Global InformationOrigin of the Palestinians information
The origin of the Palestinians, an ethnonational group residing in the Southern Levant, has been the focus of studies in history, linguistics and genetics, as well as nationalistic ideology. Ethnically, Palestinians share broad religious, linguistic, and cultural practices with Jordanians, Syrians and Lebanese, as well as variations unique to Palestine such as Palestinian Arabic. At the same time Palestinians are part of the broader Arab world. The majority of Palestinians are Muslim, although there is a minority of Palestinian Christians.
The demographic history of Palestine is complex and has been shaped by various historical events and migrations. Throughout history, the region has been subject to the influence and control of various imperial powers, leading to political, social, and economic changes that have affected the demographic composition of the region. Wars, revolts and religious developments have also played a significant demographic role in encouraging immigration, emigration and conversion. Between the 4th and 5th century, the region had become majority Christian and would remain so until the 11th century, however, with the Muslim conquest of the Byzantine Levant in the 7th century, the region gradually began to be Arabized and Islamized as a result of local conversion and acculturation combined with Arab Muslim settlement.[1] This ultimately led to the creation of an Arab Muslim population, which, despite being considerably smaller than the area's population in late antiquity, would go on to become the region's main religious group beginning in the Middle Ages and lasting until the 20th century.
Genetic studies reveal that modern Palestinians share genetic continuity with Bronze-Age Levantine populations and exhibit similarity with both contemporary Jewish and Arab-speaking Levantine groups.[2][3][4][5][6][7] Many Palestinian villagers claim ancestral ties to Arab tribes from the Arabian Peninsula that settled in Palestine during or after the Arab conquest,[8] while others trace their roots to Turkish, North African, Kurdish, Egyptian, and Turkman origins. Some claim Jewish[9] or Samaritan[10][11] ancestry based on oral traditions.
The ongoing effort of nation-building and the effort to solidify Palestinian national consciousness as the primary framework of identity, as opposed to other identities dominant among Palestinians, including primordial clannish, tribal, local, and Islamist identities, have an impact on internal Palestinian historical discourse regarding the origins of Palestinians.[12]
- ^ Ehrlich, Michael (2022). The Islamization of the Holy Land, 634-1800. Leeds, UK: Arc Humanities Press. pp. 3–4. ISBN 978-1-64189-222-3. OCLC 1302180905.
Samaritan rebellions during the fifth and sixth centuries were crushed by the Byzantines and as a result, the main Samaritan communities began to decline. Similarly, the Jewish community strove to recover from the catastrophic results of the Bar Kokhva revolt (132–135 ce). During the Late Roman and Byzantine periods, many Jews emigrated to thriving centres in the diaspora, especially Iraq, whereas some converted to Christianity and others continued to live in the Holy Land, especially in Galilee and the coastal plain. [...] Accordingly, most of the Muslims who participated in the conquest of the Holy Land did not settle there, but continued on to further destinations. For most of the Muslims who settled in the Holy Land were either Arabs who immigrated before the Muslim conquest and then converted to Islam, or Muslims who immigrated after the Holy Land's conquest. [...] Consequently, many local Christians converted to Islam. Thus, almost twelve centuries later, when the army led by Napoleon Bonaparte arrived in the Holy Land, most of the local population was Muslim. [...] The Holy Land's transformation from an area populated mainly by Christians into a region whose population was predominantly Muslim was the result of two processes: immigration and conversion
- ^ Lawler, Andrew (28 September 2020). "DNA from the Bible's Canaanites lives on in modern Arabs and Jews". National Geographic. Archived from the original on June 2, 2020. Retrieved 28 May 2020.
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pmid20560205was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Das, R; Wexler, P; Pirooznia, M; Elhaik, E (2017). "The Origins of Ashkenaz, Ashkenazic Jews, and Yiddish". Frontiers in Genetics. 8: 87. doi:10.3389/fgene.2017.00087. PMC 5478715. PMID 28680441.
the ancient Levantines clustered predominantly with modern-day Palestinians" as well as describing the ancient levantine origin among Palestinians as "predominant
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Forensicwas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Nebel, Almut; Filon, Dvora; Weiss, Deborah A.; Weale, Michael; Faerman, Marina; Oppenheim, Ariella; Thomas, Mark G. (December 2000). "High-resolution Y chromosome haplotypes of Israeli and Palestinian Arabs reveal geographic substructure and substantial overlap with haplotypes of Jews" (PDF). Human Genetics. 107 (6): 630–641. doi:10.1007/s004390000426. PMID 11153918. S2CID 8136092.
According to historical records 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 (Shaban 1971; Mc Graw Donner 1981). These local inhabitants, in turn, were descendants of the core population that had lived in the area for several centuries, some even since prehistorical times (Gil 1992)... Thus, our findings are in good agreement with the historical record...
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Hajjah2021was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Ben Zvi 1985, p. 8.
- ^ Litvak, M. (2009). "Constructing a National Past: The Palestinian Case". In Litvak, M. (ed.). Palestinian Collective Memory and National Identity. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 97–133. doi:10.1057/9780230621633_5. ISBN 978-1-349-37755-8.