Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness
Rashid Khalidi
The book that answered the claim that Palestinian identity was invented in reaction to Zionism, by tracing where it actually came from — the late Ottoman press, the Mandate, and the peasantry.
The claim that Palestinian national identity is a recent invention — that it was manufactured in opposition to Israel and has no history of its own — is old, and it is still made. Palestinian Identity is the scholarly answer to it, and it does not answer by asserting the opposite. It goes and finds where the identity came from.
Khalidi works across the periods in which it formed: late Ottoman Palestine, the years of early Zionist settlement, and the rupture after the First World War. He follows three strands together — the resistance of a peasantry defending its land, the debates of an emerging intelligentsia, and the political circumstances that pressed on both — and shows them combining into a distinct national identity. What emerges is that religious attachment, Ottoman and Arab loyalties, local patriotism and a sense of Palestine were held simultaneously rather than in sequence, and that the identity was already articulate long before 1948 gave it its wound.
The 2010 reissue carries a new introduction in which Khalidi looks at what that identity has survived since, and argues that what exists on the ground is a de facto one-state arrangement that is inequitable and unstable — while stopping short of predicting where it goes.
About the author
Rashid Khalidi was born in New York in 1948 to a Jerusalem family. He is Edward Said Professor Emeritus of Modern Arab Studies at Columbia University, a former president of the Middle East Studies Association, and editor of the Journal of Palestine Studies. He advised the Palestinian delegation at the Madrid and Washington talks between 1991 and 1993. His other books include The Iron Cage and The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine, both also in this library.
Details
- First published by Columbia University Press, 1997
- Reissued with a new introduction, Columbia University Press, 2010 — 352 pages
- ISBN 9780231150750 (paperback); 9780231150743 (hardcover); 9780231521741 (ebook)
Where to find it
- In print from Columbia University Press, and orderable through any independent bookshop or library.
The edition
Support a local independent bookseller or your library first. The publisher’s page is given for the edition and its details.
Connected in the archive
11 connected records11 records elsewhere in the archive are linked to this one, each by a piece of evidence you can read below.
named in this record — 3 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Rashid Khalidiرشيد خالدي
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Rashid Khalidi was born in New York in 1948 to a Jerusalem family.
- The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: He advised the Palestinian delegation at the Madrid and Washington talks between 1991 and 1993. His other books include The Iron Cage and The Hundred Years' War on Palestine, both also in this library.
- The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: He advised the Palestinian delegation at the Madrid and Washington talks between 1991 and 1993. His other books include The Iron Cage and The Hundred Years' War on Palestine, both also in this library.
names this record — 2 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Palestinians did not exist before 1948 — they are an invented people
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: …Rashid Khalidi's Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness (Columbia University Press, 1997) traces Palestinian identity to well before the First World War, rooted in attachment to a recognized country whose…
- The Khalidi familyالخالدي
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: - Rashid Khalidi (b. 1948) — historian, Edward Said Professor Emeritus at Columbia University, author of Palestinian Identity and The Hundred Years' War on Palestine.
on a related subject — 6 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", "Ottoman Palestine".
- A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Shared tag: "history".
- Avi Shlaimأفي شلايم
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Shared tag: "history".
- Palestine: A Four Thousand Year History
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Shared tag: "history".
- Ten Myths About Israel
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Shared tag: "history".
- The Gun and the Olive Branch: The Roots of Violence in the Middle East
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Shared tag: "history".
Cite this page
Every claim above carries its sources — citation is the point.
- Chicago
“Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness.” Library, FALASTEEN.AI. Accessed 22 August 2026. https://falasteen.ai/library/palestinian-identity/.- MLA
“Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness.” Library, FALASTEEN.AI, 2026, https://falasteen.ai/library/palestinian-identity/. Accessed 22 August 2026.- BibTeX
@misc{falasteen-palestinian-identity, title = {Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness}, howpublished = {\url{https://falasteen.ai/library/palestinian-identity/}}, organization = {FALASTEEN.AI — A Living Archive for Palestine}, year = {2026}, note = {Accessed 2026-08-22} }