The Palestinian-Arab scout movement has received very little attention in the existing literature. My paper, representing findings of a study in its early stages on youth in Mandatory Palestine, will point to three aspects of the Palestinian scout movement during the Mandate. It will outline the organizational development of the movement. It will reconstruct various aspects of scouting life as they were experienced by Palestinian-Arab youths. Furthermore, it will examine scouting as the focus around which a culture of nationalism was produced. With the establishment of the British Mandate in 1920, Palestinian-Arab troops were put under the country-wide Palestine Scout Association, sanctioned by the Mandatory government and headed by British officials for the purpose of shaping a loyal colonial subject. Much to the detriment of the Mandate authorities and its Department of Education, within a decade, national and local Palestinian political leaders were involved in the creation of an independent scout movement which was more in tune with the national aspirations of the Arabs. The story of Arab scouting in Palestine appears firstly as that of an indigenous opposition to a foreign colonial regime. In this paper, I will also point to the potency of scouting as an agent for socialization and show that by taking part in scouting activities, young members of various ages were exposed, quite possibly for the first time in the history of the country, to a vast array of disciplinary tactics, nationalistic culture, and recreational practices. Beyond shaping a national and gender identity for its members, the scout movement also became a visible component of the Palestinian public sphere. Indeed the scouts' activities were not confined to the school, monastery, mosque or camp. As it received wide coverage in the daily press, scouts' participation in parades, official ceremonies, and demonstrations solidified identification with local communities, parent organizations, and the Palestinian nation. The paper relies on Zionist, British and Palestinian-Arab archival material, daily press, memoir excerpts, and the Palestinian scouting booklets, as well as referring to social science literature and historical examples on the subject of scouting in the West and the colonies. The story of the Palestinian Arab Scouts, so far hardly considered, will recreate an essential aspect of life for ordinary Palestinians; local leaders, educators, young men and children, who, despite internal divisions and external pressures, sought to mold a new culture for their society in times of dramatic shifts.