Britain's Pacification of Palestine

The British Army, the Colonial State, and the Arab Revolt, 1936–1939

Matthew Hughes

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9781107103207
• eBook ISBN:
  9781108752428
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: History

In this complete military history of Britain's pacification of the Arab revolt in Palestine, Matthew Hughes shows how the British Army was so devastatingly effective against colonial rebellion. The Army had a long tradition of pacification to draw upon to support operations, underpinned by the creation of an emergency colonial state in Palestine. After conquering Palestine in 1917, the British established a civil Government that ruled by proclamation and, without any local legislature, the colonial authorities codified in law norms of collective punishment that the Army used in 1936. The Army used 'lawfare', emergency legislation enabled by the colonial state, to grind out the rebellion. Soldiers with support from the RAF launched kinetic operations to search and destroy rebel bands, alongside which the villagers on whom the rebels depended were subjected to curfews, fines, detention, punitive searches, demolitions and reprisals. Rebels were disorganised and unable to withstand the power of such pacification measures.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title
• Series information
• Title page
• Frontispiece
• Copyright information
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Table of contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations and Glossary
• Nomenclature
• 1 Framing the Arab Revolt
• 2 The Emergency State in Mandate Palestine
• 3 Rebels and Revolt
• 4 From Insurgency to Banditry
• 5 The Regiments Arrive
• 6 Screwing Down the Population
• 7 Collaboration and Intelligence
• 8 Dirty Wars and Extra-judicial Violence
• Afterword
• Appendix A: Order of Battle
• Appendix B: Casualties
• Appendix C: Women and Violence
• Appendix D: Sartorial Wars
• Appendix E: Dramatis Personae and Membership of the Arab Higher Committee
• Appendix G: The Escapes of al-Qawuqji and Hajj Amin
• Bibliography
• Index