Al-Sawafir al-Shamaliyya

Al-Sawafir al-Shamaliyya stood on the coastal plain 33 kilometers northeast of Gaza, at an average elevation of about 50 meters, a short distance north of a highway that linked al-Majdal and Ramla to the Jerusalem–Jaffa highway. The adjectival second part of its name — al-Shamaliyya, “northern” — distinguished it from its two sister villages, al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya and al-Sawafir al-Sharqiyya; PalQuest records that the three together formed an approximately right-angled triangle. The Crusaders knew the village as Zeophir and recorded it as the property of the Bishop of Jerusalem in the early twelfth century; sixteenth-century Ottoman records list it as “Sawafir al-Halil” in the nahiya of Gaza, with a population of 616 paying taxes on wheat, barley, olive trees, and fruit trees. In the late nineteenth century the village had several small gardens and wells. Many of its houses were built of adobe, a few of stone; its residents were Muslim, and it had its own mosque but shared a school with the other two Sawafir villages — enrollment was about 280 in the mid-1940s, a figure Palestine Remembered dates to 1945. The population was 334 in 1922 per Palestine Remembered’s table, 454 in 1931 living in 77 houses, and the British government’s April 1945 survey estimated it at 680, all Muslims. Village lands totaled 5,861 dunums, of which PalQuest records 5,166 as Arab-owned, 450 as Jewish-owned, and 245 as public — figures Palestine Remembered’s table matches, attributing them to the British Mandate’s Village Statistics. Agriculture, mainly rainfed, was the backbone of the economy: grain, citrus, grapes, and apricots were grown (Zochrot’s account adds bananas), with 481 dunums of Arab-owned land under citrus and bananas, 10 dunums irrigated or used for orchards, and cereals on 4,632 dunums of Arab-owned land per PalQuest — Palestine Remembered’s table lists 4,633. The sources disagree on one antiquarian detail: PalQuest’s account states that it was al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya that contained archaeological remains — pieces of marble and the shafts and capitals of ancient columns — while Palestine Remembered’s page for al-Shamaliyya lists those same remains under this village.

Like its sister villages, al-Sawafir al-Shamaliyya was occupied during Operation Barak (9–13 May 1948); Zochrot’s catalogue lists the occupying unit as “Giva’ati”, and Palestine Remembered’s table lists “Possibly Giva’ti Brigade” under the operation’s second stage. The reached sources do not agree on the date of capture. PalQuest’s account, following Khalidi, says the villagers may have been pushed out by the attack on nearby Bayt Daras on 10 May, which was preceded by a mortar attack, but that it is more likely they left during an attack on the village itself that led to its capture on 12 May, along with nearby Bashshit, according to an Associated Press dispatch quoting a Haganah source; the same account states that Israeli historian Benny Morris claims, “probably incorrectly,” that the villagers fled at the time of the attack on al-Sawafir al-Sharqiyya. Zochrot’s catalogue lists the occupation date as 11 May 1948, while Palestine Remembered’s summary table gives 18 May 1948. The disagreement does not support selecting a more exact date. Palestine Remembered classifies the exodus cause as “fear of Jewish attack, or of being caught in the fighting.” Its table estimates the 1948 population at 789 in 133 houses; Zochrot’s catalogue gives 790. PalQuest also records, citing the History of the War of Independence, that at the end of the war’s first truce in early July 1948 Egyptian and Sudanese forces planned to capture the three sister villages but were prevented from doing so at an early stage. Palestine Remembered states that the village’s inhabitants were completely ethnically cleansed, and estimates the village’s refugees at 4,844 as of 1998.

PalQuest and Palestine Remembered both record that no Israeli settlements were built on the village’s lands, PalQuest adding that determining the locations of several settlements in the area is complicated by the numerous changes in their names since founding. Zochrot’s narrative likewise states there are no Israeli settlements on village lands, but its catalogue field for post-1948 settlement lists a “Kfar Varburg expansion” — the contradiction stands within the same page and the reached sources do not resolve it. The 1992 field research recorded in Khalidi’s All That Remains, as carried by PalQuest, described a few vacant houses and segments of houses standing amidst wild vegetation, one with a covered porch supported on two columns; an old village road was still identifiable, cactuses and fig trees grew on the site, and the surrounding lands were cultivated. Palestine Remembered summarizes the village as mostly destroyed with the exception of a few deserted houses, and Zochrot adds that the surrounding land is cultivated by Israeli farmers. The reached sources do not establish their condition in 2026.

Sources

• al-Sawafir al-Shamaliyya — Interactive Encyclopedia of the Palestine Question (PalQuest)
• al-Sawafir al-Shamaliyya — Palestine Remembered
• al-Sawafir al-Shamaliyya — Zochrot