Info
District: Safed
Population 1948: 70
Occupation date: 30/10/1948
Jewish settlements on village/town land before 1948: None
Jewish settlements on village/town land after 1948: Sde Meron School
Background:
Ghabbatiyya Before 1948
The village stood on a rocky hill between the peaks of Mount al-Jarmaq (1208 m) and Mount ‘Adathir (1009m), the two highest mountains in Palestine. It was 2 km of the Druz village Hurfaysh. Three wadis passed next to the village, supplying it with water during the rainy season and making part of its arable land during the dry season. Ghabbatiyya obtained additional surface water from a number of springs and a well. Classified as a hamlet by the Mandate-era Palestine Inde.r Gazetteer, it Was laid out in an east-west direction along the northern side of a secondary road that linked it to other villages. This secondary road was connected to highways that led to Safad and the Jewish settlement of Nahariyya on the Mediterranean. The entire village population was Muslim, and the economy relied heavily on ariculture and animal husbandry. In 1944/45 a total of 412 dunums was allocated to cereals; 15 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards.
Occupation and Depopulation
Ghahhatiyya was occupied on 30 October 1948, during the second phase of Operation Hiram (see ‘Arab al-Samniyya, Acre District), just as forces on the eastern and western fronts converged in a pincer movement at nearby Sa’sa’ around noon that same day. The following day, an Israeli army spokesman, quoted in the New York Times, said that several hundred of the area’s Arab Liberation Army garrison were killed, and another several hundred taken prisoner.
Israeli Settlements on Village Lands
There are no Israeli settlements on village lands.
The Village Today
The site is deserted and covered with grass, a few fig trees, stones, and the ruins of stone houses. The walls of one destroyed house still stand. The surrounding land is used by Israelis for grazing and forestry, and woods cover nearby Mount ‘Adathir.
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Source: al-Khalidi, Walid (ed.). All that remains: the Palestinian villages occupied and depopulated by Israel in 1948. Washington DC: 1992.
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