Al-'Al ( ar, الْعَال, al-ʿĀl, trans. "the high place"), is a former
Syria
Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
n village in the southern
Golan Heights,
[CIA map: Golan Heights and vicinity]
- showing Al-'Al as an abandoned/dismantled Syrian village. on the southern
tributary of Wadi es-Samekh.
Israel occupied the area during the
Six-Day War. The village was abandoned and dismantled.
During the
French Mandate for Syria and Lebanon
The Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon (french: Mandat pour la Syrie et le Liban; ar, الانتداب الفرنسي على سوريا ولبنان, al-intidāb al-fransi 'ala suriya wa-lubnān) (1923−1946) was a League of Nations mandate foun ...
, the name was spelt "El Al" on French maps.
History
Archaeological remains of several Roman and Greek artifacts at the site give evidence of ancient settlement.
[
In 1812, the place was described as a "ruined village."][ A modern village was probably established during the second half of the 19th century. In 1884, it was reported that the village contained 65 dwellings, including 320 inhabitants and was a "large, well-built village on the point of reviving."][
The ]Israeli settlement
Israeli settlements, or Israeli colonies, are civilian communities inhabited by Israeli citizens, overwhelmingly of Jewish ethnicity, built on lands occupied by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. The international community considers Israeli se ...
of Eliad was built nearby.[
During the Yom Kippur War, the Syrian 5th Infantry Division set up a ]defence in depth
Defence in depth (also known as deep defence or elastic defence) is a military strategy that seeks to delay rather than prevent the advance of an attacker, buying time and causing additional casualties by yielding space. Rather than defeating ...
strategy at the Al 'Al ridgeline.
See also
* Qasr Bardawil
Qasr ( ar, قصر, lit=palace/castle/fortress, plural ''qusur''), from Latin ''castrum'', may refer to:
Individual ''qusur'' and places named after a ''qasr''
*
*
Particular types of ''qusur''
*Alcázar (cognate Spanish term; also ''Alcácer'' ...
, an archaeological site from a mountain spur near Al-'Al, now classified as a Bronze Age fortification but previously misidentified as the Crusader castle of al-Al
The Castle of al-Al, also ʿAlʿālGibb (2002)932 pp. 71-2. ( ar, قلعة العال, "Qal'at al-'Al") was, according to contemporary Damascene chronicler Ibn al-Qalanisi, a short-lived castle built in 1105 near al-‘Al on the Golan Heights by ...
*
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Al-'Al
Destroyed populated places
Former populated places in the Golan Heights
19th-century establishments in Ottoman Syria
1960s disestablishments in Syria