Acre district · depopulated 1948 · 2 min read
Al-Nahr
النهر
Al-Nahr, the twin of al-Tall, stood on a sandy mound fourteen kilometres from Acre built on archaeological debris going back to the eighteenth century BC, its 610 people working land of which 97 per cent was cultivable — 2,066 dunums in citrus and bananas alone. It was captured on 20–21 May 1948 in the second phase of Operation Ben-Ami. The day before, the commander of the Carmeli Brigade ordered his battalion commanders "to attack in order to conquer, to kill among the men, to destroy and burn the villages of Al Kabri, Umm al Faraj and An Nahr." Two houses remain.
See Al-Nahr on the Atlas33.0071°N · 35.1413°EAl-Nahr, the twin of al-Tall, stood on a sandy, slightly elevated mound at about 65 metres, fourteen kilometres from Acre, in the eastern part of the Galilee coastal plain, on the Tarshiha–Nahariyya–Acre highway. Like many tells in Palestine the mound was the site of an ancient settlement; investigations by Aaron Kempinsky indicate that both al-Nahr and its sister village of al-Tall, to the west, stood on archaeological debris dating back to the eighteenth century BC. Al-Nahr was built on a site called Tall al-Qahwa, “the mound of coffee”; the 1904 Ottoman Yearbook for Beirut refers to the site as belonging to the villages of Tall and Qahwa.
The village had a rectangular layout on a southeast–northwest orientation. Its houses were bunched close together and built of a variety of materials — stone blocks with cement or mud mortar, and reinforced concrete. Its entire population was Muslim. Agriculture and animal husbandry were the principal sources of livelihood, and the land was almost wholly under cultivation: of 5,261 dunums, 97 per cent was cultivable, with 2,066 dunums in citrus and bananas, 1,094 allotted to cereals and 1,937 irrigated or planted in orchards, of which 30 dunums were olives. The 1931 census counted 522 people in 120 houses; the 1945 statistics counted 610.
Along with a series of villages in western Galilee north of Acre, al-Nahr was captured on 20–21 May 1948, during the second phase of Operation Ben-Ami. The day before launching the incursion, the commander of the Haganah’s Carmeli Brigade ordered his battalion commanders “to attack in order to conquer, to kill among the men, to destroy and burn the villages of Al Kabri, Umm al Faraj and An Nahr.” Zochrot dates the occupation to 21 May and names the Carmeli Brigade.
Benny Morris indicates that the Israeli settlement which replaced the village in 1949 is Ben Ammi, named after Ben Ammi Pechter, the Haganah commander killed in a skirmish near Nahariyya in March 1948 — the same man after whom the operation that took al-Nahr was named. The settlement of Kabri also uses the village lands. Only two houses remain, one of them partially destroyed. A tall date palm grows on the site, which is overgrown with wild grasses, a few cactus plants and fig trees. The cemetery, on the western side of the village, contains one identifiable grave. The nearby Fawwara spring has been fenced in and declared private property.
Sources
Cited works
2- palquest.org — al nahr(opens in a new tab)https://www.palquest.org/en/place/16865/al-nahr
- zochrot.org — en(opens in a new tab)https://www.zochrot.org/villages/village_details/49311/en
Connected in the archive
22 connected records22 records elsewhere in the archive are linked to this one, each by a piece of evidence you can read below.
named in this record — 3 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Acreعكا
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Al-Nahr, the twin of al-Tall, stood on a sandy, slightly elevated mound at about 65 metres, fourteen kilometres from Acre, in the eastern part of the Galilee coastal plain, on the Tarshiha–Nahariyya–Acre highway.
- Al-Kabriالكابري
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The day before launching the incursion, the commander of the Haganah's Carmeli Brigade ordered his battalion commanders "to attack in order to conquer, to kill among the men, to destroy and burn the villages of Al Kabri, Umm al Faraj and An Nahr." Zochrot dates the occupation to 21 May and names the Carmeli Brigade.
- Umm al-Farajأم الفرج
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The day before launching the incursion, the commander of the Haganah's Carmeli Brigade ordered his battalion commanders "to attack in order to conquer, to kill among the men, to destroy and burn the villages of Al Kabri, Umm al Faraj and An Nahr." Zochrot dates the occupation to 21 May and names the Carmeli Brigade.
in the same district — 19 records
Filed near each other — the same Mandate district, or the same uncommon subject tags.
- Al-Bassaالبصة
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Both recorded in the Acre district.
- Al-Birwaالبروة
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Both recorded in the Acre district.
- Al-Damunالدامون
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Both recorded in the Acre district.
- Al-Ghabisiyyaالغابسية
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Both recorded in the Acre district.
- Al-Manshiyya (Acre)المَنْشِيَّة
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Both recorded in the Acre district.
- Al-Mansuraالمنصورة
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: Both recorded in the Acre district.
- and 13 more
Cite this page
Every claim above carries its sources — citation is the point.
- Chicago
“Al-Nahr.” Village Memory, FALASTEEN.AI. Accessed 22 August 2026. https://falasteen.ai/memory/al-nahr.- MLA
“Al-Nahr.” Village Memory, FALASTEEN.AI, 2026, https://falasteen.ai/memory/al-nahr. Accessed 22 August 2026.- BibTeX
@misc{falasteen-al-nahr, title = {Al-Nahr}, howpublished = {\url{https://falasteen.ai/memory/al-nahr}}, organization = {FALASTEEN.AI — A Living Archive for Palestine}, year = {2026}, note = {Accessed 2026-08-22} }