In Allison Emmerich's letter to the editor on Oct. 4 she wrote, "How could anybody hate Americans when we waltz into Palestine, take their land and give it to the Jewish people?"

The United States never waltzed into Palestine. The British had a mandate over Palestine that began shortly after the end of World War I and lasted until Nov. 29, 1947.

On that day, the UN voted to divide Palestine and establish two states: one for Palestinian Arabs (Jordan) and one for Palestinian Jews (Israel).

The Jews accepted this decision and their much smaller portion of the land; the Arabs refused to accept the international, majority approved decision. Immediately, seven militaries invaded the Jewish state. Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the Sudan urged the Arabs living in Israel to leave in order to ease their warpaths. These seven states promised the Arabs that the land would be purged of Jews and Arabs could move in.

However, at a cost of one percent of its population, the Jewish state defeated the Arab armies and maintained its sovereignty. This is when the "Palestinian problem" was born.

Emmerich wrote, "the truth is, it wasn't our land to give."

The Jews were not "given" this land. Six-thousand Jews lost their lives while defending a new state that had literally existed for hours. Emmerich also wrote, "the Muslims who were there already basically had no say in the matter."

Muslim Arabs initiated the war from 1947 to 1949 and had everything to say in the matter.

Further, the name Palestine comes from "Syria Palestina" what the Romans renamed Jewish lands after they defeated the Jews over two thousand years ago, centuries before Mohammed introduced Islam.