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チリのパレスチナ人（アラビア語: فلسطينيو تشيلي ）は、アラブ世界以外で最大のパレスチナ人コミュニティであると考えられている。[ 2 ]ディアスポラには、主に中東に約600万人のパレスチナ人が住んでいる。チリには、パレスチナ系の人々が約45万～50万人いると推定されている。[ 3 ] [ 4 ] [ 5 ]
パレスチナからの移民の最初の波は、オスマン帝国とロシア帝国の間のクリミア戦争中の1850年代にチリにやって来た。彼らは主に農業や商売に従事した。第一次世界大戦中と、パレスチナが分割された1948年のパレスチナ戦争（ナクバ）中に、移民の波が次々と到着した。[ 6 ]
出身地は主にベイト・ジャラ、ベツレヘム、ベイト・サフールの都市であった。[ 7 ]これらの初期移民のほとんどはキリスト教徒であり、通常はアルゼンチンの港に上陸し、ラバに乗ってアンデス山脈を越えてチリに入った。 [ 8 ]チリのパレスチナ人は、初期のアラブ移民がパスポートに持っていたオスマン帝国の国籍にちなんで、しばしば誤って、また意図的にトルコ人（スペイン語でトルコ人）と呼ばれている。ドイツ人や他の西ヨーロッパ諸国の移民とは異なり、パレスチナ人の移民はチリの知識人にとって有益とは考えられておらず、東ヨーロッパ、中国、日本の移民と並んで疑問視されていた。[ 9 ] 20世紀初頭にパレスチナ移民がチリに到着した時期は、チリ政府がチリへの移民の受け入れを停止し、同国が深刻な社会経済危機に見舞われ、排外主義的で人種差別的なニュアンスを伴うナショナリズムの波が押し寄せた時期と重なっていた。 [ 9 ]移民はチリの報道機関によって非常に侮辱的な扱いを受けることもあった。例えば、エル・メルクリオ紙は1911年に次のように書いている。[ 9 ]
Whether they are Mohammedans or Buddhists, what one can see and smell from far, is that they are more dirty than the dogs of Constantinople...
—El Mercurio, April 13, 1911.
Many of the immigrants were very poor and illiterate and had to take loans to pay their travel costs.[9] Once in Chile, Palestinians settled largely in the marginal areas of cities and worked as small merchants.[9] In the 1950s by the time of the second government of Carlos Ibáñez del Campo many Palestinian-Chileans had acquired substantial economic as well as political power in Chile, some working as deputies, ministers or ambassadors.[9]
Aside from these migrants of previous decades, Chile has also taken in some Palestinian refugees in later years, as in April 2008 when it received 117 from the Al-Waleed refugee camp on the Syria–Iraq border near the Al-Tanf crossing.[10] All of those refugees were Sunni Muslims.[9]
People who hold a diplomatic or official Palestinian passport can visit Chile as tourists for up to 90 days, without a visa.[11]
The vast majority of the Palestinian community in Chile follow Christianity. The largest denomination is Orthodox Christian followed by Roman Catholic, and the number of Palestinian Christians in the diaspora in Chile alone exceeds the number of those who have remained in their homeland.[6] One early Palestinian church in Santiago, the Iglesia Ortodoxa San Jorge, was founded in 1917.[12] The rest are Sunni Muslims.
The Club Palestino is one of the most prestigious social clubs in Santiago; it offers swimming, tennis, and dining facilities to its members. There is also a soccer team, C.D. Palestino, whose uniform is in the traditional Palestinian colours red, green, and white. The team has been champion of the Chilean Primera División twice.[6] Also, some Chilean-Palestinian footballers like Roberto Bishara and Alexis Norambuena have played for the Palestine national football team. Other Chileans of Palestinian origin, such as Luis Antonio Jiménez, played international football for Chile and several foreign clubs.
A number of Palestinians in Chile have shown significant concern with the situation of Palestine, for example, the president of the Cámara de Comercio (chamber of commerce) of the Barrio Patronato, himself a Palestinian, in 2006 organised a protest regarding the 2006 Lebanon War; Lebanese and Palestinian flags were widely seen in the neighbourhood's streets at that time.[12] On another occasion, outside the Club Palestino and again in front of the Colegio Árabe, someone wrote on the sidewalk "Árabe=terrorismo" ("Arabs=terrorism") and "Palestina no existe" ("Palestine does not exist").[13]
In August 2025, the Palestine Football Association relocated its base of operations to the country due to the large diaspora in the country as well as its distance from the Gaza war.[14]
A number of Chilean novels have featured Palestinian characters and discussed the experience of Palestinian immigrants in the country, such as El viajero de la alfombra mágica by Walter Garib, Los turcos by Roberto Sarah, and Peregrino de ojos brillantes, by Jaime Hales.[15]