| al-Batani al-Sharqi | |
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al-Batani al-Sharqi
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| Arabic | البطاني الشرقي |
| District | Gaza |
| Coordinates | |
| Population | 650 (1945) |
| Area | 5,764 dunums
5.8 km² |
| Date of depopulation | May 13, 1948[1] |
| Cause(s) of depopulation | Military assault by Yishuv forces |
| Current localities | None |
Al-Batani al-Sharqi (Arabic: البطاني الشرقي) was a Palestinian Arab village in the District of Gaza, located 36.5 kilometers (22.7 mi) northeast of Gaza situated in the flat terrain on the southern coastal plain of Palestine. It had a population of 650 in 1945. Al-Batani al-Sharqi was depopulated during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.[2]
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The earliest mention of al-Batani indicates that it was originally founded as a ranch by the Umayyad caliph Mu'awiyah I in the 8th century CE. In 1596, under the Ottoman Empire, it was a village in the nahiya of Gaza, part of the Sanjak of Gaza with a population of 39. It paid taxes on wheat, barley, fruit, beehives, goats, and vineyards.[2]
In the late 19th century, the village of al-Batani al-Sharqi was situated on low ground and extended from east to west in a rectangular shape. Patches of garden and a number of wells surrounded the village.[3] Construction expanded westward—the Wadi al-Mari's winter flooding impeded eastward expansion—along the road that linked to al-Batani al-Gharbi until the distance between the two villages was less than 2 kilometers (1.2 mi). Village houses, made of adobe, with wood-and-cane roofs, were built close together along narrow alleys. The two al-Batanis shared an elementary school that was opened in 1947; its initial enrollment was 119 students. The village had a mosque and a number of small shops. The entire population was Muslim.[2]
Together with nearby Bashshit and Barqa, al-Batani al-Sharqi was captured by the Haganah's Givati Brigade, just before the end of the British Mandate period in Palestine.[2] According to Israeli historian Benny Morris, it fell on May 13, 1948, as part of Operation Barak in which the Haganah moved southwards in anticipation of an engagement with Egyptian forces.[4]
The History of the War of Independence, however, states that it was captured by Israeli forces under the Givati Brigade's Eighth Battalion on June 10-11. Palestinian historian Walid Khalidi said that this may have meant that the village briefly changed hands in the course of Israeli-Egyptian battles on the southern front before the first truce came into effect on June 11.[2]
There are no Israeli localities on village lands which consisted of 5,764 dunams in 1945. According to Khalidi, "Only a dilapidated police station from the Mandate period survives. It is a complex of three single-storey, concrete flat-roofed buildings... Cactuses and fig, eucalyptus, and sycamore trees are scattered over the site. Israeli farmers cultivate citrus on the adjacent lands."[2]