Abstract: Most histories dealing with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict treat it as if it emerged following the issuing of the Balfour Declaration in 1917, and the subsequent occupation by Great Britain. However, this dissertation, by examining Ottoman, Arabic, and Hebrew documents, will demonstrate that it is necessary to go back to the late Ottoman period to understand the historical developments of the British mandate. In fact, this dissertation will argue that following the Young Turk Revolution of 1908, the Palestinians began to place a greater importance on their local identity, and Palestinian notables began to adopt the cause of peasants, creating a unique Palestinian identity. Through the Haram al-Sharif Incident of 1911, in which a British archaeological team was accused of stealing treasures from under this holy compound, this work will show how the Palestinians from all over the land, united as one community in attempt to protect the Islamic holy sites. This strengthened the Palestinian notables' attempts to strengthen their hold over Jerusalem in the face of British imperialism, and Zionism. In terms of the Jewish community, this dissertation will reassess the first years of the Zionist movement and will argue that until now we have underestimated the extent of the local Jewish population's contribution in creating a Jewish political community in Palestine. Further, while other scholars have recently proposed that the Ottoman Jews were working towards 'a shared homeland,' this work will suggest that the Ottomanization of Jews, was actually an attempt on behalf of the Jews to remained tied closely to the Ottoman state, and to separate themselves from the Palestinian population. Lastly, this dissertation will further suggest that the Zionist debate in Istanbul was interpreted by many in Istanbul as a 'Jewish question,' and had very little relation with what was happening in Palestine.