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Safsaf

Summary

Safsaf (Arabic: صفصاف Ṣafṣāf, "weeping willow") was a Palestinian village 9 kilometres northwest of Safed, present-day Israel. Its villagers fled to Lebanon after the Safsaf massacre in October 1948, during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.

Safsaf
صفصاف
Safsofa
Village
Safsaf in 1938
Safsaf in 1938
Etymology: "the Osier willow"[1]
1870s map
1940s map
modern map
1940s with modern overlay map
A series of historical maps of the area around Safsaf (click the buttons)
Safsaf is located in Mandatory Palestine
Safsaf
Safsaf
Location within Mandatory Palestine
Coordinates: 33°00′42″N 35°26′44″E / 33.01167°N 35.44556°E / 33.01167; 35.44556
Palestine grid192/268
Geopolitical entityMandatory Palestine
SubdistrictSafad
Date of depopulation29 October 1948[4]
Area
[3]
 • Total7,391 dunams (7.391 km2 or 2.854 sq mi)
Population
 (1945)
 • Total910[2][3]
Cause(s) of depopulationMilitary assault by Yishuv forces
Secondary causeFear of being caught up in the fighting
Current LocalitiesKfar Hoshen,[5][6] Bar Yohai[7]

History edit

The village was called Safsofa in Roman times.[8]

According to Yaqut, it was harried in 950 CE by the Hamdanid ruler of Aleppo, Sayf al-Dawla.[9]

Ottoman era edit

In the early sixteenth century CE, Safsaf was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire, and by the 1596 tax records, it was a village in the nahiyah ("subdistrict") of Jira, part of Sanjak Safad. It had a population of 25 households, an estimated 138 persons, all Muslim. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 25% on several agricultural items, including wheat, barley, olives and fruits, as well as other types of produce, such as beehives and goats; a total of 3,714 akçe. A quarter of the revenue went to a waqf (religious endowment).[10][11]

In 1838 Safsaf was noted as a village in the Safad district,[12] while in 1875 Victor Guérin described it as a village with fifteen Muslim families.[13] At this time it was part of Eyalet Sidon.

In 1881 the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described Safsaf as a small village situated on a plain, with a population of about 100. They also noted that "ornamented stones of a preexisting public building" had been built into the doorway of the village mosque.[14] The villagers cultivated olive and fig trees and vineyards.[15]

A population list from about 1887 showed Safsaf to have about 740 inhabitants, all Muslim.[16] At this time it was part of Beirut vilayet.

British Mandate era edit

Safsaf became a part of the British Mandate in 1922. During this time, the village lay on the eastern side of the Safad-Tarshiha highway and extended in a northeast–southwest direction. All the residents of Safsaf were Muslims. A mosque and several shops were located in the village center, and an elementary school was established during this period. Agriculture was the main economic activity, and it was both irrigated from springs and rainfed. Fruits and olives were cultivated on the land north of the village.[6]

In the 1922 census of Palestine Safsaf had a population of 521 Muslims,[17] increasing in the 1931 census to 662, still all Muslims, in a total of 124 houses.[18]

 
Safsaf. 1945. Survey of Palestine

In the 1945 statistics the population was 910 Muslims,[2] with a total of 7,391 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.[3] Of this, a total of 2,586 dunums were allotted to cereals; 769 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards,[6][19] while a 72 dunams was built-up (urban) area.[20]

1948, and aftermath edit

On October 29, 1948, Israeli forces assaulted the village as part of Operation Hiram.[21] After the villagers surrendered, some 50-70 men were massacred while bound and four women reported being raped.[6][22][23][24] The IDF records for this massacre remain classified.

In 1949 Kfar Hoshen was established on village land, followed by Bar Yohai in 1979, also on village land.[6]

In 1992 the village site was described: "The site is overgrown with grass and scattered trees among which can be seen a few terraces and piles of stones from destroyed houses. A few houses are inhabited by Israelis. A fraction of surrounding land is cultivated by the settlements, and the rest is forested."[6]

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ Palmer, 1881, p. 95
  2. ^ a b Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 11
  3. ^ a b c Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 71
  4. ^ Morris, 2004, p. xvi, village #45. Also gives causes of depopulation.
  5. ^ Morris, 2004, p. xxi, Settlement #49, established January 1949.
  6. ^ a b c d e f Khalidi, 1992, p. 491
  7. ^ Established in 1979. Khalidi, 1992, p. 491
  8. ^ Khalidi, 1992, p. 490
  9. ^ Le Strange, 1890, p. 526
  10. ^ Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p.177, quoted in Khalidi, 1992, p. 490
  11. ^ Note that Rhode, 1979, p. 6 Archived 2019-04-20 at the Wayback Machine writes that the register that Hütteroth and Abdulfattah studied was not from 1595/6, but from 1548/9
  12. ^ Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, 2nd appendix, p. 134
  13. ^ Guérin, 1880, pp. 418-419
  14. ^ Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p. 257. Quoted in Khalidi, 1992, p. 491
  15. ^ Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p.200. Quoted in Khalidi, 1992, p. 491
  16. ^ Schumacher, 1888, p. 190
  17. ^ Barron, 1923, Table XI, Sub-district of Safad, p. 41
  18. ^ Mills, 1932, p. 110
  19. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 121
  20. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 171
  21. ^ Welcome to Safsaf, Palestine Remembered, retrieved 2007-12-12
  22. ^ Benvenisti, 2000, p. 153
  23. ^ Nazzal, 1978, pp. 93-96
  24. ^ Morris, 2004, p. 481

Bibliography edit

  • Barron, J. B., ed. (1923). Palestine: Report and General Abstracts of the Census of 1922. Government of Palestine.
  • Benveniśtî, M. (2000). Sacred landscape: the buried history of the Holy Land since 1948 (Illustrated ed.). University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-21154-5.
  • Conder, C.R.; Kitchener, H.H. (1881). The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology. Vol. 1. London: Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
  • Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics (1945). Village Statistics, April, 1945.
  • Guérin, V. (1880). Description Géographique Historique et Archéologique de la Palestine (in French). Vol. 3: Galilee, pt. 2. Paris: L'Imprimerie Nationale.
  • Hadawi, S. (1970). Village Statistics of 1945: A Classification of Land and Area ownership in Palestine. Palestine Liberation Organization Research Centre.
  • Hütteroth, Wolf-Dieter; Abdulfattah, Kamal (1977). Historical Geography of Palestine, Transjordan and Southern Syria in the Late 16th Century. Erlanger Geographische Arbeiten, Sonderband 5. Erlangen, Germany: Vorstand der Fränkischen Geographischen Gesellschaft. ISBN 3-920405-41-2.
  • Khalidi, W. (1992). All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948. Washington D.C.: Institute for Palestine Studies. ISBN 0-88728-224-5.
  • Le Strange, G. (1890). Palestine Under the Moslems: A Description of Syria and the Holy Land from A.D. 650 to 1500. Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
  • Mills, E., ed. (1932). Census of Palestine 1931. Population of Villages, Towns and Administrative Areas. Jerusalem: Government of Palestine.
  • Morris, B. (2004). The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-00967-6.
  • Nazzal, Nafez (1978). The Palestinian Exodus from Galilee 1948. Beirut: The Institute for Palestine Studies. ISBN 9780887281280. (Safsaf, p. 93-96, 107)
  • Palmer, E.H. (1881). The Survey of Western Palestine: Arabic and English Name Lists Collected During the Survey by Lieutenants Conder and Kitchener, R. E. Transliterated and Explained by E.H. Palmer. Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
  • Rhode, H. (1979). Administration and Population of the Sancak of Safed in the Sixteenth Century (PhD). Columbia University. Archived from the original on 2020-03-01. Retrieved 2018-11-13.
  • Robinson, E.; Smith, E. (1841). Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petraea: A Journal of Travels in the year 1838. Vol. 3. Boston: Crocker & Brewster.
  • Schumacher, G. (1888). "Population list of the Liwa of Akka". Quarterly Statement - Palestine Exploration Fund. 20: 169–191.

External links edit

  • welcome to safsaf - Nidal Hamad Archived 2020-06-21 at the Wayback Machine
  • Welcome to Safsaf
  • Safsaf, Zochrot
  • Survey of Western Palestine, Map 4: IAA, Wikimedia commons
  • Safsaf, from the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center
  • Safsaf photos, Dr. Moslih Kanaaneh
  • Safsaf, Dr. Khalil Rizk.

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