Flag of Palestine

What the flag of Palestine looks like

The Palestinian flag is a horizontal tricolor of equal stripes: black at the top, white in the middle and green at the bottom. A red isosceles triangle starts at the hoist and points toward the fly, with its tip reaching about one-third of the way across the flag. The proportions are 1:2.

The design is a close relative of the flags of Jordan, Sudan, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, which are all built from the same four colors. The Palestinian flag has the triangle at the hoist, the same layout as Jordan, but Jordan's flag has a white seven-pointed star in the triangle and no star appears on the Palestine flag. The Palestine flag emoji shows the design without any extra symbols.

Palestine flag meaning and symbolism

The four colors are the Pan-Arab colors, which came into use as symbols of Arab unity in the early 20th century. A common explanation links each color to a historic Arab dynasty or caliphate: black for the Abbasids, white for the Umayyads, green for the Fatimids, and red for the Hashemites, or in other versions for the blood shed in battle. An older reading comes from a medieval poem by Safi al-Din al-Hilli, which describes white as deeds, black as battles, green as lands and red as swords.

For Palestinians, the flag is a national symbol and a sign of identity. For many Palestinians the red triangle stands for the sacrifice of those who died for the cause, and the colors together represent the Palestinian people and homeland. These are traditional readings, and the flag has no single official explanation.

History of the Palestinian flag

The flag has its roots in the Arab Revolt against Ottoman rule, which began in 1916 under Sharif Hussein of Mecca. The revolt's flag was black, green and white stripes with a red triangle, which became a model for other Arab flags. In the decades after the First World War, Palestinian groups began to use these colors as a national banner, and after 1948 the flag was used by Palestinian institutions.

In 1964 the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) adopted the flag as its own. For decades, Palestinians were prevented from displaying the flag in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and it could lead to arrest under Israeli military rules. This changed with the Oslo Accords of 1993, which allowed Palestinian institutions to use it. On 15 November 1988 the Palestinian National Council declared independence in Algiers and named the flag as the flag of the State of Palestine. The Palestinian Authority has used it since its creation in 1994.

The flag was officially raised at the United Nations headquarters in New York in September 2015, after the UN General Assembly voted to allow non-member observer states to fly their flags there. Palestine has had the status of a non-member observer state at the UN since 2012, and it is recognized as a state by a large majority of UN member states, while others, including Israel, do not recognize it.

Flying the Palestine flag today

People raise the flag at protests, in sports stadiums, on homes and at cultural events as a sign of solidarity or national identity. The flag is a symbol of the Palestinian people as a whole and is not tied to a single party. The flag used in Gaza is the same national flag.

Display of the flag has at times been restricted or become a political issue. Authorities in Israel restricted it for many years before 1993 and have at times ordered its removal from public spaces and demonstrations since. Some European cities and events have set limits on flags at certain gatherings, and stadium authorities have sometimes fined clubs whose supporters displayed it, which has led to debate about free expression. Rules differ by country and by event. Other flags of Asia and the flags of the world are on the site.