Palestine (region): Difference between revisions
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Meir Abelson writes: "In 1898, German [[Kaiser Wilhelm II]] also visited Palestine. He was appalled at the condition of the country. The Ottomans had stripped the forests for lumber and firewood. The Palestinian Arabs had let an old Roman aqueduct fall into ruin. The ultimate ecological curse was the ubiquitous herds of black goats. For nearly 2,000 years after the dispersion of the Jews, Arabs had allowed their goats to graze unfenced across Palestine. They had eaten the grass down to its roots, and the topsoil had eroded and blown away. The biblical land of milk and honey had become a dust bowl.<ref>[http://www.acpr.org.il/ENGLISH-NATIV/issue1/Abelson-1.htm Palestine: The Original Sin] by Meir Abelson.</ref> |
Meir Abelson writes: "In 1898, German [[Kaiser Wilhelm II]] also visited Palestine. He was appalled at the condition of the country. The Ottomans had stripped the forests for lumber and firewood. The Palestinian Arabs had let an old Roman aqueduct fall into ruin. The ultimate ecological curse was the ubiquitous herds of black goats. For nearly 2,000 years after the dispersion of the Jews, Arabs had allowed their goats to graze unfenced across Palestine. They had eaten the grass down to its roots, and the topsoil had eroded and blown away. The biblical land of milk and honey had become a dust bowl.<ref>[http://www.acpr.org.il/ENGLISH-NATIV/issue1/Abelson-1.htm Palestine: The Original Sin] by Meir Abelson.</ref> |
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However, there are other travellers of that period who wrote about a fertile and green Palestine. Lawrence Oliphant, who visited Palestine in 1887, wrote that Palestine's Valley of Esdraelon was "a huge green lake of waving wheat, with its village-crowned mounds rising from it like islands; and it presents one of the most striking pictures of luxuriant fertility which it is possible to conceive..<ref>Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, ed., The Transformation of Palestine (Illinois: Northwestern Press, 197 l ), p. 126 |
However, there are other travellers of that period who wrote about a fertile and green Palestine. Lawrence Oliphant, who visited Palestine in 1887, wrote that Palestine's Valley of Esdraelon was "a huge green lake of waving wheat, with its village-crowned mounds rising from it like islands; and it presents one of the most striking pictures of luxuriant fertility which it is possible to conceive..<ref>Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, ed., The Transformation of Palestine (Illinois: Northwestern Press, 197 l ), p. 126.</ref> |
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According to Paul Masson, a French economic historian, "wheat shipments from the Palestinian port of Acre had helped to save southern France from famine on numerous occasions in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.".<ref>Marwan R. Beheiry, "The Agricultural Exports of Southern Palestine, 1885-1 9 14," Journal of Palestine Studies, volume 10, No. 4, 198 1, p. 67.</ref> |
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Also the evaluation of Walter C. Lowdermilk, who was Assistant Chief of the United States Soil Conservation Service . In a study of the natural agricultural potential of Palestine, "Palestine: A Promise for the Middle East," Lowdermilk favorably compares Palestine to California: |
Also the evaluation of Walter C. Lowdermilk, who was Assistant Chief of the United States Soil Conservation Service . In a study of the natural agricultural potential of Palestine, "Palestine: A Promise for the Middle East," Lowdermilk favorably compares Palestine to California: |
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Revision as of 08:23, 4 June 2007
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Palestine (from Latin: Palaestina; Hebrew: פלשתינה Palestina; Arabic: فلسطين Filasṭīn, Falasṭīn) is one of several names for the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River and various adjoining lands. Different definitions for the region have been used over the past three millennia.
Other English names for this region include: Canaan, Land of Israel, Holy Land and Cisjordan (not to be confused with the French term for the modern-day West Bank, Cisjordanie).
Boundaries and name
Ancient Egyptian texts called the entire Levantine coastal area along the Mediterranean Sea between modern Egypt and Turkey R-t-n-u (conventionally Retenu). Retenu was subdivided into three regions and the southern region, Djahy, shared approximately the same boundaries as Canaan, or modern-day Israel and the Palestinian territories.
During the Iron Age, the Kingdom of Israel of the United Monarchy may have reigned from Jerusalem over an area approximating modern-day Israel and the Palestinian territories, extending farther westward and northward to cover much (but not all) of the greater Land of Israel, although archaeological evidence for this period is very rare and disputed.[1][2]
The term "Palestine" derives from the word Philistine,[3] the name of a non-Semitic ethnic group, originating from Southern Greece, closely related to early Mycenaean civilization.[4] Inhabiting a smaller area on the southern coast called Philistia, whose borders approximate the modern Gaza Strip, Philistia encompassed the five cities of Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron, and Gath.
Egyptian texts of the temple at Medinet Habu, record a people called the P-r-s-t (conventionally Peleset), one of the Sea Peoples who invaded Egypt in Ramesses III's reign. This is considered very likely to be a reference to the Philistines. The Hebrew name Peleshet (Hebrew: פלשת Pəléshseth), usually translated as Philistia in English, is used in the Bible to denote their southern coastal region.
The Assyrian emperor Sargon II called the region the Palashtu in his Annals. By the time of Assyrian rule in 722 BCE, the Philistines had become "part and parcel of the local population."[5] In 586 BCE, when Chaldean troops commanded by the Babylonian empire carried off significant numbers of the population into slavery, the distinctly Philistine character of the coastal cities ceased to exist.[5]
In the 5th century BCE, Herodotus wrote in Greek of a "district of Syria, called Palaistinêi" (whence Latin: Palaestina, whence English: Palestine). The boundaries of the area he referred to were not explicitly stated, but Josephus used the name only for the smaller coastal area, Philistia. Ptolemy also used the term. In Latin, Pliny mentions a region of Syria that was "formerly called Palaestina" among the areas of the Eastern Mediterranean.
During the Roman period, the Iudaea Province (including Samaria) covered most of Israel and the Palestinian territories. But following the Bar Kokhba rebellion in the 2nd century, as part of a dual program of cooptation and forced migration, the Romans tried to erase the Jewish connection to the land of Judea, renaming it Syria Palaestina (Latin: Syria Palaestina) (including Judea) and Samaria.[6]
During the Byzantine Period, this entire region (including Syria Palestine, Samaria, and Galilee) was renamed Palaestina and then subdivided into Diocese I and II. The Byzantines also renamed an area of land including the Negev, Sinai, and the west coast of the Arabian Peninsula as Palaestina Salutoris, sometimes called Palaestina III. Since the Byzantine Period, the Byzantine borders of Palaestina (I and II) have served as a name for the geographic area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea.
19th Century sources define Palestine as lying between the sea and the caravan route, presumably the Hejaz-Damascus route east of the Jordan River valley. Others describe it as being between the sea and the desert.
Holy texts
The Hebrew Bible calls the region Canaan (Hebrew: כּנען) when referring to the pre-Israelite period and thereafter Israel (Yisrael). The name "Land of the Hebrews" (Hebrew: ארץ העברים, Eretz Ha-Ivrim) is also found, as well as several poetical names: "land flowing with milk and honey", "land that [God] swore to your fathers to assign to you", "Holy Land", "Land of the Lord", and the "Promised Land".
The Land of Canaan is given a precise description in (34:1 Numbers 34:1–12) as including all of Lebanon, as well (13:5 Joshua 13:5). The wide area appears to have been the home of several small nations such as the Canaanites, Hebrews, Hethites, Amorrhites, Pherezites, Hevites and Jebusites.
According to Old Testament tradition, the land of Canaan is part of the land given to the descendants of Abraham, which extends from the Nile to the Euphrates River (15:18 Genesis 15:18). This land is said to include an area called Aram Naharaim, which includes Haran in modern Turkey, from where Abraham the ancestor of the Israelites departed.
The events of the Four Gospels of the Christian Bible take place entirely in the Holy Land.
In the Qur'an, the term الأرض المقدسة ("Holy Land", Al-Ard Al-Muqaddasah) [7] is mentioned at least seven times, once when Moses proclaims to the Children of Israel: "O my people! Enter the holy land which Allah hath assigned unto you, and turn not back ignominiously, for then will ye be overthrown, to your own ruin." (Surah 5:21)
History
- Main articles: History of Israel, History of Palestine
Paleolithic and Neolithic periods (1000000 - 5000 BCE)
Human remains found south of Lake Tiberias date back as early as 600,000 BCE.[8] The discovery of the "Palestine Man" in the Zuttiyeh Cave in Wadi Al-Amud near Safad in 1925 provided some clues to human development in the area.[8][9]
In the caves of Shuqba in Ramallah and Wadi Khareitun in Bethlehem, stone, wood and animal bone tools were found and attributed to the Natufian culture (12500 - 10200 BCE).[8] Other remains from this era have been found at Tel Abu Hureura, Ein Mallaha, Beidha and Jericho.[8]
Between 10000 and 5000 BCE, agricultural communities were established. Evidence of these such settlements were found at Tel el-Sultan, Jericho and include mud-brick rounded and square dwellings, pottery shards, and fragments of woven fabrics.[10]
Chalcolithic period (4500 - 3000 BCE) and Bronze Age (3000 - 1200 BCE)
Along the Jericho-Dead Sea-Bir es-Saba-Gaza-Sinai route, a culture originating in Syria, marked by the use of copper and stone tools, brought new migrant groups to the region contributing to an increasingly urban fabric.[10]
By the early Bronze Age (3000 - 2200 BCE) independent Canaanite city-states situated in plains and coastal regions and surrounded by mud-brick defensive walls were established and most of these cities relied on nearby agricultural hamlets for their food needs.[10]
Archaeological finds from the early Canaanite era have been found at Tel Megiddo, Jericho, Tel al-Far'a (Gaza), Bisan, and Ai (Deir Dibwan/Ramallah District, Tel an Nasbe (al-Bireh) and Jib (Jerusalem).[10]
The Canaanite city-states held trade and diplomatic relations with Egypt and Syria. Parts of the Canaanite urban civilization were destroyed around 2300 BCE, though there is no consensus as to why. Incursions by nomads from the east of the Jordan River who settled in the hills followed soon thereafter.[10]
In the Middle Bronze Age (2200 - 1500 BCE), Canaan was influenced by the surrounding civilizations of Egpyt, Mesopotamia, Phoenicia, and Syria. Diverse commercial ties and an agriculturally based economy led to the development of new pottery forms, the cultivation of grapes, and the extensive use of bronze.[10] Burial customs from this time seemed to be influenced by a belief in the afterlife.[10]
Political, commercial and military events during the Late Bronze Age period (1450 - 1350 BCE) were recorded by ambassadors and Canaanite proxy rulers for Egypt in several hundred cuneiform documents known as the Amarna Letters.[10]
By 1250 BCE, the Philistines arrived and mingled with the local population, losing their separate identity over several generations. [5]
Iron Age (1200 - 330 BCE)
Pottery remains found in Askalan, Isdud, Gath, Ekron and Gaza decorated with stylized birds provided the first archaeological evidence for Philistine settlement in the region.[5] The Philistines are credited with introducing iron weapons and chariots, as well as new ways to ferment wine, to the local population.[5]
Developments in Palestine between 1250 and 900 BCE have been the focus of debate between those who accept the Old Testament version on the conquest of Canaan by the Israelite tribes, and those who reject the theory.[11] Niels Peter Lemche, of the Copenhagen School of Biblical Studies, submits that the picture of ancient Israel "is contrary to any image of ancient Palestinian society that can be established on the basis of ancient sources from Palestine or referring to Palestine and that there is no way this image in the Bible can be reconciled with the historical past of the region."[12]
Hebrew Bible period
Though there is a debate over whether the Hebrews arrived to Canaan from Egypt, or emerged from among the local population existent there at the time, these events are generally dated to between the 13th and 12th centuries BCE.[11]
According to Biblical tradition, the united Kingdom of Israel was established by the Hebrew tribes with Saul serving as its first king in 1020 BCE. [13] In 1000 BCE, Jerusalem made the capital of King David's kingdom and it is believed that the First Temple was constructed in this period by King Solomon.[13] By 930 BCE, the kingdom was split into two kingdoms: the northern Kingdom of Israel, and the southern Kingdom of Judah.[13]
Archaeological evidence indicates that the late 13th, the 12th and the early 11th centuries BCE witnessed the foundation of perhaps hundreds of insignificant, unprotected village settlements, many in the mountains of Palestine. [12] From around the 11th century BCE, there was a reduction in the number of villages, though this was counterbalanced by the rise of certain settlements to the status of fortified townships.[12]
There was an at least partial Egyptian withdrawal from Palestine in this period, though it is likely that Bet Shean was an Egyptian garrison as late as the beginning of the 10th century BCE.[12] The socio-political system was characterized by local patrons fighting other local patrons, lasting until around the mid-9th century BCE when some local chieftains were able to create large political structures that exceeded the boundaries of those present in the Late Bronze Age.[12]
Between 722 and 720 BCE, the northern kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrian Empire and the Hebrew tribes - thereafter known as the (Lost Tribes) - were exiled. [13] In 586 BCE, Judah was conquered by the Babylonian Empire and Jerusalem and the First Temple were destroyed. [13] Most of the remaining Hebrews, and much of the other local population, were sent into slavery in Babylonia. [5]
Persian rule (538 BCE)
After the Persian Empire was established, Jews were allowed to return to what their holy books had termed the Land of Israel, and having been granted some autonomy by the Persian administration, it was during this period that the Second Temple in Jerusalem was built.[5]
Sabastiye, near Nablus, was the northernmost province of the Persian administration in Palestine, and its southern borders were drawn at Hebron.[5] Some of the local population served as soldiers and lay people in the Persian administration, while others continued to agriculture. In 400 BCE, the Nabataeans made inroads into southern Palestine and built a separate civilization in the Negev that lasted until 160 BCE.[5]
Classical antiquity
Hellenistic rule (333 BCE)
The Persian Empire soon fell under the Greek forces of the Macedonian general Alexander the Great. .[14] After his death, with the absence of heirs, his conquests were divided amongst his generals, while the region of the Jews ("Judah" or Judea as it became known) was first part of the Ptolemaic dynasty and then part of the Seleucid Empire.[15]
The landscape during this period was markedly changed by extensive growth and development that included urban planning and the establishment of well-built fortified cities.[14] Hellenistic pottery was produced that absorbed Philistine traditions. Trade and commerce flourished, particularly in the most Hellenized areas, such as Askalan, Gaza, Jerusalem, Jaffa, and Nablus (Sabastiya, Tel Balata and Jabal Jizrim).[14]
The Jewish population in Judea was allowed limited autonomy in religion and administration.[16] In the second century BCE fascination in Jerusalem for Greek culture resulted in a movement to break down the separation of Jew and Gentile and some people even tried to disguise the marks of their circumcision.[17] Disputes between the leaders of the reform movement, Jason and Menelaus, eventually led to civil war and the intervention of Antiochus IV Epiphanes.[17] Subsequent persecution of the Jews led to the Maccabean Revolt under the leadership of the Hasmoneans, and the construction of a native Jewish kingship under the Hasmonean Dynasty .[17] After approximately a century of independence disputes between the Hasmonean rivals Aristobulus and Hyrcanus led to control of the kingdom by the Roman army of Pompey. The territory then became first a Roman client kingdom under Hyrcanus and then a Roman Province administered by the governor of Syria.[18]
Roman rule (63 BCE)
Though General Pompeii arrived in 63 BCE, Roman rule was solidified with the appointment of Herod the Edumite as king.[14] Urban planning under the Romans was characterized by cities designed around the Forum - the central intersection of two main streets - the Cardo, running north-south and the Peladious running east-west. [14] Cities were connected by an extensive road network developed for economic a military purposes. Among the most notable archaeological remnants from this era are Herodion (Tel al-Fureidis) to the south of Bethlehem and Caesarea.[14]
Around the time that Jesus is believed to have been born, Roman Palestine was in a state of disarray and direct Roman rule was re-established.[14] The early Christians were oppressed and while most inhabitants became Romanized, others, particularly Jews, found Roman rule to be unbearable.[14]
As a result of the First Jewish-Roman War (66-73), Titus sacked Jerusalem destroying the Second Temple, leaving only supporting walls, including the Western Wall. In 135, following the fall of a Jewish revolt led by Bar Kokhba in 132–135, the Roman emperor Hadrian expelled most Jews from Judea on the pain of death, leaving large Jewish populations in Samaria and the Galilee.[6] Tiberias became the headquarters of exiled Jewish patriarchs.[14] The Romans changed the name of Judea to Syria Palaestina;[6]
The Emperor Hadrian (132 CE) renamed Jerusalem "Aelia Capitolina" and built temples there to honor Jupiter.[14] Christianity was practiced in secret and the Hellenization of Palestine continued under Septimius Severus (193 - 211 CE).[14] New cities were founded at Eleutheropolis (Beit Jibrin), Diopolis (Lydd), and Nicopolis (Emmaus).[14]
Byzantine (Eastern Roman Empire) rule (330-640 CE)
Emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity around 330 CE made Christianity the official religion of Palaestina. [19] After his mother Empress Helena identified the spot she believed to be where Christ was crucified, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher was built in Jerusalem.[19] The Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and the Church of the Ascension in Jerusalem were also built during Constantine's reign.[19]
Palestine thus became a center for pilgrims and ascetic life for men and women from all over the world.[19] Many monasteries were built including the Saint George Monastery in Wadi al-Qilt, Deir Quruntul and Deir Hijle near Jericho, and Deir Mar Saba and Deir Theodosius east of Bethlehem.[19]
In 352 CE, a Jewish revolt against Byzantine/Roman rule in Tiberias and other parts of the Galilee was brutally suppressed.[19]
In approximately 390 CE, Palaestina was further organised into three units: Palaestina Prima, Secunda, and Tertia (First, Second, and Third Palestine).[19] Palaestina Prima consisted of Judea, Samaria, the coast, and Peraea with the governor residing in Caesarea. Palaestina Secunda consisted of the Galilee, the lower Jezreel Valley, the regions east of Galilee, and the western part of the former Decapolis with the seat of government at Scythopolis. Palaestina Tertia included the Negev, southern Jordan — once part of Arabia — and most of Sinai with Petra as the usual residence of the governor. Palestina Tertia was also known as Palaestina Salutaris. [19]
In 536 CE, Justinian I promoted the governor at Caesarea to proconsul (anthypatos), giving him authority over the two remaining consulars. Justinian believed that the elevation of the governor was appropriate because he was responsible for "the province in which our Lord Jesus Christ... appeared on earth".[20] This was also the principal factor explaining why Palestine prospered under the Christian Empire. The cities of Palestine, such as Caesarea Maritima, Jerusalem, Scythopolis, Neapolis, and Gaza reached their peak population in the late Roman period and produced notable Christian scholars in the disciplines of rhetoric, historiography, Eusebian ecclesiastical history, classicizing history and hagiography.[20]
Byzantine administration of Palestine was temporarily suspended during the Persian occupation of 614–28, and then permanently after the Muslims arrived in 634 CE, defeating the empire's forces decisively at the Battle of Yarmouk in 636 CE. Jerusalem capitulated in 638 CE and Caesarea between 640 CE and 642 CE.
Arab Caliphate rule (638 - 1099 CE)
In 638 CE, Caliph Omar Ibn al-Khattab and Safforonius, the Byzantine governor of Jerusalem, signed Al-Uhda al-'Omariyya (The Umariyya Covenant), an agreement that stipulated the rights and obligations of all non-Muslims in Palestine.[19] Jews were permitted to return to Palestine for the first time since the 500-year ban enacted by the Romans and maintained by Byzantine rulers.[21]
Omar Ibn al-Khattab was the first conqueror of Jerusalem to enter the city on foot, and when visiting the site that now houses the Haram al-Sharif, he declared it a sacred place of prayer.[21] Cities that accepted the new rulers, as recorded in registrars from the time, were: Jerusalem, Nablus, Jenin, Acre, Tiberias, Bisan, Caesarea, Lajjun, Lydd, Jaffa, Imwas, Beit Jibrin, Gaza, Rafah, Hebron, Yubna, Haifa, Safad and Askalan.[21]
Umayyad rule (661 - 750 CE)
Under Umayyad rule, the province of ash-Sham (Arabic for Greater Syria), of which Palestine was a part, was divided into five districts. Jund Filastin (Arabic جند فلسطين, literally "the army of Palestine") was a region extending from the Sinai to the plain of Acre. Major towns included Rafah, Caesarea, Gaza, Jaffa, Nablus and Jericho. Initially Lydd was the capital, but in 717 the newly established city of Ramleh became the capital. Jund al-Urdunn (literally "the army of Jordan") was a region to the north and east of Filastin. Major towns included Legio, Acre, Bisan and Tyre and the capital was at Tiberias.
In 691, Caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan ordered that the Dome of the Rock be built on the site where the Prophet Muhammed is believed by Muslims to have begun his nocturnal journey to heaven, on the Temple Mount. About a decade afterward, Caliph Al-Walid I had the Al-Aqsa Mosque built.[21]
It was under Umayyad rule that Christians and Jews were granted the official title of "Peoples of the Book" to underline the common monotheistic roots they shared with Islam.[21]
Abbasid rule (750 - 969 CE)
Palestine was not as central to the Abbasid rulers, though the Baghdad-based Abbasid Caliphs did visit the holy shrines and sanctuaries in Jerusalem and continued to build up Ramleh.[21] Coastal areas were fortified and developed and port cities like Acre, Haifa, Caesarea, Arsuf, Jaffa and Ashkelon received monies from the state treasury.[22]
A trade fair took place in Jerusalem every year on September 15 where merchants from Pisa, Genoa, Venice and Marseilles converged to acquire spices, soaps, silks, olive oil, sugar and glassware in exchange for European products.[22] European Christian pilgrims visited and made generous donations to Christian holy places in Jerusalem and Bethlehem.[22]
Fatimid rule (969 - 1099 CE)
From their base in Tunisia, the Fatimids, who claimed to be descendants of the Prophet Muhammed through his daughter Fatima, conquered Palestine by way of Egypt in 969 CE.[22] Jerusalem, Nablus, and Askalan were expanded and renovated under their rule.[22]
After the 10th century, the division into Junds began to break down. In 1071, the Isfahan-based Seljuk Turks captured Jerusalem only to hand it back in 1098.[22]
- See also the Mideastweb map of "Palestine Under the Caliphs", showing Jund boundaries (external link).
Crusader rule (1099 - 1187 CE)
Also known as the "Latin Kingdom" of Jerusalem, European rule over Palestine was "as repressive as it was foreign".[22] Over the course of many wars and battles interrupted by truces, Jews, Muslims and Orthodox Christians were killed, expelled or set to work doing menial labor. Intermarriage with local women and conversions of smaller communities to Islam were not uncommon.[22]
Fortifications, castles, towers and fortified villages were built, rebuilt and renovated across Palestine largely in rural areas.[22] A notable urban remnant of the Crusader architecture of this era is found in Acre's old city.[22]
In July 1187, the Cairo-based Kurdish General Saladin commanded his troops to victory in the decisive Battle of Hittin.[23] Saladin went on to take Jerusalem. An agreement granting special status to the Crusaders allowed them to continue to stay in Palestine and In 1229, Frederick II negotiated a 10-year treaty that placed Jerusalem, Nazareth and Bethlehem once again under Crusader rule.[23]
In 1270, Sultan Baibars expelled the Crusaders from most of the country, though they maintained a base at Acre until 1291.[23] Thereafter, any remaining Europeans either went home or merged with the local population.[23]
Mamluk rule (1270 - 1516 CE)
Palestine formed a part of the district of Damascus under the rule of the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt and was divided into three smaller districts with capitals in Jerusalem, Gaza, and Safad.[23] Celebrated by Arab and Muslim writers of the time as the "blessed land of the Prophets and Islam's revered leaders," Muslim sanctuaries were "rediscovered" and received many pilgrims.[23]
While the first half of the Mamluk era (1270 - 1382) saw the construction of many schools, lodgings for travellers (khans) and the renovation of mosques neglected or destroyed during the Crusader period, the second half (1382 - 1517) was a period of decline as the Mamluks were engaged in battles with the Mongols in areas outside Palestine.[23]
In 1486, hostilities broke out between the Mamluks and the Ottoman Turks in a battle for control over western Asia. The Mamluk armies were eventually defeated by the forces of the Ottoman Sultan, Selim I, and lost control of Palestine after the 1516 battle of Marj Dapiq .[23]
Ottoman rule (1516 - 1917 CE)
After the Ottoman conquest, the name "Palestine" disappeared as the official name of an administrative unit, as the Turks often called their (sub)provinces after the capital. Since its 1516 incorporation in the Ottoman Empire, it was part of the vilayet (province) of Damascus-Syria until 1660, next of the vilayet of Saida (Sidon), briefly interrupted by the 7 March 1799 - July 1799 French occupation of Jaffa, Haifa, and Caesarea. On 10 May 1832 it was one of the Turkish provinces annexed by Muhammad Ali's shortly imperialistic Egypt (nominally still Ottoman), but in November 1840 direct Ottoman rule was restored.
Still the old name remained in popular and semi-official use. Many examples of its usage in the 16th and 17th centuries have survived.[24] During the 19th century, the "Ottoman Government employed the term Arz-i Filistin (the 'Land of Palestine') in official correspondence, meaning for all intents and purposes the area to the west of the River Jordan which became 'Palestine' under the British in 1922".[25] Amongst the educated Arab public, Filastin was a common concept, referring either to the whole of Palestine or to the Jerusalem sanjaq alone[26] or just to the area around Ramle.[27]
Ottoman rule over the region lasted until the Great War (World War I) when the Ottomans sided with Germany and the Central Powers. During World War I, the Ottomans were driven from much of the area by the United Kingdom during the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.
The 20th century
In European usage up to World War I, "Palestine" was used informally for a region that extended in the north-south direction typically from Raphia (south-east of Gaza) to the Litani River (now in Lebanon). The western boundary was the sea, and the eastern boundary was the poorly-defined place where the Syrian desert began. In various European sources, the eastern boundary was placed anywhere from the Jordan River to slightly east of Amman. The Negev Desert was not included.[28]
Under the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916, it was envisioned that most of Palestine, when freed from Ottoman control, would become an international zone not under direct French or British colonial control. Shortly thereafter, British foreign minister Arthur Balfour issued the Balfour Declaration of 1917, which laid plans for a Jewish homeland to be established in Palestine eventually.
The British-led Egyptian Expeditionary Force, commanded by Edmund Allenby, captured Jerusalem on 9 December, 1917 and occupied the whole of the Levant following the defeat of Turkish forces in Palestine at the Battle of Megiddo in September 1918 and the capitulation of Turkey on 31 October.[29]
British Mandate (1920–1948)
Formal use of the English word "Palestine" returned with the British Mandate, which enacted English, Hebrew and Arabic as its three official languages. Palestine was now the formal name of the entity in English and Arabic whilst Palestina (Eretz Yisrael) ((פלשתינה (א"י) was the formal name in Hebrew.
In April 1920 the Allied Supreme Council (the USA, Great Britain, France, Italy and Japan) met at Sanremo and formal decisions were taken on the allocation of mandate territories. The United Kingdom accepted a mandate for Palestine, but the boundaries of the mandate and the conditions under which it was to be held were not decided. The Zionist Organization's representative at Sanremo, Chaim Weizmann, subsequently reported to his colleagues in London:
- "There are still important details outstanding, such as the actual terms of the mandate and the question of the boundaries in Palestine. There is the delimitation of the boundary between French Syria and Palestine, which will constitute the northern frontier and the eastern line of demarcation, adjoining Arab Syria. The latter is not likely to be fixed until the Emir Feisal attends the Peace Conference, probably in Paris."[30]
In July 1920, the French drove Faisal bin Husayn from Damascus ending his already negligible control over the region of Transjordan, where local chiefs traditionally resisted any central authority. The sheikhs, who had earlier pledged their loyalty to the Sharif of Mecca, asked the British to undertake the region's administration. Herbert Samuel asked for the extension of the Palestine government's authority to Transjordan, but at meetings in Cairo and Jerusalem between Winston Churchill and Emir Abdullah in March 1921 it was agreed that Abdullah would administer the territory (initially for six months only) on behalf of the Palestine administration. In the summer of 1921 Transjordan was included within the Mandate, but excluded from the provisions for a Jewish National Home.[31] On 24 July, 1922 the League of Nations approved the terms of the British Mandate over Palestine and Transjordan. On 16 September the League formally approved a memorandum from Lord Balfour confirming the exemption of Transjordan from the clauses of the mandate concerning the creation of a Jewish national home and from the mandate's responsibility to facilitate Jewish immigration and land settlement.[32] With Transjordan coming under the administration of the British Mandate, the mandate's collective territory became constituted of 23% Palestine and 77% Transjordan. Transjordan was a very sparsely populated region (specially in comparison with Palestine proper) due to its relatively limited resources and largely desert environment.
The award of the mandates was delayed as a result of the United States' suspicions regarding Britain's colonial ambitions and similar reservations held by Italy about France's intentions. France in turn refused to reach a settlement over Palestine until its own mandate in Syria became final. According to Louis,
- Together with the American protests against the issuance of mandates these triangular quarrels between the Italians, French, and British explain why the A mandates did not come into force until nearly four years after the signing of the Peace Treaty.... The British documents clearly reveal that Balfour's patient and skillful diplomacy contributed greatly to the final issuance of the A mandates for Syria and Palestine on September 29, 1923.[33]
Even before the Mandate came into legal effect in 1923 (text), British terminology sometimes used '"Palestine" for the part west of the Jordan River and "Trans-Jordan" (or Transjordania) for the part east of the Jordan River.[34][35]
Jewish immigration into the region also increased during this time.
In the years following World War II, Britain's position in Palestine gradually worsened. This was caused by a combination of factors, including:
- Rapid deterioration due to the incessant attacks by Irgun and Lehi on British officials, armed forces, and strategic installations. This caused severe damage to British morale and prestige, as well as increasing opposition to the mandate in Britain itself, public opinion demanding to "bring the boys home".[36]
- World public opinion turned against Britain as a result of the British policy of preventing the Jewish Zionist Holocaust survivors from reaching Palestine, sending them instead to refugee camps in Cyprus, or even back to Germany, as in the case of Exodus 1947.
- The costs of maintaining an army of over 100,000 men in Palestine weighed heavily on a British economy suffering from post-war depression, and was another cause for British public opinion to demand an end to the Mandate.
Finally in early 1947 the British Government announced their desire to terminate the Mandate, and passed the responsibility over Palestine to the United Nations.
UN partition
On 29 November 1947, the United Nations General Assembly, with a two-thirds majority international vote, passed the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine (United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181), a plan to resolve the Arab-Jewish conflict by partitioning the territory into separate Jewish and Arab states, with the Greater Jerusalem area (encompassing Bethlehem) coming under international control. Jewish leaders (including the Jewish Agency), accepted the plan, while Palestinian Arab leaders rejected it and refused to negotiate. Neighboring Arab and Muslim states also rejected the partition plan. The Arab community reacted violently after the Arab Higher Committee declared a strike and burned many buildings and shops. As armed skirmishes between Arab and Jewish paramilitary forces in Palestine continued, the British mandate ended on May 15, 1948, the establishment of the State of Israel having been proclaimed the day before (see Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel). The neighboring Arab states and armies (Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Transjordan, Holy War Army, Arab Liberation Army, and local Arabs) immediately attacked Israel following its declaration of independence, and the 1948 Arab-Israeli War ensued. Consequently, the partition plan was never implemented.
Current status
Following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the 1949 Armistice Agreements between Israel and neighboring Arab states eliminated Palestine as a distinct territory. With the establishment of Israel, the remaining lands were divided amongst Egypt, Syria and Jordan.
In addition to the UN-partitioned area it was allotted, Israel captured 26% of the Mandate territory west of the Jordan river. Jordan captured and annexed about 21% of the Mandate territory, known today as the West Bank. Jerusalem was divided, with Jordan taking the eastern parts, including the Old City, and Israel taking the western parts. The Gaza Strip was captured by Egypt.
For a description of the massive population movements, Arab and Jewish, at the time of the 1948 war and over the following decades, see Palestinian exodus and Jewish exodus from Arab lands.
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From the 1960s onward, the term "Palestine" was regularly used in political contexts. Various declarations, such as the 15 November 1988 proclamation of a State of Palestine by the PLO referred to a country called Palestine, defining its borders based on the U.N. Resolution 242 and 383 and the principle of Land for Peace. The Green Line was the 1967 border established by many UN resolutions including those mentioned above.
In the course of the Six Day War of June 1967, Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan and Gaza from Egypt.
According to the CIA World Factbook,[37] of the ten million people living between Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea, 49% identify as Palestinian, Arab, Bedouin and/or Druze. One million of those are citizens of Israel. The other four million are stateless residents of the West Bank and Gaza. In the meantime, they live under Palestinian National Authority jurisdiction, subject to conditions imposed by Israel.
In the West Bank, 360,000 Israeli settlers live in a hundred scattered settlements with connecting corridors. The 2.5 million West Bank Palestinians live in four blocks centered in Hebron, Ramallah, Nablus, and Jericho, while Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005.
Demographics
Early demographics
Estimating the population of Palestine in antiquity relies on 2 methods - censuses and writings made at the times, and the scientific method based on excavations and statistical methods that consider the number of settlements at the particular age, area of each settlement, density factor for each settelment.
According to Joseph Jacobs, writing in the Jewish Encyclopedia[38] (1901-1906), the Pentateuch contains a number of statements as to the number of Jews that left Egypt, the descendants of the seventy sons and grandsons of Jacob who took up their residence in that country. Altogether, including Levites, there were 611,730 males over twenty years of age, and therefore capable of bearing arms; this would imply a population of about 3,154,000. The Census of David is said to have recorded 1,300,000 males over twenty years of age, which would imply a population of over 5,000,000. The number of exiles who returned from Babylon is given at 42,360. Tacitus declares that Jerusalem at its fall contained 600,000 persons; Josephus, that there were as many as 1,100,000. According to excavational studies by Magen Broshi of The Israel Museum in Jerusalem, "... the population of Palestine in antiquity did not exceed a million persons. It can also be shown, moreover, that this was more or less the size of the population in the peak period--the late Byzantine period, around A.D. 600"[39] Similarly, a study by Yigal Shiloh of The Hebrew University suggests that the population of Palestine in the Iron Age could have never exceeded a million. He writes: "... the population of the country in the Roman-Byzantine period greatly exceeded that in the Iron Age...If we accept Broshi's population estimates, which appear to be confirmed by the results of recent research, it follows that the estimates for the population during the Iron Age must be set at a lower figure."[40]
Shmuel Katz writes: [41]
"When Jewish independence came to an end in the year 70, the population numbered, at a conservative estimate, some 5 million people. (By Josephus' figures, there were nearer 7 million.) Even sixty years after the destruction of the Temple, at the outbreak of the revolt led by Bar Kochba in 132, when large numbers had fled or been deported, the Jewish population of the country must have numbered at least 3 million, according to Dio Cassius' figures. Sixteen centuries later, when the practical possibility of the return to Zion appeared on the horizon, Palestine was a denuded, derelict, and depopulated country. The writings of travellers who visited Palestine in the late eighteenth and throughout the nineteenth century are filled with descriptions of its emptiness, its desolation. In 1738, Thomas Shaw wrote of the absence of people to fill - Palestine's fertile soil. In 1785, Constantine Francois Volney described the "rained" and "desolate" country. He had not seen the worst. Pilgrims and travellers continued to report in heartrending terms on its condition. Almost sixty years later, Alexander Keith, recalling Volney's description, wrote: "In his day the land had not fully reached its last degree of desolation and depopulation."[42]
The table below represents estimates of the first century population of Palestine (as adapted from Byatt, 1973).
| Authority | Jews | Total population1 |
|---|---|---|
| Condor , C R[43] | - | 6 million |
| Juster, J[44] | 5 million | >5 million |
| Mazar, Benjamin[45] | - | >4 million |
| Klausner, Joseph[46] | 3 million | 3.5 million |
| Grant, Michael[47] | 3 million | not given |
| Baron, Salo W[48] | 2-2.5 million | 2.5-3 million |
| Socin, A[49] | - | 2.5-3 million |
| Lowdermilk, W C[50] | - | 3 million |
| Avi-Yonah, M[51] | - | 2.8 million |
| Glueck, N[52] | - | 2.5 million |
| Beloch, K J[53] | 2 million | not given |
| Grant, F C[54] | - | 1.5-2.5 million |
| Byatt, A[55] | - | 2.265 million |
| Daniel-Rops, H[56] | 1.5 million | 2 million |
| Derwacter, F M[57] | 1 million | 1.5 million |
| Pfeiffer, R H[58] | 1 million | not given |
| Harnack, A[59] | 500,000 | not given |
| Jeremias, J[60] | 500,000-600,000 | not given |
| McCown, C C[61] | <500,000 | <1 million |
1. There is no consensus on the population of Palestine in the first century of the Common Era; estimates range from under 1 million to 6 million.
Demographics in the late Ottoman and British Mandate periods
In the middle of the first century of the Ottoman rule, i.e. 1550 A.D., Bernard Lewis in a study of Ottoman registers of the early Ottoman Rule of Palestine reports[62]
From the mass of detail in the registers, it is possible to extract something like a general picture of the economic life of the country in that period. Out of a total population of about 300,000 souls, between a fifth and a quarter lived in the six towns of Jerusalem, Gaza, Safed, Nabulus, Ramle, and Hebron. The remainder consisted mainly of peasants, living in villages of varying size, and engaged in agriculture. Their main food-crops were wheat and barley in that order, supplemented by leguminous pulses, olives, fruit, and vegetables. In and around most of the towns there was a considerable number of vineyards, orchards, and vegetable gardens.
By Volney's estimates in 1785, there were no more than 200,000 people in the country.[63]
In his paper 'Demography in Israel/Palestine: Trends, Prospects and Policy Implications'[64] Sergio DellaPergola, drawing on the work of Bachi (1975), provides rough estimates of the population of Palestine west of the River Jordan by religion groups from the first century onwards summarised in the table below.
| Year | Jews | Christians | Muslims | Total1 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| First half 1st century C.E. | Majority | - | - | ~2,5002 |
| 5th century | Minority | Majority | - | >1st century |
| End 12th century | Minority | Minority | Majority | >225 |
| 14th cent. before Black Death | Minority | Minority | Majority | 225 |
| 14th cent. after Black Death | Minority | Minority | Majority | 150 |
| 1533-1539 | 5 | 6 | 145 | 157 |
| 1690-1691 | 2 | 11 | 219 | 232 |
| 1800 | 7 | 22 | 246 | 275 |
| 1890 | 43 | 57 | 432 | 532 |
| 1914 | 94 | 70 | 525 | 689 |
| 1922 | 84 | 71 | 589 | 752 |
| 1931 | 175 | 89 | 760 | 1,033 |
| 1947 | 630 | 143 | 1,181 | 1,970 |
1. Figures in thousands. The total includes Druzes and other small religious minorities.
2. There is no consensus on the population of Palestine in the first century of the Christian Era; estimates range from under 1 million to 6 million.
According to Alexander Scholch, the population of Palestine in 1850 had about 350,000 inhabitants, 30% of whom lived in 13 towns; roughly 85% were Muslims, 11% were Christians and 4% Jews[65]
| Qazas | Number of Towns and Villages |
|||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Muslims | Christians | Jews | Total | |||
| 1 | Jerusalem | |||||
| Jerusalem | 1 | 1,025 | 738 | 630 | 2,393 | |
| Countryside | 116 | 6,118 | 1,202 | 7,320 | ||
| 2 | Hebron | |||||
| Hebron | 1 | 2,800 | 200 | 3,000 | ||
| Countryside | 52 | 2,820 | 2,820 | |||
| 3 | Gaza | |||||
| Gaza | 1 | 2,690 | 65 | 2,755 | ||
| Countryside | 55 | 6,417 | 6,417 | |||
| 3 | Jaffa | |||||
| Jaffa | 3 | 865 | 266 | 1,131 | ||
| Ludd | . | 700 | 207 | 907 | ||
| Ramla | . | 675 | 250 | 925 | ||
| Countryside | 61 | 3,439 | 3,439 | |||
| 4 | Nablus | |||||
| Nablus | 1 | 1,356 | 108 | 14 | 1,478 | |
| Countryside | 176 | 13,022 | 202 | 13,224 | ||
| 5 | Jinin | |||||
| Jinin | 1 | 656 | 16 | 672 | ||
| Countryside | 39 | 2,120 | 17 | 2,137 | ||
| 6 | Ajlun | |||||
| Countryside | 97 | 1,599 | 137 | 1,736 | ||
| 7 | Salt | |||||
| Salt | 1 | 500 | 250 | 750 | ||
| Countryside | 12 | 685 | 685 | |||
| 8 | Akka | |||||
| Gaza | 1 | 547 | 210 | 6 | 763 | |
| Countryside | 34 | 1,768 | 1,021 | 2,789 | ||
| 9 | Haifa | |||||
| Haifa | 1 | 224 | 228 | 8 | 460 | |
| Countryside | 41 | 2,011 | 161 | 2,171 | ||
| 10 | Nazareth | |||||
| Nazareth | 1 | 275 | 1,073 | 1,348 | ||
| Countryside | 38 | 1,606 | 544 | 2,150 | ||
| 11 | Tiberias | |||||
| Tiberias | 1 | 159 | 66 | 400 | 625 | |
| Countryside | 7 | 507 | 507 | |||
| 12 | Safad | |||||
| Safad | 1 | 1,295 | 3 | 1,197 | 2,495 | |
| Countryside | 38 | 1,117 | 616 | 1,733 | ||
Figures from Ben-Arieh, in Scholch 1985, p. 388.
According to Ottoman statistics studied by Justin McCarthy,[66] the population of Palestine in the early 19th century was 350,000, in 1860 it was 411,000 and in 1900 about 600,000 of which 94% were Arabs. In 1914 Palestine had a population of 657,000 Muslim Arabs, 81,000 Christian Arabs, and 59,000 Jews.[67]
Traveller's impressions of Nineteenth Century Palestine
Alphonse de Lamartine visited Palestine in 1835, "Outside the gates of Jerusalem we saw indeed no living object, heard no living sound, we found the same void, the same silence ... as we should have expected before the entombed gates of Pompeii or Herculaneam a complete eternal silence reigns in the town, on the highways, in the country ... the tomb of a whole people.[68]
Mark Twain visited Palestine in 1867 and wrote in chapters 46,49,52 and 56 of Innocents Abroad: "Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes. Over it broods the spell of a curse that has withered its fields and fettered its energies. Palestine is desolate and unlovely -- Palestine is no more of this workday world. It is sacred to poetry and tradition, it is dreamland."(Chapter 56)[69] "There was hardly a tree or a shrub anywhere. Even the olive and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country".(Chapter 52)[70]"A desolation is here that not even imagination can grace with the pomp of life and action. We reached Tabor safely. We never saw a human being on the whole route".(Chapter 49) [71] "There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent – not for thirty miles in either direction. ...One may ride ten miles hereabouts and not see ten human beings." ...these unpeopled deserts, these rusty mounds of barrenness..."(Chapter 46) [72]
Kathleen Christison was critical of Twain and noted that Twain described the Samaritans of Nablus at length without mentioning the large Arab population at all.[73] The Arab population at the time was about 20,000.[74]
During the nineteenth century, many residents and visitors attempted to estimate the population without recourse to official data, and came up with a large number of different values. Estimates that are reasonably reliable are only available for the final third of the century, from which period Ottoman population and taxation registers have been preserved.[75]
After a visit to Palestine in 1891, Ahad Ha'am wrote:
From abroad, we are accustomed to believe that Eretz Israel is presently almost totally desolate, an uncultivated desert, and that anyone wishing to buy land there can come and buy all he wants. But in truth it is not so. In the entire land, it is hard to find tillable land that is not already tilled; only sandy fields or stony hills, suitable at best for planting trees or vines and, even that after considerable work and expense in clearing and preparing them- only these remain unworked. ... Many of our people who came to buy land have been in Eretz Israel for months, and have toured its length and width, without finding what they seek.[76]
Meir Abelson writes: "In 1898, German Kaiser Wilhelm II also visited Palestine. He was appalled at the condition of the country. The Ottomans had stripped the forests for lumber and firewood. The Palestinian Arabs had let an old Roman aqueduct fall into ruin. The ultimate ecological curse was the ubiquitous herds of black goats. For nearly 2,000 years after the dispersion of the Jews, Arabs had allowed their goats to graze unfenced across Palestine. They had eaten the grass down to its roots, and the topsoil had eroded and blown away. The biblical land of milk and honey had become a dust bowl.[77]
However, there are other travellers of that period who wrote about a fertile and green Palestine. Lawrence Oliphant, who visited Palestine in 1887, wrote that Palestine's Valley of Esdraelon was "a huge green lake of waving wheat, with its village-crowned mounds rising from it like islands; and it presents one of the most striking pictures of luxuriant fertility which it is possible to conceive..[78]
According to Paul Masson, a French economic historian, "wheat shipments from the Palestinian port of Acre had helped to save southern France from famine on numerous occasions in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.".[79]
Also the evaluation of Walter C. Lowdermilk, who was Assistant Chief of the United States Soil Conservation Service . In a study of the natural agricultural potential of Palestine, "Palestine: A Promise for the Middle East," Lowdermilk favorably compares Palestine to California:
The similarity of Southern California and Palestine is so close in climate, topography, soils and vegetation that the present condition of similarly placed areas in California is a reliable index of the early condition of the land of Palestine. Vegetation varied from desert scrub on lower slopes of the Jordan Valley and Dead Sea, to luxuriant forests of Cedars of Lebanon on the flanks of Mount Hermon, similar to the desert vegetation from Coachella Valley below sea level in Southern California to pine and fir forests on lower slopes of Mt. Baldy (10,000 feet) in the San Gabriel Range. Rainfall favours Palestine, for Jaffa gets more rain 2 1.5 inches) per annum than Los Angeles (15.2 inches), and the Mt. Hermon mountain land mass gets up to 70 inches of rain while Mt. Baldy only 50 inches. Other comparisons are striking. The region of the Jordan River, including Palestine and Trans-Jordan and the maritime slopes, is quite similar to California, but has an added advantage of its limestone country rock. The climates are alike, the natural vegetation, the physiographic features, except for the great limestone springs in Palestine. Similar crops may be grown. Differences are that soils of Palestine were uniformly better, that uplands have been badly eroded from misuse, and that slopes of Palestine favoured tree crops and were terraced where surface rock was ready at hand..".[80]
Official reports
In 1920, the League of Nations' Interim Report on the Civil Administration of Palestine stated that there were 700,000 people living in Palestine:
Of these 235,000 live in the larger towns, 465,000 in the smaller towns and villages. Four-fifths of the whole population are Moslems. A small proportion of these are Bedouin Arabs; the remainder, although they speak Arabic and are termed Arabs, are largely of mixed race. Some 77,000 of the population are Christians, in large majority belonging to the Orthodox Church, and speaking Arabic. The minority are members of the Latin or of the Uniate Greek Catholic Church, or--a small number--are Protestants.
The Jewish element of the population numbers 76,000. Almost all have entered Palestine during the last 40 years. Prior to 1850 there were in the country only a handful of Jews. In the following 30 years a few hundreds came to Palestine. Most of them were animated by religious motives; they came to pray and to die in the Holy Land, and to be buried in its soil. After the persecutions in Russia forty years ago, the movement of the Jews to Palestine assumed larger proportions.[81]
By 1948, the population had risen to 1,900,000, of whom 68% were Arabs, and 32% were Jews (UNSCOP report, including bedouin).
Genetic analyses of regional populations
According to various genetic studies, Jewish and Samaritan populations and various Palestinian populations overlap genetically because they share some of the same Neolithic ancestors.
Geneticists generally agree there was mixing in Middle East populations in prehistoric times. Nebel et al. (2000) doing Y-chromosome haplotype analysis for patrilineal ancestry of Jews and Palestinian Muslims "revealed a common gene pool for a large portion of Y chromosomes, suggesting a relatively recent common ancestry". The two modal haplotypes that comprise the Palestinian Arab clade were very infrequent among Jews, "reflecting divergence and/or admixture from other populations". Nebel et al. regard their findings in good agreement with historical evidence that suggest that "Part, or perhaps the majority, of the Muslim Arabs in this country descended from local inhabitants, mainly Christians and Jews, who had converted after the Islamic conquest in the seventh century AD... These local inhabitants, in turn, were descendants of the core population that had lived in the area for several centuries, some even since prehistoric times.[82]
A subsequent study aimed at determining the genetic relationship among three Jewish communities (Ashkenazi, Sephardic, and Kurdish) by the same group described two Y-chromosomal haplotype groups, Eu9 and Eu10, that represent a major part of Middle East ancestry. Eu9 appears to originate from the northern Fertile Crescent, while Eu10 appears to come from the southern part of it. Jewish and Muslim Kurdish populations have high-frequency of Eu9 but generally lack Eu10, which is prevalent in Palestinian Muslims. The study proposes that
...the Y chromosomes in Palestinian Arabs and Bedouin represent, to a large extent, early lineages derived from the Neolithic inhabitants of the area and additional lineages from more-recent population movements. The early lineages are part of the common chromosome pool shared with Jews. According to our working model, the more-recent migrations were mostly from the Arabian Peninsula, as is seen in the Arab-specific Eu 10 chromosomes that include the modal haplotypes observed in Palestinians and Bedouin... The study demonstrates that the Y chromosome pool of Jews is an integral part of the genetic landscape of the region and, in particular, that Jews exhibit a high degree of genetic affinity to populations living in the north of the Fertile Crescent.[83]
Arnaiz-Villena, et al. (2001) compared the genetic profile of Palestinians with that of other Mediterranean populations, and concluded that, "Archaeologic and genetic data support [the hypothesis] that both Jews and Palestinians came from the ancient Canaanites, who extensively mixed with Egyptians, Mesopotamian and Anatolian peoples in ancient times."[84]
However, the study also says that Palestinians are closely related to Egyptians, Lebanese, Iranians, Cretans, Ancient Macedonians and Sardinians, Turks, Armenians and also to Algerians, Spaniards, French, Italians and Basques. It therefore doesn't answer the question of immigration.
Arnaiz-Villena was later sacked from the journal's editorial board and the article retracted.[85] The journal claimed the article was politically biased and was written using inappropriate remarks about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The question of late Arab immigration to Palestine
Whether there was significant Arab immigration into Palestine after the beginning of Jewish settlement there in the late 19th century has been a matter of some controversy.
Demographer Uziel Schmelz, in his analysis of Ottoman registration data for 1905 populations of Jerusalem and Hebron kazas, found that most Ottoman citizens living in these areas, comprising about one quarter of the population of Palestine, were living at the place where they were born. Specifically, of Muslims, 93.1% were born in their current locality of residence, 5.2% were born elsewhere in Palestine, and 1.6% were born outside Palestine. Of Christians, 93.4% were born in their current locality, 3.0% were born elsewhere in Palestine, and 3.6% were born outside Palestine. Of Jews (excluding the large fraction who were not Ottoman citizens), 59.0% were born in their current locality, 1.9% were born elsewhere in Palestine, and 39.0% were born outside Palestine.[86]
American economist Gottheil argues that there likely was significant Arab immigration:
There is every reason to believe that consequential immigration of Arabs into and within Palestine occurred during the Ottoman and British mandatory periods. Among the most compelling arguments in support of such immigration is the universally acknowledged and practiced linkage between regional economic disparities and migratory impulses. The precise magnitude of Arab immigration into and within Palestine is, as Bachi noted, unknown. Lack of completeness in Ottoman registration lists and British Mandatory censuses, and the immeasurable illegal, unreported, and undetected immigration during both periods make any estimate a bold venture into creative analysis. In most cases, those venturing into the realm of Palestinian demography—or other demographic analyses based on very crude data—acknowledge its limitations and the tentativeness of the conclusions that may be drawn.[87]
Yehoshua Porath believes that the notion of "large-scale immigration of Arabs from the neighboring countries" is a myth "proposed by Zionist writers". He writes:
As all the research by historian Fares Abdul Rahim and geographers of modern Palestine shows, the Arab population began to grow again in the middle of the nineteenth century. That growth resulted from a new factor: the demographic revolution. Until the 1850s there was no "natural" increase of the population, but this began to change when modern medical treatment was introduced and modern hospitals were established, both by the Ottoman authorities and by the foreign Christian missionaries. The number of births remained steady but infant mortality decreased. This was the main reason for Arab population growth. ... No one would doubt that some migrant workers came to Palestine from Syria and Trans-Jordan and remained there. But one has to add to this that there were migrations in the opposite direction as well. For example, a tradition developed in Hebron to go to study and work in Cairo, with the result that a permanent community of Hebronites had been living in Cairo since the fifteenth century. Trans-Jordan exported unskilled casual labor to Palestine; but before 1948 its civil service attracted a good many educated Palestinian Arabs who did not find work in Palestine itself. Demographically speaking, however, neither movement of population was significant in comparison to the decisive factor of natural increase.[88]
Daniel Pipes responds to Porath by saying that the argument that "substantial immigration of Arabs to Palestine took place during the first half of the twentieth century is supported by an array of demographic statistics and contemporary accounts, the bulk of which have not been questioned by anyone, including Professor Porath."[89]
Current demographics
According to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics, as of May 2006, of Israel's 7 million people, 77% were Jews, 18.5% Arabs, and 4.3% "others".[90] Among Jews, 68% were Sabras (Israeli-born), mostly second- or third-generation Israelis, and the rest are olim — 22% from Europe and the Americas, and 10% from Asia and Africa, including the Arab countries.[91]
According to Palestinian evaluations, The West Bank is inhabited by approximately 2.4 million Palestinians and the Gaza Strip by another 1.4 million. According to a study presented at The Sixth Herzliya Conference on The Balance of Israel's National Security[92] there are 1.4 million Palestinians in the West Bank. This study was criticised by demographer Sergio DellaPergola, who estimated 3.33 million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip combined at the end of 2005.[93]
According to these Israeli and Palestinian estimates, the population in Israel and the Palestinian Territories stands at 9.8-10.8 million.
Jordan has a population of around 6,000,000 (2007 estimate).[94][95] Palestinians constitute approximately half of this number.[96]
See also
- Arab-Israeli conflict
- Conflict: Middle East Political Simulator
- Greater Israel
- Greater Syria
- History of Fatah/Hamas tensions
- History of Palestine
- State of Israel
- Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- Land of Israel covers roughly the same region, with a different focus
- Mandate for Palestine
- Names of the Levant
- Occupation of Palestine
- Palestinian people
- State of Palestine
External links
- The Hope Simpson Report (London, 1930) [1]
- Palestine Royal Commission Report (the Peel Report) (London, 1937) [2]
- Report to the Council of the League of Nations (1928) [3]
- Report to the Council of the League of Nations (1929) [4]
- Report to the Council of the League of Nations (1934) [5]
- Report to the Council of the League of Nations (1935) [6]
- - A website with a wealth of statistics regarding population in Palestine
- Coins and Banknotes of Palestine under the British Mandate
- WorldStatesmen- Maps, flags, chronology, see Israel and Palestinian National Authority
- hWeb - Israel-Palestine in Maps
- Palestine Fact Sheet from the Common Language Project
- 1911 Encyclopedia description of Palestine
Maps
- Sykes-Picot Agreement, 1916
- 1947 UN Partition Plan
- 1949 Armisitice Lines
- Israel After 1949 Armistice Agreements
References
- ^ Thomas L. Thompson (1999). The Mythic Past:How Writers Create the Past. Basic Books. ISBN 0465006493.
- ^ Israel Finkelstein and Neil Ascher Silberman (2000). "The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts". Bible and Interpretation. Retrieved 05.14.2007.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ Hansen, 2000, p. 130.
- ^ Killebrew, 2005, p. 231.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Shahin (2005), page 6
- ^ a b c Lehmann, Clayton Miles (1998). "Palestine: History: 135–337: Syria Palaestina and the Tetrarchy". The On-line Encyclopedia of the Roman Provinces. University of South Dakota. Retrieved 2006-07-19.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|month=ignored (help) - ^ Surah 5:21
- ^ a b c d Shahin (2005), page 3
- ^ [antiquity.ac.uk/Ant/034/0090/Ant0340090.pdf "Human Evolution and Neanderthal Man"] (PDF). Antiquity Journal.
{{cite web}}: Check|url=value (help) - ^ a b c d e f g h Shahin (2005), page 4
- ^ a b Gyémánt, Ladislau (2003). "Historiographic Views on the Settlement of the Jewish Tribes in Canaan". 1/2003. Sacra Scripta: 26 - 30.
{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires|journal=(help) - ^ a b c d e Niels Peter Lemche. "On the Problems of Reconstructing Pre-Hellenistic Israelite (Palestinian) History". Journal of Hebrew Scriptures. Retrieved 05.10.2007.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ a b c d e "Facts about Israel:History". Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affaits. Retrieved 05.10.2007.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Shahin (2005), page 7
- ^ Pastor, 1997, p. 41.
- ^ Hayes & Mandell, 1998, p. 41.
- ^ a b c Johnston, 2004, p. 186.
- ^ Chancey, 2005, p. 44.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Shahin (2005), page 8
- ^ a b Kenneth G. Holum "Palestine" The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. Ed. Alexander P. Kazhdan. Oxford University Press 1991.
- ^ a b c d e f Shahin (2005), page 10
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Shahin (2005), page 11 Cite error: The named reference "Shahinp11" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
- ^ a b c d e f g h Shahin (2005), page 12.
- ^ Gerber, 1998.
- ^ Mandel, 1976, p. xx.
- ^ Porath, 1974, pp. 8-9.
- ^ Haim Gerber (1998) referring to fatwas by two Hanafite Syrian jurists.
- ^ [Biger]
- ^ Hughes, 1999, p. 17; p. 97.
- ^ 'Zionist Aspirations: Dr Weizmann on the Future of Palestine', The Times, Saturday, 8 May, 1920; p. 15.
- ^ Gelber, 1997, pp. 6-15.
- ^ Sicker, 1999, p. 164.
- ^ Louis, 1969, p. 90.
- ^ Ingrams, 1972
- ^ "Mandate for Palestine - Interim report of the Mandatory to the LoN/Balfour Declaration text". League of Nations. 1921-07-30. Retrieved 2007-03-08.
- ^ Colonel Archer-Cust, Chief Secretary of the British Government in Palestine, said in a lecture to the Royal Empire Society that "The hanging of the two British Sergeants [an Irgun retaliation to British executions] did more than anything to get us out [of Palestine]". (The United Empire Journal, November-December 1949, taken from The Revolt, by Menachem Begin)
- ^ Population data calculated from three pages of the online CIA World Factbook https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/is.html https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/we.html https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/gz.html
- ^ Statistics, accessed 21 May, 2007.
- ^ Magen Broshi, The Population of Western Palestine in the Roman-Byzantine Period, Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 236, p.7, 1979.
- ^ Yigal Shiloh, The Population of Iron Age Palestine in the Light of a Sample Analysis of Urban Plans, Areas, and Population Density, Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 239, p.33, 1980.
- ^ Katz, p.113-115 Template:He icon
- ^ Tomas Shaw, Travels and Observations Relating to Several Parts of Barbary and the Levant (London, 1767), p. 331ff.; Constantine Francois Volney, Travels Through Syria and Egypt in the Years 1783, 1784 and 1785 (London, 1787); Alexander Keith, The Land of Israel (Edinburgh, 1944), P. 465.
- ^ Hastings Bible Dictionary, Vol. 3, 646.
- ^ Les Juifs dans l'empire romain (1914), 1, 209f.
- ^ Referred to by W C Lowdermilk, Palestine, Land of Promise,(1944), p. 47.
- ^ From Jesus to Paul (1944), 33.
- ^ Herod the Great (1971), 165.
- ^ A Social and Religious History of the Jews, 2nd ed. (1952), Vol. 1, 168, 370-2.
- ^ Encyc. Biblica column 3550.
- ^ Referred to by W C Lowdermilk, Palestine, Land of Promise (1944), 47.
- ^ The Holy Land (1966), 220, 221.
- ^ Letter of 16 Dec. 1941 reported by Lowdermilk, ibid, 47.
- ^ Die Bevolkerung der griechischromischen Welt (1886), 242-9.
- ^ Economic Background of the Gospels (1926), 83.
- ^ Byatt, 1973.
- ^ Daily Life in Palestine at the Time of Christ (1962), 43.
- ^ Preparing the Way for Paul (1930), 115.
- ^ History of New Testament Times (1949), 189.
- ^ Mission und Ausbreitung des Christentums (1915), 1, 10.
- ^ Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus (1969), 205.
- ^ The Density of Population in Ancient Palestine, Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol 66 (1947), 425-36.
- ^ Bernard Lewis, Studies in the Ottoman Archives--I, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 16, NO. 3, pp. 469-501, 1954
- ^ Katz, 115 citing C.F.C Conte de Volney: Travels through Syria & Egypt in the years 1783, 1784, 1785 (London, 1798). Vol II p. 219
- ^ DellaPergola, 2001, p. 5.
- ^ Scholch, 1985, p. 503.
- ^ McCarthy, 1990, p.26.
- ^ McCarthy, 1990.
- ^ Katz, 114 citing Alphonse de Lamartine, Recollections of the East, Vol. I (London, 1845), pp. 268, 308.
- ^ Chapter 56.
- ^ Chapter 52.
- ^ Chapter 49.
- ^ Chapter 46.
- ^ K. Christison, Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy, Univ. of California Press, 1999; p20.
- ^ B. B. Doumani, The political economy of population counts in Ottoman Palestine: Nablus, Circa 1950, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol 26 (1994) 1-17.
- ^ J. McCarthy, The population of Ottoman Syria and Iraq, 1878-1914, Asian and African Studies, vol. 15 (1981) 3-44. K. H. Karpat, Ottoman population 1830-1914 (Univ. Wisconsin Press, 1985).
- ^ Alan Dowty, Much Ado about Little: Ahad Ha'am's "Truth from Eretz Yisrael," Zionism, and the Arabs, Israel Studies, Vol. 5, No. 2 (Fall 2000) 154-181.
- ^ Palestine: The Original Sin by Meir Abelson.
- ^ Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, ed., The Transformation of Palestine (Illinois: Northwestern Press, 197 l ), p. 126.
- ^ Marwan R. Beheiry, "The Agricultural Exports of Southern Palestine, 1885-1 9 14," Journal of Palestine Studies, volume 10, No. 4, 198 1, p. 67.
- ^ Palestine's Economic Future: A Review of Progress and Prospects (London: Percy Lund Humphries and Co., Ltd., 1946), pp. 19-23.
- ^ Interim Report on the Civil Administration of Palestine
- ^ Journal Abstract: Almut Nebel, Dvora Filon, Deborah A. Weiss, Michael Weale, Marina Faerman, Ariella Oppenheim, Mark G. Thomas. 2000 "High-resolution Y chromosome haplotypes of Israeli and Palestinian Arabs reveal geographic substructure and substantial overlap with haplotypes of Jews". Human Genetics 107(6): 630-641.
- ^ Journal Article: Almut Nebel, Dvora Filon, Bernd Brinkmann, Partha P. Majumder, Marina Faerman, Ariella Oppenheim. 2001. "The Y Chromosome Pool of Jews as Part of the Genetic Landscape of the Middle East". American Journal of Human Genetics 69(5): 1095–1112.
- ^ Arnaiz-Villena, Antonio et al. (2001), The Origin of Palestinians and Their Genetic Relatedness With Other Mediterranean Populations, Human Immunology',' Vol 62, 889-900
- ^ Journal axes gene research on Jews and Palestinians, The Guardian, November 25, 2001.
- ^ Schmelz, 1990, pp. 15-67.
- ^ Gottheil, 2003.
- ^ Porath, Y. (1986). Mrs. Peters's Palestine. New York Review of Books. 16 January, 32 (21 & 22).
- ^ Mrs. Peters's Palestine: An Exchange, The New York Review of Books, Volume 33, Number 5, March 27, 1986.
- ^ Central Bureau of Statistics, Government of Israel. "Population, by religion and population group" (PDF). Retrieved 2006-04-08. {{PDFlink}
- ^ Central Bureau of Statistics, Government of Israel. "Jews and others, by origin, continent of birth and period of immigration" (PDF). Retrieved 2006-04-08. {{PDFlink}
- ^ Bennett Zimmerman & Roberta Seid (January 23, 2006). "Arab Population in the West Bank & Gaza: The Million Person Gap". American-Israel Demographic Research Group. Retrieved 2006-09-27.
- ^ Sergio DellaPergola (Winter 2007, No. 27). "Letter to the Editor". Azure. Retrieved 2007-01-11.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|date=(help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in:|publisher=(help) - ^ Jordan: Facts & Figures, accessed 22 May, 2007.
- ^ CIA World Factbook, accessed 22 May, 2007.
- ^ Assessment for Palestinians in Jordan, Minorities at Risk, accessed 22 May, 2007.
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