Raml Zayta ( ar, رمل زيتة, ''Raml Zeitâ''), also Khirbet Qazaza, was a

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

village located 15 km northwest of

Tulkarm Tulkarm, Tulkarem or Tull Keram ( ar, طولكرم, ''Ṭūlkarm'') is a Palestinian city in the West Bank, located in the Tulkarm Governorate of the State of Palestine. The Israeli city of Netanya is to the west, and the Palestinian cities of N ...

.Khalidi, 1992, p. 560

History

British Mandate era

In the

1931 census of Palestine The 1931 census of Palestine was the second census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate for Palestine. It was carried out on 18 November 1931 under the direction of Major E. Mills after the 1922 census of Palestine. * Census of P ...

it was counted with

Zeita, Tulkarm Zeita ( ar, زيتا) is a Palestinian town in the Tulkarm Governorate in the western West Bank, located 11 kilometers North-east of Tulkarm. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Zeita had a population of 2,852 inhabitants in ...

, and together they had a population 1165, all Muslim, in a total of 237 houses.Mills, 1932, p
58
/ref> In the 1945 statistics, the village had a population of 140 Muslims, with a total of 14,837 dunams of land.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p.
76
/ref> The land ownership of the village before occupation in

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: Types of land use in

s in the village in 1945:Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p
127
/ref>Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p
177
/ref>

1948, and aftermath

According to

Rosemarie Esber Rosemarie M. Esber is a researcher and writer with degrees from the University of London and Johns Hopkins University with a background in the history, culture, and economy of the Middle East and North Africa. Her published work is centered on ...

, the village was depopulated on 15 March 1948 during the

1948 Palestine war The 1948 Palestine war was fought in the territory of what had been, at the start of the war, British-ruled Mandatory Palestine. It is known in Israel as the War of Independence ( he, מלחמת העצמאות, ''Milkhemet Ha'Atzma'ut'') and ...

.Esber, 2008, p. 297

Benny Morris Benny Morris ( he, בני מוריס; born 8 December 1948) is an Israeli historian. He was a professor of history in the Middle East Studies department of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in the city of Beersheba, Israel. He is a member of t ...

lists it as one of the villages for which the causes and date of depopulation are unknown.Morris, 2004, p.
xvi
village #183 Esber, in an interview with a refugee from Raml Zaita, Zakiya Abu Hammad, writes that according to his memories,

Yishuv Yishuv ( he, ישוב, literally "settlement"), Ha-Yishuv ( he, הישוב, ''the Yishuv''), or Ha-Yishuv Ha-Ivri ( he, הישוב העברי, ''the Hebrew Yishuv''), is the body of Jewish residents in the Land of Israel (corresponding to the s ...

forces had besieged the village for about two weeks, causing a lack of food: "

he Jews He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...

started going into people's homes and forcing them out. They told us, "You either leave or we'll kill you." Some people were killed on the roads, as they abandoned their homes... They followed us. Those who were lucky, escaped with their lives, others did not." The villages were then forced out of their town and the surrounding villagers. According to

Walid Khalidi Walid Khalidi ( ar, وليد خالدي, born 1925 in Jerusalem) is an Oxford University-educated Palestinian people, Palestinian historian who has written extensively on the 1948 Palestinian exodus, Palestinian exodus. He is a co-founder of the ...

writing in 1992, an Arab family is still living in the village in one of the original houses.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * *

External links

Welcome To Raml Zayta, Palestine RememberedRaml Zayta

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 Pa ...

*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 8:
IAAWikimedia commons

from the

Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center () is a leading Palestinian arts and culture organization that aims to create a pluralistic, critical liberating culture through research, query, and participation, and that provides an open space for the community ...

(dead WP:EXT)--> {{Palestinian Arab villages depopulated during the 1948 Palestine War Arab villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War District of Tulkarm