The News Journal · Mansfield, Ohio · 13 March 1927

CP-1927-012

Glory Of Ancient Palestine May Be Restored By Jews

Transcribed from the clipping

“The Jew, living under English rule, apparently holds in his hand the future of modern Palestine, Rev. Dr. A. H. Smith, pastor of Trinity Lutheran church of Ashland, told the Amina club, speaking before the club’s weekly luncheon in the Elks grill, yesterday at noon. ‘It may be possible that the Jew will come again and restore a part of the old time glory of Palestine,’ he said. The Jews who have repopulated Palestine through the Zionist movement are carrying on an extensive agricultural program, using modern agricultural implements. They are beginning to reforest the land and to put a new life into it, unknown to the Turks and Arabs who have controlled Palestine for so many centuries, he said.… He made the people that inhabit the land appear as real in their occupations and modes of living as though they were to be seen in any American city… The speaker described the mountains in their picturesque setting, yet desolate of forests, due to the ravages of the Turk. The forests have all been hewn down, he said, and only orange groves and other tropical fruits provide the foliage of the land, except for the reforestation work the Jews have done in most recent years. The 740,000 population of Palestine, includes 600,000 Arabs, 100,000 Jews and 40,000 Christians. This is compared with a population of between seven and eight million during the time of Christ, he said.… ‘A new day has dawned for Palestine as a result of the English control,’ he said. ‘The land is quiet, at peace and its economic life is stable.’… He pictured old Jerusalem with its narrow streets and byways, where the camel still monopolizes traffic and the donkey carries the merchandise to the little shops and stalls… He told of meeting a Bedouin who was shooting fish from his horse in a stream. The Arab came suddenly galloping up to the tourist party, and in good English asked for tobacco. In the conversation that ensued, Dr. Smith said he learned that the Arab had spent several years in the United States and had an excellent command of English.… First, he said, there is great reason for being wonderfully thankful that we live in the United States. He said he found everywhere, among the Arabs particularly, superstition, filth, degradation, unstability and ignorance. The Arab is as he has been for 2,000 years. He has not progressed…”

Context added by this archive

A lunchtime lecture at an Elks grill in Ohio, and it contains its own refutation. The pastor concludes that the Arab has not progressed in two thousand years, four paragraphs after describing a Bedouin who galloped up to his tourist party, asked for tobacco in good English, and turned out to have lived several years in the United States. The population he gives is 600,000 Arabs, 100,000 Jews and 40,000 Christians — a different breakdown from the 500,000 Moslems, 100,000 Christians and 150,000 Jews that two other 1927 clippings in this archive print eight months later.

Cite this item

"Glory Of Ancient Palestine May Be Restored By Jews," The News Journal, 13 March 1927. Covering Palestine archive, CP-1927-012. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-1927-012

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