Beit Fajjar Explained

Beit Fajjar
Translit Lang1:Arabic
Translit Lang1 Type:Arabic
Translit Lang1 Info:بيت فجّار
Translit Lang1 Type1:Latin
Translit Lang1 Info1:Bayt Fajjar (official)
Beit Fujar (unofficial)
Type:Municipality type B
Pushpin Map:Palestine
Pushpin Map Caption:Location of Beit Fajjar within Palestine
Coordinates:31.6247°N 35.1556°W
Grid Name:Palestine grid
Grid Position:164/114
Subdivision Type:State
Subdivision Name:State of Palestine
Subdivision Type1:Governorate
Subdivision Name1:Bethlehem
Established Title:Founded
Government Type:Municipality
Leader Title:Head of Municipality
Leader Name:Umar Abdel Aziz Taqatqa
Unit Pref:dunam
Area Total Km2:7.9
Area Total Dunam:7933
Population Footnotes:[1]
Population Total:13520
Population As Of:2017
Population Density Km2:auto
Blank Name Sec1:Name meaning
Blank Info Sec1:Relating to Umar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb[2]

Beit Fajjar (Arabic: بيت فجّار) is a Palestinian town located eight kilometers south of Bethlehem in the Bethlehem Governorate, in the central West Bank. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the town had a population of over 13,520 in 2017.

Beit Fajjar was founded in the 18th century.[3]

History

A tomb, dating from about the time of Constantine the Great, or the 4th century C.E, have been excavated here.[4]

Beit Fajjar is believed to have been a camping area for the Islamic Caliph, Umar ibn al-Khattab.[5]

Ottoman era

According to the people of Beit Fajjar, they came from Bethlehem due to a conflict in the town, and settled at Beit Fajjar in 1784,[6] or 1738.

Edward Robinson noted the village on his travels in the area in 1838,[7] as a Muslim village in the Hebron district.[8] According to Kark and Oren-Nordheim, Beit Fajjar was mostly farmland until the 19th century, when it gradually transformed into an urban settlement. The residents were descendants to a semi-nomadic family from the Hauran. The lands formerly belonged to the village of Buraikut.[5]

Victor Guérin visited the village in 1863, and described it as a village on the top of a hill, with about 400 people. The villagers still buried their dead in rock-cut tombs, below the village.[9] An Ottoman village list of about 1870 indicated 27 houses and a population of 81, though the population count included only men.[10] [11]

In the 1883, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine, Beit Fejjar was described as a "small stone village standing very high on a ridge. It is supplied by the fine springs and spring wells of Wady el Arrub".[12]

In 1896 the population of Bet faddscar was estimated to be about 624 persons.[13]

British Mandate era

The site's high altitude was the highest point in the area and later the town expanded into other hills. During British rule in Palestine in the 1920s-1940s, Beit Fajjar was used as an observation point for the Bethlehem-Hebron area.

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Bait Fajjar (alternative spelling) had a population 766, all Muslims.[14] In the 1931 census the population of Beit Fajjar was counted together with Umm Salamuna, Marah Ma'alla and Marah Rabah. The total population was 1043, still all Muslims, in 258 houses.[15]

In the 1945 statistics the population of Beit Fajjar was 1,480, all Muslims,[16] who owned 17,292 dunams of land according to an official land and population survey.[17] 2,572 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 2,633 for cereals,[18] while 87 dunams were built-up (urban) land.[19]

Jordanian era

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Beit Fajjar came under Jordanian rule.

In 1961, the population was 2,182.[20]

After 1967

Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Beit Fajjar has been under Israeli occupation. The population in the 1967 census conducted by the Israeli authorities was 2,474.[21]

The former head of Beit Fajjar's local council, Saber Mohammed Abdul Latif, testified to United Nations representatives that after his arrest on November 1, 1969, how Beit Fajjar had been besieged for about four months, no water had been allowed in and some 70 houses had been blown up. Abdul Latif was then deported on August 28, 1970.[22]

After the 1995 accords, 85.7% of Beit Fajjar land was classified as Area B land, while the remaining 14.3% is Area C.[23]

Nibal Thawabteh was the first woman to be elected to the Beit Fajjar Village Council, where she served for seven years.[24]

Economy

The primary economic sectors are agriculture and stone-cutting. Beit Fajjar is a major player in the stone industry, supplying meleke, widely known as Jerusalem stone, used in the construction of buildings in Israel and the Palestinian territories.[25] There are 138 stone production outlets in Beit Fajjar, out of 650 in the West Bank.[26] After about 1998, the Palestinian quarry owners have experienced difficulties in renewing their permits. According to HRW, while "Israel issued a permit to the European company to operate the quarry on an area of land that Israel declared belongs to the state, Israel has refused to issue permits for nearly all of the 40 or so Beit Fajar quarries, or for almost any other Palestinian-owned quarry in the area of the West Bank under Israel’s administrative control."[27]

Arab-Israeli conflict

On 4 October 2010, a mosque in Beit Fajjar was attacked by arsonists, who doused carpets with kerosene and ignited them at approximately 3am local time. The attackers left a "Star of David symbol and the words 'Price Tag'" over the doorway; the slogan is associated with militant Israeli settlers, who Palestinian residents accused of responsibility for the attack. Gush Etzion is close to the village.[28] After the attack, a delegation of Rabbis from the adjacent Jewish settlements arranged with Beit Fajjar leadership and the PA security and visited the mosque in solidarity, while condemning the arson attack.[29] On October 30, 2015, the PA health ministry reported that an 8 month old boy from Beit Fajjar had died after inhaling tear gas fired by the IDF during violent clashes[30]

In July, 2019, 30 (or 31) year old Nassar Taqatqa from Beit Fajjar was found dead in Israeli solitary confinement. He had been arrested by the Israelis six weeks earlier, suspected of "ties to Hamas", but had not been charged with anything.[31] The Palestinian Prisoners’ Society (PPS) and the man’s relatives stated that Taqatqa was a "completely healthy" young man when he was detained by the Israelis. According to IMEMC, the death of Taqatqa brought "the number of [Palestinian] detainees, who were killed or died in Israeli prisons since 1967, to 220."[32] [33]

Bibliography

External links

Notes and References

  1. February 2018 . Preliminary Results of the Population, Housing and Establishments Census, 2017 . Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) . . 64–82 . 2023-10-24.
  2. The Applied Research Institute – Jerusalem, 2010, p. 5 http://vprofile.arij.org/bethlehem/pdfs/VP/Beit%20Fajjar_tp_en.pdf
  3. Grossman, D. (1986). "Oscillations in the Rural Settlement of Samaria and Judaea in the Ottoman Period". in Shomron studies. Dar, S., Safrai, S., (eds). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad Publishing House. p. 366
  4. Husseini and Iliffe, 1935, pp. 175-178
  5. Kark and Oren-Nordheim, 2001, p. 334
  6. http://vprofile.arij.org/bethlehem/pdfs/VP/Beit%20Fajjar_tp_en.pdf Beit Fajjar Town Profile
  7. Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 2, p. 183
  8. Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol. 3, 2nd appendix, p. 115
  9. Guérin, 1869, p. 301
  10. Socin, 1879, p. 154
  11. Hartmann, 1883, p. 142, also noted 27 houses
  12. Conder and Kitchener, 1883, vol. 3, p. 303
  13. Schick, 1896, p. 123
  14. Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Bethlehem, p. 18
  15. Mills, 1932, p. 35
  16. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 24
  17. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 56
  18. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 101
  19. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 151
  20. Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. 15
  21. Web site: The 1967 Census of the West Bank and Gaza Strip: A Digitized Version . Perlmann, Joel . November 2011 – February 2012 . . 24 June 2016 .
  22. http://domino.un.org/unispal.nsf/9a798adbf322aff38525617b006d88d7/858c88eb973847f4802564b5003d1083!OpenDocument UN Doc
  23. http://vprofile.arij.org/bethlehem/pdfs/VP/Beit%20Fajjar_tp_en.pdf Beit Fajjar Town Profile
  24. Web site: Trailblazer Opens Doors for Palestinian Women IIP Digital . 2014-08-22 . https://web.archive.org/web/20160303221949/http://iipdigital.usembassy.gov/st/english/article/2008/03/20080310114345ajesrom0.3168146.html . 2016-03-03 . dead .
  25. http://cchp.ps/new/en/inventory-of-sites/agricultural-villages-near-bethlehem/item/78-beit-fajjar Beit Fajjar
  26. http://www.csmonitor.com/2000/0104/p6s1.html Palestinians' stones cut both ways
  27. https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/01/19/occupation-inc/how-settlement-businesses-contribute-israels-violations-palestinian Occupation, Inc. How Settlement Businesses Contribute to Israel’s Violations of Palestinian Rights
  28. https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6933BG20101004 Korans burnt in West Bank mosque attack
  29. http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3964488,00.html Rabbis visit torched mosque, condemn attack
  30. http://www.timesofisrael.com/pa-palestinian-baby-dies-from-inhaling-tear-gas-fired-by-idf/ PA: Palestinian baby dies from inhaling tear gas fired by IDF
  31. https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-palestinian-prisoner-s-death-in-israeli-medical-ward-prompts-raised-alert-1.7531068 Palestinian Prisoner's Death in Israeli Medical Ward Prompts Raised Alert
  32. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/07/palestinian-prisoner-dies-solitary-confinement-israeli-jail-190716074433939.html Palestinian prisoner dies in solitary confinement in Israeli jail
  33. https://imemc.org/article/palestinian-detainee-dies-in-solitary-confinement-in-nitzan-israeli-prison/ Palestinian Detainee Dies In Solitary Confinement In Nitzan Israeli Prison

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