Palestinian community in Santa Dominica

The Palestinian community in Santa Dominica is one with a long history. While some Palestinians immigrated to the country following Israeli independence in 1948, the vast majority immigrated following the Six-Day War in 1967. Santa Dominica has a long history of solidarity with the Palestinian cause, something which differed seriously with the United States and other Western allies, notably during the Cold War. Socialist Prime Minister Henry McMacey began a program in 1967 which allowed any displaced Palestinian with the ability to make it to Santa Dominica the right to seek asylum and residency. About 7,000 refugees came, and in 2020 the Palestinian population numbered around 65,600 or 3% of the population. About 2/3 of the community identifies as Sunni Muslim, while a third identify as Christian. Santa Dominica's flag carrier, Santa Dominican Airways, was involved in carrying 1,000 of the 7,000 refugees in a series of two flights out of Damascus, Syria, and Amman, Jordan in 1967, and broke the record for the most number of people carried on an SDA flight.

Santa Dominca's support for Palestine has consequently hurt their shaky relationship with Israel. The two countries shared relations between 1973 and 1988 until the First Intifada, and again between 1997 and 2014 until the Israeli war in Gaza when Prime Minister Andrew Walker suspended relations. Prime Minister Rosa Anand, a Conservative, announced during her campaign that she would "look into establishing relations" again, however following the 2021 Israel-Palestine Crisis has said that she is "no longer considering the move."