Palestinian Arabic or simply Palestinian is a dialect continuum of mutually-intelligible varieties of Levantine Arabic spoken by Palestinians, indigenous to the Palestine region, which includes the states of Palestine and Israel. It is also spoken by the Palestinian diaspora.
The Arabic dialects spoken in the region of Palestine and Transjordan do not form a homogeneous linguistic unit; rather, they encompass a diverse range of dialects influenced by geographical, historical, and socioeconomic factors. Comparative studies of Arabic dialects indicate that Palestinian Arabic is among the closest dialects to Modern Standard Arabic, particularly the dialect spoken in the Gaza Strip. Additional distinctions can be made within Palestinian Arabic, such as the dialects spoken in the northern West Bank and the Hebron area, which exhibit similarities to those spoken by descendants of Palestinian refugees.
Palestinian Arabic dialects reflect a historical layering of languages previously spoken in the region, including Canaanite, Ancient Hebrew (both Biblical and Mishnaic), Aramaic (especially Western Aramaic), Persian, Greek, and Latin. Furthermore, during the early modern period, these dialects were influenced by Turkish and various European languages. Since the establishment of Israel in 1948, Palestinian Arabic has also been shaped by Modern Hebrew influences.
History Prior to their adoption of the Arabic language from the seventh century onwards, most of the inhabitants of Palestine spoke varieties of Palestinian Aramaic (Jewish, Christian, and Samaritan) as a native language. Koine Greek was used among the Hellenized elite and aristocracy, and Mishnaic Hebrew for liturgical purposes.
The Negev desert was under the rule of the Nabatean Kingdom for the greater part of Classical antiquity, and included settlements such as Mahoza and Ein-Gedi where Judean and Nabatean populations lived in alongside each other, as documented by the Babatha archive which dates to the second century. The earliest Old Arabic inscription most resembling of Classical Arabic is found in Ayn Avadat, being a poem dedicated to King Obodas I, known for defeating the Hasmonean Alexander Jannaeus. Its date is estimated between 79 and 120 CE, but no later than 150 CE at most.
The Nabataeans tended to adopt Aramaic as a written language as shown in the Nabataean language texts of Petra, as well as a Lingua Franca. Nabatean and Palestinian Aramaic dialects would both have been thought of as “Aramaic”, and almost certainly have been mutually comprehensible. Additionally, occasional Arabic loanwords can be found in the Jewish Aramaic documents of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The adoption of Arabic among the local population occurred most probably in several waves. After the Early Muslim Arabians took control of the area, so as to maintain their regular activity, the upper classes had to quickly become fluent in the language of the new rulers who most probably were only few. The prevalence of Northern Levantine features in the urban dialects until the early 20th century, as well as in the dialect of Samaritans in Nablus (with systematic imāla (vowel raising) of ) tends to show that a first layer of Arabization of urban upper classes could have led to what is now the Urban Levantine variety. A subsequent phenomenon would have been the slow countryside shift of Aramaic-speaking villages to Arabic under the influence of Arabized elites, leading to the emergence of the rural Palestinian dialects. This scenario is consistent with several facts.
The rural forms can be correlated with features also observed in the few Syrian villages where use of Aramaic has been retained up to this day. Palatalisation of (but of too), pronunciation of for instance. Note that the first also exists in Najdi Arabic and Gulf Arabic, but is limited to palatal contexts ( followed by i or a). Moreover, those Eastern dialects have or for . The less-evolutive urban forms can be explained by a limitation owed to the contacts urban trader classes had to maintain with Arabic speakers of other towns in Syria or Egypt. The Negev Bedouin dialect shares a number of features with Bedouin Hejazi dialects (unlike Urban Hejazi).
Features
The dialects spoken by Arabic-speakers in the Eastern Mediterranean, form a group known as Levantine Arabic. Arabic manuals for the "Syrian dialect" were produced in the early 20th century,Crow, F.E., Arabic manual: a colloquial handbook in the Syrian dialect, for the use of visitors to Syria and Palestine, containing a simplified grammar, a comprehensive English and Arabic vocabulary and dialogues, Luzac & co, London, 1901 and in 1909 a specific "Palestinian Arabic" manual was published in Jerusalem for Western travelers.
Palestinian Arabic is a variant of Levantine Arabic because its dialects display characteristic Levantine features: A conservative stress pattern, closer to Classical Arabic than anywhere else in the Arab world. The indicative imperfect with a b- prefix A very frequent Imāla of the feminine ending in front consonant context (names in -eh). A realisation of in the cities, and a realisation of by the Druze, and more variants (including ) in the countryside. A shared lexicon
The noticeable differences between southern and northern forms of Levantine Arabic, such as Syrian Arabic and Lebanese Arabic, are stronger in non-urban dialects. The main differences between Palestinian and northern Levantine Arabic are as follows:
Phonetically, Palestinian dialects differ from Lebanese regarding the classical diphthongs and , which have simplified to and in Palestinian dialects as in Western Syrian, while in Lebanese they have retained a diphthongal pronunciation: and . Palestinian dialects differ from Western Syrian as far as short stressed and are concerned: in Palestinian, a more or less open and pronunciation is retained, and not neutralised to as in Syrian. The Lebanese and Syrian dialects are more prone to imāla of than the Palestinian dialects. For instance, 'winter' is in Palestinian, but in Lebanese and Western Syrian. Some Palestinian dialects ignore imāla totally (e.g. Gaza). Those dialects that prominently demonstrate imāla of (e.g. Nablus) are distinctive. The plural personal pronouns are 'we'; , 'they'; 'you'; 'them' in Palestinian. This is in contrast to in Syria/Lebanon, where they are 'we'; 'they'; 'you'; 'them'. The variants 'you', 'them', and / 'they' are also used in Northern Palestinian. The conjugation of the imperfect 1st and 3rd person masculine has different prefix vowels. Palestinians say 'I write' 'I see'; whereas Lebanese and Syrians say and , respectively. In the 3rd person masculine, Palestinians say 'He writes' where Lebanese and Western Syrians say . Hamza-initial verbs commonly have an prefix sound in the imperfect in Palestinian. For example, Classical Arabic has 'to eat' in the perfect tense, and with sound in the first person singular imperfect. The common equivalent in Palestinian Arabic is in the perfect, with imperfect 1st person singular (with the indicative prefix.) Thus, in the Galilee and Northern West Bank, the colloquial for the verbal expression, "I am eating" or "I eat" is commonly / , rather than as used in the Western Syrian dialect. Note however that or even are used in the South of Palestine. The conjugation of the imperative is different too. 'Write!' is in Palestinian, but , with different stress and vowel and length, in Lebanese and Western Syrian. For the negation of verbs and prepositional pseudo-verbs, Palestinian, like Egyptian, typically suffixes on top of using the preverb negation , e.g. 'I don't write' is in Palestinian, but in Northern Levantine (although some areas in southern Lebanon utilise the suffix). However, unlike Egyptian, Palestinian allows for without the preverb negation /ma/ in the present tense, e.g. . In vocabulary, Palestinian is closer to Lebanese than to Western Syrian, e.g. 'is not' is in both Lebanese and Palestinian (although in a few villages and , which are found in Maltese and North African dialects, are used) while it is in Syrian; 'How?' is in Lebanese and Palestinian while it is in Syrian (though is also used). However, Palestinian also shares items with Egyptian Arabic, e.g. 'like' (prep.) is in Palestinian in addition to , as found in Syrian and Lebanese Arabic.
There are also typical Palestinian words that are shibboleths compared to other Levantine Arabic dialects: The usage of 'thing, something', as opposed to in Lebanon and Syria as an indefinite pronoun. Instead of the common Levantine 'now', Central Rural dialects around Jerusalem and Ramallah use (although is used in some cities such as Tulkarm, Hebron, and Nablus alongside (both from ) and northern Palestinians use , , and (from ). Villagers in the southern West Bank also use or (both from ) Some villagers use (meaning 'remained' in MSA) as a verb to be alongside the standard ( in MSA)
Social and geographic dialect structuration As is very common in Arabic-speaking countries, the Arabic dialect spoken by a person depends on both the region of origin, and socio-economic class. The hikaye, a form of women's oral literature inscribed to UNESCO's list of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Palestine, is recited in both the urban and rural dialects of Palestinian Arabic.
Urban varieties The Urban ('madani') dialects resemble closely northern Levantine Arabic dialects, that is, the colloquial variants of western Syria and Lebanon. This fact, that makes the urban dialects of the Levant remarkably homogeneous, is probably due to the trading network among cities in Ottoman Syria, or to an older Arabic dialect layer closer to the North Mesopotamian Arabic (the 'qeltu dialects").
Urban dialects are characterised by the (hamza) pronunciation of qaf, the simplification of interdentals as dentals plosives, i.e. as , as and both and as . In borrowings from Modern Standard Arabic, these interdental consonants are realised as dental sibilants, i.e. as , as and as but is kept as ; this pattern is similar if not quite identical to the pattern of Egyptian Arabic. The urban dialects also ignore the difference between masculine and feminine in the plural pronouns is both 'you' (masc. plur.) and 'you' (fem. plur.), and is both 'they' (masc.) and 'they' (fem.)
Druze have a dialect that may be classified with the Urban ones, with the difference that they keep the uvular pronunciation of qaf as .
Sephardi variety
As Sephardic Jews were expelled after the conclusion of the Reconquista, they established communities in Ottoman Palestine in Jerusalem and Galilee under the invitation of Sultan Bayezid II. Their Maghrebi Judeo-Arabic dialect mixed with Palestinian Arabic. It peaked at 10,000 speakers and thrived alongside Yiddish among Ashkenazis until the widespread adoption of Modern Hebrew among the Yishuv following its revival in the late 19th century.
Today it is nearly extinct, with only 5 speakers remaining in the Galilee. It contained influence from Judeo-Moroccan Arabic and influence Judeo-Lebanese Arabic and Judeo-Syrian Arabic.
Rural varieties Rural ('fallahi') variety is retaining the interdental consonants, and is closely related with rural dialects in Southern Lebanon and the sedentary population east of the Jordan river. They keep the distinction between masculine and feminine plural pronouns, e.g. is 'you' (masc.) while is 'you' (fem.), and is 'they' (masc.) while is 'they' (fem.). The three rural groups in the region are the following:
North Galilean rural dialect – does not feature the > palatalization, and many of them have kept the realisation of (e.g. Maghār, Tirat Carmel). In the very north, they announce dialect that is more closely to the Northern Levantine dialects with n-ending pronouns such as 'you', 'them' (Tarshiha, etc.).