Books

Submitted by Wallace Edward Brand (United States), Dec 14, 2011 at 19:55

For a book suggesting Palestinians began in 1920 try a book by historian Yehoshua Porath. The emergence of Palestinian Nationalism 1918 - 1920. My recollection is that he claims it commenced as Syrian/Palestinian nationalism and that the Palestinians broke off from the Syrians because they viewed them as not as strongly anti-Zionist as they would be without them.

It showed evidence of a national group, but one that was devoted to anti-Zionism, not self government such as the desired nationalism of the Kurds or the Basques. It commenced in 1918 because that was the end of WWI. The Arabs local to Palestine had fought on the side of the Turks in WWI even though the British had offered Arabs self government if they fought with the Allies. But with the end of the war, the Allies had decided to split off the Ottoman territories in the Middle East and North Africa so that Turkish rule was no longer available to them.

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