Zarzir | |
Settlement Type: | Local council (from 1997) |
Translit Lang1: | Hebrew |
Translit Lang1 Type1: | ISO 259 |
Translit Lang1 Info1: | Zarzir |
Translit Lang1 Type3: | Also spelled |
Translit Lang1 Info3: | Bet Zarzir (official) |
Pushpin Map: | Israel jezreel |
Coordinates: | 32.7272°N 35.2247°W |
Subdivision Type: | Country |
Subdivision Name: | Israel |
Subdivision Type1: | District |
Subdivision Name1: | Northern |
Unit Pref: | dunam |
Population Density Km2: | auto |
Zarzir (Arabic: زرزير, Hebrew: זַרְזִיר), also known as Beit Zarzir, is an Arab local council located 10km (10miles) west of the city of Nazareth in the Northern District of Israel. In it had a population of, consisting of five Bedouin tribes, Mazarib, Grifat, Haib, Jawamis, and Eyadat.
A few kilometres away, at HaMovil Junction, there is a memorial to the Bedouin soldiers of the IDF fallen since 1948, 230 of them by 2022.[1] The Monument to the Bedouin Soldier (sometimes translated a Fighter or Warrior), established at a site close to Bedouin and other Israeli Arab towns, was inaugurated on Independence Day in 1993 by then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.[1] The memorial includes a museum of Bedouin heritage and a garden with medicinal herbs.[1]
On June 6, 2024, during the Hamas-Israel war, an IDF soldier from Zarzir was killed in action in the Gaza Strip by Hamas gunmen who were trying to infiltrate through the border fence into Israel. Warrant Officer Zeed Mazarib, 34, was part of a force of Bedouin trackers from the Desert Reconnaissance Battalion sent to intercept the Hamas cell.[2]
Dr. Tomer Mazarib, The Integration Process of the Bedouin population into Arab Villages and Towns in the Galilee: Historical, Social and Cultural Aspects from the beginning of the 18th Century to the end of the 20th Century (Haifa: University of Haifa Press, 2016).