Why Israel Must Stop Using ‘West Bank’ For ‘Judea and Samaria’

Reject the sinister “Palestinian” propaganda.

June 22, 2023

By Hugh Fitzgerald

Reprinted from FrontPageMag

Almost two millennia ago the Romans, who had been given considerable trouble by rebellious Jews living in their homeland and resisting Roman rule – you remember Masada, of course, and the destruction of the Second Temple? — decided around the time of the Bar Kochba revolt in 135 A.D., to rename “Judea” as “Syria Palestina,” which soon was shortened to “Palestina,” as a way to downplay the Jewish connection to the land. In the same spirit, after Jerusalem was razed by the Romans in 70 A.D., they built a new city on the site, which they called “Aelia Capitolina.” In both cases, the motive was clear: to efface the Jewish connection to the land by romanizing the toponyms that were from then on to be used. “Palestina,” which became “Palestine,” became accepted in the Western world, while “Aelia Capitolina” was not, reverting as soon as the Romans left to its previous name of Jerusalem.

Now we fast forward to the mid 20th century. In 1948, war broke out when five Arab armies invaded the newly-declared state of Israel in order to destroy it. At the end of that war, Jordan’s Arab Legion – British-officered, British-trained, and supplied with British weapons – had seized and held onto an ear-shaped territory — a “bank” implies a sliver of land of approximately equal width all along its length — to the west of the Jordan River. That territory had been known in the Western world for three millennia as “Judea” and “Samaria.” The Jordanians were at a loss. They knew they didn’t want to use those place names, so redolent of Jewish history. What to call it? It took Amman many months to come up with a name, but in 1950, the Jordanians called the territory they held west of the Jordan River the “West Bank of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan” or the “West Bank” for short.

By dint of repetition, beginning immediately in 1950 with all the Arab and Muslim delegates using “the West Bank” speeches at the UN, the rest of the world quickly chose to forget the venerable toponyms that had been in constant use for 3000 years, not just by the Jews, but by the entire Western world. Take a look at any American, British, French, German, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, Russian maps of the area up to 1950, and you will see “Judea” and “Samaria” clearly marked. And nowhere will you find “West Bank.” But here we are, in 2023, and practically everyone now uses, without giving it a thought, “West Bank” for “Judea and Samaria.”

How was it that Israelis themselves failed to understand that the place name “West Bank” was a weapon of war; its adoption meant a verbal severing of the Jewish link to what had been the heartland of Jewish history? The Israelis were simply not paying attention. They had just fought a war for survival. They were busy building housing for Jewish survivors of the camps. They were busy setting up a government, building roads and other infrastructure, trying to create jobs for the hundreds of thousands of Jews who were pouring in from DP camps in Europe, and to find homes for 800,000 impoverished Jews who were arriving from Arab lands. Besides, the Israelis knew that Judea and Samaria were the names that had been in use for millennia; they could not have imagined that within a few years those toponyms would disappear from use, save in Israel itself.

But now, with greater leisure to think, many Israelis have come to their senses; they now realize the sinister propaganda value of “West Bank” and the need to escort back into widespread circulation “Judea and Samaria.” Is it too late to recapture that lost ground? More on the Place Name War can be found here: “Demand from Israeli public broadcaster: Stop calling Judea and Samaria ‘the West Bank,’” Israel National News, June 15, 2023:

The CEO of the Btsalmo human rights organization, Shai Glick, wrote to Kan-Israel Public Broadcasting Corporation CEO Golan Yochpaz demanding the corporation discontinue the use of the term “West Bank” for Judea and Samaria.

Glick states that in its broadcasts and on its Facebook page, the corporation’s English radio station uses the term “West Bank,” which is an “errant term that should be replaced with ‘Judea and Samaria,’” writes Glick.

Glick is absolutely correct. If Israel itself uses the term “West Bank” for “Judea and Samaria,” how can it expect other countries, and peoples, to stop using “West Bank” and instead to return to the 3000-year-old toponyms in use before 1950? Some Israeli officials are shying away from making the effort, because it will indeed be difficult to convince others to stop using “West Bank.” But over time, it becomes easier and easier to eliminate “West Bank” and use only “Judea and Samaria.” Some people are simply too defeatist, thinking to themselves that its a hopeless task, that we are stuck with “West Bank” and there is nothing we can do about it. Some are agonizingly self-conscious about referring to “Judea and Samaria,” afraid that others will think they must be “crazy settlers who insist on using those ‘Biblical’ names.” It will require a sustained effort to avoid “West Bank” and put “Judea and Samaria” back in general circulation, but it can be done.

Why not supply broadcasters and journalists throughout the Western world, and not just in Israel, with a brief history of how “Judea and Samaria” were quite deliberately supplanted by “the West Bank”? Let them know that “West Bank” is 1) a place name that began to be used only in 1950, while “Judea and Samaria” have been in continuous use since before 1500 B.C. 2) “West Bank” was adopted only in 1950, by the Jordanians, in order to deliberately sever the Jewish connection to the land 3) by using the place name “West Bank” you are — wittingly or unwittingly — promoting Palestinian propaganda. Perhaps CAMERA can start a campaign to insist that “Judea and Samaria” should be used, just as “Gaza, another “Biblical” name, is used – these are the names that have appeared on maps in the Western world for more than 3000 years. “West Bank,” by contrast, was born yesterday, the insect of an hour.

Individuals can help by calling into news programs and talk shows when the topic is Israel and the Palestinians, and insisting that “Judea and Samaria” are the proper place names, in use for 3000 years before a Hashemite king decided for propaganda purposes to call that area by the preposterously vague phrase, “the West Bank.” Repeat that same message in letters to the editor. In letters to your Congressional representatives, especially if they are known to be pro-Israel, explain why you think they should, in their speeches, especially those delivered in on the House or Senate floor and inserted into the Congressional Record, use “Judea and Samaria” and not “West Bank.” In fact, a few dozen members of Congress should be willing to propose a resolution that will require the American government to replace “West Bank” with “Judea and Samaria” in all official documents and discussions. What will those opposed to such a measure say? That Judea and Samaria are just Zionist propaganda, even if they have been in constant use by Jews and non-Jews alike, for 3000 years before Theodor Herzl appeared?

He [Glick] points out that in the past, he wrote to the [Kan broadcasting] corporation, and in response, they claimed that they make equal use of both terms and that when Palestinian issues are discussed, the term “West Bank” is used, while “Judea and Samaria” is used in connection with Israeli matters….

He explains that since the official term in the state of Israel is “Judea and Samaria, “It is incorrect that the state corporation uses the foreign term ‘West Bank,’ which is left over from the Jordanian occupation before 1967.”

According to him, “The term ‘West Bank’ damages public diplomacy since it connects the region to the Jordanian kingdom and does not reflect the ancient connection of the Jewish people with Judea and Samaria.”…

Correct. And anyone who still refuses to use the terms “Judea and Samaria” after having been made aware of the propaganda purpose and effect of “the West Bank,” deserves to be named and shamed for trying to suppress the “ancient connection of the Jewish people with Judea and Samaria.”

Let’s start right here, right now. No more W*** B**K. Judea and Samaria. Samaria and Judea. Judea, Samaria. Keep it up. You’ll soon get over your initial diffidence.