This article presents an interpretation of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's notion of the general will through the example of the modern Palestinian predicament. ‘Being Palestinian’ focuses in particular on the continuing crisis of the Palestinian refugees of 1948, the Palestinian people being largely a refugee population. It discusses the mechanisms that express the general will for a stateless people, and demonstrates how particular political sentiments, negotiating positions, common understandings and political will are expressed, deliber-ated and understood within the Palestinian body politic, both across borders and within besieged national institutions.