Explaining the Arab-Israeli conflict through numbers

Thursday, July 29, 2004

A fascinating look at the two solitudes from the occasionally interesting Dennis Prager

 
Dennis Prager (July 27, 2004

For the many readers who have requested a brief synopsis of the moral arguments in the Arab-Israeli conflict, I offer the following list of numerical data.

Number of times Jerusalem is mentioned in the Old Testament: over 700

Number of times Jerusalem is mentioned in the Koran: 0

Number of Arab leaders who visited Jerusalem when it was under Arab rule (1948 to 1967): 1

Number of Arab refugees who fled the land that became Israel: approximately 600,000

Number of Jewish refugees who fled Arab countries: approximately 600,00

Number of U.N. agencies that deal only with Palestinian refugees: 1

Number of U.N. agencies that deal with all the other refugees in the world: 1

Number of Jewish states that have existed on the land called Palestine: 3

Number of Arab or Muslim states that have existed on the land called Palestine: 0

Number of terrorist attacks by Israelis or Jews since 1967: 1

Number of terrorist attacks by Arabs or Muslims since 1967: thousands

Percentage of Jews who have praised the Jewish terrorist: approximately .1

Percentage of Palestinians who have praised Islamic terrorists: approximately 90

Number of Jewish countries: 1
Number of Jewish democracies: 1
Number of Arab countries: 19
Number of Arab democracies: 0
Number of Arab women killed annually by fathers and brothers in "honor killings": thousands
Number of Jewish women killed annually by fathers and brothers in "honor killings": 0
Number of Christian or Jewish prayer services allowed in Saudi Arabia: 0
Number of Muslim prayer services allowed in Israel: unlimited
Number of Arabs Israel allows to live in Arab settlements in Israel: 1,250,000
Number of Jews Palestinian Authority allows to live in Jewish settlements in Palestinian Authority: 0
Percentage of U.N. Commission on Human Rights resolutions condemning an Arab country for human rights violations: 0
Percentage of U.N. Commission on Human Rights resolutions condemning Israel for human rights violations: 26
Number of U.N. Security Council resolutions on the Middle East between 1948 and 1991: 175
Number of these resolutions against Israel: 97
Number of these resolutions against an Arab state: 4
Number of Arab countries that have been members of the U.N. Security Council: 16
Number of times Israel has been a member of the U.N. Security Council: 0
Number of U.N. General Assembly resolutions condemning Israel: 322
Number of U.N. General Assembly resolutions condemning an Arab country: 0
Percentage of U.N. votes in which Arab countries voted with the United States in 2002: 16.6
Percentage of U.N. votes in which Israel voted with the United States in 2002: 92.6
Percentage of Middle East Studies professors who defend Zionism and Israel: approximately 1.
Percentage of Middle East Studies professors who believe in diversity on college campuses: 100
Percentage of people who argue that the Jewish state has no right to exist who also believe some other country has no right to exist: 0
Percentage of people who argue that of all the countries in the world, only the Jewish state has no right to exist and yet deny they are anti-Jewish: approximately 100
Number of Muslims in the world: more than 1 billion
Number of Muslim demonstrations against Islamic terror: approximately 2