October 2, 2026: There would be little violence between Palestinians and Israelis if the Muslim Palestinians had not systematically driven Christian Palestinians out of the region over the centuries. The Palestinians don’t just hate Israelis and Christians; they will threaten or kill any Palestinian in or near Israel with violence or death if they disagree with or criticize the Palestinian campaign to drive all non-Muslims from the Middle East.

Most Palestinian Christians agree that the existence of Israel gives Muslim radicals an excuse to attack any non-Muslims in the region in the cause of driving all non-Muslims from the region. The violence in the region is not about Israel as much as it is about driving all non-Muslims out. After all, the goal of Islam is Islamic rule for the entire planet. Islamic radicals have made this objective non-negotiable in the Muslim world.

Before Islam arrived in the 600s, most of the Arabs in what is now Israel and the Palestinian territories were Christian. It wasn’t until Israel was established in 1948 that secular violence became common. Another problem is that a group called “Palestinian” did not exist until the 1960s, when the various Arab groups trying to drive Israel out of the region decided to declare that the Arabs living near Israel were “Palestinians”. The original meaning of the word Palestinian was a variation on Philistines, a people who originated in the Mediterranean and became successful traders and raiders. They eventually landed and settled on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean and fought the locals, including the ancient Israelis. The Philistines were gradually absorbed into other groups and largely disappeared from the historical record.

Violence in this region was generally rare until Israel was founded. This was largely antisemitism and an effort to blame local problems on the newly established Israel. Gradually, all the nations in the region made peace with Israel, which had become the wealthiest, most economically productive, scientifically advanced, and militarily strongest nation in the region. Fundamentalist Muslims decided that it was an affront to Islam, or something like that, and that Israel must be destroyed.

Any group describing itself as Palestinians resisting Israel would receive money from groups in the region or beyond who wanted to cripple or embarrass Israel. That never worked, and the violence made the Israelis more militarily effective. The Israeli defense industry became a major source of combat-tested modern weapons and military equipment.