This is a ridiculous theory, so I responded:
Somehow, between 1921 and 1948, under full British control, Zionists managed to build a prosperous economy and effective governance.Palestinians have had since 1994 with more autonomy than Jews had. And yet they blame Israel for their failures.
As usual when I strike a nerve, I got a lot of angry responses , nearly all of which are the usual mindless anti-Israel drivel. But a few people made one reasonable point.
So I answered that point and elaborated on my initial tweet.
The only reasonable response to this has been that the Zionists had large amounts of capital from the Jewish diaspora.
This is true - and it proves my point. Jews didn't depend on anyone else to build their nation. They funded it themselves, they drained the swamps themselves, they built their government themselves, they built cities from scratch themselves, they built an economy themselves. They had no foreign aid, no NGOs giving advice, and the British didn't allow them to do a great deal.
Now let's look at Palestinians since 1994.
They've received tens of billions of dollars - from the EU, from the Arab world, from the US. They have more NGOs advising them than anyone else on Earth does. They have an automatic UN majority for political support. They got the world to recognize their "state" before it exists.
And yet they haven't built squat. Three decades later they are dysfunctional, corrupt, divided, and immature. All those billions were wasted instead of invested. Instead of working to build, they are spending all their political capital to fight Israel in international fora.
The most honest Palestinian government comes from the Hamas terrorists. At least they don't pretend - they want Palestine to be a stage towards a pan-Islamic ummah. The PA tells the world it wants peace but it admires and financially supports terrorism.
Neither Hamas nor the PA have shown the slightest interest in building a real independent nation - only the trappings of one. Neither have shown any interest in making the lives of their people better. Their goals are the same: blame everything on Israel and work to destroy it.
Everyone knows all of this. But it is a convenient fiction for the West to pretend that the PA actually cares about its people and actually wants an independent state. The PA focus on "return" shows that its goals lie elsewhere.
So, no, Israel isn't the reason the Palestinians have a dysfunctional and corrupt statelet.
The Jews built Israel despite the difficulties, the Palestinians avoid building a state despite the financial and political support of nearly the entire world.
Adults take responsibility for their actions. Palestinians do not. Instead they blame all their problems on others.
Any objective observer can see that they are the ones who have architected their own problems by making poor decisions for decades and never abandoning Arafat's "stages" program to destroy Israel.
If the Palestinians were serious about peace and building a nation, they'd have no better partner than Israel.
But leaders that responded to a peace plan in 2001 with a terror spree that they remain proud of today are not leaders.
They are antisemites.
