Slavery in Palestine

Last updated March 25, 2024

Open slavery existed in the region of Palestine until the 20th-century. The slave trade to Ottoman Palestine officially stopped in the 1870s, when the last slave ship is registered to have arrived, after which slavery appeared to have gradually diminished to a marginal phenomena in the census of 1905. However, the former slaves and their children still continued to work for their former enslavers, and were reported to still live in a state of de facto servitude in the 1930s. Many members of the Black Palestinians minority are descendants of the former slaves.

History

Palestine was a part of the Ottoman Empire between 1516 and 1917.

Slave trade

Palestine was close to the Red Sea slave trade, but also to the slave ports of the Mediterranean Sea, were slaves from the Trans-Saharan slave trade were imported via Libya and Egypt.

The Ottoman Empire issued decrees to restrict and gradually prohibit the slave trade and slavery between 1830 and 1909, but these laws were not strictly enforced in the Ottoman provinces, such as Palestine and the Arabian Peninsula.^[1]

In 1880, the Ottoman Empire conceeded to Britain the right to search and seize any vessel to Ottoman territories suspected of carrying slaves.^[2] The British occupation of Egypt in 1882 seriously disturbed the import of slaves to the Mediterranean provinces of the Ottoman Empire, since a large part of the slave import had came via Egypt.^[2] Formally, the Ottoman Empire declared black slaves manumitted in 1889.^[2]

The last official slave ship arrived to Haifa in Palestine in 1876, after which the official slave trade to Palestine appeared to have stopped.^[3] The end of the open slave trade also appeared to have resulted in the gradual death of slavery itself. In the 1905 census for Palestine, only eight individuals were officially registered as slaves.^[3] However, while no longer officially referred to as slaves, it appeared as if the former slaves continued to work for their former enslavers, as did their children.^[3]

In the last decades of open slavery in Palestine, the origin of slaves appeared to have been similar to other Ottoman provinces at the time: a small minority were Caucasians (usually Circassians), but the vast majority of the slaves were of African origin, mostly from Ethiophia (Abyssinia) and the Sudan.^[3]

Function and conditions

Slaves were given tasks which were regarded as disdained and degrading to free Muslims, such as domestic servants, municipal services, industrial work, sex slaves (concubines), and farmhands and sharecroppers.^[4] As commonly in other parts of the Muslim world, slaves were preferred to free employed people as domestic servants, since they were dependent on their employer and not loyal to their clan and their own families.^[5]

Female slaves were used as domestic servants in private households as well as concubines (sex slaves), while male slaves were used in a number of different tasks such as laborers, bodyguards, servants and attendants.^[3]

The sex slave-concubines of rich Urban men who had given birth to the son of their enslaver were counted as the most priviliged, since they became an Umm Walad and became free upon the death of their enslaver; the concubine of a Beduoin mainly lived the same life as the rest of the tribal members and the women of the family.^[6] Female domestic slaves lived a hard life and reproduction among slaves was low; it was noted that the infant mortality was high among slaves, and that female slaves were often raped in their childhood and rarely lived in their forties, and that poorer slave owners often prostituted them.^[6]

Women slaves were more rarely described by foreigners since women lived in harem seclusion, but female servants (slaves) were sometimes noted in passing, such as Edward Robinson, who noted upon his visit to an Arab home in Jaffa in 1838: "Of the many females it contained, we saw none except the mother of the family, who welcomed us at our entrance, and the Nubian slave who washed our feet."^[7]

Male slaves are also known as poets to the Bedouin tribal leaders during the 19th- and 20th centuries.^[8] William Hepworth Dixon noted slaves in various tasks Jerusalem of the 1860s, such as in his depiction of Jaffa Gate, when he mentioned "Yon negro dozing near his mule is a slave from the Upper Nile, and belongs to an Arab bey who lets him out on hire", and the servants in the coffee houses: “Enter this coffee house, where the old sheikh is smoking near the door; call the cafigeh, the waiter, commonly a negro slave; command a cup of black comfort, a narghiley [water pipe], and a morsel of live charcoal", and "Saïd is a Nubian, a negro, and a slave; and like the mule and horses is the property of an Arab gentleman, not too proud to let his people and his beasts earn money by trade."^[9]

Randal William MacGavock from Tennessee visited Ramla in the 1850s, described the custom regarding the children of the Palestinian slaves and compared it to slavery in the United States:^[10]

During our visit the subject of slavery was suggested by the appearance of a likely negro boy bearing coffee and pipes, which resulted in my gaining some information that I would have otherwise. When two slaves intermarry belonging to different masters, the owner of the man claims the male issue [progeny], and the owner of the woman the female issue; whereas with us the owner of the woman is entitled to both. Quite a strong attachment exists between the master and slave, and it is not unfrequently the case that they marry and live happily together.

It was common to manumit slaves. However, a manumission rarely had true practical meaning, since freedmen normally simply continued to live in the same servitude as before. The American consul in Jerusalem, Selah Merrill, noted in 1885 the custom that manumitted slaves in fact continued to be slaves in practice:^[11]

As to house servants it must be remembered that there is a considerable class here who have been held as slaves. They are black people from Nubia, and having been brought up as slaves and knowing no other kind of life, they, in many cases, remain with their old masters. Practically, some of them are still slaves, although they are not bought and sold; such persons get nothing besides their clothing, shelter, and food.

Abolition

In 1920, Ottoman Palestine was formally transformed in to the British Mandatory Palestine. The British Empire, having signed the 1926 Slavery Convention as a member of the League of Nations, was obliged to investigate, report and fight slavery and slave trade in all land under direct or indirect control of the British Empire. The British policy was thus abolitionist, however in reality they were reluctant to interfere in cultural issues if they feared their interference could cause unrest. In the British report to the League of Nations for 1924, they reported that slavery existed in Transjordan but had ended in Palestine in the early 20th-century after the import of slaves had stopped.^[12] According to the British, the Palestina Bedouin tribes did own African servants called Abid , but that they now had the same rights as the rest of the tribe members and should be regarded as former slaves, and that the same term should apply to the African female domestic servants of the Arab noble families.^[12] When the League of Nations ratified the 1926 Slavery Convention, the British were expected to enforce it in their colonies and other dependent land. When the British filed a new report to the League of Nations in 1926, they stated that slavery had no legal base in Palestine or Transjordan, and that it was therefore uneccessary for the British to ban it.^[12]

In 1931, the police and the Welfare Inspector Margaret Nixon conducted an investigation on behalf of the British government regarding the enslaved servant girls of private Arab households.^[12] The result of the investigation showed that after the slave trade to Palestine stopped, the African abid-slaves of the Bedouin tribes of the Jordan Valley sold their children (primarily their daughters) as domestic servants and maidservants.^[12] After the World War I, this custom started to be called employment, upon which the girls were sold as contract servants for a period between seven and twenty-five years, and in 1931, there were about 150 such girls in Nablus and about 150 more in the rest of Palestine.^[12] It was also noted, that the Abid-servants of the Bedouin tribes in the Jordan Valley, though they were now officially called former slaves, were in fact still slaves in practice, since they owned nothing, could only marry other Abid and they and their children had to serve their Arab tribe members without salary unless they escaped to another part of Palestine.^[12] The British wished to ban the practice, but since the Abid and their daughters appeared to accept the situation as it was and not interested in protesting or changing the practice, the British preferred not to interfere in the matter. The British limited themselwes with introducing the 1933 Employment of Girls Ordinance, which made all contracts stipulating more than one year of service automatically illegal.^[12]

In 1934, a report to the League of Nations acknowledged that slaves were still kept among the Bedouin shaykhs in Jordan and Palestine, and that slavery was maintained under the guise of clientage.^[13]

Many members of the Black Palestinians minority are descendants of the former slaves.^[3]

Related Research Articles

Harem refers to domestic spaces that are reserved for the women of the house in a Muslim family. A harem may house a man's wife or wives, their pre-pubescent male children, unmarried daughters, female domestic servants, and other unmarried female relatives. In the past, harems also enslaved concubines. In former times some harems were guarded by eunuchs who were allowed inside. The structure of the harem and the extent of monogamy or polygamy has varied depending on the family's personalities, socio-economic status, and local customs. Similar institutions have been common in other Mediterranean and Middle Eastern civilizations, especially among royal and upper-class families, and the term is sometimes used in other contexts. In traditional Persian residential architecture the women's quarters were known as andaruni, and in the Indian subcontinent as zenana.

Slavery in the Ottoman Empire was a major institution and a significant part of the Ottoman Empire's economy and traditional society. The main sources of slaves were wars and politically organized enslavement expeditions in the Caucasus, Eastern Europe, Southern Europe, Southeast Europe, and Africa. It has been reported that the selling price of slaves decreased after large military operations. In Constantinople, the administrative and political center of the Ottoman Empire, about a fifth of the 16th- and 17th-century population consisted of slaves. Statistics of these centuries suggest that Istanbul's additional slave imports from the Black Sea slave trade have totaled around 2.5 million from 1453 to 1700.

The History of slavery in Iran (Persia) during various ancient, medieval, and modern periods is sparsely catalogued. Slavery was abolished in Iran in 1929.

Slavery in Tunisia was a specific manifestation of the Arab slave trade, which was abolished on 23 January 1846 by Ahmed I Bey. Tunisia was in a similar position to that of Algeria, with a geographic position which linked it with the main Trans-Saharan routes. It received caravans from Fezzan and Ghadamès, which consisted solely, in the eighteenth century, of gold powder and slaves, according to contemporary witnesses.

The history of slavery in the Muslim world began with institutions inherited from pre-Islamic Arabia. The practices of keeping slaves in the Muslim world nevertheless developed in radically different ways in different Muslim states based on a range of social-political factors, as well as the more immediate economic and logistical considerations of the Arab slave trade. As a general principle, Islam encouraged the manumission of Muslim slaves as a way of expiating sins, and many early converts to Islam, such as Bilal, were former slaves. However, Islam never banned the practice, and it persisted as an important institution in the Muslim world through to the modern era.

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Slavery existed in the area which was later to become Oman from antiquity until the 1970s. Oman was united with Zanzibar from the 1690s until 1856, and was a significant center of the Indian Ocean slave trade from Zanzibar in East Africa to the Arabian Peninsula and Iran, a central hub of the regional slave trade, which constituted a large part of its economy.

Slavery existed in the area of later Saudi Arabia until the 1960s.

Cariye was a title and term used for category of enslaved women concubines in the Islamic world of the Middle East. They are particularly known in history from the era of the Ottoman Empire, where they legally existed until the mid-19th century.

The Red Sea slave trade, sometimes known as the Islamic slave trade, or Oriental slave trade, was a slave trade across the Red Sea trafficking Africans from the African continent to slavery in the Arabian Peninsula and the Middle East from antiquity until the mid-20th-century. When other slave trade routes were stopped, the Red Sea slave trade became internationally known as a slave trade center during the interwar period. After World War II, growing international pressure eventually resulted in its final official stop.

Slavery existed in Morocco since antiquity. Morocco was a center of the Trans-Saharan slave trade route of enslaved Black Africans from sub-Saharan Africa, as well as a center of the slave trade of Barbary slave trade of Europeans captured by the barbary pirates. The slave trade was suppressed in Morocco in the 1920s.

Slavery existed in the Sultanate of Zanzibar until 1909. Slavery and slave trade existed in the Zanzibar Archipelago for thousands of years. When clove and coconut plantations became a big industry on the islands, domestic slavery expanded to a point where two thirds of the populations were slaves. Zanzibar was internationally known as a major player in the Indian Ocean slave trade, where slaves from the Swahili coast of Eastern Africa were trafficked across the Indian Ocean to Oman in the Arabian Peninsula during the Zanzibar slave trade.

Slavery in Egypt existed up until the early 20th century. It differed from the previous slavery in ancient Egypt, being managed in accordance with Islamic law from the conquest of the Caliphate in the 7th century until the practice stopped in the early 20th-century, having been gradually abolished in the late 19th century. Slave trade was abolished successively between 1877 and 1884. Slavery itself was not abolished, but it gradually died out after the abolition of the slave trade, since no new slaves could be legally acquired. Existing slaves were noted as late as the 1930s.

Slavery existed in the Trucial States (1892–1971), which later formed the United Arab Emirates. The Trucial States consisted of the Sheikdoms Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Fujairah, and Ras Al Khaimah. The region was mainly supplied with enslaved people from the Indian Ocean slave trade, but humans were also trafficked to the area from Hejaz, Oman and Persia. Slaves were used in the famous pearl fish industry and later in the oil industry, as well as sex slaves and domestic servants. Many members of the Afro-Arabian minority are descendants of the former slaves.

Open slavery existed in Kuwait until the 1940s. Slavery was formally abolished in Kuwait in 1949. In practice, slavery was not actually abolished as such, but the law no longer recognized it after 1949, which meant that every slave who applied for manumission was guaranteered to be freed. Many members of the Afro-Arabian minority are descendants of the former slaves. Slavery of people from Africa and East Asia was succeeded by the modern Kafala system of poor workers from the same region were slaves had previously been imported.

Open slavery existed in Bahrain until the 1930s. Slavery was formally abolished in Bahrain in 1937. Slavery ended earlier in Bahrain than in any other Gulf state, with the exception of Iran and Iraq. Many members of the Afro-Arabian minority are descendants of the former slaves. Slavery of people from Africa and East Asia was succeeded by the modern Kafala system of poor workers from the same region were slaves had previously been imported.

Slavery is noted in the area later known as Algeria since antiquity. Algeria was a center of the Trans-Saharan slave trade route of enslaved Black Africans from sub-Saharan Africa, as well as a center of the slave trade of Barbary slave trade of Europeans captured by the barbary pirates.

Slavery existed in the territory of the modern state of Iraq until the 1920s.

Slavery in Jordan is illegal, however, like many other countries, it suffers from issues relating to human trafficking. Historically, slavery in the territory later to become the modern state of Jordan, was significant during the Ottoman Empire period.

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References

↑ Likhovski, A. (2006). Law and identity in mandate Palestine. Storbritannien: University of North Carolina Press. p. 87-93
1 2 3 Clarence-Smith, William Gervase. Islam and the abolition of slavery. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006; Lewis, Bernard. Race and slavery in the Middle East, an historical enquiry, New York: Oxford University Press, 1990, particularly chapters 10 and 11; Miller, Joseph C. “The Abolition of the Slave Trade and Slavery: Historical Foundations,” in Diène, Doudou. (ed.) From Chains to Bonds: The Slave Trade Revisited, Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2001, pp. 159–193. Avitsur, Shmuel. Daily Life in Eretz Israel in the XIX century. Tel Aviv: Am Hassefer Publishing House, 1972 (Hebrew).
1 2 3 4 5 6 Buessow, Johann. "Domestic Workers and Slaves in Late Ottoman Palestine at the Moment of the Abolition of Slavery: Considerations on Semantics and Agency." Slaves and Slave Agency in the Ottoman Empire (2020): 373–433. Web.
↑ Erdem, Y. Hakan. Slavery in the Ottoman empire and its demise, 1800–1909. London: Macmillan, 1996, pp. 9–57.
↑ Buessow, Johann. “Domestic Workers and Slaves in Late Ottoman Palestine at the Moment of the Abolition of Slavery: Considerations on Semantics and Agency.” Slaves and Slave Agency in the Ottoman Empire (2020): 373–433. Web. p. 15
1 2 Women and Slavery: Africa, the Indian Ocean world, and the medieval north Atlantic. (2007). Grekland: Ohio University Press. p. 13
↑ Robinson, Edward and Smith, Eli. Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petraea. Vol. 3, Boston: Crocker & Brewster, 1841, p. 31.
↑ Curtis, E. E. (2014). The Call of Bilal: Islam in the African Diaspora. USA: University of North Carolina Press. p. 40
↑ Dixon, William Hepworth. The Holy City. London: Chapman and Hall, 1865, Vol. 2, pp. 2, 23. Dixon (Vol. 1, p. 26)
↑ MacGavock, Randal William. A Tennessean Abroad; Or, Letters from Europe, Africa, and Asia. New York: Redfield, 1854, p. 251.
↑ United States. Labor in America, Asia, Africa, Australasia, and Polynesia: Reports from Consuls of the United States in the Several Countries of America, Asia, Africa, Australasia, and Polynesia on the State of Labor in Their Several Districts, in Response to a Circular from the Department of State. United States consular reports. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1885, p. 286. For further information on Selah Merrill, see: Ruth Kark. American Consuls in the Holy Land, 1832–1914. Jerusalem: Magnes Press and Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1994.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Likhovski, A. (2006). Law and identity in mandate Palestine. Storbritannien: University of North Carolina Press. p. 87-93
↑ Clarence-Smith, W. (2020). Islam and the Abolition of Slavery. USA: Hurst.

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[1] Likhovski, A. (2006). Law and identity in mandate Palestine. Storbritannien: University of North Carolina Press. p. 87-93

[:0-2] 1 2 3 Clarence-Smith, William Gervase. Islam and the abolition of slavery. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006; Lewis, Bernard. Race and slavery in the Middle East, an historical enquiry, New York: Oxford University Press, 1990, particularly chapters 10 and 11; Miller, Joseph C. “The Abolition of the Slave Trade and Slavery: Historical Foundations,” in Diène, Doudou. (ed.) From Chains to Bonds: The Slave Trade Revisited, Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2001, pp. 159–193. Avitsur, Shmuel. Daily Life in Eretz Israel in the XIX century. Tel Aviv: Am Hassefer Publishing House, 1972 (Hebrew).

[:1-3] 1 2 3 4 5 6 Buessow, Johann. "Domestic Workers and Slaves in Late Ottoman Palestine at the Moment of the Abolition of Slavery: Considerations on Semantics and Agency." Slaves and Slave Agency in the Ottoman Empire (2020): 373–433. Web.

[4] Erdem, Y. Hakan. Slavery in the Ottoman empire and its demise, 1800–1909. London: Macmillan, 1996, pp. 9–57.

[5] Buessow, Johann. “Domestic Workers and Slaves in Late Ottoman Palestine at the Moment of the Abolition of Slavery: Considerations on Semantics and Agency.” Slaves and Slave Agency in the Ottoman Empire (2020): 373–433. Web. p. 15

[:2-6] 1 2 Women and Slavery: Africa, the Indian Ocean world, and the medieval north Atlantic. (2007). Grekland: Ohio University Press. p. 13

[7] Robinson, Edward and Smith, Eli. Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petraea. Vol. 3, Boston: Crocker & Brewster, 1841, p. 31.

[8] Curtis, E. E. (2014). The Call of Bilal: Islam in the African Diaspora. USA: University of North Carolina Press. p. 40

[9] Dixon, William Hepworth. The Holy City. London: Chapman and Hall, 1865, Vol. 2, pp. 2, 23. Dixon (Vol. 1, p. 26)

[10] MacGavock, Randal William. A Tennessean Abroad; Or, Letters from Europe, Africa, and Asia. New York: Redfield, 1854, p. 251.

[11] United States. Labor in America, Asia, Africa, Australasia, and Polynesia: Reports from Consuls of the United States in the Several Countries of America, Asia, Africa, Australasia, and Polynesia on the State of Labor in Their Several Districts, in Response to a Circular from the Department of State. United States consular reports. Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 1885, p. 286. For further information on Selah Merrill, see: Ruth Kark. American Consuls in the Holy Land, 1832–1914. Jerusalem: Magnes Press and Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1994.

[:3-12] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Likhovski, A. (2006). Law and identity in mandate Palestine. Storbritannien: University of North Carolina Press. p. 87-93

[13] Clarence-Smith, W. (2020). Islam and the Abolition of Slavery. USA: Hurst.

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