The most serious falsification of history was Zionism’s claim that Palestine was a land without a people for a people without a land. The falsification series continued and included stealing the Palestinian heritage and attributing it to the Israeli occupation. What are the most prominent falsification and theft attempts? This report presents some of the Israeli crimes in this regard.

Falsifying History

The second lie was claiming that the Jews’ Haykal was in Palestine. Hence, they made excuses for the excavations beneath the foundations of Al-Masjid Al-Aqsa. Whether the occupation knows the truth or pretends not to, the excavations threaten Al-Masjid and give room for its Judaization through profaning it and allowing the settlers to enter it as rightful owners.

The truth is Sulaiman, peace be upon him, built a Masjid (mosque) not a haykal. It was narrated from 'Abdullah bin 'Amr that the Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) said: "When Sulaiman bin Dawud finished building Bait Al-Maqdis, he asked Allah for three things: Judgement that was in harmony with His judgement, and he was given that. And he asked Allah for a dominion that no one after him would have, and he was given that. And when he finished building the Masjid he asked Allah, the Mighty and Sublime, that no one should come to it, intending only to pray there, but he would emerge free of sin as the day his mother bore him."

This hadith proves that Sulaiman, peace be upon him, built a Masjid not a haykal. One might ask, how do we make sense of this hadith in line with the hadiths that attribute the building of Al-Masjid Al-Aqsa to Ibrahim, peace be upon him, or the angels?

The answer, says Al-Qurtubi, is that “Ibrahim and Sulaiman, peace be upon them, renewed what was already founded by the angels”. If Ibrahim, peace be upon him, had built it, then Sulaiman, peace be upon him, renewed it. Whatever the case is, it is a Masjid not a haykal.

We will not address the Jews’ dispute over the real location of the haykal, nor will we talk about the contradictions in the number of builders or the area of the alleged haykal (which does not really fit the number of workers who are said to have participated in the construction nor the tools and equipment which were used). We will only repeat the truth that was confirmed by the archeologists: the Israeli occupation has not found any proofs whatsoever that support its allegation of the existence of a haykal.

Stealing the Heritage

According to Modern Arabic Dictionary ‘Al-Turath’ (heritage) is everything the ancestors have left in relation to science, art and literature; be it materialistic (such as books and monuments) or abstract (such as opinions, norms and habits), which are precious to the spirit and traditions of the present age. 

The Israeli occupation’s theft of heritage included four sections:

Books and documents: In 2009, the Israeli scholar Gish Amit revealed the existence of a department in the national Israeli library called ‘Abandoned Properties’. This department includes all the Palestinian heritage that was stolen from private and public libraries after the displacement of the families in 1948. There are about 70,000 books and documents.

Clothes: The flight attendants at El Al Israeli Airlines wear the popular Palestinian outfit. Similarly, Miri Regev, the Israeli Minister of Culture, wore a gown with Al-Quds drawn on the lower part of the dress in the opening of Cannes Film Festival.

Foods: Homos, Falafel and Maqloba.

This theft was openly stated when Shimon Peres, former Israeli president, said he would present Falafel and Homos to former president Barak Obama during his visit to occupied Palestine.

As for Kunafeh, a type of sweets, in 2014 BuzFeed published an advertorial titled “17 Incredible Desserts From Around the World” and placed Kunafeh as an Israeli type of sweets. However, the American Ozy website exposed this and wrote, “The dessert has a long history, dating back centuries — perhaps as far back as the 10th century — but there is no dispute over where it was first created: in Nablus”.

Monuments: The policy of stealing monuments has been going since the beginning of the Israeli occupation. Moshe Dayan, former Defense Minister of Israel, used to steal Palestinian monuments. Now, the Israeli occupation confiscates lands in the West Bank – especially the lands under its security and administrative control (i.e. about 60% of the West Bank’s lands).

One of these lands is Sebastia, to the north west of Nablus, which is being Judaized by the occupation and whose monuments are being stolen – along with other 26 monumental locations in the West Bank under the pretext of turning them into public parks.

UNESCO’s List

The occupation registers these thefts under its name in the UNESCO, which is completely protested against by the Palestinian people who successfully managed to register some of the historical sites under Palestine’s name in the UNESCO. An example is the old town in Hebron. The Palestinians registered it on the UNESCO’s World Heritage list.