Jannatah ( ar, جناتة) is a Palestinian town in the central

West Bank The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...

south of

Bethlehem Bethlehem (; ar, بيت لحم ; he, בֵּית לֶחֶם '' '') is a city in the central West Bank, Palestine, about south of Jerusalem. Its population is approximately 25,000,Amara, 1999p. 18.Brynen, 2000p. 202. and it is the capital o ...

in the Bethlehem Governorate. Nearby villages include

Hindaza Hindaza ( ar, هندازة) is a Palestinian territories, Palestinian village located six kilometers south-east of Bethlehem. The village is in the Bethlehem Governorate Southern West Bank. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, ...

in the north and Tuqu' to the south. It is situated above sea level. The total land area is 11,901 dunams of which 319 constitute built-up area and 277 have been confiscated by the Israeli government for

settlement Settlement may refer to: *Human settlement, a community where people live *Settlement (structural), the distortion or disruption of parts of a building *Closing (real estate), the final step in executing a real estate transaction *Settlement (fina ...

s and a military base. Much of the remainder is used for

arable land Arable land (from the la, arabilis, "able to be ploughed") is any land capable of being ploughed and used to grow crops.''Oxford English Dictionary'', "arable, ''adj''. and ''n.''" Oxford University Press (Oxford), 2013. Alternatively, for the ...

.Jannatah Town Profile
Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem. 2010. Retrieved on 2012-02-27.

History

In the wake of the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 (or First) Arab–Israeli War was the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. It formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight on 14 May 1948; the Israeli Declaration of Independence had ...

, and after the

1949 Armistice Agreements The 1949 Armistice Agreements were signed between Israel and Egypt,Jordanian rule The Jordanian annexation of the West Bank formally occurred on 24 April 1950, after the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, during which Transjordan occupied territory that had previously been part of Mandatory PalestineRaphael Israeli, Jerusalem divi ...

. Since the

Six-Day War The Six-Day War (, ; ar, النكسة, , or ) or June War, also known as the 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states (primarily United Arab Republic, Egypt, S ...

in 1967, Jannatah has been held under

Israeli occupation Israeli-occupied territories are the lands that were captured and occupied by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967. While the term is currently applied to the Palestinian territories and the Golan Heights, it has also been used to refer to a ...

. According to ARIJ, Israel has

confiscated Confiscation (from the Latin ''confiscatio'' "to consign to the ''fiscus'', i.e. transfer to the treasury") is a legal form of seizure by a government or other public authority. The word is also used, popularly, of spoliation under legal forms, o ...

land from Jannatah to construct two Israeli settlements; 409

dunam A dunam ( Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; tr, dönüm; he, דונם), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area equivalent to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amount ...

s of land in 1982 for

Nokdim Nokdim ( he, נוֹקְדִים, ''lit.'' Shepherds) is an Israeli settlement organized as a community settlement in the West Bank. Located south of Bethlehem in the northern Judean Mountains, it falls under the jurisdiction of Gush Etzion Regio ...

Jannatah Town Profile
ARIJ, p. 18 and 222 dunams in 1999 for El David. After the 1995 accords, 9.4% of the Jannatah’s land was classified as

Area A Area is the quantity that expresses the extent of a region on the plane or on a curved surface. The area of a plane region or ''plane area'' refers to the area of a shape or planar lamina, while '' surface area'' refers to the area of an open s ...

, 28.5% as

Area B The Palestinian enclaves are areas in the West Bank designated for Palestinians under a variety of Israeli–Palestinian peace process, U.S. and Israeli-led proposals to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The enclaves are Israel and aparthe ...

, 54% as Area C, while the remaining 8.1% was classified as "nature reserves". Jannatah is named after ''Wadi al-Jana'en'' or "Valley of Gardens," the name of the area where the town is located. Jannatah was formed by the

Palestinian National Authority The Palestinian National Authority (PA or PNA; ar, السلطة الوطنية الفلسطينية '), commonly known as the Palestinian Authority and officially the State of Palestine,

(PNA) in 1996 with the merger of the villages of al-Iqab, Rakhme, al-Asakra, Khallet al-Karaneen, Harmala and Abu Nujeim in order to ease the provision of government services and planning for the communities. Since then the town has been governed by a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

consisting of eleven members appointed by the PNA. The current mayor is Mustafa Urooj and his deputy is Ibrahim Abakreh. There are six mosques and five public schools in Jannatah. On 28 August 2001, during the

Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...

, ARIJ reported the

Israeli Army The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; he, צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the State of Israel. It consists of three service branc ...

raided Abu Nujeim, destroyed its water network, uprooted 20 of its olive trees and damaged part of the Abu Nujeim School. That same day, ARIJ reported Israeli soldiers had fired at a livestock pen, killing 15 sheep. In the 2007 census by the

Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS; ar, الجهاز المركزي للإحصاء الفلسطيني) is the official statistical institution of the State of Palestine. Its main task is to provide credible statistical figures a ...

(PCBS), Jannatah had a population of 5,416, or 860 households.Population, Housing and Establishment Census 2007
.

(PCBS). 2008. Retrieved on 2012-02-27. The principal families are al-'Asakra, az-Zeer, al-Mu'ti, al-Urooj, al-Hreimi, Shawriya, Salahat and at-Tinih. About 60% of the town's labor force work in agriculture, 15% as civil servants and the remainder in the Israeli labor market and trade, service and industry sectors.

References

External links

Jannatah Town (Fact Sheet)
Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem (ARIJ)
Jannatah Town Profile
ARIJ
Jannatah, aerial photo
ARIJ
The priorities and needs for development in Jannatah town based on the community and local authorities’ assessment
ARIJ {{Bethlehem Governorate Towns in the West Bank Municipalities of the State of Palestine Bethlehem Governorate