Questions about Palestinian migration.......

Dave!

Hey folks,

I'm studying middle eastern history from the late 19th century, and there's one thing in particular that I have been trying to understand, even before I started the class in college.

Before the fall of the Ottoman empire there was already Jewish immigration into the area of Palestine. When they migrated to there, where did they stay? I believe I saw mention of "a series of land purchases"... Does this mean that they bought private land and property off the Arab population? If not then did they merely start building houses on public land that was administered by the government of the time? Would this have been illegal? Or did the Ottoman government sell them the land?

After WW1 Palestine came under the control of the League of Nations and was mandated to Britain. Jewish immigration increased alot from then. The British obviously supported the Zionist movement, so did the administration in Palestine then start doling out the public land for them to build settlements on?

Did the Jewish immigrants actually displace the Arab population (by force for example) or was it the sudden influx of thousands of migrants that bothered them?

There seems to have been a large increase in Arab migration into Palestine at the time also -- is it the case that the Arabs were attracted by the money the British were pumping into the area, or would the Jews have had anything to do with that? Ze'ev Jabotinsky (I'm reading) seemed to think that the Jews positively influenced the area economically and that's why the Arabs migrated there.

This is more of a fact-finding mission than a debate, so if ye could help me out that would be schweeeet!

Cheers

FYI

try...

Holy Land, Unholy War: Israelis and Palestinians - Anton La Guardia

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Holy-Land-Unholy-War-Palestinians/dp/0719556015

Dave!

Cheers, i already have a few books though.

Anybody able to answer this?

The Saint

Hey Dave, This websire might be of interest to you. Note that it might not be the most objective website but the statistics and maps seem to be accurate.
http://www.palestineremembered.com/index.html

The map section might be of interest to you but might from a later time period than you're looking for.
http://www.palestineremembered.com/Maps/index.html
Here's an example of some:





Chronology here. http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story564.html#70%20-%201899
Some demographic info from the page:
1882-1903
First wave of 25,000 Zionist immigrants enters Palestine, coming mainly from eastern Europe.

1904-1914
Second wave of about 40,000 Zionist immigrants increases Jewish population in Palestine to about 6% of total. Since the inception of Zionism it has been claiming that Palestinian was an empty country.

1919-1923
Third wave of over 35,000 Zionist immigrants increases Jewish population in Palestine to 12% of total. Registered Jewish landownership (1923) totals 3% of area of country.

1922
October
First British census of Palestine shows population of 757,182 -78% Muslim Arab, 11% Jewish, 9.6% Christian Arab.

1924-1928
Fourth wave of 67,000 Zionist immigrants, over 50% from Poland, increases Jewish population of Palestine to 16% of total. Registered Jewish landownership (1928) totals 4.2% of area of country. Click here to view a map illustrating a breakdown of Palestinian-Zionist landownership per district as of 1945.

1929-1939
Fifth wave of over 250,000 Zionist immigrants increases Jewish population in Palestine to 30% of total. Registered Jewish landownership (1939) totals 5.7%of area of country.

1931
Second British census of Palestine shows population of 1,035,154-73% Muslim Arab, 16.9% Jewish, 8.6% Christian Arab.

1940-1945
Arrival of over 60,000 Zionist immigrants, including 20-25,000 who have entered the country illegally (April 1939-December 1945), increases Jewish population in Palestine to 31% of total. Registered Jewish landownership rises to 6.0% of area of country.


Not sure if any of this helps but take a look around the site and I'm sure you'll find some useful stuff. Best of luck with the studies Dave.


Edit: Also here is a map with alot of information that could be useful for you. The map is too big to post here so I'll just post the link.
http://lw.palestineremembered.com/Maps/New/pal-english-2004.jpg

Dave!

Thanks alot for that! Very helpful and interesting And thanks for the luck! hehe

The Saint

DaveMcG wrote:

Thanks alot for that! Very helpful and interesting And thanks for the luck! hehe

No worries man. Glad I could be of help. I know how you feel. I'm coming to the end of an international studies degree.