Palestinian National Council President Rawhi Fattouh: Netanyahu Says The Jews Have Been In Jerusalem For 3,000 Years – But We Inhabited This Land For Over 1.5 Million Years

Palestinian National Council president Rawhi Fattouh said at a May 22, 2023 Nakba Day event in Algeria that the Palestinians have been living in Palestine for more than 1.5 million years, and spoke about a neanderthal civilization that lived on Mount Carmel 60,000 years ago. In response to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's statement that the Jews have been in Jerusalem for 3,000 years, Fattough said that the Palestinians' Jebusite "forefathers" had established Jerusalem in 5,000 BCE, and he emphasized that it belongs "exclusively to the Palestinians, the Arabs, and the Muslims." Fattouh's speech was aired on Palestine TV on May 26, 2023.

Rawhi Fattouh: "Palestine in its entirety belongs to us, and to no one else. We do not share it with anyone. Humans appeared in Palestine 1.5 million years ago. The first human civilization appeared in the ancient caves on Mount Carmel, in Palestine. The first Kebaran civilization and the first Kebaran engineering civilization appeared in the Kebara Cave 60,000 years ago. Our Jebusite forefathers built Palestine – and especially Jerusalem – in 5,000 BC.

"Yesterday, Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of the extreme right, fascist government of Israel held a meeting at the Al-Buraq [Western] Wall, in order to respond to Abu Mazen's [Mahmoud Abbas] speech at the General Assembly of the UN, on the 15th of this month, and in order to say: 'We have been here on this land for 3,000 years.' This is what Netanyahu says.

"We say that we have been here for more than 1.5 million years. Jerusalem was built by our Jebusite forefathers in 5,000 BC – so it is 7,000 years old – and it belongs exclusively to the Palestinians, the Arabs, and the Muslims."