opinions lack an educated literary or aesthetic basis. They say, "We know what we like". In fact, they like what they know. That is the mediocrity that cartoonist critic Sir Max Beerbohm used to say is the only opinion that can be trusted never to change. Despite intermittent negotiations the adversarial Palestinian and Israeli prejudices are not likely to do so either.

The term 'Palestine' came into modern use under the 1920-1948 British Mandate over former Turkish territory. It included the ancient regions of Philistia, Gaza, Judah, Israel and Trans-Jordan. When either European guilt or a fulfilment of prophecy created the State of Israel in 1948, many of the region's centuries-long Arab inhabitants had to flee the Zionist zeal to dispossess and drive them out in order to re-establish the realm of Kings David and Solomon and a Jewish homeland. Messianic Jews, but not fundamentalist Christians, opposed the scheme on the basis that the Messiah would one day accomplish that purpose without the help of either secular Zionists or of the United Nations, the United States or the United Kingdom.

Budapest-born Theodor Hertzl (1860-1904) and his "Jewish State" visionaries had no particular religious agenda. Although the justification for the recovery of Arab territory often appealed to Scriptural promises about a "return to Zion" not many of the world's 6 million Jews have chosen to go there. With that reticence the Israeli government has not allowed a return of the displaced Palestinians or entertained any other policy that would permit the possibility of an Arab majority within what is now Israel. Thus, there are the refugee camps and the festering resentment of four generations of Palestinian exiles. It is an intolerable situation. The Nazi 'holocaust' was a human tragedy. So also, many now say, has been the imposition of a Euro-American- Jewish state upon Arabs who had been promised post-World War I autonomy by the victorious allies. It is a constant Middle East irritant.

The current Arab Palestinians do not have an indisputable claim to Palestine/Israel. Neither have either Canada or the U.S.A. one to North America, nor the Latin Americans to the lands they took from other aboriginal people. Should we all, then, go back to where our ancestors came from? Should all those who possessed any given land 3000 years ago repossess it now? Impossible! There must be some reasonable solution to that problem even though either American aboriginal or Hebrew tribalism and historical memory may lay claim to lands long occupied by others. Above all, repeated acts of terror and reprisal are not the solution. Some who have messianic expectations insist on that eventuality. They look forward to Armageddon, the ultimate 'jihad'. Those who advance such opinions, whether based on the Bible or the Qu'ran are, like Cassius and his fellow plotters, dangerous men.

The ancient Hebrews knew that good relations with the Philistines were necessary. The Torah notes in Genesis 26 that Abraham's son, Isaac, made an agreement with Abimelech, the Philistine king, in a time of famine. It was threatened because of Isaac's deception. The Hebrew 'spin' on the story was that, although he feared Isaac's wealth, Abimelech finally saw "that the Lord is with you". Maybe. It was Hebrews, not Philistines, who wrote the story. Those who read any scriptures should consider the context and the espoused prejudice. The ancient Philistines had the military advantage of iron weapons and chariots but the Torah makes it clear that Isaac had wealth. Money always talks. Modern Israel has had billions of U.S. dollars behind it while, despite neighbouring Arab petro-dollars, the Palestinians suffer international sanctions and sink further into economic and political chaos.

The long-ago Philistines, predecessors of the Palestinians, had two advantages over the ever factious and not always justifiably self-righteous Hebrews. For one thing, their technology had entered the Iron Age and their weapons and chariots were therefore superior to those of their enemies, David's skill with his slingshot notwithstanding. As Jeffrey Goldberg says in a new book, Prisoners: A Muslim and a Jew Across the Middle East Divide, an unarmed Jew is always at a disadvantage. Well, no more in Israel.

The non-military advantage of the ancient Palestinians was their unity. The world's Jewish diaspora has lacked a similar unanimity. The biblical Hebrews were divided into twelve tribes that eventually split into two vulnerable kingdoms: the ten northern 'lost tribes' and two southern ones. Both were overrun by one empire after another. Finally, Titus Flavius destroyed Jerusalem and its Temple in 70 A.D. The region once known as Judea, Galilee and Samaria became the Roman province of Syria Palaestina. Until 638 A.D. Palestine continued under Byzantine (Eastern Roman) imperial rule. Thereafter a succession of Arab and Turkish Muslims held power, before and after the European Crusader kingdom, until the modern British Mandate. Jews make important contributions to many nations but too few have elected to return to modern Israel.

The 1947 United Nations partition of Palestine (56.5% for a Jewish, 43.5 % for a Palestinian state) decreed that Jerusalem should be an international city. Its very name means 'foundation of peace'.

The inter-faith importance of the 'Holy Land' would indicate that, barring a workable accord, Palestine/Israel should become the world's first post-national region under a new United Nations mandate. Meanwhile, there persists a visceral, adversarial, 'Us vs.Them', attitude between Israelis and Palestinians that is no basis for peace. It may, indeed, take a messiah to overcome it.