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Palestine (Filasteen فلسطين) has been the Arabic name of the region since the earliest medieval Arab geographers (adopted from the then-current Greek term Palaistinê, first used by Herodotus, itself derived ultimately from the name of the Philistines), and "Palestinian" (Filasteeni فلسطسيني) was always a common nisba adopted by natives of the region, starting as early as the first century after the Hijra (eg `Abdallah b. Muhayriz al-Jumahi al-Filastini[17], an ascetic who died in the early 700's.) However, the Palestinians, like most Arab nationalities, have come to view themselves as primarily Palestinians (rather than as primarily Arabs, or Syrians, or denizens of a particular town) mostly in the past century. Whereas European and to a lesser extent Ottoman colonialism was the main spur in forming national identities and borders elsewhere, the main force in reaction to which Palestinian nationalism developed was Zionism. One of the earliest Palestinian newspapers, Filastin founded in Jaffa in 1911 by Issa al-Issa, addressed its readers as "Palestinians"[18].
Until the 19th century, most modern Arab national groups, including Palestine, had no distinct national identities per se, but it is difficult to determine how regional loyalties may have felt to Palestine's inhabitants over the course of hundreds of years, including periods that predate the rise of the contemporary nation-state. There were well-known regions - including Palestine, or Filasteen فلسطين, which was considered to be the southern region of the Levant, ash-Sham الشام - but there was no sense that a person should owe a particular loyalty to his region rather than to his religion or ethnic group, or in the case of a Bedouin his tribe. However, starting in the 19th century, the European concept of nationalism crept in, in many varieties; some pushed the idea of a Syrian or Fertile Crescent state, some pushed the idea of a pan-Arab state, while some pushed for smaller states such as Lebanon.
Even before the end of Ottoman administration, Palestine, rather than the Ottoman Empire, was considered by many Palestinians to be their country. On 25 July 1913, for instance, the Palestinian newspaper al-Karmel wrote: "This team possessed tremendous power; not to ignore that Palestine, their country, was part of the Ottoman Empire."[19] The idea of a specifically Palestinian state, however, was at first rejected by most Palestinians; the First Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations (in Jerusalem, February 1919), which met for the purpose of selecting a Palestinian Arab representative for the Paris Peace Conference, adopted the following resolution: "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." ( Yehoshua Porath, Palestinian Arab National Movement: From Riots to Rebellion: 1929- 1939, vol. 2, London: Frank Cass and Co., Ltd., 1977, pp. 81-82.) However, particularly after the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the French conquest of Syria, the notion took on greater appeal; in 1920, for instance, the formerly pan-Syrianist mayor of Jerusalem, Musa Qasim Pasha al-Husayni , said "Now, after the recent events in Damascus, we have to effect a complete change in our plans here. Southern Syria no longer exists. We must defend Palestine". Similarly, the Second Congress of Muslim-Christian Associations (December 1920), passed a resolution calling for an independent Palestine; they then wrote a long letter to the League of Nations about "Palestine, land of Miracles and the supernatural, and the cradle of religions", demanding, amongst other things, that a "National Government be created which shall be responsible to a Parliament elected by the Palestinian People, who existed in Palestine before the war."
It was nonetheless still rejected by many groups; in 1937 Auni Bey Abdul-Hadi, leader of the small pan-Arabist Istiqlal party, told the Peel Commission: "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." (Myths & Facts. A Guide to the Arab-Israeli Conflict by Mitchell G. Bard)
Originally the normal headgear of Palestinian peasants, the keffiyeh, worn here by Yasir Arafat, first came to symbolize Palestinian nationalism during the British Mandate period.
Gradually, however, the Palestinians came to fully embrace the idea of a distinct Palestinian nationality in the course of the ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict. The idea of an independent nationality for Palestinian Arabs was greatly boosted by the 1967 Six Day War; instead of being ruled by different Arab states encouraging them to think of themselves as Jordanians or Egyptians, they were now ruled by a state with no desire to make them think of themselves as Israelis, and an active interest in discouraging them from regarding themselves as Egyptians, Jordanians or Syrians. Moreover, the natives of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip now shared many interests and problems in common with each other that they did not share with the neighboring countries.
Because of the gradualness of the creation of an Palestinian national identity (as opposed to a regional one) - and, many allege, for reasons of political convenience - many Israelis did not accept the existence of an independent Palestinian people, as in Golda Meir's statement: "There are no Palestinians," (see History of Palestine). Today the existence of a unique Palestinian nationality/identity is generally recognized even by most Israelis ([20], [21]).
In the period shortly after the State of Israel came into existence, many Arabs, including some Palestinians - in particular, supporters of pan-Arabism or pan-Syrianism - insisted that Palestinians were not distinct from other Arabs of the region. Zuhair Mohsen, leader in the seventies of the Syrian-funded Baathist group as- Saiqa and simultaneous head of the Military Department of the PLO, expressed the pan-Syrianist position of his main funders in an interview with the Dutch daily Trouw on March 1977: "There is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. It is for political reasons only that we carefully emphasize our Palestinian identity, because it is in the national interest of the Arabs to encourage the existence of Palestinians against Zionism, the establishment of a Palestinian state is a new expedient to continue the fight against Zionism and for Arab unity... For tactical reasons, Jordan, which has defined borders, cannot claim Haifa or Jaffa; but a Palestinian can claim Haifa, Jaffa, Beersheba and Jerusalem." After his annexation of the West Bank, King Abdullah I of Jordan forbade the use of the term Palestine in Jordanian official documents, for fear of encouraging separatism among the Palestinians. However, both pan-Arabism and pan-Syrianism have massively declined in popularity, and most Arabs now believe that Palestinians have a distinctive identity.
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