The majority of the population of the State of Palestine and Palestinians write in the Arabic language and use a Palestinian Arabic dialect for daily communication. The Palestinian Basic Law designates Arabic as the official language of the state, of legislation, administration, and the courts, though several other languages are also used in the educational sphere, both presently and historically. There are minority language groups, and this, in addition to fairly widespread general knowledge of English and/or Modern Hebrew, as well as the diglossic nature of Arabic, means multilingualism is common.
Multilingualism and diglossia are longstanding features of the linguistic atmosphere historically-speaking as well, especially among elite and educated classes. The region's location as a crossroads ruled by various empires who brought different languages of administration and people to oversee and inhabit the land throughout its history, has contributed to its rich linguistic profile. The influence of the Aramaic language in particular, which was used as both a lingua franca and a koine in Palestine and the wider region for some 1500 years (c. 7th/6th centuries BC – 9th/10th centuries CE) can be seen in the Palestinian Arabic dialects spoken by the majority of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza and beyond.
The Palestinian Arabic vernacular is also part of a continuum of mutually intelligible dialects known as Levantine or "Syro-Palestinian" Arabic that each contain several subtypes that can cross-cut political boundaries (as with the urban, or Levantine Bedawi Arabic subtypes), but can also be entirely unique (as in the case of localized village dialects). Further, in its broadest definitions, the historical territory of the region of Palestine now lies in multiple countries, and the Palestinian people themselves have been dispersed by the partition of Palestine and the Nakba, making cross-border linguistic analysis essential to understanding the languages' development and variation.
Historical overview
Reviewing some of the history of language use and development in Palestine is essential to understanding its current linguistic profile. This history stretches back to very beginnings of written language, and includes several ancient Semitic languages. Of relevance here is the process by which the region of Palestine went from being a predominantly Aramaic-speaking population to an Arabic-speaking one, which took place by means of a gradual language shift over several centuries following the Muslim conquest of Syria, and included phases of Aramaic-Arabic (and Aramaic-Hebrew) bilingualism, both before and afterward. By the 2nd century CE, Old Hebrew had ceased to be a spoken language, though its biblical form continued to used in liturgical practice.
Ancient varieties of Arabic, such as Ancient North Arabian, were already in use among some of the inhabitants of Palestine centuries prior to the Muslim conquest. The Nabataeans, for example, whose kingdom (c. 3rd century BC - 106 CE) extended into the south of Palestine were speakers of both Nabataean Aramaic and Nabataean Arabic, a form of Old Arabic, which they transcribed using a modified Imperial Aramaic script, that eventually birthed the Arabic alphabet. One of the oldest examples of Arabic poetry was transcribed in Nabataean script and discovered in Ein Avdat in the Negev. Following the annexation of their kingdom and its incorporation into the Roman province of Arabia Petraea (and later Palaestina Salutaris), bilingual Greek-Nabataean inscriptions proliferate, as Koine Greek replaced Aramaic as the lingua franca and koine.
Diglossia and multilingualism have therefore long been a feature of the Palestinian linguistic landscape, and that of the Ancient Near East in general, particularly among the elite classes. In Byzantine and Umayyad-era Nessana, for example, the Arabic-speaking population left behind papyri composed in Greek, Syriac, Arabic and Latin. Late phase bilingualism in the gradual language shift from Aramaic to Arabic is readily apparent in the texts composed by Palestinian Christian scholars in the 9th and 10th centuries in a form of Middle Arabic classified as Ancient South Palestinian, which were often translations of Syriac or Greek biblical/liturgical texts, and even when originally composed in Arabic reveal a strong Aramaic/Syriac substratum (see also Christian Palestinian Aramaic). Another distinctive form of Middle Arabic is Samaritan Arabic, which emerged from within the last indigenous community in Palestine to complete the language shift, the Samaritans, for whom Arabic became their dominant and perhaps sole vernacular only in the 11th century, using Samaritan Aramaic (and Samaritan Hebrew) today largely for liturgical/textual purposes.
Other ancient languages that influenced Arabic and contemporary Palestinian Arabic (and Levantine Arabic) dialects are Canaanite, Classical Hebrew (Biblical and Mishnaic), Persian, Classical Greek (Koine) and Latin. In the modern era, as a result of centuries of Ottoman rule (1516-1917), European interventions, and the Mandate for Palestine, components of the Turkish language, as well as English, French, German and Italian have also been incorporated into the Arabic language and common speech. Additionally, as a result of Zionist immigration and the establishment of Israel, Modern Hebrew, revived as part of the Zionist project, has imprinted upon the general linguistic environment.
Languages
While Arabic is the primary and dominant language in use in the State of Palestine, other languages are known and used by many, due to their use in educational institutions and workplaces, or as a result of immigration, tourism, and travel. Primary among these, as in the case in much of the world, is knowledge of English, and this is especially true of younger generations due to their use of social media. In addition, there is exposure to and some knowledge of modern Hebrew, as well as European languages like French, Spanish, German and Italian. There are also languages used or spoken by small minority communities who have inhabited Palestine for several generations, or even millennia, such as Samaritan, Armenian, Assyrian, Abyssinian, and Coptic, though use of these languages is generally restricted to their respective communities who are centered in cities like Nablus, the Old City of Jerusalem and Bethlehem, and in some cases is largely confined to liturgical purposes.
Official status and language policy The Palestinian Basic Law designates Arabic as the official language of the State of Palestine, and Arabic is the language of legislation, administration, and the courts. The New Palestinian Curriculum instituted following the Oslo Accords (which granted the newly formed Palestinian National Authority control over education in the Occupied Palestinian Territories), includes an internationally oriented approach to language instruction. Arabic language instruction remains the main focus to maintain communication with the countries of the region, for which Arabic is also the primary language of communication. However, there is also a focus on English instruction, as an international language of communication, as well as Modern Hebrew, in order to be able to address the reality of required interaction with Israel.
Arabic and Palestinian Arabic
Arabic is a diglossic language, whereby there is a "high" or standard form (closely related to the Classical Arabic of the Quran) used primarily for writing, and various "low" or colloquial forms used to communicate in daily life. This diglossic use of two different varieties of the same general language group has been characterized as a kind of bilingualism.
The spoken form used by Palestinians is Palestinian Arabic which is a Levantine dialect that cannot be fully understood within modern political borders alone. Typically, 'national' varieties of Arabic are characterized by internal diversity with several sub-varieties, or what scholars have termed "ecolinguistic" varieties, of three main types: urban, rural (fellahi), and Bedouin (badawi). Urban varieties are associated with major cities such as Jerusalem, Hebron, Nablus, Gaza City, and Ramallah, and share much in common with the urban Levantine Arabic varieties spoken in Syrian and Lebanese cities, as well as Palestinians urban-dwellers elsewhere in the region. Bedouin dialects, which are closer to those of Arabia are spoken among Palestinian bedouin communities, especially in the southern West Bank and Gaza, and among Galilee and Negev Bedouins and those of Sinai, Egypt and beyond. Rural dialects spoken in villages are the most localized, diverse, and unique, with some retaining very conservative and classical elements, while others deviate exhibiting patterned changes from classical pronunciation in selected phonemes. Speakers of Palestinian Arabic are religiously diverse and include Muslims, Druze, Samaritans, Jews, and Christians of various denominations.
The continued influence and use of Aramaic in the Palestinian Arabic spoken today is most obvious upon the vocabulary used in villages in the Galilee in what is now the north of Israel; however, there are also grammatical constructions used both there, and among Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, such as the use of la as an object marker ("e.g. Smi 'tu la-axük ? (did you hear your brother?)"), a usage extant in Arabic translations of the Peshitta, the Syriac version of Bible. There is also some Aramaic vocabulary influence that is not localized, that relates to agriculture and household items tied to ancient practices. For example, the term dafūra, which is used to describe the first figs to ripen, instead of the more general terms for figs tīn. In the Jewish Aramaic Mishnah texts it is used to refer to trees that bear fruit twice a year, and can be used in Palestinian Arabic to refer to the first harvest of a biseasonal crop as well, though the more common meaning was for the first ripe figs. Many of these terms are becoming less commonly used as Palestinians of the younger generations lose their lived connection to land and traditional practices.
Armenian
Armenian is a significant minority language in Palestine, as Armenians have inhabited in the region since the 4th century AD, considered to be one of the oldest Armenian communities outside of Armenia. Their presence slowly and steadily increased throughout the Early Islamic period, as members of their community came to perform pilgrimages and ended up staying, as attested in multiple references to Armenian churches and monasteries in textual sources from the 9th and 10th centuries. Around 2,000-3,000 Armenians lived in Palestine circa World War I, with the population peaking at over 10,000 prior to the 1948 war. The headquarters of the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem is based in the Old City of Jerusalem, and the majority of Armenians in Palestine reside in the Armenian Quarter, but historically have also lived in Haifa, Jaffa, and Nazareth, with a small Armenian community also in Ramallah. Currently, the Jerusalem-Armenian population has declined, reducing the amount of Armenian speakers in their communities and greater region.
Assyrian/Syriac
The Assyrian/Syriac community in Palestine is centered in Bethlehem and are primarily descendants of Assyrians or Syriac Christians who came to perform pilgrimage in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and decided to stay or were unable to return to their home villages in the region due to Sayfo. The initial arrivals spoke dialects of Surayth, a Central Neo-Aramaic language, associated with their home villages (like Azech). With time, their use of these village dialects has receded, and the majority predominantly use Arabic for daily life, though many of the elders continue to converse in Surayth and consume media in that language.