The accusation is as relentless as it is absurd: Israel, the Jewish state, stands accused of being a colonialist outpost in the heart of the Middle East.
Critics on campuses, in international forums, and across much of the media paint a picture of European Zionist invaders displacing an indigenous population, imposing foreign rule on ancient Arab lands. This narrative flips history on its head, ignoring millennia of Jewish connection to the Land of Israel while whitewashing the true architects of regional domination.
It is time to ask the core question plainly: Who are the colonizers? The answer reveals a legacy of conquest and cultural erasure that reshaped the entire Middle East and North Africa, and one that continues to target the Jewish homeland today.
To understand this inversion, we must look beyond the headlines to the historical forces that transformed the region. Long before any modern Jewish return, waves of expansion from the Arabian Peninsula fundamentally altered the demographic, linguistic, and cultural landscape.
Beginning in the 7th century, following the rise of Islam, Arab armies swept out of their peninsula, conquering vast territories with remarkable speed. These forces overran ancient empires and civilizations, imposing not just political control but a comprehensive process of Arabization and cultural assimilation. What emerged was a map far different from what might have been without this imperial push.
Imagine, for a moment, an alternative history. In North Africa, the indigenous Berber peoples might still dominate Libya and Algeria, preserving their distinct languages and traditions rather than being largely subsumed. Parts of the Levant could retain stronger Phoenician influences, with their maritime and cultural legacies intact.
Sudan might reflect its Nubian roots more prominently, while Iran could have evolved as a vibrant Persian society. Somalia’s Kushitic heritage might stand unencumbered.
Instead, across these lands, Arabic language, customs, and identity became dominant through centuries of settlement, taxation pressures on non-converts, and social incentives that encouraged assimilation. This was not a benign migration but a deliberate imperial project that marginalized or absorbed pre-existing populations.
This history of expansion created one of the largest empires the world has ever seen, stretching across continents. Unlike some conquerors who allowed local cultures to flourish alongside their own, the process here aggressively promoted linguistic and religious uniformity. Ancient communities, whether Coptic Christians in Egypt, Zoroastrians in Persia, or Aramaic-speaking groups in the Levant, faced systemic pressures.
Over time, many indigenous identities receded as Arabic became the language of governance, scholarship, and daily life. Even as this era produced notable advancements in science and philosophy, it came at the profound cost of erased or diminished native civilizations. Modern “Arab” nations in the region largely embody this transformed reality, a testament to enduring imperial legacies rather than organic, unbroken continuity.
Fast forward to the 20th century, and echoes of these ambitions persisted through pan-Arab movements that sought political unity under a singular Arab banner, often at the expense of non-Arab minorities like Kurds, Berbers, or Assyrians. This context frames the conflict with Israel not as a simple story of Jewish “settler-colonialism” but as part of a broader pattern.
Israel and the Jewish people in the face of Arab conquest
The Jewish people, returning to their ancestral homeland after centuries of exile and persecution, represent the reclamation of indigenous rights in the face of repeated conquests. Jews maintained an unbroken presence in the land, however small, and their national revival drew on deep historical, religious, and archaeological ties – connections that predate Arab arrival by millennia.
Nowhere is this distortion more evident than in the construction of a distinct “Palestinian” identity. I’m not the first to posit that the notion of a separate Palestinian nationality serves primarily tactical purposes. It functions as a strategic tool to sustain opposition to the Jewish state and advance broader Arab cohesion, rather than reflecting an ancient, organic peoplehood distinct from the surrounding Arab world.
This ideology emerged in modern times as a mechanism to delegitimize the sole sovereign Jewish entity in the region, framing Jewish self-determination as an alien intrusion.
Consider the visual reality of any regional map. Vast Arab-majority countries surround tiny Israel, home to the Jewish people. The contrast is stark: a constellation of Muslim-majority states, products of historical expansion, arrayed against the Jewish homeland.
This is not a case of a powerful empire oppressing a minority indigenous group, but rather the opposite: the world’s smallest, most unique native civilization defending itself against the lingering impulses of one of history’s greatest imperial forces.
The greatest feat of rhetorical sleight-of-hand has been convincing much of the globe that this expansive legacy represents a vulnerable underdog fighting for liberation, rather than a continuation of efforts to extinguish Jewish sovereignty.
This imperial Arab history provides essential context for today’s debates over indigeneity and justice. The Jewish return to Israel, far from colonialism, is decolonization, the restoration of a people to their biblical and historical cradle after successive foreign dominations, including Roman, Byzantine, Arab, Crusader, Ottoman, and British periods.
Israel’s success as a vibrant democracy, technological innovator, and refuge stands in sharp contrast to the challenges faced by many neighboring societies still grappling with the aftereffects of authoritarian legacies and rejectionism.
The Palestinian cause, in this light, appears less as a pure liberation movement and more as an extension of historical patterns of denial toward Jewish rights. By insisting on a narrative that erases Jewish indigeneity while promoting a fabricated national story for tactical gain, it perpetuates conflict rather than seeking genuine coexistence.
True peace would require acknowledging the Jewish people’s ancient ties, the realities of regional history, and the right of Israel to exist as the fulfillment of self-determination for an indigenous nation.
The real colonial dynamic in the Middle East stems from those expansive conquests that reshaped identities and suppressed diversity across North Africa and beyond. Israel, by contrast, embodies resilience and revival, the Jewish people’s determination to reclaim and rebuild in their eternal homeland, contributing to the region while defending against ongoing threats.
They are the colonizers. Recognizing this truth does not diminish legitimate aspirations for peace or prosperity among all peoples, but it demands intellectual honesty. Only by confronting historical realities can we hope for a future where the Jewish state is accepted not as an anomaly, but as the rightful, indigenous presence it has always been.
The writer is a certified interfaith hospice chaplain in Jerusalem and the mayor of Mitzpe Yeriho.