The Palestinian Society in the Wake of the 1948 War: From Social Fragmentation to Consolidation

Abstract

THE REPERCUSSIONS OF THE 1948 War between Arab states and Israel created deep social, demographic, and political crises within Palestinian society: two major products of war were refugee problem and Arab-Israeli conflict. Moreover, Palestinians were left without responsible leadership that both Palestinians and Arab states could accept as representative. or as a geo-political entity vanished from map of Middle East. The Eastern part of Palestine, which was occupied by Arab Legion, was formally annexed to TransJordan in April 195o and called West Bank of Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. The other part of Palestine, which was occupied by Egypt, was not annexed to Egypt, but was called Gaza Strip or officially the Palestinian land under control of Egyptian Army. At Arab League Council in March I959, Egypt initiated notion of revival of Palestinian entity. In September 1963, Arab League Council nominated Ahmad al-Shuqayri as Filastin representative at Council instead of Ahmad Hilmi, who had died in June of that year. It was only in January 1964, however, that first Arab summit's decisions on Palestinian entity paved way for Ahmad al-Shuqayri to establish Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) in June 1964. The PLO was designed to represent Palestinians and symbolize their politicalnational issue rather than Palestinian refugee problem.1 The year 1959 witnessed three important Palestinian phenomena. In October 1959, organizational structure of Fatah organization was established in a meeting of its founders.2 In same year organ of Fatah, monthly Filastinuna, was published in Beirut and, in November,