When Jews began to immigrate to Palestine in large numbers in 1882, fewer than 250,000 Arabs lived there, and the majority of them were not long- time residents but relatively recent arrivals. Palestine was never an exclusively Arab country, although Arabic gradually became the language of the majority of the population after the Muslim invasions of the seventh century.

The Arab Revolt

The central figure in the Arab nationalist movement at the time of World War I was Hussein ibn’ Ali, who was appointed by the Turkish Committee of Union and Progress to the position of Sherif of Mecca in 1908. As sherif, Hussein was responsible for the custody of Islam’s shrines in the Hejaz and, consequently, was recognized as one of the Muslims’ spiritual leaders. In July 1915, Hussein sent a letter to Sir Henry MacMahon, the British High Commissioner( essentially governor) for Egypt, informing him of the terms for Arab participation in the war against the Turks. The letters between Hussein and MacMahon that followed outlined the areas that Great Britain was prepared to cede to the Arabs. TheHussein- MacMahon correspondence conspicuously does not mention Palestine. The British argued the omission had been intentional, thereby justifying their refusal to grant the Arabs independence in Palestine after the war. Nevertheless, the Arabs held then, as now, that the letters constituted a promise that Palestine would be an Arab state.

“ I feel it my duty to state, and I do so definitely and emphatically, that it was not intended by me in giving this pledge to King Hussein to include Palestine in the area in which Arab independence was promised. I also had every reason to believe at the time that the fact that Palestine was not included in my pledge was well understood by King Hussein.”— Sir Henry MacMahon

1. The points are clear........The Arabs and the British were partners in the war against the Turks.......
2. The land known as Palestine was NOT inhabited by a native population as such, but as many Arabs were moving there from other countries.

Cheers
fatak

No independent Arab or Palestinian state ever existed in Palestine. In fact, Palestine is never explicitly mentioned in the Koran, rather it is called“ the holy land”(al- Aradal- Muqaddash). Palestinian Arabs never viewed themselves as having a separate identity. When the First Congress of Muslim- Christian Associations met in Jerusalem in February 1919 to choose Palestinian representatives for the Paris Peace Conference, the following resolution was adopted:“ We consider Palestine as part of Arab Syria, as it has never been separated from it at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, natural, economic and geographical bonds.” The representative of the Arab Higher Committee to the United Nations submitted a statement to the General Assembly in May 1947 that said,“ Palestine was part of the Province of Syria” and that,“ politically, the Arabs of Palestine were not independent in the sense of forming a separate political entity.” A few years later, Ahmed Shuqeiri, later the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization( PLO), told the United Nations Security Council,“ It is common knowledge that Palestine is nothing but southern Syria.”

In 1937, a local Arab leader, Auni Bey Abdul Hadi, told the Peel Commission, which ultimately suggested the partition of Palestine:“ There is no such country[ as Palestine]!‘ Palestine’ is a term the Zionists invented! There is no Palestine in the Bible. Our country was for centuries part of Syria.”

The point here is obvious.....

Cheers
fatak