Records of the Palestine Police recently made available at the Haganah Archives in Tel Aviv reveal a previously unknown story of the Palestine revolt of 1936. This paper argues that the revolt, while retaining local territorial characteristics, also was part of a general pan-Arab effort to limit British and French colonial control. This effort began in the early 1930s and did not truly end until 1942 when Britain reoccupied the entire region. The pan-Arab movement’s anti-colonial efforts reached violent heights in Palestine between 1936 and 1941, as well as in Iraq and Syria in 1941. The British army did battle with irregular Arab forces, and police forces captured thousands of prisoners in the process. In Palestine, it was up to the police’s Criminal Investigation Department (CID) to keep interrogation and other intelligence records of these prisoners. Between 1941 and 1944, the Police and government worked together to determine who would be released from internment. Many internees continued to serve British intelligence, perhaps even as part of the war effort. Others became eligible to join the civil service. After the war, the Palestine government and Colonial Office discussed the eligibility to return home for colonial “renegades” – Palestinian leaders who had been expelled to Seychelles, Rhodesia, Australia and elsewhere. The process of releasing prisoners during 1942-45 and bringing back exiles during 1945-46 demonstrates that Britain aimed to rebuild the Palestinian political elite through access to the civil service. Britain believed that a “jobocracy” would provide leverage over nationalist politics, while meeting the Palestine Mandate’s aim of nurturing the country’s ability to govern itself Initially successful, the 1946 reintroduction of Jamal al-Husseini, cousin and confidant to the notorious ex-Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin, undermined the authority of the opposition parties which had gained strength since 1939 and set the Palestinian community on a collision course with the Yishuv. Britain’s wartime plans to reshape the region in its image collapsed its interests and those of the various Palestinian and Syrian factions collided.