Sur Baher
| Sur Baher | |
|---|---|
| Hebrew transcription(s) | |
| • Also spelled | Sur Bahr (official) |
| Arabic transcription(s) | |
| • Arabic | صور باهر |
 | |
  Sur Baher | |
| Coordinates: 31°44′14″N 35°13′59″E / 31.73722°N 35.23306°ECoordinates: 31°44′14″N 35°13′59″E / 31.73722°N 35.23306°E | |
| District | Jerusalem |
| Population (2006) | |
| • Total | 15,000 |
| Name meaning | The wall of Bahir (Prominent)[1] |
Sur Baher (Arabic صور باهر, Hebrew צור באהר) is an Palestinian neighborhood on the southeastern outskirts of Jerusalem. It is located southeast of Talpiot and north of the Har Homa neighborhood, down the hill from Kibbutz Ramat Rachel. In 2006, Sur Baher had a population of 15,000.[2]
History
In 1596, it appeared in Ottoman tax registers as "Sur Bahir", a village in the Nahiya of Quds in the Liwa of Quds. It had a population of 29 households, all Muslim, and paid taxes on wheat barley, vineyards and fruit trees, goats and beehives.[3]
French explorer Victor Guérin visited the place in 1863, and described Sur Baher as having about 400 inhabitants.[4] An Ottoman village list of about 1870 found 46 houses and a population of 154, though the population count included only men. It further noted that it was an old, well-built and nice-looking village.[5] In 1883, it was described as "a stone village of moderate size, on a bare hill. On the north is a well in the valley, and there are rock-cut tombs above it to the west."[6]
In the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Sur Baher had an all Muslim population of 993 persons.[7] In the 1931 census the population of Sur Bahir was a total of 1529, still all Muslim, in 308 inhabited houses.[8]
In 1945 the population of Sur Baher, together with Umm Tuba, was 2,450, all Arabs, who owned 8,915 dunams of land according to an official land and population survey.[9] 911 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 3,927 used for cereals,[10] while 56 dunams were built-up (urban) land.[11]
During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War Sur Baher was captured by Jordanian forces, and became a part of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan until the Six-Day War in 1967, when it was captured by Israel.
Development projects
In 2000, the Israeli government and Jerusalem municipality approved building plans for two new high schools and a youth center. In September 2005, the Jerusalem municipality, in cooperation with the Israel Defense Forces, cleared a Jordanian minefield in Sur Baher. The work, carried out by an Israeli company, was completed by October 2005.[2] In May 2007, the municipality built two schools on the cleared land: a girls school attended by 800 students, and Ibn Rushd, a boys school attended by 700 students.[12]
References
- ↑ Palmer 1881, p. 329
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Minefield as a School Ground: The Tzur Baher Minefield Clearance Project, by Bentzi Telefus (10.1)
- ↑ Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 120.
- ↑ Guérin, 1869, p. 83
- ↑ Socin, 1979, p. 161
- ↑ Conder and Kitchener, 1883, p. 30
- ↑ Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Jerusalem
- ↑ Mills, 1932, p 44
- ↑ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in S. Hadawi, Village Statistics, 1945. PLO Research Center, 1970, p. 58
- ↑ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in S. Hadawi, Village Statistics, 1945. PLO Research Center, 1970, p. 104
- ↑ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in S. Hadawi, Village Statistics, 1945. PLO Research Center, 1970, p. 154
- ↑ Arnona 2008, newsletter published by the public relations department of the Jerusalem Municipality http://www.jerusalem.muni.il
Bibliography
- ‘Adawi, Zubair (19/1/2010): Jerusalem, Sur Bahir, Final Report, Hadashot Arkheologiyot – Excavations and Surveys in Israel, Journal 122
- Barron, J. B., ed. (1923). Palestine: Report and General Abstracts of the Census of 1922. Government of Palestine.
- Conder, Claude Reignier; Kitchener, H. H. (1883). The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology 3. London: Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
- Dagan, Yehuda, Leticia Barda and Zubair ‘Adawi (13/12/2009): Jerusalem, Sur Bahir, Survey Final Report, Hadashot Arkheologiyot – Excavations and Surveys in Israel, Journal 121
- Ganor, Amir and Alon Klein (12/9/2011): Jerusalem, Sur Bahir Final Report, Hadashot Arkheologiyot – Excavations and Surveys in Israel, Journal 123
- Guérin, Victor (1869). Description Géographique, Historique et Archéologique de la Palestine. Vol 1, pt 3: Judee, "Tome troisieme". Unknown parameter
|part=ignored (help) - Hadawi, Sami (1970), Village Statistics of 1945: A Classification of Land and Area ownership in Palestine, Palestine Liberation Organization Research Center
- Hütteroth, Wolf-Dieter; Abdulfattah, Kamal (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. ISBN 0-88728-224-5.
- E. Mills, ed. (1932). Census of Palestine 1931. Population of Villages, Towns and Administrative Areas. Jerusalem: Government of Palestine.
- Palmer, E. H. (1881). The Survey of Western Palestine: Arabic and English Name Lists Collected During the Survey by Lieutenants Conder and Kitchener, R. E. Transliterated and Explained by E.H. Palmer. Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
- Socin, A. (1879). "Alphabetisches Verzeichniss von Ortschaften des Paschalik Jerusalem". Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins 2: 135–163.
External links
- Welcome To Sur Bahir & Umm Tuba
- Sur Baher on facebook
- Wandering in Sur Baher on I'm from Jerusalem website
