Discover Palestinian Traditions

A Bedouin sheikh in Palestine standing in a dark wool cloak worn open over his robe, with a keffiyeh and agal on his head

The Palestinian Bisht: The Abayeh, Handwoven Wo...

The Palestinian bisht went by another name at home: the abayeh, a homespun striped wool cloak off Hebron sheep, woven in Majdal, Bethlehem, Ramallah and Jerusalem, and absent from the...

The Palestinian Bisht: The Abayeh, Handwoven Wo...

The Palestinian bisht went by another name at home: the abayeh, a homespun striped wool cloak off Hebron sheep, woven in Majdal, Bethlehem, Ramallah and Jerusalem, and absent from the...

A Palestinian craftsman carving a figure from olive wood at his bench in a Bethlehem workshop

Palestinian Olive Wood Carving: Bethlehem, Beit...

Olive wood carving in Bethlehem, Beit Sahour and Beit Jala: branch wood from the pruning season, Franciscan teaching centres from the sixteenth century, and 135 workshops in one small town.

Palestinian Olive Wood Carving: Bethlehem, Beit...

Olive wood carving in Bethlehem, Beit Sahour and Beit Jala: branch wood from the pruning season, Franciscan teaching centres from the sixteenth century, and 135 workshops in one small town.

A Palestinian potter at his wheel in Nazareth in July 1940, photographed at the table with a partly formed vessel in his hands

Palestinian Pottery: Hebron's Kilns, the Gaza J...

Palestinian pottery never stopped. Two traditions, the women's household ware and the men's wheel workshops, plus the Gaza jar and the Jerusalem tile workshops of 1919.

Palestinian Pottery: Hebron's Kilns, the Gaza J...

Palestinian pottery never stopped. Two traditions, the women's household ware and the men's wheel workshops, plus the Gaza jar and the Jerusalem tile workshops of 1919.

Nineteenth century Bethlehem dress embroidery worked in silk, silver and gold cord, showing the raised couched surface of tahriri

Palestinian Embroidery Stitches: Fallahi Cross-...

Palestinian embroidery is not one stitch. Fallahi counts squares against the weave, tahriri couches cord onto the surface, and manajel, jadleh, and tashreem hold the garment together.

Palestinian Embroidery Stitches: Fallahi Cross-...

Palestinian embroidery is not one stitch. Fallahi counts squares against the weave, tahriri couches cord onto the surface, and manajel, jadleh, and tashreem hold the garment together.

A married Bethlehem woman photographed around 1900 wearing the tall shatweh cap beneath a white veil, with a coin chin chain across her throat

Palestinian Headdress: The Shatweh, the Smadeh,...

A married woman in Bethlehem could carry her entire dowry above her eyebrows. The shatweh, the smadeh, and the wuqayat al-darahim were coin headdresses that recorded a woman's village, her...

Palestinian Headdress: The Shatweh, the Smadeh,...

A married woman in Bethlehem could carry her entire dowry above her eyebrows. The shatweh, the smadeh, and the wuqayat al-darahim were coin headdresses that recorded a woman's village, her...

Embroidered chest panel (qabbeh) from a Bethlehem Palestinian thobe, 1930s–1940s, showing dense traditional needlework

Tatreez Patterns by Region: Bethlehem to Gaza

Tatreez Patterns by Region: Bethlehem to Gaza Chest panel from a Bethlehem thobe, 1930s-1940s. Tiraz: Widad Kawar Home for Arab Dress & Textile Museum. Photo: Ma'moun Othman, CC BY-SA 4.0....

Tatreez Patterns by Region: Bethlehem to Gaza

Tatreez Patterns by Region: Bethlehem to Gaza Chest panel from a Bethlehem thobe, 1930s-1940s. Tiraz: Widad Kawar Home for Arab Dress & Textile Museum. Photo: Ma'moun Othman, CC BY-SA 4.0....