Most of earth's territory has been conquered, often many times, by a succession of peoples. In the U.S. we think of our own conquest of native tribes (who themselves were often conquerors, e.g. the Sioux did nor originate in the Dakotas nor the Comanche in Texas or Oklahoma). And, most Anglos, even those most sympathetic to Native Peoples, are not getting on boats or planes and going back to Europe. Of course that would not solve the problem. Celts might demand that Germanic peoples move back east, ad infinitum. Those Hispanics who claim the southwestern U.S. should go back to Mexican peoples could be met by claims from Navajo or Apache.

Regardless of what our moral sense is regarding conquest, after a while we accept the movement of peoples as an accomplished fact. Which brings me to a question I have asked regarding the nation of Israel. To the Arab nations: how long does the nation of Israel have to be in place before you recognize it as legitimate? If the answer is "never, we will always regard it as conquered land," then I ask this question: why should we accept the Arab conquest of the Middle East about 1400 years ago as legitimate? Why should not Egypt be the land of the Copts, Iraq the land of the Chaldeans and others, Morocco the land of the Berbers? Arabs back to Arabia! In other words, if the position is taken that the Jews never can be legitimate occupiers of Israel, no matter how long they are there, then Islamic Arab claims on huge chunks of territory have no logical basis, no claim on the land either.

Of course, the real motivation, I maintain, is not nationalist, but religious. In Islamic thought, none of the Land of Submission ever can be given up (call it the Al Brezhnev Doctrine).