Newsletter 5860-050 or 5861-001
The 1st Year of the 5th Sabbatical Cycle
Or The 2nd Year of the 5th Sabbatical Cycle
The 29th year of the 120th Jubilee Cycle
The 2nd day of the 13th or 1st month 5860 or 5861 years after the creation of Adam
The 5th Sabbatical Cycle after the 119th Jubilee Cycle
The Sabbatical Cycle of the Red Heifer, Famine, Captivity & The 2 Witnesses
February 1, 2025
Shabbat Shalom to the Royal Family of Yehovah,
I received this great endorsement from Lucinda Robinson on FaceBook about The Stones Cry Out Part 1. I hope you all will write favourable comments like this on Amazon so others can see it. It is one way you can help spread the word by encouraging others to get the books.
This book by Joseph Dumond will bring unity. There are many true believers deceived on the subject of reckoning the beginning of a Scriptural year. This book examines each calendar and its history and compares them to exactly what Scripture reveals. Whether you use the equinox, Zadok, Jubilees, Hillel, Julian, Enoch, or other calendar, you must read this book to get the full picture and history of each one. This book HAD to be written. Such detail! Such shutting down of arguments by FACTS! I urge every sabbath and feast keeper to read this book!
You can get your Free PDF copy here. https://sightedmoon.com/the-stones-cry-out-lp/
I would like to remind you all to go to your spam box and search for any newsletter from sightedmoon.com. We generally send them out on Thursdays at midnight, Eastern Time zone time. Check your spam to see if our emails are there, and then move them to your inbox so they are no longer considered spam. You may have to do this to two or three emails to train your server to put them in the right box.
The National Religious Broadcasters Convention is approaching February 24-27, 2025. We are now contacting many of the media outlets that will be there, asking them to interview us so we can share our message about the Jubilee Cycles. I ask you all to pray that Yehovah will open this door wide for us and that we can reach many through this event. At the NRB we will be connecting with FrontGate Media who have been doing some of our past advertising over the past two years and created two of our recent videos. They are front and center at the NRB and can introduce us to those we need to speak to. We are talking to them about an advertising campaign to get me on several podcasts and radio shows to explain our message. The starting cost is $5000 for two months and my goal is to do this for the next twelve months. It will cost $30,000 to hire FrontGate to market me and our message to as many megaphones as we can reach. I am not going to be able to do this on my own. I need your financial help. As you read this week’s newsletter, you will see why we must speak out now while we can. If you do not support this work with your donations, may I ask you to please consider helping us now? We are running out of time. I am going to go forward on this. You can watch this video and become a supporter at this link. https://sightedmoon.com/supporters-lp/
Through the NRB show, I have contacted another promoter (IAMPRONLINE) and am talking with them about how to promote our message and get it in front of the TV and Radio media. There could be other promoters I have to meet. Again, I ask for your prayers and that Yehovah opens the door He wants us to go through. However, each of these companies wants to be paid for this service. We need divine intervention, and that comes from all of us asking Yehovah to open the door and to send sponsors.
Our small team is leaving for Israel this week. I want to thank you all for your prayers for our safety. As a result of your prayers, Yehovah inspired Israel and Hamas to have a truce and to exchange hostages for prisoners. So we expect now to have no drones or missiles shot at us from the Houthi, Hezbollah, or Hamas while we search out in the fields for the barley during our time there. Thank you, Yehovah. Now in exchange for the hostages, murderers and hardened criminals will be and are being released back into East Jerusalem, where we will be going. They are also being set free in Samaria and Gaza. These are those terrorists who stabbed and murdered innocent people and were caught. These are those lone wolfs who often act alone at bus stops, gas stations or cafes. So, I again implore your prayers for our protection and safety during our time there as we search on your behalf to determine if the barley is Aviv or if we are to add an Adar Bet. Many of you are watching and relying on this information so that you can keep your Feasts when Yehovah said to keep them. In this matter, I will also need your financial support. We share this information for free, but paying for airfare, hotel, car rental, and food costs money. I am asking those of you who are not yet supporting this work to please help by giving as little as $25 a month. Those who do support this work have access to all our PDFs and audiobooks from the time you begin to help—all of them. https://sightedmoon.com/supporters-lp/
Once I return from Israel, I will have to turn around and leave for Texas and the NRB event. I will be driving there, which is about a 20-hour drive. We are working on a speaking tour to the Philippines in April. We are reaching out to the people of Japan, Singapore, Hongkong and Thailand. If you are interested in having me come and present this end-time information to your group and to your country, then please reach out to your Pastor and to your group and consider inviting me to your assembly. It is time. We are in the gun lap and once you see it, you too will see our urgency. Please reach out and let me know. Thank you for your help.
Torah Portion
Torah Portions
We read through the entire Torah along with the Prophets and the New Testament, once over the course of 3 1/2 years. Or according to the Sabbatical Cycle which means we read it all twice over a 7-year period. This allows us to cover more in-depth rather than being rushed to cover as much as is covered on an annual basis. We allow all to comment and take part in the discussions.
Septennial Torah Portion
If you go to Torah Portion in our archived section, you can then go to the 1st year, which is the 1st year of the Sabbatical Cycle, the one we are in now, as we state at the top of every Newsletter. There, you can scroll down to the proper date and see that this Shabbat, we could very well be midrashing about:
Exodus 3
1 Kings 7
Psalm 107
Luke 18
We are in the 1st Sabbatical Cycle in 2024-2025. We go through the entire bible twice in a 7 year cycle. This means we cover the entire bible once every 3 1/2 years. It gives us more time to debate and discuss each portion we read.
If you missed last week’s exciting discoveries as we studied that section, you can go and watch past Shabbats on our media section.
Join Our Sabbath Meetings
Join Our Sabbath Meetings
There are many people in need of fellowship and who are sitting at home on the Sabbath with no one to talk to or debate with. I want to encourage all of you to join us on Shabbat, and to invite others to come and join us as well. If the time is not convenient then you can listen to the teaching and the midrash after on our YouTube channel.
What are we doing and why do we teach this way?
We are going to discuss both sides of an issue and then let you choose. It is the work of the Ruach (Spirit) to direct and to teach you.
The medieval commentator Rashi wrote that the Hebrew word for wrestle (avek) implies that Jacob was “tied”, for the same word is used to describe knotted fringes in a Jewish prayer shawl, the tzitzityot. Rashi says, “thus is the manner of two people who struggle to overthrow each other, that one embraces the other and knots him with his arms”.
Our intellectual wrestling has been replaced by a different kind of struggle. We are wrestling with Yehovah as we grapple with His Word. It is an intimate act, symbolizing a relationship in which Yehovah and you and I are bound together. My wrestling is a struggle to discover what Yehovah expects of us, and we are “tied” to the One who assists us in that struggle.
Today, many say Israel means “Champion of God”, or better — the “Wrestler of God”.
Our Torah sessions each Shabbat teaches you and encourages you to constantly challenge, question, argue against, as well as view alternative views and explanations of the Word. In other words, we are to “wrestle with the Word” to get to the truth. Jews worldwide believe that you need to wrestle with the Word and constantly challenge Dogma, Theology, and views or else you will never get to the Truth.
We are not like most churches where “The preacher talks and everyone listens.” We encourage everyone to participate, to question and to contribute what they know on the subject being discussed. We want you to be a champion wrestler of the Word of Yehovah. We want you to wear the title of Israel, knowing that you not only know but are capable of explaining why you know the Torah to be true with logic and facts.
We have a few rules though. Let others talk and listen. There is no discussion about UFO’s, Nephilim, Vaccines or conspiracy-type subjects. We have people from around the world with different world views. Not everyone cares who is the President of any particular country. Treat each other with respect as fellow wrestlers of the word. Some of our subjects are hard to understand and require you to be mature and if you do not know, then listen to gain knowledge and understanding and hopefully wisdom. The very things you are commanded to ask Yehovah for and He gives to those who ask.
Jas 1:5 But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and with no reproach, and it shall be given to him.
We hope you can invite those who want to keep Torah to come and join us by hitting the link below. It is almost like a Torah teaching fellowship talk show with people from around the world taking part and sharing their insights and understandings.
We start off with some music and then some prayers and it’s as though you were sitting around the kitchen back in Newfoundland having a cup of coffee and all of us enjoying each other’s company. I hope you will grace us with your company someday.
Sabbath services begin at 12:30 PM EDT where we will be doing prayers, songs and teaching from this hour.
Shabbat midrash will begin at about 1:15 pm Eastern.
We look forward to you joining our family and getting to know us as we get to know you.
Joseph Dumond is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Topic: Joseph Dumond’s Personal Meeting Room
Join Zoom Meeting
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The Perpetual Calendar
The Perpetual Calendar
We have available from our website a calendar you can use to keep track of the days of the month based on when the barley is ripe and when the moon is sighted. All you have to do is download it. https://sightedmoon.com/perpetual-calendar/
With the new year about to begin, you can learn about the calendar as you record it. This is a great tool to have and it is free to anyone who wants it.
The Stones Cry Out Are Free
The Stones Cry Out Part 1 & Part 2
Do you want to know how to prove the Zadok Calendar, the Enoch Calendar, and the Book of Jubilee Calendar false?
Do you want to know how the calendar issue became so confusing?
In The Stones Cry Out, I walk you through the history of each change and why those changes came about, starting with the Maccabean days. Yes, it all began around 164 B.C. When Yehshua was here, he was dealing with two schools of thought. The Sadducees were all but wiped out when the Temple fell in 70 C.E. This left only the Pharisees, who began to be persecuted after the failure of the Bar Kochbah Revolt in 134 C.E.
The truth began to become out of focus around 160 C.E. when Rabbi Jose wrote the Seder Olam. This work orignally was writen to proof Simon Bar Kochbah was the Messiah. When that did not pan out the history was later revived and then redacted as the truth into the Mishneh Torah by Rabbi Judah ha Nasi in 180 C.E. After this the Jerusalem Talmud begins to debate these issues. It was then during this time as the Jerusalem Talmudist are forced to flee and the Babylonian Talmudist continue to grow until the 6th cenury that Hillel came up with a solution to help them keep the Holy Days at the proper time while they were out of the land of Israel. He did this in 358 C.E. This work was then modified and adjusted over the next 800 years with additions added and other rejected. Until it was finally redacted once again in 1177 by Rambam. And with that we now have the modern Hebrew calendar which includes the errors passed on during each redaction. These errors included the time of the Sabbatical and Jubilee years.
Once the Temple was destroyed in 70 C.E., the Jews recorded time by counting from the time It was destroyed. This is why the 40 tombstones of Zoar, which record this information, are crucial to understand.
When you understand why the Postponement rules were first created so that the crescent moon would not be seen in another part of the world before it was seen in Israel then you can understand how they were still trying to follow the crescent moon to begin the month. The Tombstones show us this exact thing. The tombstones also show us when the Jews changed from a crescent moon to a Conjunction moon to begin the month. They also show us when the Jews changed the year from the month of Aviv to the Tishri to begin the year.
I really want you to understand these things so you know why you do what you do as far as following a calendar to keep Yehovah’s moedim.
Get your Free copies of The Stones Cry Out Part 1 and Part 2 here https://sightedmoon.com/the-stones-cry-out-lp/
And share this information with your FB friends and Bibles Study groups. If they dont like it, it never cost them anything.
Get your copy today. If you want a paperback copy, I have them on Amazon for the least amount they would let me post them there. Order both of them and start to understand the history of how these changes affect those who follow Yehovah and keep His Feasts.
I would like to add this recent comment to encourage you all to get this book and learn these truths. And the Book is FREE. You have no reason not to get it.
Most people assume that Hillel created the calendar in 358 C.E. They then assume that because it was a Sanhedrin, they are not allowed to change in order to obey Yehovah. The Hillel calendar has been changed many times since 358 C.E. up until 1177 C.E. Few people talk about these changes but we do in our latest Book The Stones Cry Out Part 1 which is free on our website. The Hillel calendar was changed on many occasions and many sought to make other changes during this time. They never needed a Bet Din to approve those changes. They just did them. So this excuse that we do not have the right to obey Yehovah because the Bet Din has not approved it is a crock of crap.
You have the obligation to obey Yehovah. You have the duty to prove which calendar you are to go by. You must prove it beyond all doubt. Yehshua never followed the Hillel calendar. Nor did any of the Apostles.
The reason no man can know the day or the hour is because it refers to a crescent moon to begin the 7th month. That is the day He was born on and the day He comes to judge on. At a day and hour no one can know. Using the Hillel calendar predicts Yom Teruah years in advance so every one knows when to keep it. But even in the Hillel calendar they keep two days of Yom Teruah reckoning back to the sighted moon. Also in the postponement rules developed long after Hillel, they again state that if the conjunction is at a certain time then the day begins at such and such, in order that the moon will not be seen in another part of the world before it is seen in Israel. That was rule number 2.
Everyone has to choose. You have the right to be wrong. But if you choose to be wrong then you also must live with the consequences that come with sin. And that is the death penalty for not keeping the Holy Days, these Sabbath at the proper time. It is your choice.
Just because you write in to me to justify your position does mean it is right. It just means your sounding off.
Allow me to share this endorsement of our latest book again. If you have read our books, please share your thoughts about them with us in the comments below or email me.
And yes, many observe the Equinox. There are many who are deceived, improperly educated. And this is why Joe puts out a newsletter every week, why he writes books, why the SightedMoon Zoom Shabbat service started, why he travels to places like England and the Philippines to share this message and why were are going to the NRB in February. The calendar is always a divisive issue in social circles because the details are many, that’s why there are so many books Joe has written. I’m not looking to put Joe on a pedestal here. This is not about Joe worship. But Joe has tenaciously studied out the calendar from every angle, not to prove himself right, to to seek to find and share what Yehovah is telling us about His Calendar.
In The Stones Cry Out, Joe has shared the history of all the different groups within Israel, and the beliefs they had about the scriptures and the feast days and the calendar. When you line it all up, you can see for yourself the how and why these misunderstandings and arguments about how and where and why they came about.
This is my new favourite book and I’m only 60-70 pages in. And I encourage you to read the footnotes in this one. Sometimes there’s more footnote on the page than Joe’s words.
Sombra Wilson
When I wrote Stones Cry Out, I wanted it to be one of our FREE books so everyone would have it. It is more of an encyclopedia than a book to read. It will be your quick resource book; you will have access to every question about any calendar, how it got started, and who started it. You will also learn the history of how the Mishnah was assembled, when it was assembled and why. Then, you will learn how that information was transferred into both the Jerusalem and the Babylonian Talmud until it reached its final stage in the Mishneh Torah. Along with this progression, the calendar also progressed and changed long after 358 C.E. when Rabbi Hillel first published it. But…what was before the Hillel calendar? What does the Mishnah record about those things?
The Stones Cry Out was originally going to be one book explaining all the various proofs we have discovered, demonstrating when the Sabbatical and Jubilee years are throughout history.
You can know; it is not a mystery.
As I began to write The Stones Cry Out, I quickly found myself going back, time and time again, to explain how the calendar is behind the confusion of the Sabbatical and Jubilee years. The Rabbis, as they began to write the Mishnah, incorporated wrong understandings, and those errors were written into what became known as the Talmud and then the Mishneh Torah. The expulsion from the land and subsequent persecutions in trying to send out messengers to report the barley being found or the crescent moon being seen, proved to be more and more dangerous over time. All of these things took place over 14 centuries.
Then as I was working on The Stones Cry Out, I discovered that many people were now accepting the Zadok calendar as factual. This is when we pivoted to include all the details of the various calendars that have crept back into public knowledge today and are being used to mislead new people who are just starting to learn about the calendar. All of this was directly connected to the period starting with the Hasmonaeans, up to the destruction of the Temple. Then, with the compiling of the Mishnah, the studies that led into the writing of the Jerusalem Talmud, then the Babylonian Talmud and finally the Mishneh Torah, each error that was added is compounded over time.
The Stones Cry Out, Part 1 explains the history of how each compilation of the Oral Torah incorporated errors, leading the followers thereof away from the actual Torah. In understanding these facts, it is then possible to understand more readily how the Sabbatical and Jubilee years were then mixed and later changed. By explaining all this history, I will be able to help you the reader understand the tombstones when most authorities do not. They have assumed, to their error, the Hillel calendar to have always been in use since Mount Sinai. Not understanding the history of the calendars is why most authorities dismiss the tombstones as too confusing to use. Once you understand The Stones Cry Out Part 1, Part 2 will be very easy to grasp.
Daniel 7:25 tells us he will change the appointed seasons and commandments. Many assume Constantine did this when he made Sunday the Sabbath. Few have considered the calendar’s many changes and how they relate to us today. Hidden in this proverbial swamp of confusion is the truth about the Sabbatical and Jubilee years. The Sabbatical and Jubilee years reveal the truths about the calendar that have been hidden for almost 2000 years.
We are in the very last days and Yehshua warned us that during this time:
Mat 24:10 And then many will be offended, and will betray one another, and will hate one another.
Mat 24:11 And many false prophets will rise and deceive many.
Mat 24:12 And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many will become cold.
Mat 24:13 But he who endures to the end, the same shall be kept safe.
Paul also warned Timothy about these last days, warning that some would leave the truth and begin to follow demonic teachers:
1Ti 4:1 But the Spirit expressly says that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and teachings of demons,
Paul again warned the Thessalonians that the Great Falling away would take place in the last days. How can you fall away if you have never come to know the truth? So who is Paul talking to? Those who are called and answer that calling begin to walk this road of restoration back to Yehovah, and then at some point along that walk, they change and leave this walk following the teachings of demons to false calendar.
2Th 2:1 Now we beseech you, my brothers, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him,
2Th 2:2 that you should not be soon shaken in mind or troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word or letter, as through us, as if the Day of Christ is at hand.
2Th 2:3 Let not anyone deceive you by any means. For that Day shall not come unless there first comes a falling away, and the man of sin shall be revealed, the son of perdition,
2Th 2:4 who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, setting himself forth, that he is God.
We must endure until the end. We must not let ourselves become offended by personalities and leave the faith once given.
I want you all to have access to and the ability to read this book and use it as a reference. https://sightedmoon.com/the-stones-cry-out-lp/ Click on the link fill in the form and you will have access to the FREE PDF anywhere in the world. If you want a copy you can hold in your hands we have published it at Amazon for the lowest price they would allow us. Order you copy after Shabbat and begin to read it today.
The 10 Days of Awe
It’s a Riddle, Not a Command
Cracking the Code of Christ’s Return
Yehovah is Calling the Palestinians
Yehovah is Calling the Palestinians
If you had asked me what do we do with the Palestinians after this war they started on October 7, 2023, I would have said, without missing a beat, to completely wipe them out, man, woman and child. They have nothing in them except hate for Israel. And just as Yehovah wiped out men, women, and children when Israel was moving towards the Promised Land and other nations attacked them, I would have felt no remorse in seeing the Palestinians completely removed from the face of this earth.
In my self-righteousness, I decided to check the Torah and see what Yehovah Himself had said. I thought He was saying the same thing. I thought I was just repeating what I saw in the Torah.
I was confident Yehovah said this in the book of Obadiah. Lets go there and read it.
Edom Will Be Humbled
Oba 1:1 The vision of Obadiah. So says the Lord God concerning Edom: We have heard a message from Jehovah, and a messenger is sent among the nations: Rise up, even let us rise up against her for battle.
Oba 1:2 Behold, I have given you to be small among the nations; you are greatly despised.
Oba 1:3 The pride of your heart has deceived you, dwelling in the clefts of the rock, his dwelling is lofty; saying in his heart, Who shall bring me down to the ground?
There are no clefts of rocks in Gaza. They do not dwell up in the mountains on high.
Oba 1:4 Though you rise high like the eagle, and though you set your nest between the stars, I will bring you down from there, says Jehovah.
Oba 1:5 If thieves came to you, if destroyers by night (how you have been cut off!), would they not have stolen until they had enough? If the grape-gatherers came to you, would they not leave gleanings?
Oba 1:6 How Esau is searched out! His hidden things are sought out!
Oba 1:7 All the men of your covenant have dismissed you to the border; the men who were at peace with you have deceived you, and have overcome you. They are setting your bread as a snare under you; there is no understanding in them.
Oba 1:8 Shall I not in that day even destroy the wise out of Edom, and understanding out of the mount of Esau, says Jehovah?
Oba 1:9 And your mighty ones, O Teman, shall be afraid, so that each man from the mount of Esau may be cut off by slaughter.
Again, this is Esau, Edom, and not the Philistines.
Edom’s Violence Against Jacob
Oba 1:10 Shame shall cover you from the violence against your brother Jacob, and you shall be cut off forever.
Oba 1:11 On the day of your standing on the other side, on the day that the strangers were capturing his force, and foreigners entered his gates and cast lots for Jerusalem, even you were like one of them.
Oba 1:12 But you should not have looked on the day of your brother on the day of his alienation; nor should you have rejoiced over the sons of Judah in the day of their ruin; nor should you have enlarged your mouth in the day of distress.
Oba 1:13 You should not have entered into the gate of My people in the day of their calamity; also, you should not have looked on his evil in the day of their calamity. Nor should you have sent out against his force in the day of his calamity.
Oba 1:14 Nor should you have stood on the crossways to cut off those of him who escaped; nor should you have shut up his survivors in the day of distress.
Esau was the brother of Jacob. The Philistines were never the brother of any of the Israelites.
The Day of the Lord Is Near
Oba 1:15 For the day of Jehovah is near on all the nations; as you have done, it shall be done to you. Your reward shall return upon your head.
Oba 1:16 For as you have drunk upon My holy mountain, so all the nations shall drink forever. Yes, they shall drink, and they shall swallow, and they shall be as though they had not been.
Oba 1:17 But upon Mount Zion shall be those who escaped; and it shall be holy. And the house of Jacob shall possess their own possessions.
Oba 1:18 And the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame. And the house of Esau shall be for stubble. And they shall kindle in them and burn them up. And no survivor shall be to the house of Esau; for Jehovah has spoken it.
This is what I thought was about to happen to the Philistines. But no, it is Judah and Joseph who are going to destroy Esau so that no one survives of his house. Yehovah is advocating the genocide of Esau, but this is not the Philistines.
The Kingdom of the Lord
Oba 1:19 And those of the south shall possess the mountain of Esau and the low country of the Philistines. And they shall possess the fields of Ephraim and the fields of Samaria; and Benjamin shall possess Gilead.
Oba 1:20 And the exiles of this army shall go to the sons of Israel who shall possess the land of the Canaanites to Zarephath; even the exiles of Jerusalem who are in Sepharad shall possess the cities of the south.
Oba 1:21 And deliverers shall go up into the mountain of Zion to judge the mountain of Esau; and the kingdom shall be to Jehovah.
OK, so that is where I got my confusion. Here is where it says those of the south, Judah, shall possess the mountain of Esau and the low country of the Philistines. There, I am vindicated. The Philistines are to be wiped out.
But there is more. Before I get to that let me give you the history of the Philistine people which is in the next tab.
Origin of the Palestinians
Origin of the Palestinians
The study of the origins of the Palestinians, a population encompassing the Arab inhabitants of the former Mandatory Palestine and their descendants,[1] is a subject approached through an interdisciplinary lens, drawing from fields such as population genetics, demographic history, folklore, including oral traditions, linguistics, and other disciplines.
The demographic history of Palestine has been shaped by various historical events and migrations. Over time, it shifted from a Jewish majority in the early Roman period to a Christian majority in Late Roman and Byzantine times.[2] The Muslim conquest of the Levant in the 7th century initiated a process of Arabization and Islamization through the conversion and acculturation of locals, accompanied by Arab settlement. This led to a Muslim-majority population, though significantly smaller, in the Middle Ages.[3][4] Some Palestinian families, notably in the Hebron and Nablus regions, claim Jewish and Samaritan ancestry respectively, preserving associated cultural customs and traditions.[5][6][7]
Genetic studies indicate a genetic affinity between Palestinians and other Levantine populations, as well as other Arab and Semitic groups in the Middle East and North Africa.[8][9] Historical records and later genetic studies indicate that the Palestinian people descend mostly from Ancient Levantines extending back to Bronze Age inhabitants of Levant.[10][a] They represent a highly homogeneous community who share one cultural and ethnic identity,[17][18][19] speak Palestinian Arabic and share close religious, linguistic, and cultural practices and heritage with other Levantines (e.g Syrians, Lebanese, and Jordanians). According to Palestinian historian Nazmi Al-Ju’beh, like in other Arab nations, the Arab identity of Palestinians is largely based on linguistic and cultural affiliation and is not necessarily associated with the existence of any Arabian origins.[20]
The historical discourse regarding the origin of the Palestinians has been influenced by the ongoing effort of nation-building, including the attempt 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.[21]
Genetics
As recently as 2001, genetic research was incomplete enough that genetic scientists still cited theories about the roots of today’s Palestinians’ in present-day Israel/Palestine dating back only 1200 BC — in one theory, from Egyptian garrisons that were abandoned to their own fate in Canaan, in another, from immigrants from Crete or the Aegean, conflating Palestinians with “Philistines”, from which the word “Palestine” is derived.[22] A 2010 study by Behar et al. found Palestinians tested clustered genetically close to Bedouins, Jordanians and Saudi Arabians, which was described as “consistent with a common origin in the Arabian Peninsula”.[23] More recent studies since 2017[24][25] have found that Palestinians, and other Levantine people, are primarily descended from ancient Levantines present in what is today Israel and Palestine, dating back at least 3700 years.[26] According to Marc Heber et al, all modern Levantine Arabs descend from Canaanite-like ancestors, whereas later migrations impact on their population ancestry was slight.[27]
Levantine origins
Principal Component Analysis of ancient and modern populations of Palestinians, Jews and others showing Palestinians clustering with Bronze-Age Levantines
A 2015 study by Verónica Fernandes and others concluded that Palestinians have a “primarily indigenous origin”.[28]
In a 2016 study by Scarlett Marshall and others published in Nature, the study concluded that the biogeographical affinities of “both Syrians and Palestinians are highly localised to the Levant”, the authors also noted that the biogeographical affinity of Palestinians goes in agreement with historical records and previous studies on their uniparental markers, which all suggest that Palestinians at least in part descend from local Israelite converts to Islam after the Islamic expansion.[29]
According to a study published in June 2017 by Ranajit Das, Paul Wexler, Mehdi Pirooznia, and Eran Elhaik in Frontiers in Genetics, in a principal component analysis, Natufians, together with a Neolithic Levantine sample, “clustered predominantly with modern-day Palestinians and Bedouins” and that Palestinians have a “predominant” ancient Levantine origin (58%) and residual Iranian origin (18%), with some Eastern Hunter-Gatherer and smaller amounts of Anatolian admixture.[24]
In a study published in August 2017 by Marc Haber et al. in The American Journal of Human Genetics, the authors concluded that: “The overlap between the Bronze Age and present-day Levantines suggests a degree of genetic continuity in the region.”[30]
A 2020 study on human remains from Middle Bronze Age Palestinian (2100–1550 BC) populations suggests a significant degree of genetic continuity in Arabic-speaking Levantine populations (such as Palestinians, Druze, Lebanese, Jordanians, Bedouins, and Syrians), as well as several Jewish groups (such as Ashkenazi, Iranian, and Moroccan Jews).[31] Palestinians, among other Levantine groups, were found to derive 81–87% of their ancestry from Bronze age Levantines, relating to Canaanites as well as Kura–Araxes culture impact from before 2400 BCE (4400 years before present); 8–12% from an East African source and 5–10% from Bronze age Europeans. Results show that a significant European component was added to the region since the Bronze Age (on average ~8.7%), seemingly related to the Sea Peoples, excluding Ashkenazi and Moroccan Jews who harbour ~ 41% and 31% European-related ancestry respectively, both populations having a history in Europe.[31]: 1146–1157
A 2021 study by the New York Genome Center found that the predominant component of the DNA of modern Palestinians matches that of Bronze Age Palestinian Canaanites who lived around 2500–1700 BCE.[26]
Between Muslim and Christian Palestinians
In a genetic study of Y-chromosomal STRs in two populations from Israel and the Palestinian Authority Area: Christian and Muslim Palestinians showed genetic differences. The majority of Palestinian Christians (31.82%) were a subclade of E1b1b, followed by G2a (11.36%), and J1 (9.09%). The majority of Palestinian Muslims were haplogroup J1 (37.82%) followed by E1b1b (19.33%), and T (5.88%). The study sample consisted of 44 Palestinian Christians and 119 Palestinian Muslims.[32]
Relation to other Semitic and Arab peoples
In a 2003 genetic study, Bedouins showed the highest rates (62.5%) of the subclade Haplogroup J-M267 among all populations tested, followed by Palestinian Arabs (38.4%), Iraqis (28.2%), Ashkenazi Jews (14.6%) and Sephardic Jews (11.9%), according to Semino et al.[33] Semitic-speaking populations usually possess an excess of J1 Y chromosomes compared to other populations harboring Y-haplogroup J.[33][34][35][36] The haplogroup J1, the ancestor of subclade M267, originates south of the Levant and was first disseminated from there into Ethiopia and Europe in Neolithic times. J1 is most common in Palestine, as well as Syria, Iraq, Algeria, and Arabia, and drops sharply at the border of non-semitic areas like Turkey and Iran. A second diffusion of the J1 marker took place in the 7th century CE when Arabians brought it from Arabia to North Africa.[33]
According to a 2010 study by Behar et al. titled “The genome-wide structure of the Jewish people”, in one analysis, Palestinians tested clustered genetically close to Bedouins, Jordanians and Saudi Arabians which was described as “consistent with a common origin in the Arabian Peninsula”. In another analysis of West Eurasians only, Palestinians fell between Saudis (and more distantly, Bedouins) on one side and Jordanians and Syrians on the other. Admixture analysis in the same study inferred that the Palestinian and Jordanian DNA largely resembled the mixture of Syrians, Lebanese, Druze and Samaritans. They differed from the Saudi profile, which almost completely lacked a European-like component and had a smaller proportion of the component typical of more northerly West Asian populations, both of which were more prominently present in Palestinians and other Levantine populations. Palestinians differed from Druze and Samaritans in having more sub-Saharan African-related admixture.[23]
A 2013 study by Haber et al. found that “The predominantly Muslim populations of Syrians, Palestinians and Jordanians cluster on branches with other Muslim populations as distant as Morocco and Yemen.” The authors explained that “religious affiliation had a strong impact on the genomes of the Levantines. In particular, conversion of the region’s populations to Islam appears to have introduced major rearrangements in populations’ relations through admixture with culturally similar but geographically remote populations leading to genetic similarities between remarkably distant populations.” The study found that Christians and Druze became genetically isolated following the arrival of Islam. The authors reconstructed the genetic structure of pre-Islamic Levant and found that “it was more genetically similar to Europeans than to Middle Easterners.”[37]
Comparison of Jews and Palestinians
In recent years, genetic studies have demonstrated that, at least paternally, Jewish ethnic divisions and the Palestinians are related to each other.[38] Genetic studies on Jews have shown that Jews and Palestinians are closer to each other than the Jews are to their host countries.[39][40] At the haplogroup level, defined by the binary polymorphisms only, the Y chromosome distribution in Arabs and Jews was similar but not identical.[41]
A 2010 study by Atzmon and Harry Ostrer concluded that the Palestinians were, together with Bedouins, Druze and southern European groups, the closest genetic neighbors to most Jewish populations.[42]
One DNA study by Nebel found substantial genetic overlap among Israeli/Palestinian Arabs and Jews.[43] the study concluded that “part, or perhaps the majority” of Muslim Palestinians descend from “local inhabitants, mainly Christians and Jews, who had converted after the Islamic conquest in the seventh century AD”.[38]
As noted previously a 2020 study found common ancestry for modern Levantine Arabic-speaking peoples and Ashkenazi populations, but with the latter harbouring a much higher (41%) European-related component.[31]
Sub-Saharan Africa
A study found that the Palestinians, like Jordanians, Lebanese, and Syrians, have what appears to be female-mediated gene flow in the form of maternal DNA haplogroups from Sub-Saharan Africa. 15% of the 117 Palestinian individuals tested carried maternal haplogroups that originated in Sub-Saharan Africa. These results are consistent with female migration from eastern Africa into Near Eastern communities within the last few thousand years. There have been many opportunities for such migrations during this period. However, the most likely explanation for the presence of predominantly female lineages of African origin in these areas is that they may trace back to women brought from Africa as part of the Arab slave trade, assimilated into the areas under Arab rule.[44]
Historical analysis
The complex demographic history of Palestine has been influenced by several historical occurrences and migrations. The region was home to diverse ethnic groups and populations over centuries. During the Bronze Age, the region of Palestine was mainly inhabited by Canaanites, who mainly established themselves in fortified cities, as well as various Semitic nomadic groups such as the Shasu.[45][46][47][48][49] Following the Late Bronze Age collapse c. 1200–1150 BC, and the consequent advent of the Iron Age, the Israelites emerged in the central highlands establishing settlements throughout the country, founding the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, while the Philistines settled along the coastal strip of what became known as the Philistine pentapolis.[50][51] The Israelite kingdoms came to an abrupt end under the Assyrians and the Babylonians, and the period of Babylonian exile set in until the exilic return during the Persian period.
Following the Maccabean Revolt, the consequent Hasmonean conquests in Palestine prompted Jewish settlement outside of Judea in Galilee,[52][53] Samaria,[54][55] and Idumaea,[53] establishing a preponderance of Jewish elements throughout Palestine by the 1st century BC, where pagans and Samaritans also lived.[56][57][58] However, the Jewish–Roman wars between 66 and 135 significantly diminished Jewish numbers, especially with the destruction of the Jerusalem metropolis and its environs. Nevertheless, Jewish communities continued to thrive along the eastern, southern and western edges of Judah, in the Galilee, Golan and the Scythopolis region.[59]
In the centuries that followed, the region experienced political and economic unrest and the division of the Roman empire into two western and eastern empires. With the conversion of Constantine in the 4th century, the situation for the Jewish majority in Palestine “became more difficult”.[60] A series of laws were passed that discriminated against Jews and Judaism, and Jews were persecuted by both the church and the authorities.[61] Many Jews had emigrated to flourishing Diaspora communities,[62] while locally there was both Christian immigration and local conversion. By the middle of the 5th century, there was a Christian majority.[63][64] By the 6th century, much of the community churches in Judea, western Galilee, the Naqab and other places had been built.[65]
In the period prior to the Muslim conquest of Palestine (635–640), Palaestina Prima had a population of 700 thousand, of which around 100 thousand were Jews and 30 to 80 thousand were Samaritans,[66] with the remainder being Chalcedonian and Miaphysite Christians.[67][68][69]
Demographic changes during the Islamic period
The Muslim conquest of the Levant in the 7th century which brought the region under the rule of the Muslim Arabs from the west-central Arabian Peninsula. In the following centuries, several Arabic-speaking Muslim dynasties such as the Umayyads, Abbasids, and Fatimids came to rule the region.[69] This era witnessed a gradual process of Arabization and Islamization, accompanied by significant emigration and immigration. Frequent plague recurrences between 688 and 744 and devastating earthquakes (in 749, 881 and 1033) caused a steady decline of the population, falling from an estimated 1 million in the 5th century to a lowest estimate of 560,000–400,000 by the onset of the First Crusade.[70][71][72][73]
It is unknown whether Palestine’s population shifted toward Islam before or after the Crusader period (1099–1291). Some academics suggest that much of Palestine was already predominantly Muslim at the time the Crusaders arrived.[74][75][76] Alternatively, it has been argued that the process of Islamization occurred much later, perhaps during the Mamluk period.[3][77][69]
Unlike other regions, the Levant and Palestine experienced minor Arabian tribal settlement, which mostly included Kinana, Khath’am, Khuza’a, and Azd Sarat newcomers, and instead the prominent pre-Islamic Arab tribes of Palestine were incorporated into military and governance, namely Lakhm, Amilah, Ghassan and Judham.[78][67] Some of these local Arab tribes and Bedouin fought as allies of Byzantium in resisting the invasion, which the archaeological evidence indicates was a ‘peaceful conquest’,[dubious – discuss] and the newcomers were allowed to settle in the old urban areas. Theories of population decline compensated by the importation of foreign populations are not confirmed by the archaeological record.[79] In contrast to other regions where Muslim soldiers established garrison cities (amsar), in the Levant, Muslim troops settled in pre-existing cities where they lived off of jizya and the kharaj taxes paid by the majority non-Muslim population, and had little interest in making converts to Islam.[80][81][82]
During the early Islamic period, there was a significant movement of local populations, particularly Christians, from coastal areas to inland settlements and destinations across the Mediterranean. Arabs and other Muslims established themselves in fortified towns and fortresses along the coast. Historical accounts from Muslim writers confirm the presence of Muslims, including military personnel and individuals in administrative or religious roles, originating from regions such as Syria, Iraq, Persia, Egypt, and the Maghreb residing in Palestine, particularly in large towns.[83]
The pace of Islamization among the Christian, Jewish, and Samaritan communities in Palestine varied during the early period (661–861).[84] After the 630s most of the urban centers declined, which caused local ecclesiastical administrations to weaken or disappear altogether, leaving Christians most susceptible to conversion.[84][69] Nevertheless, Christians managed to survive in larger numbers than Jews and Samaritans, possibly due to their superior numbers or better organization.[84] Jewish communities, which were almost on the brink of extinction, only recovered following the arrival of Jews from various diaspora communities.[84] Following the 749 Galilee earthquake, northern Palestine foestered movement from the devastated cities in the Transjordan, such as Hippos.[84][69]
The Christians appear to have maintained a majority in much of both Palestine and Syria under Muslim rule until the Crusades. The original conquest in the 630s had guaranteed religious freedom, improving that of the Jews and the Samaritans, who were classified with the former.[85][86][87] However, as dhimmi, adult males had to pay the jizya or “protection tax”. The economic burden inflicted on some dhimmi communities (especially that of the Samaritans) sometimes promoted mass conversions.[88] Among the cultural survivals from pre-Islamic times are the significant Palestinian Christian community, roughly 10% of the overall population in late Ottoman times and 45% of Jerusalem’s citizens,[89] and smaller Jewish and Samaritan ones, as well as an Aramaic substratum in some local Palestinian Arabic dialects.[90][page needed]
In the Crusader, Ayyubid and Mamluk periods
When the Crusaders arrived in Palestine during the 11th century, they made no distinction between Christians who for the Latin rite were considered heretics, Jews and Muslims, slaughtering all indiscriminately.[91][92] The Crusaders, in wresting holy sites such as the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, and the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem from the Orthodox church were among several factors that deeply alienated the traditional Christian community, which sought relief in the Muslims. When Saladin overthrew the Crusaders, he restored these sites to Orthodox Christian control.[93]
Together with the alienating policies of the Crusaders, the Mongol Invasion and the rise of the Mamluks were turning points in the fate of Christianity in this region, and their congregations – many Christians having sided with the Mongols – were noticeably reduced under the Mamluks. Stricter regulations to control Christian communities ensued, theological enmities grew, and the process of Arabization and Islamicization strengthened, abetted with the inflow of nomadic Bedouin tribes in the 13th and 14th centuries.[94]
The Zengid offensive in Kurdistan circa 1130 resulted in the migration of numerous Kurds to settle in Palestine and Syria. Additionally, the Mongol invasions during the thirteenth century triggered a large-scale movement of Kurds into Palestine and Syria, not all of it permanent.[95]
Beit Sahour was first settled in the 14th century by a handful of Christian and Muslim clans (hamula) from Wadi Musa in Jordan, the Christian Jaraisa and the Muslim Shaybat and Jubran, who came to work as shepherds for Bethlehem’s Christian landowners, and they were subsequently joined by other Greek Orthodox immigrants from Egypt in the 17th–18th centuries.[96]
Under Ottoman rule (1516–1918)
By the start of the Ottoman period in 1516, it is commonly thought that the Muslim majority in the country was more-or-less like that of the mid-19th century.[97] During the first century of the Ottoman rule, i.e., 1550, Bernard Lewis in a study of Ottoman registers of the early Ottoman Rule of Palestine reports a population of an estimated 300,000, who were mainly fellahin (peasants).[98][4] According to Justin McCarthy, the sedentary population of Palestine during the 17th and 18th centuries was likely not much different than it was in 1850 (~350,000).[99]
In the late 18th and early 19th centuries, Egypt experienced significant waves of emigration to Palestine and Syria.[100] One notable influx occurred in the 1780s due to a severe famine in Egypt. According to one estimate, approximately one-sixth of the Egyptian population migrated during this period, with many settling in Palestine.[101] Migrants from the Hauran also arrived and established villages such as Al-Masmiyya al-Kabira[102][103] and Al-Masmiyya al-Saghira.[102]
Between 1831 and 1840, during Muhammad Ali‘s conquests and later under his son, Ibrahim Pasha, Egyptian settlers and army dropouts settled in Palestine. These immigrants primarily settled in well-established cities such as Jaffa and Gaza, where they founded sakināt (residential districts). Some dispersed into villages. Historically, there were 19 villages in the southern coastal plain and near Ramla with families of Egyptian descent. Today, remnants of this migration can still be seen in the northern parts of the Samaria region, particularly in the ‘Ara Valley, where a significant population of Egyptian descent resides.[100]
Algerian refugees (“Maghrebis“) started arriving in Palestine as early as the 1850s following Abdelkader‘s rebellion.[104][105] They were in a destitute state when they were transferred through northern Palestine to Syria and other areas. Many eventually settled in abandoned villages in the eastern part of the Lower Galilee.[104] During the Mandatory period, twelve settlements in the Galilee were inhabited by Algerians.[105] The village of Kafr Sabt, for example, was entirely inhabited by Algerians.[104] Small numbers of Algerian Berber refugees also settled in Safed after the exile of Abdelkader to Damascus in 1855.[100] During the same period, there were also significant waves of migration from the Balkans and the Caucasus.[106]
Some rural and urban Palestinians have Albanian, Bosnian, Circassian, or other non-Arab ancestry due to the legacy of the Ottoman period, which brought non-Arab communities to the region in the 19th century.[100][107][108]
Under Mandatory rule (1918–1948)
During the Mandatory era, Haifa became a hub for migration, drawing thousands from the Hauran, Galilee, and Golan regions. This influx was driven by employment prospects generated by the construction of a deep-water port and the expansion of maritime economic activities under British auspices.[109] The Sharon plain also attracted Arab migration during the Mandatory period, driven by Jewish settlement and government development initiatives that eradicated malaria, enhanced healthcare services, extended life expectancy, and generated job opportunities in the area.[110]
Pre-Islamic influence on Palestinian identity
While Palestinian culture is today primarily Arab and Islamic, many Palestinians identify themselves with earlier civilizations that inhabited the land of Palestine,[111] including Natufians and Canaanites.[112][113] According to Walid Khalidi, in Ottoman times “the Palestinians considered themselves to be descended not only from Arab conquerors of the seventh century but also from indigenous peoples who had lived in the country since time immemorial.”[114] Early Jewish advocates of Canaanism in the 1940s, including founder Yonatan Ratosh, claimed Palestinians were the descendants of Canaanites and encouraged Israeli irredentism.[115]
According to Claude R. Conder of the Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) in 1876: “It is well known to those familiar to the country that whatever else they may be, the Fellahin, or native peasantry of Palestine, are not Arabs; and if we judge from the names of the topographical features their language can scarcely be called Arabic.”[116] Modern linguists contend that Palestinian Arabic, like other Levantine Arabic dialects, is a mixture of Hejazi Arabic and ancient northern Arabic dialects spoken in the Levant before Islam, with heavy Aramaic and Hebrew substrates.[117][118][119][120][121][122]
Palestinians anthropologist Ali Qleibo and sociologist Samih Farsoun both argue:
Throughout history a great diversity of peoples has moved into the region and made Palestine their homeland: Canaanites, Jebusites, Philistines from Crete, Anatolian and Hellenic Greeks, Hebrews, Amorites, Edomites, Nabataeans, Arameans, Romans, Arabs, and Western European Crusaders, to name a few. Each of them appropriated different regions that overlapped in time and competed for sovereignty and land. Others, such as Ancient Egyptians, Hittites, Persians, Babylonians, and the Mongol raids of the late 1200s, were historical ‘events’ whose successive occupations were as ravaging as the effects of major earthquakes … Like shooting stars, the various cultures shine for a brief moment before they fade out of official historical and cultural records of Palestine. The people, however, survive. In their customs and manners, fossils of these ancient civilizations survived until modernity—albeit modernity camouflaged under the veneer of Islam and Arabic culture.[111][114]
George Antonius, founder of modern Arab nationalist history, wrote in his seminal 1938 book The Arab Awakening:
The Arabs’ connection with Palestine goes back uninterruptedly to the earliest historic times, for the term ‘Arab’ [in Palestine] denotes nowadays not merely the incomers from the Arabian Peninsula who occupied the country in the seventh century, but also the older populations who intermarried with their conquerors, acquired their speech, customs and ways of thought and became permanently arabised.[123]
American historian Bernard Lewis writes:
Clearly, in Palestine as elsewhere in the Middle East, the modern inhabitants include among their ancestors those who lived in the country in antiquity. Equally obviously, the demographic mix was greatly modified over the centuries by migration, deportation, immigration, and settlement. This was particularly true in Palestine, where the population was transformed by such events as the Jewish rebellion against Rome and its suppression, the Arab conquest, the coming and going of the Crusaders, the devastation and resettlement of the coastlands by the Mamluk and Turkish regimes, and, from the nineteenth century, by extensive migrations from both within and from outside the region. Through invasion and deportation, and successive changes of rule and of culture, the face of the Palestinian population changed several times. No doubt, the original inhabitants were never entirely obliterated, but in the course of time they were successively Judaized, Christianized, and Islamized. Their language was transformed to Hebrew, then to Aramaic, then to Arabic.[124]
In oral traditions
Traditions of Arabian, Transjordanian and Syrian ancestry
Many Muslim Palestinian villagers avow oral traditions of descent from nomadic Arab tribes that migrated to Palestine during or shortly after the Muslim conquest of the Levant.[125][126][127] Other Muslim Palestinians have linked their ancestors’ entry into Palestine to their participation in Saladin‘s army;[125][127] Saladin is revered not only as a hero of Islam but also as a national hero, downplaying his Kurdish roots.[125]
Traditions of Arabian ancestry are noted among some Palestinian families of the notable class (a’yan),[126] including the Nusaybah family of Jerusalem,[128] the Tamimi family of Nabi Salih, and the Barghouti family of Bani Zeid.[129][130] The Shawish, al-Husayni, and Al-Zayadina[131][132] clans trace their heritage to Muhammad through his grandsons, Husayn ibn Ali and Hassan ibn Ali.[133][unreliable source?]
Despite these traditions, many families migrated to Palestine in later periods, often as Bedouins or semi-nomadic herders who crossed the Jordan River after residing in Transjordan. This migration pattern complicates efforts to differentiate between Transjordanian and Arabian ancestry, as Transjordan served as a pathway for migrants and nomads from the Arabian Peninsula. Some Palestinian families still retain strong ties with relatives across the Jordan.[127]
Bedouins have drifted in waves into Palestine since at least the 7th century, after the Muslim conquest. Some of them, like the Arab al-Sakhr south of Lake Kinneret trace their origins to the Hejaz or Najd in the Arabian Peninsula, while the Ghazawiyya’s ancestry is said to go back to the Hauran‘s Misl al-Jizel tribes.[134] They speak distinct dialects of Arabic in the Galilee and the Negev.[135]
Arabs in Palestine, both Christian and Muslim, settled and Bedouin were historically split between the Qays and Yaman factions.[136] These divisions had their origins in pre-Islamic tribal feuds between Northern Arabians (Qaysis) and Southern Arabians (Yamanis). The strife between the two tribal confederacies spread throughout the Arab world with their conquests, subsuming even uninvolved families so that the population of Palestine identified with one or the other.[136][137] Their conflicts continued after the 8th century Civil war in Palestine until the early 20th century[138][unreliable source?] and gave rise to differences in customs, tradition, and dialect which remain to this day.[136]
Families like the Nimrs, originally serving as local governors of Homs and Hama‘s rural sub-districts (both in modern-day Syria), and other officer families including the Akhrami, Asqalan, Bayram, Jawhari, Khammash, Mir’i, Shafi, Sultan and Tamimi, arrived in Palestine as part of a 1657 Ottoman campaign to reassert their rule over the Nablus area. Joining them were families such as the Jarrar family from Balqa (now in Jordan), and the Tuqan family, from either northern Syria or Transjordan.[139] The valleys surrounding Nablus are also predominantly inhabited by migrants from Transjordan.[127]
Samaritan and Jewish ancestry
Some Palestinian families follow oral traditions that trace their roots to Jewish and Samaritan origins. Traditions of Jewish ancestry are especially prevalent in the southern Hebron Hills, a region with documented Jewish presence until the Islamic conquest. One notable example is of the Makhamra family of Yatta, who according to several reports, traces its own ancestry to a Jewish tribe in Khaybar.[5][140] Traditions of Jewish ancestry were also recorded in Dura, Halhul and Beit Ummar.[101]
Much of the local Palestinian population in the area of Nablus is believed to be descended from Samaritans who converted to Islam, a process that continued well into the 19th century.[141] Traditions of Samaritan origins were recorded in the city of Nablus as well as villages in its vicinity, including Hajjah.[6][7][141][142] Several Palestinian Muslim families, including the Al-Amad, Al-Samri, Buwarda, and Kasem families, who defended Samaritans from Muslim persecution in the 1850s, were named by Yitzhak Ben Zvi as having Samaritan ancestry.[7] He further asserted that these families elders and priests had kept written records attesting to their Samaritan lineage.[7]
Many Palestinians referred to their Jewish neighbors as their awlâd ‘ammnâ or paternal cousins.[143] Under Ottoman rule, Palestinian Arabs distinguished between their compatriot Jews, whom they referred to as abna al-balad, ‘natives’, or yahūd awlâd ‘arab, ‘Arab-born Jews’, and recent Zionist immigrants.[144][145]
Mughrabi ancestry
Muslims of Moroccan descent settled in Jerusalem following the Reconquista in Spain in 1492; these Muslims were granted land by the Ottoman Empire, that became the Moroccan Quarter. Its people were called “Mughrabi” which means “Moroccan” in Arabic till the 20th Century. Many Palestinians carry the surname “Mughrabi” to this day.[citation needed]
Turkmen, Turkish and Kurdish ancestry
Turks in Palestine are a known group amongst Palestinians to this day, many of them pride on their Ottoman roots and are openly discussing their arrival to the Southern Levant. In 2014, many of the modern inhabitants of the Shujaya and A-Turkmen neighborhoods in Gaza stated that they were of Turkmen and Kurds in Palestine descents. The A-Turkmen neighborhood bears this name because of its people’s origin.[146]
Kurdish-descended Palestinians inhabit various locales, among them Ar-Rihiya (originally founded by Kurdish shepherds), Beit Hanoun, and the now depopulated Bayt Nuba.[101] Palestinians of Turkmen ancestry used to inhabit now depopulated villages such as Al-Ghubayya al-Fawqa, Al-Ghubayya al-Tahta, Al-Mansi and Abu Shusha.[101]
Others
Al-Sudania neighborhood in Gaza City, was inhabited by Sudanese migrants in the 20th Century, leading to its name. Some Gaza Strip residents are thus of Sudanese descent due to intermarriages, they live in Deir El-Balah, Al-Shati and Jabalia. Even the granddaughter of the former Sudanese sultan, Ali Dinar, is among them.[147][unreliable source?]
Families of Bosniak ancestry reside in Yanun, Nablus, and Tulkarm, and previously in Qisarya.[101]
The Ajami, Jaffa neighborhood was founded by Maronites who migrated there from Lebanon in the middle of the 19th Century,[148] to serve as a Christian enclave in the Sanjak of Jaffa.[citation needed]
Linguistics
Throughout the Roman and Byzantine eras, Aramaic emerged as the dominant language in Palestine, supplanting Hebrew, which ceased to be spoken around the 2nd century. Various dialects of Aramaic were spoken by communities such as Christians, Jews, Samaritans and pagans.[117] Following the Muslim conquest of the Levant by the Arab Muslim Rashiduns, the formerly dominant languages of the area, Aramaic and Greek, were gradually replaced by the Arabic language introduced by the new conquering administrative minority.[149] A steady language shift from Aramaic vernaculars to Arabic took place over a long period of time, with an extended period of bilingualism which lasted until the 12th century.[117][150][151] Arab tribes in Palestine, of both Yaman and Qays tribes, contributed to the acceleration of the shift to Arabic.[67]
Palestinian Arabic, like other Levantine Arabic dialects, is a mixture of Hejazi Arabic and ancient northern Arabic dialects spoken in the Levant before Islam, with a heavy Aramaic and Hebrew substrate.[117][152][119][153][154][155][68][156][157][79]
According to Bassal, Palestinian Arabic dialects contain layers of languages spoken in earlier times in the region, including Canaanite, Hebrew (Biblical and Mishnaic), Aramaic (particularly Western Aramaic), Persian, Greek, and Latin, indicating the impact of former peoples and civilizations on the linguistic profile on the region. As a result of the early modern period, Palestinian dialects came to be influenced by Turkish and European languages. Since the founding of Israel in 1948, Palestinian dialects have been significantly influenced by Modern Hebrew.[119] Over time, linguistics have identified a few substrate terms derived from Canaanite, Hebrew, and Aramaic that have persisted in contemporary vocabulary.[158][119]
In Palestinian historical discourse
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.[124][21][159]
Canaanism
During the 20th century, claims that Palestinians have direct genealogical connections to the ancient Canaanites, without an intermediary Israelite relationship, began to emerge from certain sections within Palestinian society and their followers. The Canaanites are often portrayed as Arabs, allowing the Palestinians to assert that they had lived in the region for a very long period, predating Israelite settlement. Aref al-Aref, in an effort to undermine Jerusalem‘s Jewish history and emphasize its Arab identity, linked the founding of the city to the “Arab” Jebusites, despite Hebrew Bible being the only extant ancient document that uses the name “Jebusite” to describe the pre-Israelite residents of Jerusalem[161][162] The claim of kinship with the Israelites, according to Bernard Lewis, allows to “assert a historical claim antedating the biblical promise and possession put forward by the Jews.”[124]
Following the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, Palestinian writer Mustafa Dabbagh published his book “Our Country Palestine” in which he attributed the first settled civilization in Palestine to the Banu-Can’an tribe, which he claimed was closely linked to the Amorites and Phoenicians, and asserted that all of them emigrated to the region from the Arabian Peninsula around 2500 BCE. In his book he claimed that the blend of the Canaanites and the Philistines, who migrated from the Greek islands around 1500 BCE, eventually formed the nucleus of the current Palestinian Arab population.[162]
Some Palestinian scholars, like Zakariyya Muhammad, have criticized arguments based on Canaanite lineage, or what he calls “Canaanite ideology”. He states that it is an “intellectual fad, divorced from the concerns of ordinary people.”[163] By assigning its pursuit to the desire to predate Jewish national claims, he describes Canaanism as a “losing ideology”, whether or not it is factual, “when used to manage our conflict with the Zionist movement” since Canaanism “concedes a priori the central thesis of Zionism. Namely that we have been engaged in a perennial conflict with Zionism—and hence with the Jewish presence in Palestine—since the Kingdom of Solomon and before … thus in one stroke Canaanism cancels the assumption that Zionism is a European movement, propelled by modern European contingencies…”[163]
Commenting on the implications of Canaanite ideology, Eric M. Meyers, a Duke University historian of religion, writes:
What is the significance of the Palestinians really being descended from the Canaanites? In the early and more conservative reconstruction of history, it might be said that this merely confirms the historic enmity between Israel and its enemies. However, some scholars believe that Israel actually emerged from within the Canaanite community itself (Northwest Semites) and allied itself with Canaanite elements against the city-states and elites of Canaan. Once they were disenfranchised by these city-states and elites, the Israelites and some disenfranchised Canaanites joined to challenge the hegemony of the heads of the city-states and forged a new identity in the hill country based on egalitarian principles and a common threat from without. This is another irony in modern politics: the Palestinians in truth are blood brothers or cousins of the modern Israelis — they are all descendants of Abraham and Ishmael, so to speak.[159]
According to Meir Litvak, the historical discourse regarding the origins of Palestinians has been significantly impacted by the attempt of Palestinian nationalism to establish itself as the dominant framework of identity among Palestinians, and to use origin ideas to counter Zionist arguments. Litvak notes that Palestinians felt compelled to engage in historiography to counter Jewish claims, aiming to demonstrate Palestine’s enduring Arab identity throughout history, from ancient times to the present day. Litvak suggests that Palestinian historiography, particularly in Arabic, is uncritical and lacks reflection, accepting only narratives that align with the national cause. He claims that established truths are rarely questioned, and evidence contradicting the national narrative is often disregarded or labeled as false or hostile. Academic standards regarding the use of historical evidence are seldom upheld in this context.[21]
In Zionist thinking
A number of pre-Mandatory Zionists, from Ahad Ha’am and Ber Borochov to David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Ben Zvi believed that the Palestinian peasant population as descended from the ancient biblical Hebrews, but this belief was disowned when its ideological implications became problematic.[163] Ahad Ha’am believed that, “the Moslems [of Palestine] are the ancient residents of the land … who became Christians on the rise of Christianity and became Moslems on the arrival of Islam.”[163] Israel Belkind, the founder of the Bilu movement also asserted that the Palestinian Arabs were the blood brothers of the Jews.[164] Ber Borochov, one of the key ideological architects of Marxist Zionism, claimed as early as 1905 that “[t]he Fellahin in Eretz-Israel are the descendants of remnants of the Hebrew agricultural community”,[165] believing them to be descendants of the ancient Hebrew and Canaanite residents “together with a small admixture of Arab blood”.[163] He further believed that the lack of a crystallized national consciousness among Palestinian Arabs would result in their likely assimilation into the new Hebraic nationalism.[163]
David Ben-Gurion and Yitzhak Ben Zvi, later becoming Israel’s first Prime Minister and second President, respectively, suggested in a 1918 book written in Yiddish that the fellahin are descended from ancient Jewish and Samaritan farmers, “Am ha’aretz” (People of the Land), who continued farming the land after the Jewish-Roman Wars and despite the ensuing persecution for their faith. While the wealthier, more educated, and more religious Jews departed and joined centers of religious freedom in the diaspora, many of those who remained converted their religions, first to Christianity, then to Islam.[166] They also claimed that these peasants and their mode of life were living historical testimonies to ancient Israelite practices described in the Hebrew Bible and the Talmud.[167] Ben Zvi stated in a later writing that “Obviously, it would be incorrect to claim that all fellahin are descended from the ancient Jews; rather, we are discussing their majority or their foundation”, and that “The vast majority of the fellahin are not descended from Arab conquerors but rather from the Jewish peasants who made up the majority in the region before the Islamic conquest”.[168]
In his book on the Palestinians, The Arabs in Eretz-Israel, Belkind advanced the idea that the dispersion of Jews out of the Land of Israel after the destruction of the Second Temple by the Roman emperor Titus is a “historic error” that must be corrected. While it dispersed much of the land’s Jewish community around the world, those “workers of the land that remained attached to their land,” stayed behind and were eventually converted to Christianity and then Islam.[164] He therefore, proposed that this historical wrong be corrected, by embracing the Palestinians as their own and proposed the opening of Hebrew schools for Palestinian Arab Muslims to teach them Arabic, Hebrew and universal culture.[164]
Tsvi Misinai, an Israeli researcher, entrepreneur and proponent of a controversial alternative solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, asserts that nearly 90% of all Palestinians living within Israel and the occupied territories (including Israel’s Arab citizens and Negev Bedouin)[169] are descended from the Jewish Israelite peasantry that remained on the land, after the others, mostly city dwellers, were exiled or left.[170] Irish theologian Michael Prior had a similar perspective on the Palestinians’ ancestry.[171]
According to Israeli historian Moshe Gil, in order to accept the theory of the Jewish origin of the Palestinians, it must be assumed that there was a mass conversion of Jews to Islam at some time, but according to him “there is no information in the sources – Jewish, Christian or Muslim – about a mass conversion of Jews to Islam in any place and at any time, unless it is a case of a forced conversion,” and in any case “there is no such information about the Land of Israel” and therefore “there is no reason to think that the Arabs of the Land of Israel were descendants of Jews”.[167]
Israeli statements that Palestinians are not indigenous
Statements that today’s Palestinians are genetically not indigenous to Palestine are spread by Israeli leaders and interest groups.
According to Palestinian poet Samih al-Qasim, Zionist arguments portray Palestinians as broadly Arab, de-emphasizing their specificity to Palestine.[21]
For example, in July 2019, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated: “A new study of DNA recovered from an ancient Philistine site in the Israeli city of Ashkelon confirms what we know from the Bible – that the origin of the Philistines is in southern Europe. … The Palestinians’ connection to the Land of Israel is nothing compared to the 4,000 year connection that the Jewish people have with the land.” Apparently unaware that the words Philistine and Palestinian share etymology but not meaning.[172] He later changed his implication from Palestinians being descended from southern Europeans to being descended from Peninsular Arabians: “There’s no connection between the ancient Philistines & the modern Palestinians, whose ancestors came from the Arabian Peninsula to the Land of Israel thousands of years later. The Palestinians’ connection to the Land of Israel is nothing compared to the 4,000 year connection that the Jewish people have with the land”.[173]
Individual authors have also argued that Palestinians are mostly descended from relatively recent Arab immigrants to Palestine. Notable among them was Joan Peters, who in 1984 published From Time Immemorial, in which she argued through the flawed use of statistics,[174] that Palestinians were largely descended from economic migrants from other Arabic-speaking countries who arrived in Palestine the late 19th and 20th centuries.[175][176]
Palestinian identity
Meaning of the word “Palestinian”
The term Palestinian has had two different meanings.[177][178]
Prior to 1948, the term “Palestinian” applied to people from Palestine, including Jews.[179]
In contemporary usage,[180] particularly since the creation of Israel on most of the territory of Mandatory Palestine in 1948 and the expulsion or flight of most Muslim and Christian Palestinians from that land, the terms “Palestinians” and “Palestinian people” are usually used to refer to the Levantine Arab (i.e. native Arabic- and historically Aramaic-speaking) people descended from the people who have lived in historic Palestine over the millennia with admixture of immigrants over that period.[181][182] This contemporary usage thus often implicitly excludes Palestinian Jews when describing ethnoreligious groups before 1948.
Emergence
The emergence of Palestinian identity is relatively recent, coming in the first decades of the 20th century, according to legal historian Assaf Likhovski,[183] though several scholars have traced it to as early as the mid-18th century.[184]
Philistine History
Philistine History
Caphtor (Hebrew: כַּפְתּוֹר Kaftōr) is a locality mentioned in the Bible, in which its people are called Caphtorites or Caphtorim and are named as a division of the ancient Egyptians.[1] Caphtor is also mentioned in ancient inscriptions from Egypt, Mari, and Ugarit.
According to the Bible, Caphtor is the original homeland of the Philistines. They are reported to have eradicated the Avvim prior to settling in Gaza. Genealogically, the Philistines are categorized as descendants of the Caphtorites within the table of nations. The Book of Jeremiah suggests that Caphtor is an island (“the isle of Caphtor”), but the term might alternatively refer to a seashore.[2]
Traditionally, Caphtor has been linked to Crete and associated with Egyptian Keftiu or Akkadian Kaptara.[2][3] Jewish sources placed Caphtor in the region of Pelusium. Contemporary research has challenged the link with Crete, proposing alternative locations such as Cyprus or Cilicia.[3][2]
Jewish accounts
The Caphtorites are mentioned in the Table of Nations, Book of Genesis (Genesis 10:13–14) as one of several divisions of Mizraim (Egypt). This is reiterated in the Books of Chronicles (1 Chronicles 1:11–12) as well as later histories such as Josephus‘ Antiquities of the Jews i.vi.2,[4] which placed them explicitly in Egypt and the Sefer haYashar 10 which describes them living by the Nile. A migration of the Philistines from Caphtor is mentioned in the Book of Amos (Amos 9:7).
Josephus, (Jewish Antiquities I, vi)[4] using extra-Biblical accounts, provides context for the migration from Caphtor to Philistia. He records that the Caphtorites were one of the Egyptian peoples whose cities were destroyed during the Ethiopic War.
Tradition regarding the location of Caphtor was preserved in the Aramaic Targums and in the commentary of Maimonides which place it at Caphutkia in the vicinity of Damietta[5] (at the eastern edge of the Nile delta near classical Pelusium). This view is supported by the tenth century biblical exegete Saadia Gaon,[6] and by Benjamin of Tudela, the twelfth-century Jewish traveller from Navarre, who both wrote that Damietta was Caphtor.[7][8]
The Midrash Rabbah on Genesis 37:5 (page 298 in the 1961 edition of Maurice Simon’s translation) says that the “Caphtorim were dwarfs”.[9]
In archaeological sources
Mari Tablets
A location called Kaptar is mentioned in several texts of the Mari Tablets and is understood to be reference to Caphtor. An inscription dating to c. 1780-1760 BCE mentions a man from Caphtor (a-na Kap-ta-ra-i-im) who received tin from Mari. Another Mari text from the same period mentions a Caphtorite weapon (kakku Kap-ta-ru-ú). Another records a Caphtorite object (ka-ta-pu-um Kap-ta-ru-ú) which had been sent by king Zimrilim of the same period, to king Shariya (king) of Razama. A text in connection with Hammurabi mentions Caphtorite (k[a-a]p-ta-ri-tum) fabric that was sent to Mesopotamia via Mari. An inventory thought to be from the same era as the previous texts mentions a Caphtorite vessel (GAL kap-ta-ri-tum) (probably a large jug or jar).[3]
Ras Shamra Texts
An Akkadian text from the archives of Ugarit (modern Ras Shamra, Syria) contains a possible reference to Caphtor: it mentions a ship that is exempt from duty when arriving from a place whose name is written with the Akkadian cuneiform signs KUR.DUGUD.RI. KUR is a determinative indicating a country, while one possible reading of the sign DUGUD is kabtu, whence the name of the place would be Kabturi, which resembles Caphtor.
Within Ugaritic inscriptions from the Amarna period, k-p-t-r is mentioned and understood to be Caphtor: A poem uses k-p-t-r as a parallel for Egypt (H-k-p-t) naming it as the home of the god Kothar-wa-Khasis the Ugaritic equivalent of the Egyptian god Ptah.[3] Prior to the discovery of the reference to H-k-p-t scholars had already considered the possibility of iy Caphtor found in Jeremiah being the Semitic cognate of “Egypt”.[10]
Egyptian inscriptions
The name k-p-t-ȝ-r is found written in hieroglyphics in a list of locations in the Ptolemaic temple of Kom Ombo in Upper Egypt and is regarded as a reference to Caphtor.
The reference to k-p-t-ȝ-r should not be confused with other inscriptions at the temple and from earlier sites mentioning a locality called Keftiu listed amongst lands to the northeast of Egypt and having different spelling and pronunciation, although it has been conjectured by some scholars that this is also a reference to Caphtor.[3] Attempts to identify Caphtor with Keftiu go back to the 19th century [11][12][13] and argue that r changed to y in the Egyptian language.[14] However the name k-p-t-ȝ-r more closely resembling “Caphtor” is from the (late) Ptolemaic era and still has the “r” and references to “Keftiu” occur separately at the same site. Those arguing for the identification suggest that k-p-t-ȝ-r is an Egyptian transliteration of the Semitic form of the name and that “Keftiu” is the true Egyptian form.[3] Sayce had however already argued in the 19th century that the names in the text in which k-p-t-ȝ-r occurs were not transliterations of the Semitic forms. Other scholars have disagreed over whether this can be said for the occurrence of k-p-t-ȝ-r.[3]
The equation of Keftiu with Caphtor commonly features in interpretations that equate Caphtor with Crete, Cyprus, or a locality in Anatolia. Jean Vercoutter in the 1950s had argued, based on an inscription of the tomb of Rekhmire that Keftiu could not be set apart from the “islands of the sea” which he identified as a reference to the Aegean Sea. However in 2003, Claude Vandersleyen pointed out that the term wedj wer (literally “great green”) which Vercoutter had translated “the sea” actually refers to the vegetation growing on the banks of the Nile and in the Nile Delta, and that the text places Keftiu in the Nile Delta.[15]
This issue is not settled though. In Caphtor / Keftiu: a New Investigation, John Strange argues that the late geographical lists referenced in the preceding paragraph cannot be taken at face value, as they appear to be “random” collections of antique place names, and contain other corruptions and duplicates.[16]
Translation
The targumim translate Caphtor into Aramaic as Kaputkai, Kapudka or similar i.e. Caphutkia explained by Maimonides as being Damietta on the coastland of Egypt.[5][7][17]
Referencing Katpatuka, the Septuagint translated the name as “Kappadokias” and the Vulgate similarly renders it as “Cappadocia”. The seventeenth-century scholar Samuel Bochart[18] understood this as a reference to Cappadocia in Anatolia but John Gill writes that these translations relate to Caphutkia.[7]
Modern identifications
From the 18th century onwards commentators attempted several identifications of Caphtor which increasingly disregarded the traditional identification as an Egyptian coastal locality in the vicinity of Pelusium. These included identification with Coptus, Colchis, Cyprus, Cappadocia in Asia Minor, Cilicia, and Crete.
The identification with Coptus is recorded in Osborne’s A Universal History From The Earliest Account of Time,[19] where it is remarked that many suppose the name to have originated from Caphtor. While this interpretation agrees with tradition placing Caphtor in Egypt it disregards the tradition that it was a coastland (iy rendered island in some Bible translations) and more precisely Caphutkia; and this contradiction is noted in Osborne. It is now known that the name Coptus is derived from Egyptian Gebtu [20] which is possibly not associated with the name Caphtor.
Egyptian kftı͗w (conventionally vocalized as Keftiu) is attested in numerous inscriptions.[21] The 19th-century belief that Keftiu/Caphtor was to be identified with Cyprus or Syria[22] shifted to an association with Crete under the influence of Sir Arthur Evans. It was criticized in 1931 by G. A. Wainwright, who located Keftiu in Cilicia, on the Mediterranean shore of Asia Minor,[23] and he drew together evidence from a wide variety of sources: in geographical lists and the inscription of Tutmose III‘s “Hymn of Victory”,[24] where the place of Keftiu in lists appeared to exist among recognizable regions in the northeasternmost corner of the Mediterranean, in the text of the “Keftiuan spell” śntkppwymntrkkr, of ca 1200 BCE,[25] in which the Cilician and Syrian deities Tarku (the Hittite sun god), Sandan (the Cilician and Lydian equivalent of Tarku),[26] and Kubaba were claimed,[27] in personal names associated in texts with Keftiu and in Tutmose’s “silver shawabty vessel of the work of Keftiu” and vessels of iron, which were received as gifts from Tinay in northern Syria. Wainwright’s theory is not widely accepted, as his evidence shows at most a cultural exchange between Keftiu and Anatolia without pinpointing its location on the Mediterranean coast.
In 1980 J. Strange drew together a comprehensive collection of documents that mentioned Caphtor or Keftiu. He writes that crucial texts dissociate Keftiu from “the islands in the middle of the sea”, by which Egyptian scribes denoted Crete.[28]
The stone base of a statue during the reign of Amenhotep III includes the name kftı͗w in a list of Mediterranean ship stops prior to several Cretan cities such as Kydonia, Phaistos, and Amnisos, showing that the term clearly refers to the Aegean.[29]
Philistine, one of a people of Aegean origin who settled on the southern coast of Palestine in the 12th century bce, about the time of the arrival of the Israelites. According to biblical tradition (Deuteronomy 2:23; Jeremiah 47:4), the Philistines came from Caphtor (possibly Crete, although there is no archaeological evidence of a Philistine occupation of the island). The first records of the Philistines are inscriptions and reliefs in the mortuary temple of Ramses III at Madinat Habu, where they appear under the name prst, as one of the Sea Peoples that invaded Egypt about 1190 bce after ravaging Anatolia, Cyprus, and Syria. After being repulsed by the Egyptians, they settled—possibly with Egypt’s permission—on the coastal plain of Palestine from Joppa (modern Tel Aviv–Yafo) southward to Gaza. The area contained the five cities (the Pentapolis) of the Philistine confederacy (Gaza, Ashkelon [Ascalon], Ashdod, Gath, and Ekron) and was known as Philistia, or the Land of the Philistines. It was from this designation that the whole of the country was later called Palestine by the Greeks.
The Philistines expanded into neighbouring areas and soon came into conflict with the Israelites, a struggle represented by the Samson saga (Judges 13–16) in the Hebrew Bible. Possessing superior arms and military organization, the Philistines were able (c. 1050 bce) to occupy part of the Judaean hill country. The Philistines’ local monopoly on smithing iron (I Samuel 13:19), a skill they probably acquired in Anatolia, was likely a factor in their military dominance during this period. They were finally defeated by the Israelite king David (10th century), and thereafter their history was that of individual cities rather than of a people. After the division of Judah and Israel (10th century), the Philistines regained their independence and often engaged in border battles with those kingdoms.
The first nonbiblical reference to the Philistines after their settling on the Palestinian coast is in the annals of the Assyrian king Adad-nirari III (810–782), who boasted of having collected tribute from Philistia. By the early part of the 7th century, Gaza, Ashkelon, Ekron, Ashdod, and probably Gath were vassals of the Assyrian rulers; during the second half of that century, the cities became Egyptian vassals. With the conquests of the Babylonian king Nebuchadrezzar II (605–562) in Syria and Palestine, the Philistine cities became part of the Neo-Babylonian empire. In later times they came under the control of Persia, Greece, and Rome.
There are no documents in the Philistine language, which was probably replaced by Canaanite, Aramaic, and, later, Greek. Little is known of the Philistine religion; the Philistine gods mentioned in biblical and other sources such as Dagan, Ashteroth (Astarte), and Beelzebub, have Semitic names and were probably borrowed from the conquered Canaanites. Until their defeat by David, the Philistine cities were ruled by seranim, “lords,” who acted in council for the common good of the nation. After their defeat, the seranim were replaced by kings.
There are no documents in the Philistine language, which was probably replaced by Canaanite, Aramaic, and, later, Greek. Little is known of the Philistine religion; the Philistine gods mentioned in biblical and other sources such as Dagan, Ashteroth (Astarte), and Beelzebub, have Semitic names and were probably borrowed from the conquered Canaanites. Until their defeat by David, the Philistine cities were ruled by seranim, “lords,” who acted in council for the common good of the nation. After their defeat, the seranim were replaced by kings.
Judgment on Israel’s Enemies
Zec 9:1 The burden of the Word of Jehovah against the land of Hadrach, and its resting-place, Damascus (when the eye of man, and all the tribes of Israel, shall be toward Jehovah);
Zec 9:2 and Hamath also borders on it; Tyre and Sidon, though very wise.
Zec 9:3 And Tyre shall build herself a stronghold, and shall heap up silver like the dust, and gold like the mud of the streets;
Zec 9:4 behold, the Lord will cast her out, and He will strike her wealth in the sea, and she shall be burned up with fire.
Zec 9:5 Ashkelon shall see and fear; Gaza also shall writhe in great pain; and Ekron shall be ashamed for her hope. And the king shall perish from Gaza, and Ashkelon shall not be inhabited.
Zec 9:6 And a bastard shall dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines.
As we have now seen by each of these other reports, the Palestinians are a mixed race of people, which is what Mamzer or bastard means. But this bastard character would suit Alexander very well, who most certainly was a bastard; for his mother Olympia said that Jupiter Ammon entered her apartment in the shape of a dragon and begat Alexander! Could her husband Philip believe this? The word signifies a stranger.
Zec 9:7 And I will take away his bloods out of his mouth, and his idolatries from between his teeth. But the remnant, even he, shall be for our God. And he shall be as a governor in Judah, and Ekron like a Jebusite.
WHAT! The Palestinians are going to be for Yehovah? And they will be like the Jebusites and a governor in Judah? WHAT?
Zechariah is telling us that the Palestinians will begin to remove the unkosher food from their mouths, turn their eye toward Yehovah, and become integrated into Judah. If you look at the news today and the slaughter on October 7, 2023, you would never have guessed this outcome, and yet there it is, waiting to be fulfilled.
As we keep reading this seems to happen just before our Messiah comes. In other words now in our time we will see a significant change. Not more talk of a two-state solution, but one of Israel absorbing them into Israeli society. NOW THAT WOULD BE A HUGE MIRACLE.
Zec 9:8 And I will camp around My house because of an army, because of him who passed by, and because of him who returns. And no tyrant shall pass through them any more. For now I have seen with My eyes.
The Coming King of Zion
Zec 9:9 Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold, your King comes to you. He is righteous and victorious, meek and riding on an ass, even on a colt, the son of an ass.
Zec 9:10 And I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim, and the horse from Jerusalem. And the battle bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace to the nations; and His dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.
Zec 9:11 You also, by the blood of Your covenant I have freed Your prisoners out of the pit in which is no water.
Zec 9:12 Turn to the stronghold, prisoners of hope; even today I declare that I will return to you double.
Zec 9:13 For I have bent Judah for me as a bow; I filled it with Ephraim, and I will stir up your sons, O Zion, against your sons, O Greece, and make you as the sword of a mighty man.
The Lord Will Save His People
Zec 9:14 And Jehovah shall be seen over them, and His arrow shall go forth like the lightning; and the Lord Jehovah shall blow the ram’s horn, and shall go out with the windstorms of the south.
Zec 9:15 Jehovah of Hosts shall defend them; and they shall devour and trample the slingstones. And they shall drink and be boisterous, as through wine. And they shall be filled like a bowl, and like the corners of the altar.
Zec 9:16 And Jehovah their God shall save them in that day as the flock of His people; for they are as stones of a crown, lifted up as a banner over His land.
Zec 9:17 For how great is its goodness and how great its beauty! Grain shall make the young men flourish, and new wine the virgins.
On Saturday, January 27, 2025, President Trump said he would ask Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi to take in the Palestinian people. He said he would do the same thing with Jordan’s King Abdullah.
“I’d rather get involved with some of the Arab nations and build housing at a different location where they can maybe live in peace for a change,” Trump said to reporters aboard Air Force One on Saturday.
“You’re talking about probably a million and a half people, and we just clean out that whole thing and say, ‘You know, it’s over,’” he added.
I have read this over several times and sent it to my believer friend. Thank you.
Joe mentioned many times in the past that the people who first settled in the Greek Isles were from the Tribe of Dan, who left Egypt before the time of Moses. Perhaps the ancestry of the Philistines is the Tribe of Dan?
Me being from the greek island of Chios: despite my 5 centuries of provable ancestry there, attributing me to tribe of Dan is beyond human certainty.
Is there a reason why none looks for the flax in bloom..ex 9-31. it was in bloom. it’s a little blue flower.altjo there mite be other types and color..but been looking at the Jewish calendar..Adar correspond to Feb March..could the answer been right in front of us this whole time..also another thing I have been looking at this year was the death of lazarus. In John 11-9 which was just a few days before passover and his death..Christ said something about 12 hrs in a day .that only happens twice a year hrs march and Sept..thanks