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Welcome To al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya - السوافير الغربية (א-סואפיר אל-ע'רביה)

District of Gaza
Ethnically cleansed days ago
العربية

Google Earth
Picture for al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya Village - Palestine: : Villager Pointing To The Village Site In 1987
 Gallery (2)
Statistic & Fact Value
Occupation Date May 18, 1948
Distance From District 30 (km) North East of Gaza
Elevation 50 (meters)
Before & After Nakba, Click Map For Detailswhat's new
Pre-Nakba Map showing before and after destruction
Map Location See location #14 on the map

View from satellite
Military Operation Second stage of Operation Barak
Attacking Units Possibly Giva'ti Brigade
Exodus Cause Fear of Jewish attack, or of being caught in the fighting
Village Temains The village has been mostly destroyed with the exception of its cemetery.
Ethnically Cleansing al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya inhabitants were completely ethnically cleansed.
Pre-Nakba
Land Ownership
Ethnic Group Land Ownership (Dunums)*
Arab 7,307
Jewish 0
Public 216
**Total 7,523
*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics
**Town Lands' Demarcation Maps
Land Usage
As of 1945
Land Usage Arab (Dunum)*
Irrigated & Plantation 585
Planted W/ Cereal 6,663
Built up 25
Arable 7,248
Non-Arable 250
*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics
Population
Year Population*
1596 237
1922 572
1931 723
1945 1,030
1948 1,195
Est. Refugees 1998 7,337
*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics
Number of Houses
Year Number of Houses
1931 134
1948 221
Near By Townswhat's new
Bayt Daras
          ↖
al-Sawafir al-Shamaliyya
↑
(N)
Qastina
↗        
Hamama  ←
al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya
→   al-Sawafir al-Sharqiyya
            ↙
Julis
↓
'Ibdis
↘           
al-Jaladiyya
Schools al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya shared a school with the other two Sawafir villages, and in 1945 it had an enrollment of about 280.
Shrines / Maqams A shrine for local sage al-Shaykh al-Baz
Archeological Sites The village contained the fragmentary remains of earlier occupation.
Exculsive Jewish Colonies
Who Usurped Village Lands		 Merkaz Shappira, Massu'ot Yitzchaq, and 'En Tzurim
Featured Video

Village Before Nakba

The village stood on the coastal plain, north of the highway that ran northeastwards from the city of al-Majdal to a point where it crossed the Jerusalem–Jaffa highway. The railroad to Gaza passed just north of the village. The adjectival al-Gharbiyya ('western') was added to its name to distinguish it from the two other neighboring villages with the same first name (al-Sawafir). Together they formed a right triangle, with a northeast-southwest hypotenuse. In 1596, al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya was a village in the nahiya of Gaza (liwa' of Gaza), with a population of 237. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including wheat, barley, and fruits, as well as on other types of produce and property, such as goats, beehives, and vineyards.

In the late nineteenth century, the village of al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya had several small gardens and wells. Most of its houses were built of mud and adobe bricks, although a few were made of stone. The village had a mosque—its population was Muslim—and a shrine for one Shaykh al-Baz. It also had a police station. It shared a school with the other two villages; the school had an enrollment of about 280 in the mid-1940s. Agriculture, which was mainly rainfed, constituted the backbone of the economy. Grain, citrus, grapes, and apricots were grown on the land. In 1944/45 a total of 6,663 dunums was allotted to cereals; 585 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards. Al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya contained the fragmentary remains of earlier occupation. The maqam for Shaykh al-Baz, for example, contained reused columns.

Village Occupation and Ethnic Cleaning

The village fell in the early stages of Operation Barak , according to two Israeli sources. The inhabitants of the village were driven out, either following the extensive attack on nearby Bayt Daras on 10 May 1948, or during the direct military attack on its sister village, al-Sawafir al-Sharqiyya, on 18 May. The village itself may also have been attacked on that day.

One Egyptian account claims that the village was not taken until over a month later, two weeks into the first truce of the war. The account given by the late Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser, who was a junior officer at the time, chastises the Egyptian military command for allowing the village to be occupied, along with two others. He writes that on the day the truce was announced, the villages were empty of Israeli troops, adding ironically that 'our High Command had preferred to present the enemy with the opportunity of occupying them so that our troops could recover them by assault.' As hostilities resumed on 9 July, Abdel Nasser's battalion was given orders to recapture the village. The occupation was dependent upon the capture of Bayt Daras, which was briefly entered by a Sudanese unit but relinquished due to a careless error. In the meantime, Abdel Nasser organized a reconnaissance maneuver of the site, penetrating behind enemy lines in order to draw up a plan of attack. He recalls that the Israeli force in the al-Sawafir villages was a small one. The History of the War of Independence confirms that the Egyptians planned to capture the village in early July, but were prevented from doing so after a Sudanese force was ousted from Bayt Daras.

Zionists Colonies on Village Lands

Two settlements were established on village land: Merkaz Shappira , built in 1948, and Massu'ot Yitzcha, built in 1949. En Tzurim was built nearby in 1949 on land belonging to al-Sawafir al-Sharqiyya. The determination of the settlement locations is complicated by the numerous changes in their names since they were founded. Furthermore, the settlement of Deganim seems to have been moved from its original site on the lands of al-Sawafir al-Gharbiyya to join the settlement of En Tzurim.

Village Today

All of the houses are gone. Some cactuses and fig and sycamore trees grow on the site. An old village road is clearly visible. The cemetery is overgrown with wild vegetation. One can see the debris of (what appears to be) a water-pump building in the al-Baz orchard . The adjacent lands are cultivated by Israeli farmers.

Source

Dr. Walid al-Khalidi, 1992: All That Remains.
Related Maps Town Lands' Demarcation Maps
خرائط للقضاء توضح حدود القرى والاودية
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Bibliography and References

Display Name Clan/Hamolah Country of Residence
Heba Abuabdou - Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
maher afana afana ---, -United Kingdom-manchester
رائف محمود عطالله - -
eattalah - -
samara - Amman , Jordan
أبو خليل - الرياض, السعودية
ابو محمد الحبيبي الاردن -عمان, وادي السير
أبوقيس الحبيبي رفح, السوافير الغربية
ابوكرم شحاده غزه, غزه
شحادة شحادة غزه
وسام الباز - غزة
Ayman Abu-Abdou Al-Sawafir Al-Gharbiyya Palestine
Naim1948 Afana Gaza
mohammad sawalha - -
asd asd - -
abed nofal nofal manchester, uk
Moe - Amman, Jordan
Abu Yazan Dabboor Istanbul, Turkey
Ahmed Khalil Mahmoud ABU-ABDOU Coosa Vienna, Austria
Mahmoud Abu-Abdou Abu Khalil Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
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