Palestinian people have a history that is often linked to the history of the Arab Nation. Upon the advent of Islam, Christianity was the major religion of Byzantine Palestine. Soon after the rise of Islam, Palestine was conquered and brought into the rapidly expanding Islamic empire. The Umayyad empire was the first of three successive dynasties to dominate the Arab-Islamic world and rule Palestine, followed by the Abbasids and the Fatimids. Muslim rule was briefly challenged and interrupted in parts of Palestine during the Crusades, but was restored under the Mamluks.
After toppling the Mamluk state in 1517, the Ottoman Turks took control of most of the Arab world. Palestine existed within the Ottoman Empire as two districts, also referred to as Sanjaks. The legal origin of citizenship in the Middle East was born of the Ottoman Citizenship Law of 19 January 1869 and the Treaty of Lausanne.
