The Hundred Years' War on Palestine

with Rashid Khalidi

hosted by Zeinab Azarbadegan

| In this episode, Rashid Khalidi discusses his latest book The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017, where he defines Zionism not only as a nationalist project in conflict with the Palestinian one, but also a settler colonial project supported by the British and later the American imperialism. We begin in the late Ottoman period as Khalidi examines the familiar episodes and key turning points, which he characterizes as declaratations of war and wagings of war on Palestinians. We discuss the 1917 Balfour declaration and the communal conflict in the British Mandate of Palestine that led to the general strike and Arab revolt of 1936. The 1948 war, the Palestinian Nakba, and the creation of the State of Israel provide the backdrop for Cold War period conflicts, the rise of the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the outbreak of the First Intifada, which culminated in the Oslo Accords of 1993-95. Khalidi reflects on his experiences with the failures of Oslo, which set the stage for the rise of Hamas in Gaza and periodic sieges that have continued to the present day. We conclude with a consideration of the current war, situating the unprecedented civilian toll of both the attacks by Hamas in Israel and the subsequent Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip within Khalidi's larger narrative of more than a century of war on Palestine.  

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In this episode, Rashid Khalidi discusses his latest book The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017, where he defines Zionism not only as a nationalist project in conflict with the Palestinian one, but also a settler colonial project supported by the British and later the American imperialism. We begin in the late Ottoman period as Khalidi examines the familiar episodes and key turning points, which he characterizes as declaratations of war and wagings of war on Palestinians. We discuss the 1917 Balfour declaration and the communal conflict in the British Mandate of Palestine that led to the general strike and Arab revolt of 1936. The 1948 war, the Palestinian Nakba, and the creation of the State of Israel provide the backdrop for Cold War period conflicts, the rise of the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the outbreak of the First Intifada, which culminated in the Oslo Accords of 1993-95. Khalidi reflects on his experiences with the failures of Oslo, which set the stage for the rise of Hamas in Gaza and periodic sieges that have continued to the present day. We conclude with a consideration of the current war, situating the unprecedented civilian toll of both the attacks by Hamas in Israel and the subsequent Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip within Khalidi's larger narrative of more than a century of war on Palestine.

Contributor Bios

	Rashid Khalidi is the Edward Said Professor of Modern Arab Studies at Columbia University and the author of eight books, including, most recently, The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine (2020). He also served as an advisor to Palestinian negotiators during peace talks in the 1990s.
	Zeinab Azarbadegan is a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at University of Oxford. Her research focuses on the intersection of inter-imperial relations and history of science, technology, and medicine, in nineteenth century Ottoman Iraq

Credits

Episode No. 553
Release Date: 19 November 2023
Sound production by Zeinab Azarbadegan and Chris Gratien
Sound Elements: Life for Arabs and Jews in the British Mandated territory (1936); Yasser Arafat: Extrait du discours devant l’Assemblée générale de l’ONU, le 13 novembre 1974; Bisan Owda (wizard_bisan1) on Instagram
Special thanks to Andy Guess, Heidi Hansen, and Sarina Kuersteiner

Further Listening

	Beshara Doumani	170 8/15/14	Writing the History of Palestine and the Palestinians
	Salim Tamari	367 7/17/18	The Great War and the Remaking of Palestine
	Laura Robson	389 11/1/18	Transfer and Partition in the Middle East
	Sherene Seikaly	206 10/30/15	Men of Capital in Mandate Palestine
	Lauren Banko	272 10/16/16	Nationality and Citizenship in Mandate Palestine
	Shay Hazkani	515 11/29/21	Dear Palestine
	Shira Robinson	273 10/20/16	Both Citizens and Strangers in Post-1948 Israel
	Gershon Shafir	344 2/5/18	A Half Century of Occupation
	Rochelle Davis	203 10/14/15	Palestinian Village Histories
	Greg Thomas	366 7/11/18	George Jackson in the Sun of Palestine

Images

Yusuf Dia Pasha al-Khalidi , elected from Jerusalem to the first Ottoman Parliament of 1877, where he was an active member of the opposition; mayor of Jerusalem in 1899. Interactive Encyclopedia of Palestine Question

A page of the letter Yusuf Diya sent to Theodor Herzl. Central Zionist Archives


The spokesperson for the Arab Higher Commission lays out the reasons and demands for the Palestinian general strike, 1936


Yasser Arafat's 1974 "Olive Branch" speech before the United Nations

Further Reading

Visualizing Palestine 101

Baconi, Tareq. 2018. Hamas Contained: The Rise and Pacification of Palestinian Resistance. Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Halperin, Liora R. 2021. The Oldest Guard: Forging the Zionist Settler Past. Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Hazkani, Shay. 2021. Dear Palestine: A Social History of the 1948 War. Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Heller, Daniel Kupfert. 2019. Jabotinsky's Children: Polish Jews and the Rise of Right-Wing Zionism. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Katz, Ethan, Lisa Moses Leff, and Maud Mandel. 2017. Colonialism and the Jews. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 

Khalidi, Rashid. 2020. The Hundred Years' War on Palestine : A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance 1917-2017 First ed. New York: Metropolitan Books Henry Holt and Company.

Nassar, Maha. 2017. Brothers Apart : Palestinian Citizens of Israel and the Arab World. Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Robinson, Shira. 2013. Citizen Strangers: Palestinians and the Birth of Israel's Liberal Settler State. Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Robson, Laura. 2017. States of Separation: Transfer Partition and the Making of the Modern Middle East. Oakland California: University of California Press.

Ṣabbagh-Khoury, Areej. 2023. Colonizing Palestine: The Zionist Left and the Making of the Palestinian Nakba. Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Shafir, Gershon. 2017. A Half Century of Occupation: Israel, Palestine, and the World's Most Intractable Conflict. Oakland California: University of California Press. 

Shlaim, Avi. 2009. Israel and Palestine: Reappraisals, Revisions, Refutations. London: Verso.

Stamatopoulou-Robbins, Sophia. 2020. Waste Siege: The Life of Infrastructure in Palestine. Stanford California: Stanford University Press.

Swedenburg, Ted. 2003. Memories of Revolt: The 1936-1939 Rebellion and the Palestinian National Past. Fayetteville Ark: University of Arkansas Press.