PLO official: Jewish historical ties to the land is “a Zionist invention,” Jews are in “Palestine” because “Europe wanted to get rid of them”

Official PA TV program Palestine This Morning, on the anniversary of the PLO Palestinian declaration of independence, hosting PLO Executive Committee member Saleh Rafat

PLO Executive Committee member Saleh Rafat: "There are deep Palestinian roots in Palestine throughout all of history. It is a Zionist invention that this is the land of the Jewish patriarchs. This is completely incorrect. There were Jews in Palestine... We have Muslims, Christians, and Jews. But all of them were and still are [part of] the Palestinian people. Therefore, it's a lie that was invented. The Khazar Jews were brought and expelled from Europe to Palestine, in order to get rid of them. Germany wanted to get rid of them, [as did] Britain, France, and Italy. All of Europe wanted to get rid of the Jews and expel them so that the West would have a permanent base in the Middle East. Indeed, they established the State of Israel on the land of historical Palestine."
PA TV host: "It was established by the Zionist Movement, and not by all the Jews."
PLO Executive Committee member Saleh Rafat: "Of course, I'm talking about the Zionist movement that had support from the British colonialism. The British colonialism enabled the Zionist movement to establish the State of Israel."
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Palestinian declaration of independence - On Nov. 15, 1988, before the Palestine National Council (PNC), the Palestinian parliament in exile in Algeria, Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Yasser Arafat declared the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. Although the borders were not specified in the declaration, it recognized the UN partition plan of 1947, which called for the creation of a Jewish state and an Arab state in the former British Mandate for Palestine.