ORIGIN OF PALESTINIANS

Anonymous

(Investigator 214, 2024 January)

Former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat (1929-2004), the Palestinian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, and other Palestinians denied/deny ancient Jewish links to Palestine or minimize them as insignificant.

The Bible takes Israel's origin back to about 2000 BCE, to Abraham and southern Iraq, but this so far lacks scientific corroboration.

The oldest known archaeological corroboration for Israel is the Merneptah Stele of the Egyptian Pharaoh Merneptah dated c.1208 BCE.

Palestinian denials are further refuted by the black basalt David-Stele (c. 840 BCE), the Moabite Stone (9th century BCE); archaeological confirmations of invasions of Israel by Pharoah Shishak (I Kings 14:25-26), Hazael king of Damascus (II Kings 8:7-10:33), Sennacherib king of Assyria (II Kings 18-19); and archaeological support for hundreds of geographical locations mentioned in the Bible. Regarding Sennacherib the Bible mentions the obscure facts that two of his sons killed him and escaped to "the land of Ararat" (II Kings 19:37), long unconfirmed but now elaborated on Wikipedia!

The Roman general Pompey added Judea (the former southern kingdom of Israel) to the Roman Empire in 63 BCE.

The Jews undertook three great rebellions against Rome in 66-73 CE, 117 CE and 132-135 CE.

The 117 CE rebellion may have saved Persia [Iran] from Roman domination. Emperor Trajan wanted to emulate Alexander the Great by advancing to India. He reached the Persian Gulf, and a Roman contingent may have taken the Persian capital Susa 200 km east of the Tigris River. That's when Jewish populations from Mesopotamia to the Mediterranean islands revolted, forcing Trajan's legions to retreat.



The earliest known use of the English word "Philistine" is in the 12th century CE. It came from Old French Philistin and before that from Classical Latin Philistinus; Late Greek Philistinoi; and the Hebrew Pelisti (plural Pelistim) meaning people of Peleset. (Wikipedia)

"Philistines" (referring to the people) is translated from Hebrew "Pelistim", and appears about 280 times in the Bible. The country, "Philistia", is mentioned three times, and as "Palestine" four times in the King James Bible. Archaeology and genetics support a migration event which brought the Philistines from somewhere near Greece, c.1200 BCE, to what is now Gaza in Israel. Egyptian inscriptions from the time of Rameses III (1198-1167 BCE) mention them as "Peleset".

The Philistine cities lost their independence to Assyria, Egypt and Babylon. Philistines lost their identity and disappeared from history and archaeology in the 5th century BCE (Wikipedia), confirming The Bible:

...the day is coming to destroy all the Philistines... (Jeremiah 47:4)

...the remnant of the Philistines shall perish, says the LORD. (Amos 1:8)

Modern Palestinians, therefore do not stem from the Philistines.



Whether the word "Palestine" is ultimately derived from the biblical Hebrew "Pelistim", or Egyptian "Peleset", is unclear.

The Greek historian Herodotus (485-425 BCE) mentions "Palestine" in his Histories as extending along the coast southwards: "after Phenicia this peninsula goes by the shore of our Sea [Mediterranean] along Palestine, Syria and Egypt, where it ends..." Herodotus seems to refer to the coast southwards to Egypt. It's unclear what "Syria" here means, but in another place he writes of "Syrians who dwell in Palestine" which may explain it.

Josephus, the 1st century Jewish historian, mentions "Palestine" often and apparently meant the Gaza area:
 

Now all the children of Mesraim, being eight in number, possessed the country from Gaza to Egypt, though it retained the name of one only, the Philistim; for the Greeks call part of that country Palestine. (Antiquities, Book 1, Chapter 6)

Pliny the Elder (23-79 CE), in his Natural History, describes the coast northwards from Egypt and calls Caesarea the "frontier town of Palaestina". Judea is described separately in the next chapter, therefore  not considered part of Palestine.

AFTER 135 CE

Rome's suppression of the Jewish revolt in 132-135 CE killed hundreds of thousands of Jews. The Romans renamed Jerusalem "Aelia Capitolina", and combined Judea and Gaza as "Syria Palaestina" named after the Jews' long-extinct enemies the Philistines. Despite the name this province excluded Syria which remained a separate province.

Immigrants to Syria Palaestina from other parts of the Empire, such as Greece, Italy, Egypt and Syria built Aelia Capitolina and populated it. Arab tribes too were admitted to the province from time to time and permitted to settle, forming a population of mixed origins.

The Jews, however, remained the majority until the 4th century, after that the Christians dominated, and by 1000 CE Muslim Arabs.

Waves of immigration continued — Arabs, Crusaders, Persians, Tartars, Egyptians, Mongols, Turks, Slavs, Armenians, etc.

The name "Palestine" continued in use but the area so named varied. Under Ottoman rule (1516-1917) it composed part of three provinces.

Visitors to former Judea generally referred to it as Palestine or The Holy Land.  Around 1560 CE a German group from near Magdeburg travelled to "Palestine". The narrative mentions poor roads and constant danger from Arab robbers. They left their money and gear at a monastery and proceeded disguised as monks but were still attacked and plundered by four armed Arabs. They faced being sold as slaves but offered ransom payments from their money at the monastery. (Lühe1906)

A peasants revolt in 1834 by Arabs of Palestine against conscription into the Egyptian army may be the start of Palestinian Arabs distinguishing themselves from Egyptians and other Arabs. Up to 30,000 Egyptian peasants moved to Palestine during 1834-1841 and were assimilated by Arabs in the Gaza-Jaffa coastal area.

Palestine demographics in thousands (Wikipedia)

Year	Jews	Christians	Muslims	Total
1st c.	Majority	------------	------------	~ 1,250
4th c.	Majority	Minority	------------	>1,250
5th  c.	Minority	Majority	------------	>1,250
12th c.	Minority	Minority	Majority	225
1550s	7	9	188	205
1690	2	11	219	232
1800	7	22	246	275
1890	43	57	432	532
1922	84	71	589	752
1947	630	143	1,181	1,970

The separate identity of Palestine Arabs from other Arabs became stronger in the 20th century. A unifying force was antagonism to Jewish immigration: 

Many settled on wasteland, sand-dunes and malaria marsh, which they then drained, irrigated and farmed... The Jews purchased their land piecemeal, from European, Turkish and (principally) Arab landlords, mostly at extremely high prices. (Gilbert 1993)

In February, 1919, the First Palestinian Congress issued a manifesto rejecting Zionist immigration.

In 1920 Britain was granted the "Palestine Mandate" over what is now Israel and Jordan. In 1921 Britain separated the area west of the River Jordan down to Eilat, from "Transjordan" (east of the Jordan), as a potential Jewish homeland. West of the Jordan River was now called "Palestine", east of the Jordan River up to the Iraq border, was Transjordan.

From 1919 to 1939 360,000 Jewish immigrants arrived; also Arab immigrants, legal and illegal (estimates vary) from Egypt, Syria and Transjordan attracted by the improved economy produced by Jewish investment.

National awareness developed further with the 1936-1939 Arab Rebellion against the British and Jews.

In 1948 a large part of Palestine became Israel. Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza remained under administration by Jordan and Egypt respectively, replaced after 1967 with supervision by Israel. The Palestinian Liberation Organization (formed in 1964) became internationally recognized as representing the Palestinian people and in 1988 Jordan renounced territorial claims to the West Bank. These events finalized the Palestinian identity as distinct from other Arabs.

The Britannica says:

Although the Arabs of Palestine had been creating and developing a Palestinian identity for about 200 years, the idea that Palestinians form a distinct people is relatively recent. The Arabs living in Palestine had never had a separate state. Until the establishment of Israel, the term Palestinian was used by Jews and foreigners to describe the inhabitants of Palestine and had only begun to be used by the Arabs themselves at the turn of the 20th century.

CONCLUSION

Some Palestinians probably have family lineages in Palestine extending back many generations. But, being unrelated to the Philistines, they do not have the archaeologically-confirmed 3200 years of continuous connection to Israel like the Jews.

https://www.britannica.com/place/Palestine/Palestine-and-the-Palestinians-1948-67

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-arabs-in-palestine

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/myths-facts-the-british-mandate-period

https://www.loc.gov/rr/amed/pdf/palestine1/Arabs-of-Palestine-British-Survey.pdfBritish-Survey

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_territories

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philistines

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arda-Mulissu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezekiah
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sennacherib

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syria_Palaestina

https://ed5015.tripod.com/

https://investigatormagazine.net