Talk:Palestine (region)/Archive

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please improve this article or discuss the issue on the talk page.

I like this phrase:

the eastern boundary was the poorly-defined place where the Syrian desert began.

Now I begin to understand better why there might be different and varying definitions of Palestine in use. --Uncle Ed (El Dunce) 18:13, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Contents 1 Proposed merge 2 Renamed: Region of Palestine -> Palestine (region) 3 Origin of term Philistine? 4 Philistine kingdoms 5 Filastin in the 1300-1900 period 6 Maps of the region 7 One land - Two names 8 Greek name error 9 Hebrew: פלשתינה Palestina 10 Palestine (country)

Proposed merge

This page concerns nearly the same subject as definitions of Palestine. I propose that the two be merged into one. --Zero 12:41, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I agree as regards the definitions of Palestine section of that article, but I'm not so sure about definitions of Palestine. Great to see you around again, by the way! - Mustafaa 13:27, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I don't understand your comment, Mustafaa. Well, except the part about Zero, and I agree with that. :-) Jayjg | (Talk) 19:21, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Renamed: Region of Palestine -> Palestine (region)

As I said elsewhere, I really believe this is the the article which should be under the title of Palestine (with an appropreate disambiguation message linking to various related terms).

Unfortunately, there currently seems not to be much support for that, so for now we'll have to do with "Palestine (region)". The title "Region of Palestine" was inappropreate - it's not an established term, as most sources simply use the term "Palestine" when referring to the region. -- uriber 20:37, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I support moving the article to Palestine. The existence of a disambiguation page seems to me to unnecessary and it looks politically motivated and intended to obfuscate. Most of the things listed on it are not synonymous with Palestine (eg West Bank and Gaza, the British Mandate, the Palestinian National Authority), and those that are (a graphic novel, some US towns) clearly ought to be subordinated.

Palestine is a general, fairly well-defined and understood historical geographical region. Finding the disambiguation page under the main heading is a bit like looking up Europe and finding a list of things like Roman Empire, Council of Europe, Maastricht Treaty, Eurovision Area and so on. --Vjam 14:20, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Origin of term Philistine?

Quoth the article:

The name "Palestine" comes from the Philistine people, who are first recorded by the ancient Egyptians as P-r/l-s-t (conventionally Peleset)...

But:

The Philistines (meaning "invaders" in Hebrew)..."

It makes no sense that the Egyptians would use a Hebrew word to as their name for this group. One of these explanations must be wrong. Someone who knows Hebrew ought to be able to work it out... --Jfruh 19:55, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

See folk etymology... - Mustafaa 20:03, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

There is no evidence whatever that "Palestine" is either an Egyptian word or a Hebrew word. The "derivation" of it from other Hebrew words is pure speculation. Such "derivations" are claimed for every single name in the Bible, sometimes with good cause but often with no evidence beyond wishful thinking. Next, the Egyptian usage predated the period when Hebrew is regarded as having evolved as a distinguishable language, so it cannot have come from Hebrew strictly speaking. However, it could in principle have come from a pre-Hebrew Semitic word that later became part of Hebrew. The argument that the Egyptians would not use a Hebrew (read Semitic) word is incorrect; they often recorded such words. There is no solid argument for the derivation of the word from Egyptian either. A common theory (again, with little justification) is that the word is what the Philistines called themselves and that its roots belong in the Philistine language. There are not sufficient archaelogical remains from the Philistines known for this problem to be resolved. --Zero 00:19, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Right, the article seems to be saying (or implying) that the term as found in Egyptian is an Egyptian version of what the Phillistines called themselves, in which it would make no sense for the name to mean "invaders" in Hebrew, since they obviously wouldn't have called themselves that. My point is that the article seems to be saying two mutually contradictory things. The question of whether Philistine (or, really Palestina) in Hebrew actually means "invader" ought to be an easy one to answer. If there's no firm scholarly consensus, then the article should say that, rather than asserting two contradictory things as true. --Jfruh 02:18, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm no expert on this, but I think it's possible that the ancient Israelites just altered the already existing term Peleset (as used by the aegyptians) to Philistines, because this term made more sense to them, or fitted better into their point of view. That wouldn't be unusual from a linguistical point of view. Something quite similar happend when they started to call the canaanite god Baal-Zebul, meaning "Lord Baal", Beelzebul, meaning "Lord of the flies". 80.140.228.84 11:14, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Philistine kingdoms

The article mentions Philistine cities but does not indicate the political organization of the region. Did the Philistines/Palestinians have "kingdoms" or some other form of state as the Jews were reported to have in Israel.24.64.166.191 05:47, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Filastin in the 1300-1900 period

I wrote the following before, but it got buried in an archived talk page of a disambiguation page so I'm bringing it back from the dead. --Zero 11:02, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

My main source for the Muslim period was Le Strange (see the references) who quoted from a large number of contemporary Arab geographers. The fact that there was an administrative district called Filastin in the middle of the 14th century is from a geography text called Muthir written in 1351 (and somewhere else I saw a map of it; I'll try to find that again). The usage of the word Filastin in Palestine during the 16th and 17th century is from Gerber, who notes a "widespread consensus that the concept [of Filastin] disappeared" then proves the consensus wrong with a good number of examples ranging from a 13th century inscription to 17th century Islamic legal texts. Another item I read about but didn't mention is the report "All chronicles call this country the Land of Palestine" made by a Turkish visitor to Palestine in 1648-1650 (Evliya Celebi's Travels in Palestine, trans. St. H. Stephan (Ariel Publishing, 1980), p63). The comment about Arz-i Filistin is from Mandel, page xx. The comment about the educated Arab public in the 19th century is from Porath, p8-9. (Anyway, pre-WWI Arab usage of the word Filastin is something everyone knows.) The note about European usage of "Palestine" is based on Biger. --Zero 05:23, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Some additional examples: In the Cairo geniza is a letter from Rabbi Solomon ben Judah of Jerusalem, dated 1029, that refers to the province of Filastin. (Moseh Gill, "The Political History of Jerusalem During the Early Muslim Period", in Joshua Prawer and Haggai Ben-Shammai (eds), The History of Jerusalem, the Early Muslim Period, 638-1099, New York University Press and Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 1996). A later one: Rabbi Ashtory HaParchi, who lived in Palestine ca. 1310-1355, wrote twice in his travel book Kaftor VaPerach that the Arabs refer to the town of Ramla as Filastin (cited from the original). A Muslim traveler Ibn Battuta who visited Palestine in 1326 also wrote that Ramla was also known as Filastin (The Travels of Ibn Battuta, ed. H.A.R. Gibb (Cambridge University Press, 1954), 1:71-82). I also found a modern scholarly opinion that this was a practice at that time. Note that Ramla was the capital of the Filastin province for many centuries so it is not so strange that the name became associated with the city. The same happened with Damascus. A modern example is Mexico. --Zero 12:11, 26 Jan 2004 (UTC) and Zero 00:08, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Maps of the region

I have added a few relevant maps and a section The Land of Israel and the State of Israel. See also Template_talk:Israelis#"Land of Israel". ←Humus sapiens←ну? 06:39, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Why have they been deleted? Jayjg ^(talk) 18:13, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

The region of Palestine as it is known historically mostly overlaps but is slightly different than the region known as Israel. The maps concerning Israel is already covered in the Land of Israel article. These articles' contents should be seperated, but link to each other. Otherwise they should be merged. --Yodakii 01:21, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

The article is about the geographic region, and, as in any article about geo. region, historical maps are totally relevant here. The region of Palestine never had strictly defined borders and the Land of Israel's borders fluctuated in time. Since the history of the region is rich and violent, we need to reflect and illustrate it in a NPOV encyclopedic manner. The region directly concerns Israel and there is no reason to deny it other than political POV. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 01:50, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

Of course its all relevant. Thats why the articles should link to each other. If thats not enough then it seems the best way to reflect the two subjects interrelationship is by merging. --Yodakii 02:03, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

I prefer the content remain seperated. You can see an example of how articles can be seperated by looking at the Canaan article. It talks about roughly the same region as "Land of Israel" and "Palestine (region)". --Yodakii 02:15, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

The analogy is not valid: no one calls the region Canaan for millenia, while Palestine is still a common name and was official during the British Mandate. Is there a good reason to exclude the maps other than "I prefer"? ←Humus sapiens←ну? 02:56, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

Well, I think that one should realize that if there are two separate articles (my preference, see below) then if the Israel maps are in Palestine, as many Palestine maps should be in Israel, for identical reasons. What might be best is if someone could find neutral maps with both types of lines drawn on them to provide the relating information. Right now there are more Israel maps than Palestine maps in this article, and one neutral one (the UN partition); this seems silly to me, and unlikely to coincide with the probable interest of a reader of this article.John Z 09:25, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

I have added an Arab map of ash-Sham which has the region and Jerusalem on it. Could you explain what is wrong with (or what makes non-neutral) the Map of the British Mandate of Palestine? Also, the CIA map is not neutral as it shows the areas subject to negotiations as not belonging> I heard Israelis complain about that map. What would a pro-Palestinian side find wrong about it, a presence of Israel? My guess is, "the probable interest of a reader of this article" would be information. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 10:00, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

I don't think the problem is the map itself, but where they are placed. If articles are going to remain seperate then maps specifically about "Israel" should be in the Israel article and those specifically about "Palestine" should be here. I think the Arabic map of ash-Sham is much more suited to the Levant article than Palestine. --Yodakii 10:10, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

The source says it has al-Quds as one of the circles. Do I undesrtand correctly: you are saying that Israel doesn't belong to the region of Palestine? So far I am trying to assume good faith... ←Humus sapiens←ну? 10:18, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

No. You don't understand. I'm only trying to be neutral. That's my "poltical motivation". I am saying the name "Israel" and the name "Palestine" refer to roughly the same region. Both names belong to the region. "Al-Quds" is not "Palestine" it is a city also called "Jerusalem". --Yodakii 10:34, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

Of course it's Jerusalem, that is why I wrote "one of the circles". ←Humus sapiens←ну? 08:15, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

? I was counting the BMP as "Palestine", with it counted that way there were still more "Israel" than "Palestine" maps. The objections against the CIA map are entirely unreasonable; it merely shows undisputed facts, agreed on by everyone including Israel since 1949. As below, the problem is that it puts part of 1948 BM palestine in one color, while the other part is the same as the surrounding countries. The "probable interest.." would of course be information, but about what? - the region and the specific historical usage of the term "Palestine." The first makes Israel maps relevant, but the specific term indicates to me that the focus should be on "Palestine" maps and historical usage of the term Palestine.

The latest map is not in English, it is not too good for here. Yodakii can explain himself, but I do not think you understand him correctly. Current state of Israel belongs here definitely, it is part of BM Palestine and even still uses mandatory Palestine law in the territories at times. The fact that the title refers to a physical region makes "Israel" maps relevant, but the specific term used "Palestine" makes it clear to me that the focus of this article should also be on maps focused on that term. Again, reverse the argument. Should Land of Israel have lots of maps that are focused on Palestine? - say, some of the maps here or a map from the UN showing only the Occupied Palestinian Territories of the West Bank and Gaza, or from the Arab League, calling it the State of Palestine? Is opposing this, as I do, bad faith against Arabs? John Z 10:53, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

I think I got it. Can't talk much now, maybe later. Meanwhile please see if the latest ver. is an improvement. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 00:01, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

It is an improvement. Thank you.

It can be improved a little more:

• In the caption for the British Mandate map, the Transjordan sentence should be replaced with something more relevant like (1922-1948).
• "Eretz Israel" is not the Hebrew word for "Palestine". (Except during the British mandate - this should be clarified somewhere --Yodakii 13:29, 21 September 2005 (UTC))

--Yodakii 08:54, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm basically with Yodakii here. Maps specifically about "Israel" should be in the Israel article and those specifically about "Palestine" should be here. Still, it might be useful to show the essential identity of the territories referred to; I would suggest that if we do that, we should make sure that however we handle it should be very symmetric. -- Jmabel | Talk 00:49, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

This article is about a geographic region, so please let's not turn it into PLO (region). To make it "very symmetric", you would need to either provide maps of ancient Palestinian kingdoms, 12 Palestinian tribes, etc. or hide vital parts of relevant encyclopedic information. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 08:15, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

One land - Two names

It seems that any article that mentions the words "Israel" or "Palestine" can potentially erupt into edit war. I would like to see some kind of neutral policy be worked out to keep this from happening as much as possible. The problem here is that there are two politically-loaded names for the same region.
This article duplicates a lot of content on the "Land of Israel" article. I think the content should either be clearly seperated or the articles merged.
Reasons to seperate:

• Seperation avoids creating bloated articles with constant edit wars about bias. There is no need to duplicate content everywhere when they can be linked to.
• Geographically and historically "Israel" and "Palestine" refer to different ranges of territory and history. Each deserves its own article.
• The terms "Israel" and "Palestine" are used today by different people to mean different things. Seperate articles could make those differences clear.

Reasons to merge:

• The Land of Israel and region of Palestine articles already duplicate much of the content and merging is the usual policy in such cases.
• The names used to refer to the region can be explained in one place in a neutral manner without repeating arguments in other Israel and Palestine related articles.
• There is only one region, so there should be one article explaining the geography and history of the region. The history of the region can be divided into sections each with a summary and a link to its main article.

I hope this can lead to a constructive discussion towards a more neutral and "peaceful" wikipedia. --Yodakii 06:47, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

I am not necessarily against the merge, and have only one condition: the title to be Land of Israel. I feel it would be unacceptable to have it as a redirect. Let's see what other editors say. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 08:17, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

The big problem with merging is the title. I don't expect there could ever be any consensus on either "Land of Israel" or "Palestine region". If merging has any chance of working there needs to be some kind of neutral title. There's a challenge. Suggestions welcome. --Yodakii 09:51, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

Well, Humus, a merge is possible, but with that condition, I think we all can guess on the probability of it happening, IMHO about zero. I do not think it is a solvable or necessary to solve problem, so I oppose a merge and think the articles should be kept separate. The time to merge is when peace breaks out in the region, and in scholarship about it, and though far from impossible, this doesn't appear to be happening tomorrow. I don't think that traditional encyclopedias would or do merge these topics. I agree that bloating and edit wars would be increased by the merge and think content duplication is innocuous and not a big problem; I don't see these articles as POV forks. There is a bit of a type difference too, Land of Israel is to some extent a religious term, tied to Jewish religious practice, and about which I believe there is some mild religious debate as to the proper extent - and because of the greater age the actual historical boundaries are even less determined and rigid and dependent on archaeological debates. An ideal article would thus probably be larger than an ideal Palestine region article, another reason against merging. In particular, I think the added section on the Land of Israel etc is out of place, and should be removed, if you don't I will; a similar map showing present day Israel inside the Green line and proposed Palestine /occuputed territories in equally high relief, not having the territories in the same color as the other areas would be better in place of the state of Israel map.John Z 10:15, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

Why don't we just have one article build a wall near the border between the articles (although clearly impinging into the other's territory)? Then partisans of the second article can then despair of their dream of actually removing the first article, but can send out suicide missions to try to wear it down? Oh, wait, I see that someone has already basically proposed that, except he wants to build the wall deeper into the territory of the second article. -- Jmabel | Talk 00:42, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

see Talk:Land of Israel#merge. No trolling please. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 08:28, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

Could anyone point out credible references to Hebrew spelling פלסטין? I think פלשתינה was much more prevalent. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 00:55, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

A google search will show the spelling פלסטין is often used to mean Palestine today. While the spelling פלשתינה is usually used to mean Palestine before the Israeli state's establishment. --Yodakii 08:03, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

All those refer to Filastin (the name of proposed Arab state) not the region. Since that is not the subject of the article, I'm going to remove that. Also, I'm going to add Greek and sort the languages in the order of historical appearance of this word in those languages, as we do in other articles. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but there is no evidence the Arabs began using the toponym Filastin before the 7th century. AFAIK, the Jews referred to the region as Eretz Israel at least since Davidic times (10th century BCE), but I left the word פלשתינה in the intro as a compromise. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 09:42, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Looks fair to me. --Yodakii 10:01, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Another little problem is that both articles are entirely about Jews. Who lived there after 135, what were their origins? Zionists want to deny the existence of non-Jews in Palestine. The USA article mentions native peoples and African-Americans, but the Israel/Palestine articles are totally ethnocentric (I would say racist). -- Unsigned comment by anonymous IP 24.64.166.191

The article Land of Israel is "about" Jews because that phrase has been used by Jews since before there were any significant number of Arabs in the area, and because it is sometimes used as a theologically-meaningful term in the Jewish religion. If you have any helpful factual corrections or textual clarifications to offer with respect to this article, it would be helpful if you could be as specific as possible. AnonMoos 15:30, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

I happen to think that while the two articles should remain separated, both articles should be balanced in including populations of inhabitants. For example, this article refers only to the Jewish civilization in "Palestine" in passing, mentioning it only when talking about occupation of the land by others. If we trace the history of the term back to the 5th century BC, if I'm not mistaken, it was very much a Jewish territory then. Aiden Cathasaigh 18:55, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Greek name error

Is Παλεστίνα modern Greek? Because it sure the heck isn't ancient Greek, as you can see by going to http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Paus.+10.12.1 and selecting Greek text display, where you will see Παλαιστίνη in sub-sub-section 9 (or actually its genitive case form, with an additional final sigma which should be ignored, since names are generally cited in the nominative case). AnonMoos 15:42, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Please fix it. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 17:42, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

It would be helpful to have the pronounciation or transliteration included if possible. --Yodakii 03:37, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Hebrew: פלשתינה Palestina

I think the reference to the "Hebrew" name פלשתינה should go.

1.) The true Hebrew name is ארץ ישראל If you study the Zionist literature of the period before the establishment of the state of Israel you find that the region is call "Palästina" in German, "la Palestine" in French and ארץ ישראל in Hebrew. A striking example is the qeren ha-yesod le-israʾel which is called in Englisch "Palestine Foundation Fund". Herzl wrote in Altneuland: „Es gibt seit einigen Jahren eine Bewegung, man nennt sie die zionistische. Die will die Judenfrage durch eine großartige Kolonisation lösen. Es sollen alle, die es nicht mehr aushalten können, in unsere alte Heimat, nach Palästina gehen.“ For some telling posters see http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/History/Modern%20History/Centenary%20of%20Zionism/Images%20of%20a%20State%20in%20the%20Making-%20Introduction

2.) There is no clear spelling for "Palestina" in Hebrew. Google found some 1100 times with sin-tav פלשתינה and some 300 times with samekh-tet פלסטינה This shows that it is not really Hebrew, it is just a transliteration of an English word. (And there is פלשטין ( פלשטין

3.) It is not true that at any time the Hebrew name for the region of Palestine, the land of Palestine was other than ארץ ישראל -- that the British imposed Palestina as one of the officail names reinforces this fact. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.123.68.240 (talk • contribs)

This makes a lot of sense to me. I'll change it then. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 08:27, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

• Agreed. For example: Even in the case of the Jerusalem Talmud, which was called Talmud Yerushalmi in Hebrew -- and the "Palestinian Talmud" by English-speaking academics, but NEVER was it called "Talmud Palestini" (nor anything remotely similar) -- by traditional Jewish scholars, particularly the ones living under Roman occupation who were around when the ignominy of "Palestine" was transposed onto Eretz Yisrael, and they never used the word "פלשתינה Palestina" for themselves. So yes, "פלשתינה Palestina" is historically alien to Jews and Judaism. IZAK 09:07, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

So what you're saying is "Palestine" is pronounced "Eretz Yisrael" in Hebrew, and the "Land of Israel" is pronounced "Filastin" in Arabic. How about somebody fixing the other article too?
"Palestine" and "Eretz Yisrael" are different words with different histories and meanings. Only since the British Mandate did the names "Eretz Yisrael" and "Palestine" refer to the same territory. Thats why there are seperate articles. There was a whole discussion recently going through all this already. --Yodakii 13:23, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

No Yodakii I am not saying what you're saying, because what you are saying makes absolutely no sense in either English or according to logic!. This is not about "word games". Palestine is not "pronounced" "Eretz Yisrael" -- somehow I sense you are meaning to say something else but you can't get the right words out (by connecting the thoughts in your brain with the formation and vebalization of the words and in writing/typing them down here) which is evident by your false "conclusion" (if one can call it that) that "Land of Israel" "is pronounced" "Filastin". I suggest you get a dictionary and check out the meaning and translation of the word "pronounced" before you start tossing words about in a serious discussion about this topic. IZAK 09:05, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Made the change I promised earlier, adding a note "(covers roughly the same region)". ←Humus sapiens←ну? 09:31, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

So how about adding "Canaan" and the "Holy Land" to the list of names the roughly cover the same region? The "Land of Israel" is always called "Palestine" by Arabs, so it would only be fair to add the Arabic word for Palestine (noting it covers roughly the same region) to that article as well. If you can't agree on that then it seems the Hebrew should be removed outright from this article, since as you seem agree there is no Hebrew word for Palestine, only Eretz Yisrael. --Yodakii 05:45, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

I have no objections, perhaps we should also note the context of their usage. Let's see what others say. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 06:15, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

Yodakii completely removed Hebrew from the intro. Looks like an attempt to hide or erase the Jewish connection to the region. Let's not forget that this is an encyclopedic article about a geographic region, not a political pamphlet for the PLO. ←Humus sapiens←ну? 07:51, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

Your bad faith is sickening, Humus sapiens. The Jewish connection to the region is undisputed and well documented in this article and elsewhere. Only the Hebrew name is disputed. I would like to see NPOV wording in Israel-Palestine articles and avoid edit wars. Your cooperation is appreciated. --Yodakii 02:18, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

The 1906 "Jewish Encyclopedia" entry Palestine might be enlightening in this regard. Arker 02:13, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

In Hebrew, the region is generally called Eretz-Yisrael. Before 1948, the word Palestina was also used. Hence the Mandate stamp in the article, whith both פלשתינה (Palestina) and א"י (abbreviation of Eretz-Yisrael) in Hebrew.--Doron 07:43, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

As a compromise how about stating the periods when the Hebrew names "Palestina" and "Eretz-Yisrael" have been used to refer to the same region? I'm not sure about the dates, but something like:
( פלשתינה Palestina (? - 1948), ארץ ישראל Eretz-Yisrael (1922? - present))
Since it doesn't seem that "Palestina" has been used since Israel's establishment. The problem with this is that it isn't clear that prior to the British Mandate, the ancient name "Eretz-Yisrael" referred to a different range of territory. To avoid this problem we could just use this:
( פלשתינה Palestina (? - 1948))
and leave the definition of Eretz-Yisrael to the "see also" link --Yodakii 10:45, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Both are still in use, depending on context, so putting years is incorrect, and inappropriate (IMO) for the first sentence of the article anyway. Since the boundaries of "Palestine" are not well defined, and may vary accodring to context and historical scope, I think both Hebrew names are relevant to this article.--Doron 20:52, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

If both terms are still used to refer to the present region then the context should be clear. I think the "Land of Israel" makes it clear enough what "Eretz-Yisrael" refers to. This article should make it clear what "Palestine" refers to. I think we can all agree these terms are not equivalent and interchangable as the current introduction seems to suggest. --Yodakii 02:36, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

I'll endorse that. Arker 08:39, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

The borders of "Palestine" are not well-defined, and different territories would be referred to as "Palestine" in different contexts at different periods. Most often the territory of "Palestine" was called by Jews "Eretz-Yisrael", and the borrowed word "Paletina" was also used, but only in recent history. I don't see the point of omitting either of them.--Doron 11:52, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

The Hebrew word for Palestine is not a recent borrowing, it's very old. It was originally used only to refer to the coastal regions, not the inland areas in Hebrew. However, it was expanded, first by the Greeks, to refer to the entire region (syrian-palestine) and that usage eventually makes its way to Hebrew. By the 1906 reference I cited above it's well established in that usage, as a neutral term for the region. 'Eretz Yisrael' on the other hand, is not in any sense a translation of Palestine, but is a direct translation for Land of Israel. There may be a political point of view that supports equating them but I can't see how that qualifies as NPOV Arker 00:10, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

No. The ancient Hebrew name of the coastal regions is Pleshet, not Palestina. I am almost certain that Palestina was not used in Hebrew before the modern age (refer me to a source if I am mistaken). And there's certainly no political issue here, the region was called Palestine by Europeans, and European Jews sometimes adopted this name, particularly, but not exclusively, when referring to the British Mandate of Palestine. See for example Anglo-Palestine Bank (which was called in Hebrew "Bank Anglo-Palestina", est. 1902). While the Zionist movement always preferred Eretz-Yisrael, the name Palestina was also used, and that's a fact, no POV here.--Doron 07:45, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

The source, I quoted above, is the 1906 edition of the Jewish Encyclopedia. Under the entry Palestine: "The word represents the Greek form, Παλαιστίνη, of the Hebrew (Ex. xv. 14; Isa. xiv. 29, 31; Ps. lx. 10 [A. V. 8]), although in the Old Testament is applied only to the land of the Pelishtim, or Philistines, and hence denotes merely the coast district south of Phenicia.[...]n the course of time the term "Palestine" superseded the longer "Palestinian Syria," and it is used with this connotation by Josephus and Philo, while Vespasian officially designated the country as "Palestine" on the coins which he struck after the suppression of the Jewish insurrection in 70 C.E., implying thereby the territory of the Jews. The name is used in this sense by Christian authors beginning with Jerome, as well as by the Jewish writers, while the Arabic "Filasṭin" is more restricted in meaning, denoting only Judea and Samaria." While it I have no doubt that 'eretz yisrael' is the prefered term in zionist literature, that doesn't make it a translation of the term 'Palestine' - it still means 'land of Israel' instead, and it's used in that context to convey and reinforce territorial claims. Arker 21:27, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Firstly, "Filastin" most certainly is not restricted to Judea and Samaria. Secondly, this article is about the region known throughout most of history as "Palestine", not just about the coastal area. Hence, it overlaps with "Eretz-Yisrael". The name "Palestina" is only relevant in the last century or so.--Doron 08:35, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

I asked someone to search two CDs of rabbinnical literature for uses of the word "Palestine". He found very few: some mentions of the Roman use of that name, an example of Philistines called "Palestinians", a reference to the town of Ramle being called "Filastin" ca. 14th century. Of course these rabbis were about the least likely people to use a name other than "Eretz Yisrael". However, one can say that use of the name in Hebrew before the modern era was rare. --Zero 11:02, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

The word פלשתינה gets "about 14,500" hits in the Hebrew google, and that doesn't include other grammatical forms or prefixed forms (eg. בפלשתינה , "in Palestine" gets another 696), nor does it include alternative spellings. The google counts claimed above are wrong. So it simply isn't true that it isn't used any more, even if it is much less canonical a name than "Eretz Yisrael". --Zero 12:44, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Palestine (country)

We should make an article called Palestine (country) that talks about the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

This area of Wikipedia is already too fragmented. --Zero 08:34, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Let's not forget that the Arab League has a non-sovereign member state whose name is conventionally translated as "Palestine" in English-language publications, while the United Nations also refers to its observer member entity as either "Palestine" or "Occupied Palestine" in English. And so, since the historical toponym continues to be preferred over a more direct rendering of the derived modern Arabic name, the confusion is likely to continue and the dab-page remains vital. //Big Adamsky 21:49, 20 December 2005 (UTC)