Raymond Leon Roker

I’m tired of the lies we tell ourselves. Our leaders cry every day about “the occupation” as if history began in 1948, as if Israel is some unique monster in human history. But let me remind you of something that no one dares to speak out loud: we Arabs are the children of the biggest and longest occupation the Middle East and Africa have ever seen. In the 7th and 8th centuries, Arab tribes burst out of the Arabian Peninsula. Within just a few decades, they crushed the Byzantine Empire in Syria, Lebanon, and Egypt. They destroyed the Persian Empire. They swept across North Africa, reaching all the way to Morocco, Spain, and even southern France. At its height, the Arab Caliphate ruled 13 million square kilometers - larger than Rome ever dreamed of. Millions of Persians, Berbers, Copts, Arameans, Jews, Greeks, and others suddenly found themselves under Arab rule. Their languages and faiths were pushed aside. Coptic faded in Egypt. Aramaic nearly died out. Even Persian was nearly erased until poets like Ferdowsi fought to keep it alive. Arabic became the dominant tongue, Islam the dominant faith. That was not liberation - it was occupation on a scale that reshaped entire continents. The Mongols came and went in about a century. The Romans ruled for centuries, but Latin disappeared from the Middle East. The British Empire held sway for 200 years, then collapsed. The Arab-Muslim conquests? It changed the identity of entire nations forever. Think about it: Egypt was Christian and Coptic-speaking for 600 years before the Arabs came. Today it is Arab and Muslim. North Africa was Berber and Roman. Today it is Arab and Muslim. The Levant spoke Greek and Aramaic. Today it speaks Arabic. Even Spain lived under Arab rule for 700 years. That is not just an “occupation” - that is a civilizational overhaul. And yet, in 2025, our leaders - who are themselves the product of this massive Arab occupation, weep about Israel, a sliver of land the size of New Jersey, calling it “the worst occupation.” Really? Compared to what the Arabs did to North Africa, Persia, and the Levant? Compared to the centuries-long Arab rule that erased identities, forced conversions, and remade entire regions? If we, Palestinians, want honesty, we must stop pretending that Israel invented occupation. The truth is bitter: we live in the shadow of the largest and longest Arab occupation in history. Blaming only Israel while worshiping our corrupt leaders who exploit this narrative is not justice, it’s cowardice. History matters. And if we don’t face it, we will remain slaves not to Israel, but to our own hypocrisy.