Comments by "Sandy Tatham" (@sandytatham3592) on "60 Minutes Australia" channel.

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  9. ​ @shadowguard3578 : The "Children of Israel" are said to be the descendants of a man named Israel, also known as Prophet Jacob. Jacob was the son of Isaac, one of the two sons of Abraham. Muslims are said to be the descendants of Abraham's other son named Ishmael, so they are from a distinctly different lineage and they are indigenous to other lands. Peoples are usually described as "Indigenous" when they maintain traditions or other aspects of an early culture that is associated with the first inhabitants of a given region. The Jewish people have had an unbroken connection to the Holy Land for 3000+ years. Christians also have a connection to the land through Jesus who was a Jew, but the traditions and worship practices of Christians are not focussed on the Holy Land to the same extent that the Jewish traditions and worship are. Christianity is a personal religious belief and not an ethnicity. I believe that the majority of Christians living today in the Holy Land are also of Arab descent, so that makes your claim even more complicated. And those Jews who converted to Islam have lost their connection to the Holy Land as the primary holy place for Muslims is Mecca in Saudi Arabia. [Edit: any Muslim living in the Palestine Territories who discovers that his ancestry/DNA is Jewish would be in deep fear because he's likely to be considered a traitor by his Muslim community if he came out and declared that he is actually of Jewish descent.] It makes little difference now that Israel is a sovereign state. It is Israel's government that gets to decide who is to be given the right to Israeli citizenship, in the same way that all countries decide who has the right to live in their countries or not. Those Arabs who were living in the land of Israel in 1948, and who accepted Jewish rule and didn't side with the Arab armies which invaded with the aim of destroying the new state of Israel, now have equal rights under the law with Jews. They also have freedom of worship, and they are thriving.
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  10.  @shadowguard3578  : The Jewish people have been connected to their land for over 3500 years through their kings, coins, burial places of ancestors, artefacts, place names like Judea, archaeological evidence of Jewish life, the unique Hebrew language, spiritual symbols of plants such as olives, figs, pomegranates, etc. grown in that land, and religious practices which focus on that specific place, ie. "next year in Jerusalem". They are an indigenous rights success story. The Arabs invaded in the 7th century and created a narrative about Al-Aqsa Mosque which is clearly false. It's just a political symbol of conquest which they built on top of the holiest Jewish site. There is nothing to indicate that Arab Muslims are indigenous to the Holy Land.  If a Jewish person converted to Islam many centuries ago, then they would have to come out and profess their Jewishness. To do that as a Muslim could be very dangerous as it is seen as #apostasy which can carry heavy punishment. Those Palestinians today who do have Jewish DNA are stuck in limbo. If their families didn't remain in Israel in 1948 under Jewish rule when they had a chance to do so, I can't see what their solution would be. They are clearly Arab Muslims with no claim to be indigenous to the land if they have broken their connection with their Jewishness. The Jewish people were acknowledged in 1920 at the San Remo Conference to be indigenous to the Holy Land. They were granted the right to reconstitute their ancestral home so long as ALL current occupants are granted equal rights under the law and freedom of religion. Two million Arab Muslims, Christians, Druze, Circassians, etc. have that equality and freedom TODAY in Israel. Those Arabs who were hostile to Israel have made their choice to side with the Arab nations who don't want peace with Israel. They have lost many wars and they still seem like losers today to me. But there is hope in that many other Arab nations are now normalising relations with Israel so I believe that different solutions will soon be possible.
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