The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine

The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917-2017 (2020) by Rashid Khalidi is what Gareth Smyth calls a “stunning example of narrative history and academic rigor.”

Zionists criticize Rashid Khalidi as a quack, a liar, and a fake, but academics hail him as the most authoritative historian on the subject of Palestine. The author, Khalidi, is a Palestinian American author and historian with degrees from Yale and Oxford, and he retired from teaching at Columbia University in 2024. In the late 70s and early 80s, he was an assistant professor at the American University in Beirut, where he endured the 1982 Lebanon War and Israel’s bombing of Beirut.

His previous books, Palestinian Identity (1997), and The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood (2006), are noteworthy as well, but The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine is a unique blend of personal narrative and historical perspective. His family’s narrative begins in the Ottoman Empire, then in Mandatory Palestine, and ends under the state of Israel, and the historical narrative begins with Balfour Declaration of 1917 and chronicles the colonization and the Arab-Israeli Wars.

Even for rigorous scholars of the subject, this book may provide new historical information through the unique perspective of Rashid Khalidi’s own lived experiences, especially living through the Israeli siege of Beirut in 1982.

Readers who are new to the subject will learn from Khalidi’s work, and even more to learn from the extensive citations in the bibliography. The book is an essential piece of literature on Palestinian history, with a glimpse into Lebanese history as it intertwines with Palestine.

Critics claim that Khalidi is biased, therefore lacking credibility, regardless of his 58-year academic career and tenure at the prestigious Columbia University. As a Palestinian who has directly suffered because of Israel’s actions, one could not expect Khalidi to be impartial. He condemns Israel and its western allies harshly but also describes the failings of the Palestinian leadership and condemns terrorist attacks on civilians.

Those who criticize his credibility point to the fact that he has cited information directly from his family members and his own lived experiences, as if people’s experiences are innately incredulous. Discrediting people for writing about their experiences during war or a genocide is extremely bad faith, it erases the value of the first-person experience for every survivor everywhere, not just of Palestinian ones.

One self-proclaimed Zionist Israeli author and historian, Benny Morris, has criticized Khalidi for his book, leading other Zionists to cite Morris’ critical article in Jewish Review of Books to discredit Khalidi. Interestingly, Morris began as a critic of Israel but turned to a supporter, even believing that the 1948 Nakba was necessary and justifiable, and he attributed that shift to the events of 2000, in the Second Intifada.

Morris and others claim that there are inaccuracies in Khalidi’s book, they point to his argument that Israeli is a settler-colonial project, and to the unbalanced nature of the book which highlights Israel’s aggression.

Another critic is Hussain Abdul-Hussain, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a pro-Israel, anti-Iran, neoconservative, thinktank and lobbying organization in Washington DC. He wrote a Substack article about Khalidi’s book, claiming that the book is riddled with errors and the author oversimplified and did not understand the complexities of history. He offers no citations for his “corrections,” and also seems to oversimplify the history.

Everybody who is genuinely interested in learning about Palestine has something to gain from reading The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine. Do not disregard the book based on criticism from those who actively participate in or benefit from the colonization, genocide, or oppression of Palestinians.