Qarfa
| Qarfa قرفــا | |
|---|---|
| Village | |
  Qarfa | |
| Coordinates: 32°48′55″N 36°12′5″E / 32.81528°N 36.20139°E | |
| Country |
 Syria |
| Governorate | Daraa Governorate |
| District | Izra District |
| Nahiyah | Al-Shaykh Maskin |
| Population (2004 census)[1] | |
| • Total | 4,885 |
| Time zone | EET (UTC+2) |
| • Summer (DST) | EEST (UTC+3) |
Qarfa (Arabic: قرفــا, also spelled Garfa or Kurfa) is a village in southern Syria, administratively belonging to the Izra' District of the Daraa Governorate. Nearby localities include al-Shaykh Maskin to the northwest, Izra to the northeast, Maliha al-Atash to the east, Namir to the southeast, Khirbet Ghazaleh to the south and Abtaa to the southwest. In the 2004 census by the Central Bureau of Statistics, al-Hirak had a population of 20,760.[1] Its inhabitants are predominantly Sunni Muslims.[2]
Inside a private house in Qarfa a Greek inscription dedicating a church to Saint Bacchus was discovered. The inscription was dated to 589-590 CE and written on a stone lintel decorated with a cross.[3]
In 1596, Qarfa appeared in Ottoman tax registers as a village in the Nahiya of Bani Malik al-Asraf in the Hawran Qada. It had a population of 42 Muslim households and 15 bachelors. It paid taxes on wheat, barley, summercrops, and goats or beehives.[4]
In 13 August 1962 a tribal feud in Qarfa between the al-Makayed and al-Manasser clans resulted in five people being wounded. The fighting was a result of old rivalries. Security forces arrested several people from the town and the wounded were evacuated to the hospital.[5] During the ongoing Syrian Civil War, which began in 2011, opposition rebels from the Free Syrian Army attacked a petrol station in Qarfa, killing a relative of high-ranking government official Rustum Ghazaleh in early January 2013.[6]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 General Census of Population and Housing 2004. Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). Daraa Governorate. (Arabic)
- ↑ Smith, 1841, p. 152.
- ↑ Chaniotis, 2003, p. 521.
- ↑ Wolf-Dieter Hütteroth and Kamal Abdulfattah (1977). Historical Geography of Palestine, Transjordan and Southern Syria in the Late 16th Century. Erlanger Geographische Arbeiten, Sonderband 5. Erlangen, Germany: Vorstand der Fränkischen Geographischen Gesellschaft. p. 212.
- ↑ Mideast Mirror. 14. Arab News Agency. (1962). Page 20.
- ↑ FSA kills relative of Syrian security chief in Deraa. Al Arabiya. 2013-01-05.
Bibliography
- Chaniotis, A. (2003). 'Helfaya&source=gbs_navlinks_s Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum 50. BRILL Academic Publications. ISBN 9050634087.
- Smith, Eli; Robinson, Edward (1841). 'Helfaya&source=gbs_navlinks_s Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petraea: A Journal of Travels in the Year 1838 3. Crocker and Brewster.
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