Part 2
How Palestine Got Its Name
Palestine is a name coined by the Romans around 135 AD from the name of a seagoing Aegean people who had, according to archaeologists, settled on the coast of Canaan in about 1100 BC – the Philistines.
After Jewish revolts against Rome were put down in the first century AD, the Latin name Philistia was chosen by Rome to replace the name Judea. In the course of time, that name was further bastardized into Palistina or what is called the area of Palestine. By changing the name Rome was signifying that Jewish sovereignty had been eradicated.
The area that comprises Palestine has never been an independent state belonging to ANY particular people.
Nor did a group of people distinct from other Arabs appear during 1,300 years of Muslim control of “Palestine” under Arab and Ottoman rule. During that rule, local Arabs were actually considered part of, and subject to, the authority of Greater Syria (Suriyya al-Kubra). They have no connection to the Arab nation, a desert people who emerged from the Arabian Peninsula.
The Arabs living in the area known as Palestine attempted to assert Arab right to the Jewish Holy Lands in 1948, at the time when Jewish statehood was becoming a reality.
History shows that Arabs were never identified as Palestinians: this is substantiated in countless official British Mandate vintage documents that speak of the Jews and the Arabs of Palestine – not Jews and Palestinians.
So, how can a land so small have such a significant affect and be a “burdensome stone” on the entire world?
The area that makes up the city of Jerusalem is only 48 square miles. Today the reason that the conflict between Israel and the “Palestinians” exists is that the 35 acres that comprise the Temple Mount area in Jerusalem are sacred to three primary religions of the world - the Jews, Christians and Islamics. Each claims those same thirty-five acres.
2,500 years ago Zechariah prophesied and predicted this would happen. "On that day I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock [burdensome stone]. All the nations will gather against it to try to move it, but they will only hurt themselves." -Zechariah 12:3 NLT
Jerusalem in Prophecy: Conflict Ahead
The Scriptures reveal that at the time before Christ’s return to earth, this region of the world and the city of Jerusalem will be in great turmoil and conflict. The fragile balance of peace that currently exists will be destroyed.
Since its inception as a nation in 1948, Israel has struggled to survive; numerous American presidents and other international leaders have tried to broker peace in the Middle East, but all efforts have failed.
In one of GOD”S OTHER WAYS© and in spite of the best of human intentions, God is fulfilling prophecy He revealed to us through His prophets. Jerusalem will continue to be a hotbed of strife until the Second Coming of Jesus Christ to earth.