Al-Shawka al-Tahta was a

Palestinian Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...

Arab The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Wester ...

village in the Safad Subdistrict. It was depopulated during the

1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine The 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine was the first phase of the 1947–1949 Palestine war. It broke out after the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted a resolution on 29 November 1947 recommending the adoption of the Par ...

on May 14, 1948, by the Palmach's First Battalion of

Operation Yiftach Operation Yiftach ( he, מבצע יפתח, ''Mivtza Yiftah'') was a Palmach offensive carried out between 28 April and 23 May 1948. The objectives were to capture Safed and to secure the eastern Galilee before the British Mandate ended on 14 May ...

. It was located 31.5 km northeast of

Safad Safed (known in Hebrew as Tzfat; Sephardic Hebrew & Modern Hebrew: צְפַת ''Tsfat'', Ashkenazi Hebrew: ''Tzfas'', Biblical Hebrew: ''Ṣǝp̄aṯ''; ar, صفد, ''Ṣafad''), is a city in the Northern District of Israel. Located at an elev ...

History

The village contained two khirbas known as Tall al-Qadi and Khirbat al-Day'a. In 1881 the

Survey of Western Palestine The PEF Survey of Palestine was a series of surveys carried out by the Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) between 1872 and 1877 for the Survey of Western Palestine and in 1880 for the Survey of Eastern Palestine. The survey was carried out after th ...

identified ''Khirbet Dufnah'', meaning "the ruin of Daphne (

oleander ''Nerium oleander'' ( ), most commonly known as oleander or nerium, is a shrub or small tree cultivated worldwide in temperate and subtropical areas as an ornamental and landscaping plant. It is the only species currently classified in the ge ...

)", which they marked on their map in the place where ''Al-Shawka al-Tahta'' was to stand later, about 1km NNW of present-day

Dafna Dafna ( he, דַּפְנָה) is a kibbutz in the Upper Galilee in northern Israel, 7 km east of Kiryat Shmona. It was founded on 3 May 1939 as a Tower and Stockade settlement, and was the first Tower and Stockade-type settlement in the ...

British Mandate era

In the 1931 census of Palestine, during the

British Mandate for Palestine The Mandate for Palestine was a League of Nations mandate for British administration of the territories of Palestine and Transjordan, both of which had been conceded by the Ottoman Empire following the end of World War I in 1918. The mandate ...

, the village had a population of 136, all Muslims, in a total of 31 houses.Mills, 1932, p
111
/ref> In the 1945 statistics it had a population of 200 Muslims with a total land area of 2,132 dunams.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p
71
Of this, 1,845 dunams were allocated for plantations and irrigable land, 140 for cereals, while 17 dunams were classified as non-cultivable areas.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p
171

References

Bibliography

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External links

al-Shawka al-Tahta

Zochrot Zochrot ( he, זוכרות; "Remembering"; ar, ذاكرات; "Memories") is an Israeli nonprofit organization founded in 2002. Based in Tel Aviv, its aim is to promote awareness of the Palestinian ''Nakba'' ("Catastrophe"), including the 1948 P ...

al-Shawka al-Tahta
*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 2:
IAAWikimedia commons
{{DEFAULTSORT:Al-Shawka Al-Tahta Arab villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War District of Safad