Walid Khalidi
وليد خالدي
Historian and founder of the Institute for Palestine Studies
Palestinian historian whose documentary works, above all *All That Remains*, preserved the record of the villages emptied in 1948.
Walid Khalidi was born in Jerusalem in 1925 into a family of scholars, and educated at the University of London and Oxford. He taught at Oxford and then, from 1957 to 1982, at the American University of Beirut, before spending his later career as a senior research associate at Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies. In 1963 he co-founded the Institute for Palestine Studies in Beirut — the first independent research institute of its kind in the Arab world — and remained its honorary general secretary.
Writing from the 1950s onward, long before Israeli archives were opened, Khalidi documented the depopulation of Palestine in 1948, including his early study of Plan Dalet. His edited volume All That Remains (1992) recorded, village by village, the more than four hundred Palestinian communities occupied and depopulated that year. He died in March 2026, aged one hundred.
Key works
- From Haven to Conquest (editor, 1971)
- Before Their Diaspora: A Photographic History of the Palestinians, 1876–1948 (1984)
- All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948 (editor, 1992)
Sources
Further reading
An external biography or archive holding more on this life than the entry above.
Connected in the archive
28 connected records28 records elsewhere in the archive are linked to this one, each by a piece of evidence you can read below.
born in — 1 record
- Jerusalemالقدس
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: birthplace: "Jerusalem, Palestine" → Jerusalem (Jerusalem Governorate)
names this person — 16 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Abu Shushaأبو شوشة
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: …The 1992 field research of Walid Khalidi, carried by both PalQuest and Palestine Remembered, described the only remaining sign of the village as the debris of houses, overgrown with cactuses; the grain mill was gone; olive trees grew in a…
- Al-Kabriالكابري
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Walid Khalidi, inspecting the site in 1992, found crumbled walls and stone rubble overgrown with thorns, weeds, and bushes; the village cemetery and the springs remain.
- Al-Masmiyya al-Saghiraالمسمية الصغيرة
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Palestine Remembered's table estimated 3,776 refugees from the village as of 1998. The 1992 field research carried by PalQuest and Zochrot, drawing on Walid Khalidi's All That Remains, found that virtually no trace of the village remained and that the site was overgrown with weeds, tall grasses, and a scattering of eucalyptus trees; the reached sources do not establish their condition in 2026.
- Al-Sawafir al-Sharqiyyaالسَوافِير الشرقية
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The site description reproduced by PalQuest and Palestine Remembered comes from Walid Khalidi's All That Remains, published in 1992.
- Al-Sindiyanaالسنديانة
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Walid Khalidi, visiting in 1992, found the site fenced in with barbed wire: scattered piles of stones, the debris of destroyed houses, visible among thorns, cactuses, and fig, olive, and palm trees, with the surrounding lands used as grazing area.
- Barbaraبربرة
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Two settlements were built on village lands: Mavqi'im, established on 12 January 1949 just south of the village — with the stated purpose, according to Walid Khalidi's account, of preventing the villagers' return — and Talmey Yafe in 1950; Ge'a, also from 1950, stands close by on the lands of neighboring al-Jiyya.
- and 10 more
named in this record — 3 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: His edited volume All That Remains (1992) recorded, village by village, the more than four hundred Palestinian communities occupied and depopulated that year.
- Plan Dalet
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Writing from the 1950s onward, long before Israeli archives were opened, Khalidi documented the depopulation of Palestine in 1948, including his early study of Plan Dalet.
- Plan Dalet
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Writing from the 1950s onward, long before Israeli archives were opened, Khalidi documented the depopulation of Palestine in 1948, including his early study of Plan Dalet.
on a related subject — 8 records
Filed near each other — the same Mandate district, or the same uncommon subject tags.
- Adel Mannaعادل مناع
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Shared tags: "history", "Nakba".
- Ilan Pappéإيلان بابيه
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Shared tags: "history", "Nakba".
- Nur Masalhaنور مصالحة
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Shared tags: "history", "Nakba".
- Rashid Khalidiرشيد خالدي
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Shared tags: "history", "Nakba".
- Visualizing Palestine
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Shared tags: "history", "Nakba".
- A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Shared tag: "history".
- and 2 more
Cite this page
Every claim above carries its sources — citation is the point.
- Chicago
“Walid Khalidi.” Figures, FALASTEEN.AI. Accessed 22 August 2026. https://falasteen.ai/figures/walid-khalidi.- MLA
“Walid Khalidi.” Figures, FALASTEEN.AI, 2026, https://falasteen.ai/figures/walid-khalidi. Accessed 22 August 2026.- BibTeX
@misc{falasteen-walid-khalidi, title = {Walid Khalidi}, howpublished = {\url{https://falasteen.ai/figures/walid-khalidi}}, organization = {FALASTEEN.AI — A Living Archive for Palestine}, year = {2026}, note = {Accessed 2026-08-22} }