After crushing the Bar Kokhba revolt, the Roman Emperor Hadrian applied the name Syria Palestina to the entire region that had formerly included Judea province. Hadrian probably chose a name that revived the ancient name of Philistia (Palestine), combining it with that of the neighboring province of Syria, in an attempt to suppress Jewish connection to the land, although the actual Philistines from which the name derives had vanished from the pages of history centuries previously during the Neo-Assyrian Empire (911–605 BC).

Of course today Muslims employ the Palestine label for the same purpose as did Hadrian.