Before 1948: The Forgotten Peoples Who Called Palestine Home - 13mn documentary

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We create videos about ancient civilizations and historical mysteries and forgotten empires! We create a daily dose of untold history.
Here at History Tapestry, We aim to create top quality videos about world history, historical stories, ancient cultures, lost civilizations, historical mysteries in educational content and historical documentaries! Our goal is to focus on providing our audience with the hidden stories and the historical lessons that is going on in the world of human history.

Before examining the modern Israel Palestine conflict—before 1948, the Six-Day War, the Intifadas, Hamas, or the Oslo Accords—we must journey back 5,000 years to discover the forgotten peoples who first called this land home. This history documentary explores the ancient Canaanites who built cities like Jericho and Megiddo, the Philistines who settled Gaza, and the early Israelites who formed the Kingdom of Israel and Kingdom of Judah centered in Jerusalem. We trace biblical narratives while examining archaeological evidence of diverse peoples—Moabites, Edomites, Phoenicians—who shared the Land of Israel throughout ancient history, practicing Judaism, Christianity, and Islam as empires transformed the region.

Through detailed archaeology and anthropology, we reveal how Assyrian deportations, Babylonian destruction, Persian rebuilding, Greek Hellenistic influence, Roman conquest (renaming to Syria Palaestina), Byzantine transformation, Arab Islamic expansion, Crusader wars, and Ottoman millet system governance shaped the region across the early medieval period and early middle ages. Palestine became home to a remarkable mosaic: Muslim Arabs, Christian Arabs, Jewish communities of the Old Yishuv, Armenians, and countless others living side by side in world history. This ancient history documentary reveals untold history of coexistence—Sephardi scholars in Safed, Christian families in Beit Jala, Muslim merchants in Jerusalem's markets. Understanding these 5,000 years of layered civilizations is essential context for today's headlines—this is history time that matters for learning our shared past.

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SOURCES & REFERENCES
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● Herodotus and the name “Palestinian Syria / Palaistinē”
Herodotus, Histories (transl. A.D. Godley), passages referring to “Syria which is called Palestine”; University of Chicago—LacusCurtius. Penelope
ToposText, “Palaestina, ancient region… (Herodotus refs).” ToposText

● Roman renaming Judaea → Syria Palaestina
Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Roman Palestine.” Encyclopedia Britannica

● Amarna correspondence (vassal letters from Canaan)
Izre’el, Shlomo. “The Amarna Letters from Canaan,” in J. Sasson (ed.), Civilizations of the Ancient Near East (1995) [PDF]. tau.ac.il
“El-Amarna Correspondence,” RB–ECS (overview). Biblical and Early Christian Studies

● Tell es-Sakan (EB I–III; Egyptian & Canaanite phases)
BAS Library, The New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land: “Sakan, Tell es–…”. The BAS Library
Israel Antiquities/Israeli Archaeology, “The Bronze Age” (noting Egyptian center at Tel es-Sakan). מכון ישראלי לארכיאולוגיה

● Philistines’ origins (ancient DNA)
Feldman, M. et al. (2019). “Ancient DNA sheds light on the genetic origins of early Iron Age Philistines.” Science Advances 5(7): eaax0061. Science+1

● Early Israelites: markers are not exclusive
Bloch-Smith, E. (2003). “Israelite Ethnicity in Iron I: Archaeology Preserves What Is Remembered and What Is Forgotten.” Journal of Biblical Literature 122(3): 401–425. blogs.bu.edu

● Assyrian deportation/resettlement policy (incl. Samaria)
Squitieri, A. (2024). “Assyrian conquest and ruralization.” Levant (open-access article). Tandfonline
UChicago ORACC, “Mass deportation: the Assyrian resettlement policy.” oracc.museum.upenn.edu
Radner, K. (2018). “The ‘Lost Tribes of Israel’ in the Context of the Resettlement Programme of the Assyrian Empire,” in BZAW 511. epub.ub.uni-muenchen.de

● Babylonian destruction & post-destruction continuity
UNC Charlotte (2019). “Evidence of the 587/586 BCE Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem found on Mount Zion.” Inside UNC Charlotte


● Persian policy & the Cyrus Cylinder (nuanced link to Judah)
Biblical Archaeology Society, “The Cyrus Cylinder” (context and modern debates). Biblical Archaeology Society

● Ottoman ‘millet system’ Braude, B. & Lewis, B. (eds.). Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire (Abridged Edition). Boulder/London: Lynne Rienner, 2014. rienner.com

● Old Yishuv (four holy cities) National Library of Israel, “The Old Yishuv.” nli.org.il
Kaniel, Y. “Old vs New Yishuv” (overview PDF). ismi.emory.edu

● Safed & Lurianic Kabbalah Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Isaac ben Solomon Luria.” Encyclopedia Britannica