Who are the Palestinians; what is their history? The radical narrative about Israel casts the Palestinian people as an ancient people, oppressed by waves of European Jews who, supported by colonial powers, seize their land. Here is Zionism: settler colonialism, imperialism, violence, expulsion, and theft combined together. Maybe genocide too, and all wielded against the indigenous, Palestinian people. Such a narrative fulfils the 11th century prediction of the famous Jewish sage Rashi on what the nations of the world would say to the people of Israel when they regain their heritage: “You are robbers because you stole the land.” It throws into question Israel’s right to exist and casts Jews as robbers. It is also false.
A Land Without Self-Government
The two thousand years from the beginning of Roman rule in 63BC until the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948 see no period of self government for the Land. The first and second Jewish revolts against Rome (66- 70AD and 132-135AD) are catastrophic for the Jewish people, with a death toll of perhaps one million and the Jerusalem Temple destroyed in 70AD. After the second revolt, the Roman Emperor Hadrian bars Jews from Jerusalem and renames the land ‘Palestina,’ a deliberate insult for it revives the name of their ancient enemies, the Philistines. Nonetheless, Jews remain a major element of the population throughout the Roman, Byzantine and early Moslem eras.
“We consider Palestine nothing but part of Arab Syria and it has never been separated from it at any stage.”
For two millennia, through many political changes, the Land is subject to occupation and foreign rule, always part of somebody else’s Empire or Kingdom. The Land is tossed back and forth between warring—mainly Islamic—dynasties. Each brings their own armies and camp followers, bureaucracies, clerics, and labour gangs. This continual moving and mingling of peoples produces a racially mixed population. The Jews are less prone to such mixing because they hold themselves apart as a people under the requirements of the Mosaic law and of tradition: a people united by their history in the homeland of their patriarchs, kings and prophets.
Foreign Rule and Mixed Populations
The name Palestine sticks until the Crusaders take Jerusalem in 1099. They institute the Kingdom of Jerusalem. With a two month exception in 1872, the name Filastin or Palestine will not be applied again to an administrative unit at any level until the British Mandate for Palestine, formally instituted in 1922. This does not stop well-known writer Raashid Khalid, author of a book on Palestinian identity, from claiming a vilayet of ‘Filastin.’
The Jewish attachment to the Land and their continuous presence in it will be discussed in a future article. For Arab inhabitants of the Land, motivations and attachments are different. The Qur’an and associated hadith do not refer at all to the Land and Jerusalem is mentioned once, indirectly. The Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque are built in the late 7th century, when the Ummayid Caliphate loses control of Mecca and Medina. It is from this period that the identification of Jerusalem as Al Quds (the Holy) emerges. Subsequent interest in the city and the two buildings waxes and wanes; the buildings are sometimes in disrepair, sometimes refurbished. Saladin, who seizes Jerusalem from the Crusaders, emphasises the importance of his conquest. But for Sunni Muslims, Mecca and Medina are of greater importance; for Shia, the devotional focus is Karbala, Najaf and Mashdad.
So, where are the Palestinians in all this? A Jerusalem inhabitant, Al-Maqdisi, in the late 10th century refers to himself as a ‘Palestinian.’ After that, no report for eight centuries until 1898 when a translation of a Russian document mentions the ‘Palestinian peasant’. What fills the eight centuries of silence? Aside from scholarly sources using the classical term Palestina, there are occasional references to Filastin in religious and legal documents. Today, these have somehow become evidence, as one writer puts it, of the deep roots of “the concept of Palestine… in the collective consciousness of the indigenous people of Palestine.”Islamic Rule and the Rise of Jerusalem’s Religious Significance
Yet most non-Jewish inhabitants of the Land would have little concept of the world beyond village or clan during Ottoman rule (1517-1917.) The growing weakness of the Ottomans and then the triumph of the nationalistic Young Turk Revolution (1908) in Constantinople change this. Together with the impact of European concepts of nationalism, this causes the Arab elite to shift focus away from celebrating Arabic language and culture towards politically active Arab nationalism.
Because of its classical roots, European education retains the Roman usage of ‘Palestine’ to name the Land. Western visitors, in their increasing numbers during the 19th and early 20th Centuries, refer to ‘Palestine;’ Christian schools in the Land teach the ancient history of Palestine; Zionists set up the Anglo-Palestine Bank; etc. The term is taken up by the locals. Salim Qub‘ayn in a 1902 article ‘A Palestinian Describes Palestinian Towns’, describes both ‘Jewish’ and ‘non-Jewish’ inhabitants of the towns. Palestinian is used to indicate an individual’s residence rather than ethnic group.
The Making of a Modern Identity
However, Zionism and Jewish immigration raise increasing concern. The newspaper Filastin begins publication in 1911. Initially neutral, by 1914 it opposes Zionism and uses terms such as the ‘Palestine community’ and ‘Palestinians’ for those under threat. Post-war the position of Filastin and other commentators develop a broader pan-Arab nationalism—much to the irritation of later progressive writers.
In February 1919 the Arab Delegation from Palestine to the Versailles Peace Conference submits a petition: “We consider Palestine nothing but part of Arab Syria and it has never been separated from it at any stage. We are tied to it by national, religious, linguistic, moral, economic, and geographic bounds.” Emir Feisal, son of the Sharif of Mecca, writes to the Zionist organisation “We will wish the Jews a hearty welcome home… our two movements complete one another. The Jewish movement is national and not imperialist. Our movement is national and not imperialist.”
The 1919 King-Crane Commission on Ottoman territories asks local Arabs: “What do you want the mandate to be for Palestine?” The answer is nearly unanimous: “We want no separation of Palestine from Syria… We are Syrians. Palestine is Southern Syria.” In 1920, protestors fill the streets of Jerusalem with pro-Syrian chants.
Part 2 brings this study into the 21st century. Based on excerpts from “From the River to the Sea: the Land in History and Prophecy from the 1st to the 20th Century.”
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