WhatsappBBC is a very old and reliable news station. But it is slanted on many issues. On the Israel – Arab issue, the slant goes very deep. It is an anti-Israel slant. There is good reason for this. After all, the State of Israel rose up as the British Mandate over the area that is now the State of Israel and Jordan gradually fell apart. The British hold on the State of Israel did not fall apart in a natural way. The British were forced out. But occasionally the BBC gets it right.
Menachem Begin vs. the British
Before the State of Israel was formed, and the formation of the Israel Defense Forces, there were three groups that dealt with the defense of the Jewish people in the Land of Israel. There was the Haganah – the largest group. That was headed by the Jewish Agency and David Ben Gurion. They focused mainly on self defense and building up weapons for an eventual war against the Arab States. The 2nd largest group was the Irgun. The head of the Irgun was Menachem Begin, a Lithuanian born Jew who had been tortured and spent time in a Soviet prison. He understood well that the Jewish people need to defend themselves or else nobody else will do it for them. But he also understood that the British Mandate over the area would actually never change unless they were forced out. So, the Irgun, which numbered a few thousand men and did not have major weapons or resources actually declared war on the British Empire in order to kick them out of the Land of Israel. The threat was not taken very seriously, but they should have. The Irgun meant business. In the end, the British sailed away in 1948 on the very day that the Mandate ended. The British prestige was always the target of the Irgun and they ha indeed succeeded in puncturing the prestige. This was just one of many hits to the British Empire. It led to the eventual downfall of the Empire in the Middle East. The British have never truly gotten over it. But now, the Muslim issue is the central matter that they need to grapple with.
