Palestinian Nationalism, Religious (Un)claims, and the Struggle against Zionism

Abstract

This chapter examines religious claims and aspects within Palestinian nationalism from the time of the British Mandate to the present. Since such endeavor necessitates an engagement with Zionism, the chapter starts by refuting a common misperception that seeks to equate Palestinian nationalism with Zionism in the latter’s use of religion to attain its political ends. The distinctions between the two regarding their “use” of religion can be conceptualized on the basis of two guiding notions: functionality and centrality of religion and/or religious claims in either respective projects. Each uses religion differently in terms of the purpose (function), and the assigned place (centrality) within the subsequent discourse and practice. The conceptualization of these two notions is offered in this chapter as a framework for analysis in discussing the specific case of Palestinian nationalism. In undertaking the analysis of the Palestinian national movement over more than a century, the chapter is divided into three parts: the decades of the British Mandate; the decades that followed the creation of Israel up through the late 1980s; and finally the decades where Palestinian Islamism has become an integral part of the Palestinian national project – from the emergence of Hamas in December 1987 to the present.