Arabic Culture

History of Palestine

History of Palestine

Palestine is a historic region, the extent of which has varied greatly since ancient times, and is situated on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, in south-western Asia. Today Palestine is largely divided between Israel and Israel-occupied territories.

The Land

The region has an extremely diverse terrain that falls generally into 4 parallel zones: these are the coastal plain; the hills and mountains of Galilee, Samara and Judea; the valley of the Jordan River; and the eastern plateau. The region has several fertile areas, which constitute its principal natural resource. The Jordan River, the region’s only major stream flows, through Lake Tiberias to the intensely saline Dead Sea.

History

The Canaanites were the earliest known inhabitants of Palestine. During the 3rd millennium BC they became urbanized and lived in city-states, one of which was Jericho. Their religion was a major influence on the beliefs and practices of Judaism and, thus, on Christianity and Islam.

Palestine’s location – at the centre of routes linking 3 continents – made it the meeting place for religious and cultural influences from Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia and Asia Minor.

As the Egyptian power began to weaken after the 14th Century BC, new invaders appeared: the Hebrews a group of Semitic tribes from Mesopotamia and the Philistines (after whom the country was later named).Hebrew tribes probably immigrated to the areas centuries before Moses led his people out serfdom in Egypt and Joshua conquered parts of Palestine. They settled in the hill country, but they were unable to conquer all of Palestine.

The Israelites, a confederation of Hebrew tribes, finally defeated the Canaanites about 1125 BC but found the struggle with the Philistines more difficult. The Philistines, who by then had established an independent state on the southern coast of Palestine and controlled a number of towns to the north and east, threatened the Israelites and this threat forced them to unite and establish a monarchy. David, Israel’s great king, finally defeated the Philistines shortly after 1000 BC, and they eventually assimilated with the Canaanites. Israel fell to Assyria and Judah was conquered by Babylonia which destroyed Jerusalem and exiled most of the Jews living there.

Persian Rule

The exiled Jews were allowed to retain their national and religious identity. At the same time they did not forget the land of Israel. Under Persian rule they were given permit to return to Judea, a district in Palestine.

Roman Province

Palestine received special attention when the Roman emperor Constantine the Great legalized Christianity in 313 AD. His mother, Helena, visited Jerusalem, and Palestine, as the Holy Land, became a focus of Christian pilgrimage. Roman rule was interrupted, however, by a brief Persian occupation and ended altogether when Muslim Arab armies invaded Palestine and captured Jerusalem in 638 AD.

The Arab Caliphate

The Arab conquest began 1300 years of Muslim presence in what then became known as “Filastin”. Palestine was holy to Muslims because the prophet Mohammed has designated Jerusalem as the first qibla (the direction the Muslims face when praying) and because he was believed to have ascended on a night journey to heaven from the area where the Dome of the Rock was later built. Jerusalem became the third holiest city of Islam.

The Muslim rulers did not force their religion on the Palestinians, and more than a century passed before the majority converted to Islam. The remaining Christians and Jews were considered “People of the Book”. They were allowed autonomous control in their communities and guaranteed security and freedom of worship. Most Palestinians also adopted Arabic and Islamic culture.

The British Mandate

Aided by the Arabs, the British captured Palestine in 1917 and 1918. In an the famous agreement called the Balfour Declaration of 1917, Britain promised the Jews, whose help it needed in the war effort, a Jewish “national home” in Palestine. This promise was subsequently incorporated in the mandate conferred on Britain by the League of Nations in 1922.

During their mandate the British found their contradictory promises to the Jewish and Palestinian communities difficult to reconcile. The Zionists envisaged large-scale Jewish immigration. The Palestinians, however, rejected Britain’s right to promise their country to a third party and feared dispossession by the Zionists. A 1922 statement of British policy denied Zionist claims to all of Palestine and limited Jewish immigration, but reaffirmed support for a Jewish national home. The British proposed establishing a legislative council, but Palestinians rejected this council as discriminatory.

Jewish immigration rose sharply after the installation of the Nazi regime in Germany and in 1935 nearly 62,000 Jews entered Palestine. Fear of Jewish domination was the principal cause of the Arab revolt that broke out in 1936 and continued intermittently until 1939.

The horrors of the 1945 Holocaust produced world sympathy Zionism and although Britain still refused to admit 100,000 Jewish survivors to Palestine, many survivors of the Nazi death camps found their way there illegally. Various plans for solving the Palestinian problem were rejecting by one party or another.

Although the Palestinians outnumbered the Jews, the latter were better prepared. The Mufti of Jerusalem, the Palestinians’ principal spokesman, refused to accept Jewish statehood. When the UN proposed partition in November 1947, he rejected the plan while the Jews accepted it. In the military struggle that followed, the Palestinians were defeated.

The state of Israel was established on May 14, 1948. Several Arab armies, coming to the aid of the Palestinians, immediately attacked it. Israeli forces defeated the Arab armies and Israel enlarged its territory. Jordan took the West Bank of the Jordan River and Egypt took the Gaza Strip.

The war produced 780,000 Palestinian refugees. About half probably left out of fear and panic, while the rest were forced out to make room for Jewish immigrants from Europe and from the Arab world. The disinherited Palestinians spread throughout the neighbouring countries, where they have maintained their Palestinian national identity and the desire to return to their homeland.

Nakba (May 1948)

The Word “Nakba” is used to describe the catastrophic expulsion of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes and homeland,

Although the PLO leadership has for over 15 years officially recognized, acknowledged and accepted Israel as a state along the borders of 1967, Palestinians are still denied self-determination and statehood. They continue to live the Nakba: the Palestinian territories are under occupation and continue to be fractured and expropriated by Israeli land grabs, millions of refugees are still in exile, and those Palestinians who remained within the borders of Israel live as second-class citizens in their homeland.
Palestine in 1882 had a small, native, and migrant religious Jewish community of roughly 24,000 among a Palestinian population of nearly 500,000. There were several waves of politically inspired immigration into the country. The first occurred between 1882 and 1903 and totaled about 25,000. The second, between 1904 and 1914, brought in around 35,000 immigrants, which resulted in a total Jewish population of 85,000. The third wave between 1919 and 1923 brought another 85,000 immigrants, mostly Polish and middle class.
The December 1931 British census of the country showed that of the 1.04 million people, 84 percent were Arab and 16 percent were Jewish. While the increase in the Jewish population was due largely to in-migration, the Palestinian population increased naturally at 2.7 percent per year. Because of the rise of Nazism, 174,000 Jews migrated to Palestine between 1932 and 1936. Suddenly the Jewish population in Palestine rose to an estimated 28 percent of the total inhabitants. This radical change, occurring in a brief span of only five years, must certainly be recognized as an important cause of the Palestinian Arab rebellion of 1936 against British Mandate authorities. Both legal and illegal Jewish immigration (according to Mandate authorities) into Palestine increased during World War II and its aftermath.
By the end of 1947, Palestine Mandate government estimates indicate that of a total population of 1.9 million, Jews made up only 31 percent. Thus, only a year before the state of Israel was unilaterally declared, the Jewish population constituted less than one-third the total inhabitants. Nevertheless, the Jewish minority in Palestine became a powerful community.
Palestine Population

In November of 1917, as General Allenby was preparing to conquer Palestine, the British Foreign office issued the Balfour Declaration of 1917, a letter from the Foreign Secretary, Lord Balfour, to Lord Rothschild, head of the British Zionist movement. The declaration stated:
"His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."

Having owned less than 6% of the land of the Palestinian Mandate, the Jews were promised 56% by the UN Partition Plan (Year 1947; Resolution 181) and seized a total of 78% in the conflict of 1948. In securing their nation, they had uprooted 90% of Palestinians from their homes and sent the vast majority into exile. Of the more than 800 Palestinian towns and villages that had existed in Palestine in 1945, less than 450 remained after the War and only 105 of them within the Israeli borders.

Many of the Palestinians fleeing their homes in 1948 left with a minimum of luggage in the belief that they would be returning to their homes within days, as soon as the violence passed their villages. Now living in overcrowded and underprivileged camps in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, or the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, they and their descendents, now entering a fourth generation, are still waiting.

The UN Conciliation Commission estimated that 726,000 Palestinians (75% of the Arab population of Palestine) had fled outside Palestine (1948 refugees) while 32,000 remained within the armistice lines. Some 531 villages and towns were destroyed or resettled with Jews.

Today, the total 1948 refugee population is estimated at 5.5 million, including 4.0 Million registered with UNRWA and 1.5 million who simply did not register or who did not need assistance at the time they became refugees. In addition, there are 263,000 internally displaced (of 1948) and some 773,000 1967 displaced persons.

In 1967, during the Six-Day war between Israel and neighbouring Arab countries, Israel captured the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, as well as other areas.

In 1993, after decades of violent conflict between Palestinians and Israelis, leaders from each side agreed to the signing of a historic peace accord. Then Palestinian Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat and then Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin met in the White House Gardens to sign the historic agreement on September 13, 1993, to witness the signing of the agreement. The plan called for Palestinian self-rule in Israeli-occupied territories, beginning with the Gaza Strip and Jericho. Palestinian administration of these areas began in May 1994.

In 1993, Israel and PLO conclude a peace-agreement, known as the Oslo Accords.

In 1994, The Palestinian National Authority is established. Israel and Jordan sign a peace agreement. The U.S made important contributions for the peace treaty to go ahead. $700 million of debt to the U.S by the Jordan was wiped off and modern military hardware, like F-16, was supplied.

In 1995, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin is assassinated by an Israeli right-wing religious fanatic.

In 1996, Palestinians elect Yassir Arafat as president. Israelis elect the Likud party, which stalls the Oslo process.

In 1998, The Wye River Memorandum is issued focusing on redeployment of land, security and economic issues. An airport is opened in Gaza, with flights to the Arab nations.

In 2000, Israeli forces are withdrawn from Lebanon except from Sheba farms. Peace negotiations at Camp David break down. Ariel Sharon visits Temple mount and a second intifada begins which is more violent than the first one.

In 2001, Ariel Sharon is elected Prime Minister of Israel – he rejected the Oslo Agreement preferring to focus on national security. The Gaza airport runaway is bulldozed.

In 2002, Beirut Summit also known as the Arab Peace Summit meeting is endorsed based on U.N resolutions 242 and 338. Suicide bombings provoke Israeli response. Sharon blames Arafat for the violence and confines him in his Ramallah office. Israel begins building the wall (known for Israel as the security fence) within the West Bank.

In 2003, The Quartet Group (UN, U.S, EU, Russia) agree on a road map for peace- which is welcomed by the Palestinians but most key points rejected by the Israelis. An unofficial peace agreement negotiated by Israelis and Palestinians is released with extensive international support as the Geneva Initiative.

In 2004,Yasir Arafat dies.

In 2005, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) is elected president of the Palestinian National Authority. Israel evacuates settlements from the Gaza Strip and four from the West Bank.

In 2006, Ariel Sharon suffers a massive stroke leaving him in a vegetative state. Palestinians elect a new government, with Hamas winning a plurality of votes but a majority of parliamentary seats. Israel and U.S cut off funds to Palestine. Hamas and Hezbollah capture Israeli soldiers and Israel attacks Gaza and Lebanon.

In 2007, Import-export ban imposed on Gaza resulting in the suspension of 95% of Gaza’s industrial operations.

Israeli aggression continues...
Palestinian determination grows...