HIST 258B Final, Fall 2007

HISTORY 258B FINAL EXAMINATION JANUARY 2008 TIME; TWO HOURS INSTRUCTIONS: Answer any two (2) of the following questions. 1) 2) 3) 4) 5) Analyze the political and socio-economic causes which contributed to the outbreak of the Great Arab Revolt in Palestine (1936-1939). Next, examine its impact upon, as well as its short and long term consequences for, the two communities which constituted Palestine at the time. Compare and contrast the Arab and Jewish economies as they evolved during Palestine’s mandatory period, examining and accounting for the structural socio- economic disparities (= differences, gap) that existed between them. In the course of a single decade, various British Governments issued no less than three papers relating to mandatory Palestine: the Passfield White Paper, the Peel Commission Report and the 1939 White Paper. In the three instances, examine the conditions that led to their issuance, their content and recommendations and the reaction to them by the two principal communities which were vying for the control of mandatory Palestine at the time. Conclude your answer by considering what these papers tell us about British policies and intentions vis-a-vis mandatory Palestine and its Arab population. Examine in depth the internal and external factors which led to Arab Palestine’s 1948 catastrophe (a/-nakba). The following personalities were dominant in the politics of mandatory Palestine: Musa Kazim al-Husayni, Izz al-Din al-Qassam, Hajj Amin al-Husayni and Raghib al-Nashashibi. Examine the foundations on which they erected their prominence, compare and contrast their political role and, on that basis, describe the nature, strengths and limitations, of Arab politics and the Arab nationalist movement in mandatory Palestine.