Christian Israel

What if Christians tried and succeeded in making a Christian state in the Holy Land (assuming the Jewish movement of the OTL is not there)? Their motives could be to escape the "growing secularization of Europe and its materialialism," leading to a "get back to our roots movement" by having Christians move there. The Christians get British support in WWI. Christian immigration could increase by persecution of Christianity in the USSR and later the communist block.

Would the history of Israel be the same as OTL? (with obvious excpetions, like a Christmas War instead of the Yom Kippur War). Is this possible? If it is, how would relations between the West and the Islamic world be different, because this Israel really would be a "crusader state"! American evangelical support is gonna be scary in this time line.
 
Sooo, are you saying that there are no Jews in Palestine at all prior to the founding of the christian Israel? Or, are they dominated by the christians? If so, I can see jewish terrorism being a problem, perhaps a jewish/islamic alliance?
 

Old Airman

Banned
Angevins were discussed couple of times here, methink. Trouble w/Christianity is that "ethnic" component is clearly separate from "religious" one. Everyone who goes to synagogue (or simply born to mom who occasionally did) is of Jewish tribe, to put it bluntly.
 
What do you mean: a secular state with predominantly christian population, or a theocratic christian state?

And when exactly should that happen? Before the crusades? By the crusades? Later? In the 19th century? As this essentially determines whether there is a hostile native population or not this is rather important.
 
Sounds like a Theocratic State, supported by Britain after WW1. Although the OP is just looking for a way to make a Theocratic Christian state to happen. I consider it rather ASB. What is Britain's motivation to do this? At least with the Balfour declaration there was population numbers to back it up, if not an understanding of the realpolitik of the Mid-East.

Here is an idea that actually had some traction after WW1 in French Politics. Most of the Christians in Lebanon are descended from either through family or intermarriage to Crusaders who came to Lebanon in the Middle Ages. There was a movement within the Lebanese Christain communities to be recognized as French and annexed as a French territory. It never got anywhere because of Druzism (some kind of Christian offshoot) and the fact that the League of Nations granted them a Mandate not a colony even if the mandate was a de facto colony. The politics of it made it difficult to pull off.

Maybe a WW1 victory that doesn't require American help (I think Wilson will ask for a 13 points type declaration no matter what kind of victory it is) this makes WW1 like a traditional European war with the outright exchange of territory and the French caught up in a Nationalist fervor outright annex Lebanon and Syria and declare them the states of Tyre and Aleppo (in reference to the Crusader States).
 
For starters, if it is christian it would definitely not be called Israel

Not so; the Christian Bible calls the land "Eretz Yisrael" just like the Jewish Bible does. Hell, such a nation would be purely motivated by religion, rather than the weird combination of religion and nationalism IOTL, making Israel an even more likely name.
 
Not so; the Christian Bible calls the land "Eretz Yisrael" just like the Jewish Bible does. Hell, such a nation would be purely motivated by religion, rather than the weird combination of religion and nationalism IOTL, making Israel an even more likely name.
:confused:Firstly, talking about "the Christian Bible", when there are hundreds of translations, particularly when you're talking about word usage, is nonsensical.

Secondly, NO translation of the Bible that I have seen in English (~10), French (3), German(2), Esperanto(1) or Latin(1) has used "Eretz", and I don't THINK any used a 'y' in Israel. I don't believe the Septuagint or the original of the New Testament use either, nor IIRC the Russian, although the 'y' distinction gets pretty meaningless in another alphabet.

However, they certainly talk about the land of Israel, the Kingdom of Israel, etc., so what I THINK your point was is valid.

(Eretz Yisrael, at least in English, seems to be a code phrase used by irredentist Jews who want to continue building settlements in the West Bank, e.g.)
 
Anyway. Addressing the OP.

Doing this as a result of successful Crusades (obviously this would belong in the other forum), might be possible - although they tended to call the place "the Holy Land" or "Kingdom of Jerusalem" and getting that place called "Israel" would be tougher.

With a post 1900 PoD? Darn near ASB, IMO. You'd have to push out or suppress the Jews (not a problem, there weren't THAT many) AND the Arabs (which would get every Arab state around violently angry with you). Of course, if the British or French were determined enough, it's almost a matter of supplying enough machine-gun bullets if we're talking ~WWI era. Still, why WOULD Britain or France be prepared to do this? It would be very expensive both in terms of money and lives, and the pay-off would be so low.

The motivations I can conceive of (and that's verging on the ASB) is 1) if the British Israelites manage to take over Britain (which since their theories are very flimsy would be ... tough - you'd almost need a Nazi-esque movement with this as their ideology - and getting a Nazi-esque movement to succeed in Britain would be tough enough). or 2) if the French have a monarchy that buys into the Sang Real/Saint Graal theory (à la Dan Brown). Again, you'd almost need a Nazi-esque royal government.

So, I suppose it's not QUITE ASB, but, IMO, it's darn close.
 
:confused:Firstly, talking about "the Christian Bible", when there are hundreds of translations, particularly when you're talking about word usage, is nonsensical.

Secondly, NO translation of the Bible that I have seen in English (~10), French (3), German(2), Esperanto(1) or Latin(1) has used "Eretz", and I don't THINK any used a 'y' in Israel. I don't believe the Septuagint or the original of the New Testament use either, nor IIRC the Russian, although the 'y' distinction gets pretty meaningless in another alphabet.

However, they certainly talk about the land of Israel, the Kingdom of Israel, etc., so what I THINK your point was is valid.

(Eretz Yisrael, at least in English, seems to be a code phrase used by irredentist Jews who want to continue building settlements in the West Bank, e.g.)

I'm not discussing translations, I'm discussing the original language, which tends to be Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek. In this case, the Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings, many of which are written in Hebrew. In these portions, every reference to Palestine/Israel/Judea/Levant/etc is "Eretz Yisrael", meaning "Land of Israel" (note: "Eretz Yisrael" is a transliteration of ארץ ישראל). In Hebrew, this is the way to refer to that region, just like one refers to Italia, Deutschland, France, England, Hrvatska, etc.

(Why yes, I am taking advantage of the fact that the Christian and Jewish Bibles share heavy, heavy overlap).
 
The french name for the region was Outremer during the time of the crusader kingdoms . "Holy Land" would be another plausible name .
 
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