Elite Composition and Socio-Political Correlations: Age, Foreign Travel and Writings of the Jewish Political Elite During the British Mandate over Palestine (Other Papers) (Essay‪)‬

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND Over many centuries, Palestine, nowadays the land including Israel, the West Bank of the Jordan and the Gaza Strip, or parts of it, was under the rule for different lengths of time by various regimes: those of the Canaanites, Arabians, Israelite-Jewish, Philistines, Phoenicians and Romans. By A.D. 640, Palestine had come under the rule of the Muslim Arabs, who originated in the Arabian Peninsula. Before the advent of Islam in the early 7th century and during the Islamic rule, a considerable number of Arabians moved to live in Palestine. Between 1099 and 1291, Palestine was ruled by the Crusaders. The Crusaders rule was ended in 1291 by the Muslim Mamelukes, whose seat of power was Cairo. The Mameluke rule came to an end in 1516 with the conquest of Palestine by the Ottoman Turks. The Ottoman rule continued until the end in 1917-18, when the Allied Forces occupied the Holy Land.