The "Palestinian" Gag

From The Associating Press:

In one of the longest running gags of recent times, the "Palestinians" have finally admitted to a joke started in 1948 when the United Nations created the nation of Israel.  "We had just been hanging out in the countryside at the time," said one of the many Arabs who was in on the joke.  "We saw that the 'Jordanians' had made up a name for themselves... (Don't tell anyone but they're really Arabs with a made up name too)... and the Jews were calling themselves Israelis.

"So my Dad and some other guys got together at a pub in Jericho and had this great idea of calling ourselves, 'Palestinians.'  Get it, we were in Palestine," he continued with a chuckle.  "For a while we thought we might actually get a whole country out of it.

"Then some crazies started bombing things and killing people and it all went Ramallah.  Frankly, I'm glad it's all over.  It's been hard keeping up the joke all these years.  We'll all be abandoning the desert and going back to Arabia in the next week or two."