To feel sorry for Ed Sheeran.....

Ah well. Thank you for your post saying you don't believe in virgin births or a flying horse taking Mohammed to Mecca. 1, 2, 3, deleted by the blasphemy police on mumsnet,

But places like Jaffa and Ramla , safad were never Just swampland owned by absentees landlords , they’ve always been prosperous active hubs, if some landlords sold off some plots or buildings it doesn’t mean the whole place needs to be incorporated.

Of course we can say these things so far but try living in Pakistan or Iran where apostates are put to death.

Why do you say "some of it bought from rich absentee landlords from areas like the Levant who had bought the land from the Ottomans and some of it (...)was bought honestly from the Palestinians in Deir Yassin".

The Ottoman system of land ownership did indeed mean that a huge number of farmers were just tenants on land owned by wealthy absentee landlords - but why would that make the purchase of that land "dishonest"? Would it be dishonest for other landlords to buy and sell the land, or is that only when it's the Jews doing it?

No, Arabs come from the Arabian Peninsula. As the name suggests.

Have you never heard of the Muslim Wars of Expansion, where the marauding Muslim armies came out of the Arabian Pensula and swept over the Middle East and Persia? They were as murderous as Genghis Khan and the Mongols, but we don't think Mongolians are all now indigenous to all of Central Asia/North India/China on the strength of that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Muslim_conquests

There are lots of actually indigenous languages in those regions which are either extinct or are under varying degrees of threat - because Arabic became the official language in the conquered lands for centuries.

Languages such as Neo-Aramaic, Circassian, Domari, Syriac and of course Coptic which is the descendant of the language spoken by the ancient Egyptians, have all been replaced in many places where they were the indigenous language, or (in the case of the few major languages which have resisted, in particular Kurdish and Tamazight°, demeaned by the Arab rulers as worthless.

Tamazight speakers in Morocco are still referred to as Berber Jews, funny enough, even though the actual Berber Jews all had to leave North Africa in the years after independence - but again nobody cares about that apparently: it must be bitter beyond belief for those who fled to Israel to now hear themselves described as "European settlers" by, err, Europeans.)

This thread is like banging one's head against a wall thanks to some posters who are full of misinformation, almost rabid in defence of Palestine and jump at every post that mentions something half positive about Israel.
Not wasting my energy anymore. If genuine debates cannot take place, there is no point.

The point at issue in this thread is not the rights and wrongs of the miserable situation in the middle East, but whether it is appropriate for a performer who is support to a star to use that platform to make a political point without the permission of the star whose tour it is.
And whether the promoter has the right to ditch the supporting act.

I think Ed was put in an impossible situation where he found himself between a rock and a hard place, wanting to uphold the nature of his tour with its diverse audience whilst not wanting to appear uncaring about the suffering of others in war torn areas.

He should not.have been put in this position.

Absolutely 👍🏼

The situation in the Middle East is impossibly complicated and there are rights and wrongs on both sides.
The idea that musicians and celebrities can somehow see the truth better than everyone else because they’re “creatives” is a joke.

Agree. They aren’t oracles to decide right from wrong and shouldn’t be dragged into having to take a side in a controversial conflict.

Ed felt he had to say something political against his wishes because he could see he was on the way to being cancelled. I don’t need to know Ed’s views, or any other non political person’s views, all I need them to do is entertain. He was blackmailed into saying something because he wants to go on making music. This feels like facism to me. It’s chilling.

Thank you for the history lesson but I can actually read Wikipedia for myself. Do you think Christianity, the biggest religion in the world, was spread by love and understanding? Who drove the Jews out of Spain and who actually rescued the Sephardim and brought them to Palestine. Genetic studies have shown that the Palestinian Mizrahi are almost identical to the Palestinians and far closer than any genetic link that Netanyahu may have, or any of the other Israeli prime ministers. By the way, Arabian Peninsula is a British colonial term.

What was dishonest, not illegal, was the Ottoman empire selling Palestinian land. Bit like the Elgin marbles.

I don't normally engage with whataboutisms but tell me, how many children have either of those counties recently killed. How many babies under the age of one have they killed.

“Palestinians” were the inhabitants of the region, regardless of their religion or ethnicity until the 1960s/70s. In fact until the creation of Israel, newspapers referred to the Jews living there as Palestinians, because the Muslims saw themselves as members of their tribe eg Bedouins or as Syrians, Egyptians, Arabs etc, depending on where their loyalties were.

Nobody thought there was a problem with the landlords selling up - they just didn’t want the land to be sold to Jews.

You’re the one who said the Arabs were from there. You should have read Wikipedia before saying something so factually wrong.

You do know Israel was established in 1948, not the 60s. Palestine had a minority Jewish population compared to places like Baghdad or Damascus. Baghdad was 40% Jewish at the turn of the 20th century. Ask Avi Shlaim what his parents would have called themselves. They would have said Baghdadi or Iraqi. A Palestinian Jew would have called themselves Falastini if asked who they were. Exactly what Christians and Muslims would have done.

You think everyone who identifies as Arab because they speak Arabic comes from the Arabian peninsula? Seriously? From Western North Africa all the way to Oman?

Unfortunately unabated ignorance is rife as is historical illiteracy.

Palestinians (along with the Lebanese, Samaritans, Syrians and other Levantine populations) have the highest DNA connections ancient Canaanites and other indigenous populations to that land. They never "came" from anywhere.

Excellent breakdown by a scientist [AI Summary below]:

A notable TED talk discussing Palestinian and Levantine DNA is titled "The splendid tapestry: How DNA reveals truths, ancient & lasting" by Nathaniel Pearson. 1]

Key Takeaways from the Talk
The "Hummus" Metaphor: Pearson describes the genetic profile of Levantine Arabic speakers (including Lebanese, Syrians, Egyptians, and Palestinians) as a shared regional mix—likened metaphorically to ingredients like olive oil, chickpeas, sesame, and lemon. 1]
Ancient Continuity: Genetic data extracted from ancient Levantine remains (such as 3,700-year-old samples from Sidon) shows a profile very similar to this modern regional baseline. 1]
Connection to Modern Palestinians: Modern Palestinians exhibit a genetic makeup closely mirroring these ancient Levantine populations, demonstrating deep and continuous genetic roots in the region alongside subsequent local admixing. 1]
Addressing Narratives: The talk uses these genetic findings to counter political claims or misconceptions that attempt to portray Palestinian populations as recent or foreign migrants to the area. 1]

Even Ben Gurion in articles/books he wrote in the 1910s :

He made this case most clearly in a 1917 essay, “On the Origin of the Falahin,” and in the 1918 book Eretz Israel in the Past and Present, written with Yitzhak Ben-Zvi (later Israel’s second president).

Ben-Gurion’s argument was roughly this:

"After the Roman wars, many Jews left, but a large rural farming population remained.

Those farmers later converted, first to Christianity and then, after the 7th-century Muslim conquest, to Islam.

The 7th-century Arab conquerors did not wipe out or replace that local agricultural population.

Therefore, the Muslim fellahin of western Palestine were, in his view, largely of Israelite/Jewish stock. He wrote that “much Jewish blood flows in their veins.”

When I go to a concert I don’t want it be political - I’m there for the music.
When I wanted to express my political opinions I went to a march and to a meeting with our MP.

@Squeezingwildoranges
when you said”Who drove the Jews out of Spain and who actually rescued the Sephardim and brought them to Palestine”
It could be interpreted as meaning that the Jewish people were not originally from the southern levant ( IsraelPalestine) but were fro
Spain.
Just to clarify- the Sephardic Jews were part of the Jewish diaspora. Jewish people originated in the Israel/ Palestine region.

No dear, the IRGC started the war, the moment they took a national hostage.

You are right. You're point is?

My point was just to clarify- the Jewish people were originally from Palestine. Thanks.

I am pro-Palestinian but also aware that it's a trendy political cause. Sheeran has a right to keep politics of any strain out of his concerts. His appeal is apolitical. So I do feel sorry for what's happened to him.