The Palestinian Nakba - ’The Nakba ‘Catastrophe

Political awareness in Palestine emerged early, and this consciousness was evident during the Ottoman Empire period. Palestine had a role within the Ottoman Empire, with representatives from its people in the Council of Deputies, which was established following the issuance of the constitution. Representatives such as Rouhi Al-Khaldi, Saeed Al-Husseini, Hafiz Al-Saeed represented the Jerusalem district, while Sheikh Ahmed Al-Khamash represented the Acre district.

Palestinian intellectuals played a crucial role in confronting colonization policies and countering Jewish immigration to their homeland. They founded approximately 117 organizations and political parties to express their opinions and defend their national rights. Many of these organizations were closely linked to regional and Arab issues

Britain extended its military control over the Palestinian territories in late 1918, marking the beginning of the British Mandate over Palestine. The administrative divisions in Palestine comprised two phases:

First Phase: The administrative and geographical division in 1922 included the Southern District, consisting of four districts; the Jerusalem-Jaffa District, comprising six districts; the Nablus District, encompassing four districts; and the Northern District, including five districts.

Second Phase: In 1939, Britain restructured the administrative divisions in the Palestinian territories, establishing six districts: the Galilee District, encompassing five districts; the Haifa District, comprising two districts; the Nablus District, including three districts; the Jerusalem District, consisting of three districts; the Jaffa District, including two districts; and the Gaza District, comprising two districts.

 The industrial activity in Palestine before the catastrophe was accompanied by increased commercial activity in major cities such as Jerusalem, Jaffa, and Haifa. This was supported by a national banking system led by the Arab Bank. Some of the key industries in Palestine before 1948 were:

• Oil and soap.
• Pottery.
• Copper.
• Fishing nets.
• Waterworks.
• Dairy and cheese factories.
• Cigarette manufacturing.
• Sulfur.
• Textiles.
• Paper.
• Cement.

Contrary to Zionist propaganda, Palestinians were the backbone of agricultural production in the country. They cultivated and farmed the land to extract its resources. By the end of the British Mandate, the total area cultivated by Palestinian farmers, excluding citrus farms, was approximately 5,484,700 dunams, while the 300 Jewish colonies could only manage to cultivate around 425,450 dunams. These figures affirm that it was the Palestinians who cultivated the desert, not the Jews. The total land area in the Negev Desert under Jewish ownership did not exceed 11,000 dunams, whereas Palestinians planted grains (wheat and barley) in the same desert on an area exceeding 2.11 million dunams. (From the Ottoman period and through the early years of the British Mandate for Palestine, the size of a dunam was 919.3 square metres (9,895 sq ft), but in 1928, the metric dunam of 1,000 square metres (0.10 ha) was adopted, and this is still used.

The beginnings of Palestinian cinema date back to the 1930s. It started as an individual initiative by some individuals who acquired cinematic equipment and began filming.

Among the pioneers was Ibrahim Hassan Sirhan, who, in 1935, filmed a 20-minute movie about Abdul Aziz Al Saud's visit to Palestine and his movement between Lod and Jaffa.

He also made a narrative film titled "Realized Dreams" (in collaboration with Jamal Al-Asfar) and a documentary about Arab League member Ahmed Helmi Abdel Baqi. Following these beginnings, Ibrahim Sirhan established the Palestine Studio and produced a narrative film titled "Storm in a House," as well as some short advertising films, until he fled to Jordan in 1948.

In 1945, three Palestinians, including Ahmed Al-Kilani who studied film directing and cinematography in Cairo, established the Arab Film Production Company. In 1946, Salah Al-Din Badr Khan directed the first Palestinian narrative film titled "Night Dreams," which was screened in Jerusalem, Jaffa, Amman, and other countries.

Mohammed Al-Kiyali, who studied cinema in Italy, worked on producing short films in the forties. After his return, he collaborated with the Arab League office, which assigned him to produce a film about the Palestinian cause, but it was not completed due to the Nakba. In 1969, he produced a lengthy narrative film titled "Three Operations in Palestine."

The Palestinians have been very focused on science and education. Before the Nakba, Palestinian schools were divided into three types: Government, Private Arab, and Private Foreign Schools. Government Schools had the highest number compared to other types of schools.

During the period between the World Wars, Palestine had a total of 48 newspapers, including 12 dailies. Most of these newspapers were issued in the city of Jaffa (17 newspapers), followed by Jerusalem (15 newspapers), and then Haifa (9 newspapers), where the oldest local newspapers, Al-Karmel and Al-Nafir, were published in 1908.

Palestinian newspapers encompassed cultural, commercial, and political objectives. At times, they embodied a family economic project, as seen in the newspaper "Palestine," where many members of the Al-Eissa family worked.

The Palestinian newspapers can be divided into three main groups according to their periods of publication. The first group was established toward the end of the Ottoman era and continued thereafter. Prominent among them were the Haifa-based Al-Karmel weekly, the Jaffa-based daily Filastin, and the semi-weekly Mirror of the Holy East and Haifa's Al-Zuhur.

The second group emerged in the mid-1920s against the backdrop of increased political activities due to the British mandate in the country and the emergence of Hajj Amin al-Husseini as the Mufti and head of the Supreme Islamic Council. Notable among these were the oppositional daily Al-Sirat Al-Mustaqim and the Arab University, which was close to the Mufti.

The third group was established by Arab journalists who migrated to Palestine and other Arab countries, such as Al-Aqdam and Al-Yarmouk.

These newspapers were published with varying page counts—some comprised eight large pages, while others appeared in 16 small-sized pages, determined by financial conditions and paper availability.

The Palestinian pound was the currency used in Palestine before the Israeli occupation in 1948, as the Palestinians knew in the years that lasted between 1917 and 1927 during the British Mandate, the Egyptian pound.

 Therefore, since then, they have called money (Masary) as it’s part of (Masr) which means egypt in arabic and they have been calling money (Masary) in their colloquial accent, but after 1948, the Israeli lira became used within the green line areas. The Jordanian dinar was the main currency in the Palestinian areas in the West Bank, while the Egyptian pound was the main currency circulating in the Gaza Strip. In 1980, the government of Mehine Begin issued its instructions to cancel the use of the Israeli pound and approve the shekel as the official currency.

The matter continued until 1967, when Israel continued its occupation of the rest of the Palestinian territories in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, where the circulation of the Israeli lira was imposed on the Palestinians in the West Bank, along with the Jordanian dinar, while the Palestinians of the Strip traded alongside the Egyptian pound.

In 1969, the Israeli Knesset legally approved the difference in the use of the shekel currency unit indicative of the lira. The use of the lira remained approved in the financial and banking circles until February 24, 1980, when the Minister of Finance Simha Ehrlig in the government of Menachem Begin issued his instructions to cancel the use of the Israeli lira and approve the shekel as the official currency. The reason for abandonment of the lira was strange because they discovered that the currency does not bear a Hebrew name and thus it turned into the shekel currency.

The shekel currency unit remained in use in Israel between 1980 and 1985 when it was replaced by a new monetary unit under the new shekel name. Since May 1998, the shekel has become an internationally tradeable currency and its annual inflation arerator revolves around 2-3%.