In a moment that can be considered one of the most embarrassing in the 5,000-year history of the Jewish people, an archeological dig unveiled a discovery of monumental importance. In a secret room deep beneath what was known as the City of David, a note was found that says, “LOL! Just kidding!” – along with the hidden diary of one Palvin E. Stein.
Palvin, or Pal for short, was a well-known 19th century Jewish clown and prankster. He would travel from village to village, first endearing himself to the townspeople, but eventually was run out of town when he played too many jokes. After the Enlightenment, when Jews left the European ghettos, Stein set out to play the greatest prank the world has ever seen: inventing a Jewish homeland and convincing European colonial settlers to move there.
According to his diary, Stein assumed that no one would actually believe him, so he found a thriving futuristic and developed corner of the Ottoman Empire and claimed that was the Jewish homeland. He named it after himself, calling it Palestine, ensuring that his efforts would not go in vain. He had no idea that everyone would take him so seriously.
Stein set out to convince the world that not only was “Palestine” the Jewish homeland, it was actually 95 percent empty swamp with land for sale, as opposed to a thriving nation in its own right. He met with Samuel Clemens, aka Mark Twain (also a well-known prankster), and convinced him to write all about the “desolation.” A particularly memorable passage of Stein’s diary recalls the two drinking and laughing in a pub in a Jaffa skyscraper about how “We never saw a human being on the whole route,” having spent the whole day complaining that the country is too modern and crowded.
The next stage of Stein’s prank was dedicated to relabeling all of the obviously Muslim holy sites into fake Jewish ones. He called the Buraq Wall the Kotel, and he changed the name of Haram al-Sharif into the “Temple Mount.” Only through the diligent efforts of the United Nations, which has been trying to undo Stein’s prank through selfless, non-Jew-hating reasons, have the names finally been fixed.
Stein also created “ancient” relics, like coins and pottery, and adorned them with Jewish symbology. To do so, he enlisted the help of Robert Langdon, a famous symbologist at Harvard University (and was incidentally the inspiration for a series of Dan Brown novels) to help. It was a two-man team: Langdon researched the symbols, and Stein added them to everyday items. They buried it all around, laughing as they did so at their own brilliance.
Upon the discovery of the secret diary, the office of the Prime Minister put out the following statement: “The Jewish people are nothing if not humorous. From Mel Brooks to Adam Sandler, from Jerry Seinfeld to Seth Rogen, we Jews know how to take a joke. In light of this hilarious prank from our predecessor, we hereby relinquish all claims to the land of Israel back to the indigenous inhabitants, and we express our apologies. Please take all the cities and massive infrastructure we built as a token of our regret.”
So where is the real Jewish homeland, if not where Israel is? Stein, in his research, actually discovered that the Jewish homeland is in Brooklyn, New York. Several sects of Judaism, which are smarter than everyone else, demand that the Jews in Israel leave that country and return to Brooklyn. This now of course means that the New Zionist movement will be forced to displace all the yuppie hipsters that have moved into sections of Crown Heights, but the chances of mass protests on their behalf are minimal.
The discovery of the secret room and diary was made by two seasoned archeologists, Satchel (Sat) Ire and Marvin B. Simchah.
By Hoshe Mill
