Scholars have generally acknowledged that there were business and real estate ties between and across religious groups in Palestine. However contrary to the predominant scholarly view that treats business interactions as simply "transactions," I argue that they may indicate more complex social relationships that are not limited solely to the economic sphere. Loan guarantees and business partnerships, for example, are significant measures of interaction and interdependency since they are predicated on a high degree of trust and mutual accountability. Moreover, geographic proximity, organizational ties, educational background, and extended networks often overlap with business ties and suggest a multi-dimensionality of social networks that has not yet been studied in depth. This paper looks at bank loan guarantees and business partnerships between Muslims, Christians, and Jews in late Ottoman Palestine as sites of constructing and reinforcing social ties, of kin, of co-religionists, and at times, of trans-confessional partners and 'brothers'. In addition to studying the specific social networks established, the paper also seeks to identify broader patterns. Did the existence of other ties (neighborhood co-residence, co-membership in a Masonic lodge, etc.) predict the ability and/or willingness to appeal outside the family for economic involvemento What factors determined how 'closed' or 'open' a network was? I seek to link some of the insights of social science on issues like trust, friendship, and social networks, with broader observations that would reconcile the spotty anecdotal memoir literature with the empirical data from my research. In other words, how can a reconsideration of the depth and relevance of social networks change our understandings of "community" as a social process rather than just a social structuret How does space enter as a relevant category of historical contingency rather than simply as a backdrop of history