Welcome To Qaddita - قديتا (קדיתא)

District of Safad Ethnically cleansed days ago	العربية Google Earth
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Statistic & Fact

Value

Occupation Date

May 11, 1948

Distance From District

5 (km) Northwest of Safad

Elevation

750 (meters)

Before & After Nakba, Click Map For Details

Pre-Nakba Map showing before and after destruction

Map Location

See location #52 on the map

View from satellite

Military Operation

Operation Yiftach (commanded by the ethnic cleansing champion Yigal Allon)

Attacking Units

The Palmach's First Battalion

Exodus Cause

Influence of fall of, or exoduce from, neighboring town

Village Temains

The village has been mostly destroyed with the exception of the village cemetery and rubble from destroyed houses

Ethnically Cleansing

Qaddita was mostly ethnically cleansed, some villagers were allowed to stay in 'Akbara (Safad).

Pre-Nakba
Land Ownership

Ethnic Group	Land Ownership (Dunums)*
Arab	2,440
Jewish	0
Public	1
**Total	2,441

*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics
**Town Lands' Demarcation Maps

Land Usage
As of 1945

Land Usage	Arab (Dunum)*
Irrigated & Plantation	150
Olive Groves	77
Planted W/ Cereal	1,452
Built up	31
Arable	1,602
Non-Arable	808

*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics

Population

Year	Population*
1596	149
19th century	200
1922	110
1931	170
1945	240
1948	278
Est. Refugees 1998	1,710

*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics

Number of Houses

Year	Number of Houses
1931	32
1948	52

Near By Towns

Jish (Gush Halav) ↖	al-Ras al-Ahmar ↑ (N)	Taytaba ↗
Safsaf ←	Qaddita	→ 'Ammuqa
↙ Mirun	↓ Mirun	↘ 'Ayn al-Zaytun

Town's Name Through History

Qaddita may have been a corruption of the Syriac word Kaddisha meaning

Exculsive Jewish Colonies
Who Usurped Village Lands

Kadita is the nearest to the village. Sifsofa and Dalton settlements are nearby the village.

Village Before Nakba

The village was situated on the slope of a hill and faced southeast. Its name could have been a corruption of the Syriac word kaddisha, 'sacred.' A secondary road linked it to a highway going to Safad. In 1596, Qaddita was a village in the nahiya of Jira (liwa' of Safad) with a population of 149. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including wheat and barley, as well as on other types of produce and property, such as goats, beehives, and vineyards. [[Hut. and Abd.:175]] In the late nineteenth century, Qaddita was a village built of stone and mud; the slope on which it was located was partially covered by gardens and fig trees. The village's population, estimated at 200, lived in 'ten houses' [[according to Guérin; see SWP (1881) I:198]] It seems likely that at least one or two of these 'houses' were clusters of one-room dwellings centered around enclosed courtyards; such a house could shelter a number of related families. In modem times Qaddita extended in a northwest-southeast direction, following the contours of the land. Its houses, made of stone, were grouped closely together. Its entire population was Muslim. Its economy was based on animal husbandry and crop cultivation, the most important crops being grain and fruits such as grapes, figs, and pomegranates. In the 1942/43 season 77 dunums of village land were planted with olive trees. In 1944/45 a total of 1,452 dunums was allotted to cereals; 150 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards.

Village Occupation and Ethnic Cleaning

Directly after the fall of Safad, a number of eastern Galilee villages were evacuated, and Qaddita was one of them, according to Israeli military intelligence. By 11 May 1948 it had been emptied of its residents, under the influence of the capture of Safad on 9‒10 May. Israeli historian Benny Morris does not make clear whether or not Haganah forces mounted a direct attack on the village when they entered it, nor does he say whether they destroyed it. Qaddita was one of the westernmost villages to fall within the scope of Operation Yiftach (see Abil al-Qamh, Safad sub-disctrict), designed in part to render eastern Galilee 'Arab-free.' [[M:123]] Some villagers were apparently evicted some time after the village was occupied. In 1949, Morris reports that some refugees from Qaddita had been transported to 'Akbara, just south of Safad. They lived there in harrowing circumstances and these conditions 'remained bad for years.' [[M:242]]

Zionists Colonies on Village Lands

There are no Israeli settlements on village lands. However, the settlements of Sifsofa (191268), built on Safsaf village lands to the northwest, and Dalton (196269), built on Dallata village lands to the northeast, are not far from the site.

Village Today

All that remains are tombs from the cemetery and stone rubble from the destroyed homes. The site is covered with thorns and weeds, as well as a few neglected fig and olive trees. The nearby settlements have planted forests as well as fruit trees on some of the surrounding land.

Source

Dr. Walid al-Khalidi, 1992: All That Remains.

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رحاب بنت محمد حمزة	حمزة	-
ibrahim	hamze	k.s.a.
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Ayman Hamzeh	-	Sharjah, UAE
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الذاكرة مفتاح العودة | قرية قديتا - قضاء صفد - فلسطين Duration: 26 min 48 sec
إيابًا: جولة في قرية قديتا مع سعيد سلامة وسعيد حليحل Duration: 26 min 43 sec

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