The Maps That Lie: A Closer Look at the “Disappearing Palestine” Graphic

You’ve likely seen the image.

Four simple maps, side by side, showing the apparent “disappearance” of Palestinian land from 1946 to the present day. Often shared with a sense of moral urgency, these maps seem to offer undeniable proof of relentless Israeli colonisation—green “Palestinian” land shrinking to a sliver while “Israeli” land swells in its place. They’ve made their way into textbooks, mainstream media, and protest placards. They’re powerful. Emotional. Persuasive.

Indeed, they form the foundation for claims that Israel is a demonic, colonising state.

But the maps are propaganda.

What’s Wrong With the Maps?

Let’s begin with the first frame: 1946. It shows almost all of the land as “Palestinian,” with tiny, fragmented areas marked “Jewish.” The implication? That Jews barely owned any land, and that nearly all of historical Palestine was Arab, now unjustly taken.

But that’s not how land ownership worked.

Under both the Ottoman Empire and the British Mandate, the majority of land was classified as state land. Private ownership—whether Arab or Jewish—accounted for a relatively small proportion. These maps conflate “non-Jewish” with “Palestinian-owned,” ignoring the legal category of public land entirely. Vast regions like the Negev desert, shown as “Palestinian” in the graphic, were never privately owned in any meaningful sense.

This isn’t a minor mislabelling—it’s foundational. It frames the entire narrative falsely, suggesting dispossession where no ownership existed to begin with.

Fictional Timelines and Imagined States

Some versions of the maps reach back even further, to 1917—when the land was still part of the Ottoman Empire, long before a Palestinian national identity had coalesced in political terms. Applying today’s labels to that era is not just anachronistic—it’s a deliberate projection of modern narratives onto a pre-modern context.

It’s the equivalent of labelling medieval England as “European Union territory” simply because it’s in the EU now. The logic doesn’t hold.

Erasing Jordan, Egypt—and Oslo

The third and fourth maps usually depict 1948 and then a modern snapshot, often labelled “2000” or “2020.” These show “Palestinian land” disappearing further, reinforcing the narrative of constant encroachment.

But what the maps leave out is just as important. In 1948, the West Bank was annexed by Jordan, and Gaza came under Egyptian control—yet neither created a Palestinian state or enabled self-rule. After 1967, when Israel gained control of these territories during war, the Oslo Accords later granted the Palestinian Authority limited self-governance in parts of the West Bank and Gaza.

Ironically, the “2020” map shows less “Palestinian land” than existed in 1994—when, in fact, that was the first moment in modern history when any form of Palestinian political autonomy existed. Governance increased. The maps suggest the opposite.

Simplicity at the Expense of Truth

The appeal of these maps lies in their simplicity. But that’s precisely the problem.

They invite outrage without understanding. They present a morality tale of good versus evil, dispossession versus occupation—in the space of a glance. Like most things designed to bypass the brain and hit the gut, they collapse complexity into falsehood. Nuance dies in the name of activism.

Israeli academic Shany Mor has offered a more accurate alternative: a series of maps tracking not ownership (a legal minefield) but political control over time. It’s a much more honest and useful approach—though far less likely to go viral.

Why It Matters

I’m not writing this because I think Israel always gets it right, or because I deny the reality of Palestinian suffering. It’s real. There is injustice, displacement, fear, and trauma—on both sides.

But we can’t move towards peace or understanding if we build our advocacy on distortions. If our moral case relies on propaganda, then it’s not moral at all.

Truth matters. History matters. And misleading maps—no matter how well-intentioned—don’t help.

They harm.