In a recent appearance on Palestinian Authority television, PA Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Ahmad Subh claimed the United Nations had not permitted the establishment of an Arab state in then British Mandatory Palestine in 1947. Subh's interview was translated by Palestinian Media Watch.

"In 1977 the UN General Assembly decided to restore the Palestinian people's esteem, following the historic injustice which happened in 1947, when a 'birth certificate' was offered to one state instead of two states,” Subh claimed. “One state [Israel] was permitted to be established, while the Palestinian state was not permitted to be established.”

In 1947, with hundreds of thousands of Jews living in the British Mandate and millions more seeking homes, the UN offered a partition plan that would split the land between Arabs and Jews. Jewish leaders accepted the plan. Surrounding Arab states rejected the plan and attacked the fledgling Jewish state, causing a bloody war that ended with the Arab nations defeated and Israel established on most of the British Mandate territory.

Subh's interview is not the first time the Fatah-led PA based in Ramallah has made false claims about the history of the region, PMW said. “Since its establishment, the Palestinian Authority has been rewriting history in an attempt to create historical legitimacy for its demands for statehood, as well as justification for the terror and wars against Israel since before Israel's establishment in 1948,” the group stated.

PMW monitors PA media and schoolbooks, and researches PA culture and society. In some of its previous reports the group published its findings on Holocaust denial in PA schools, encouragement of suicide bombings in PA media and a Hamas site encouraging young children to fight to the death against those considered enemies of Islam.