Since Arabic has no P-sound, Arabic morphs the P-sound either into an F or into a B. Thus the Hebrew “tapuach” (apple) becomes the Arabic “tufacha”, and the Hebrew “parash” (horseman) becomes the Arabic “farres”. Arabic for “trousers” is “bantalon” from the French “pantalon”, Arabic for “post” (mail) is “bosta”, and Arabic for “tomato” is “bandora” from the Italian “pomodoro”.
Arabic almost invariably morphs the “P”-sound in place-names into a “B”-sound. Hence the ancient Greek Tripolis (the League of Three Cities), which became the Latin Tripolitania, came into European languages as Tripoli (in Libya and Lebanon), and into Arabic as Tarabulus.
Similarly the Arabic name for Portugal is Bortugal, for Poland Bolanda (in some dialects Bolonya, indiscernible from Bologna), for Cyprus Kubressa, for Nepal Nibal, and for Paraguay Baraghwai.
When the Romans invaded and conquered Israel, they renamed the ancient Hebrew city of Shechem “New City” in Latin, or Nea
polis. This European colonialist name morphed into the Arabic Na
blus (that P sound turning into a B again) which is the name the Arab colonialist invaders used from the 7th century onwards.
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Not content with destroying their cities, exiling a large part of the population, and ploughing their fields with salt to render them incapable of growing food and thereby starving them, he took an additional measure: he changed the very name of the country from Ivdæa (Judæa)to Syria-Palæstina, after the Philistines, the deadly enemies of the Jews from more than 1,000 years earlier.
The Philistines hadn’t existed since the days of King Hezekiah. But the Roman Emperor Hadrian renamed the Jews’ country for them, in a deliberate act of final humiliation to the Jews.
And this brings us to the question: What does the name “Philistine” mean?
– “Philistine” is the Anglicised form of the Hebrew name “P’lishti”, from the Hebrew “polesh”, “invader”. The P’lishtim (Philistines) were a sea-faring nation, invaders who came from the Aegean Islands (which is why they dwelt mainly along the Israeli coastline).
This is the true origin of the name “Palestine”. The name means nothing in Arabic, and indeed cannot possibly exist in Arabic. This alleged “Palestinian” nation is a nation which cannot even pronounce its own name.
(full article online)
'P' is not for 'Palestine,' Ms. Golbard-Bashi
