Al-Na'ima

Al-Na'ima
Al-Na'ima
Arabic	الناعمة
Sub-district	Safad
Coordinates	33°11′17.41″N 35°35′41.88″E
Population	1240 (1945)
Area	7155 dunums
Date of depopulation	May 14, 1948
Cause(s) of depopulation	Influence of nearby town's fall
Current localities	Ne'ot Mordekhay, Kefar Blum, and Beyt Hillel

Al-Na'ima (Arabic: الناعمة ‎) was a Palestinian Arab village in the District of Safad. It was depopulated during the 1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine on May 14, 1948 by the Palmach's First Battalion of Operation Yiftach. It was located 26 km northeast of Safad.

In 1945 it had a population of 1,240 of whom 210 were Jews.

History

Al-Na'ima was located on flat land to the north west of the al-Hula Plain. A road linked it to the village of al-Khalisa and to a highway leading to Safad and Tiberias. In 1944/45 a total of 156 dunums was allocated to cereal farming and 4,122 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards. A road linked the village to a highway leading to Safad and Tiberias. A shrine for a Shaykh al-Wayzi was located about 0.5 km from the site as was a stone quarry. The village also had a boys’ ele­mentary school.

During the 1948 war, Al-Na’ima was depopulated during Operation Yiftach which targeted Safad and the surrounding district. When the city of Safad was finally attacked on 10 to 11 May 1948, morale in the village was low and shortly aftererwards many fled according to an Israeli intelligence report on 14 May shortly before advancing Israeli troops entered.

The settlement of Ne’ot Mordekhay was built in 1946 to the south of the village land, to the north is the settlement of Beyt Hillel, built in 1940, and 2 kilometres to the southeast is Kefar Blum, built in 1943.

References

Bibliography

• Esber, Rosemarie M. (2008), Under the Cover of War, The Zionist Expulsions of the Palestinians. Arabicus Books & Media.
• Hadawi, Sami (1970), Village Statistics of 1945: A Classification of Land and Area ownership in Palestine, Palestine Liberation Organization Research Center, http://www.palestineremembered.com/Articles/General-2/Story3150.html
• Khalidi, Walid (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
• Morris, Benny (2004). The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-00967-6. http://books.google.com/?id=uM_kFX6edX8C&printsec=frontcover&dq=benny+morris&q.

External links

• Welcome To al-Na'ima
• al-Na'ima at Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center
• Al-Na’ima Dr. Khalil Rizk.