I could imagine some Palestinians reading it once, then eating the paper just to have something in their stomachs. They should provide real food if they want people to listen.
It is, but it's not any older, which is one of the reasons it's clearly made up. No one talked about it for over 1000 years then suddenly a guy with something to gain suddenly knows this "fact" about a place he's never been, and no one else outside of his vicinity can remember it.
The 1100s is when an Italian merchant made up a story about the "eye of the needle" being a gate in Jerusalem that a camel could juuuuuuust about squeeze through if the owner bowed their head or something.
Feels like it's a dog whistle most of the time and not a very good one. I've seen people assuming that someone isn't here legally much more often with someone of a different race. A lot of the time people will bring it up for the sake of racism. Inherently? I don't know if it would be racist to oppose them for it's own sake, but you'd have to have just as much a problem with the German guy overstaying a visa. I'd also say that opposing it for it's own sake is unchristian.
When younkin did it before, a local newspaper in NOVA went door to door checking the people in their city. The list was public and had addresses. Everyone who was removed and had voted in a recent election was checked by the paper. Everyone of them was a citizen. I'd wager my left nut that there wasn't a hundred people from the list(maybe even a dozen) who broke the law in the state by voting (I don't believe they tried to even prosecute anyone) for a Snickers bar. And I hate Snickers.
I know it wasn't public the last time I checked.