Zawata ( ar, زواتا) is 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 ...

town in the

Nablus Governorate The Nablus Governorate ( ar, محافظة نابلس ') is an administrative district of State of Palestine, Palestine located in the Central Highlands of the West Bank, 53 km north of Jerusalem. It covers the area around the city of Nablus ...

in northern

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 ...

, located 6 kilometers Northwest of

Nablus Nablus ( ; ar, نابلس, Nābulus ; he, שכם, Šəḵem, ISO 259-3: ; Samaritan Hebrew: , romanized: ; el, Νεάπολις, Νeápolis) is a Palestinian city in the West Bank, located approximately north of Jerusalem, with a populati ...

. According to 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), the town had a population of 1,900 inhabitants in mid-year 2006.

Location

Zawata is located 4.4 km north of

. It has

Ijnisinya Ijnisinya ( ar, اجنسنيا, ''‘Ijnisinyâ'') is a Palestinian village located six kilometres northwest of Nablus in the Nablus Governorate. Most of the working-age inhabitants live as farmers or governmental workers. Iron Age II and the Per ...

and

‘Asira ash Shamaliya Asira ash-Shamaliya ( ar, عصيرة الشماليّة) is a Palestinian town in the Nablus Governorate, located 3.5 kilometers north of Nablus in the northern West Bank. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the town had a po ...

to the east, Ijnisinya and An Naqura to the north, An Naqura and

Beit Iba Beit Iba ( ar, بيت إيبا) is a Palestinian village in the Nablus Governorate in the North central West Bank, located 7 kilometers northwest of Nablus. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS), the village had a populat ...

to the west, and Beit Iba and Nablus to the south.

History

Clermont-Ganneau Charles Simon Clermont-Ganneau (19 February 1846 – 15 February 1923) was a noted French Orientalist and archaeologist. Biography Clermont-Ganneau was born in Paris, the son of Simon Ganneau, a sculptor and mystic who died in 1851 when Cler ...

found here

tessera A tessera (plural: tesserae, diminutive ''tessella'') is an individual tile, usually formed in the shape of a square, used in creating a mosaic. It is also known as an abaciscus or abaculus. Historical tesserae The oldest known tesserae ...

, probably from the

Ptolemaic Ptolemaic is the adjective formed from the name Ptolemy, and may refer to: Pertaining to the Ptolemaic dynasty * Ptolemaic dynasty, the Macedonian Greek dynasty that ruled Egypt founded in 305 BC by Ptolemy I Soter * Ptolemaic Kingdom Pertaining ...

period. Pottery

sherd In archaeology, a sherd, or more precisely, potsherd, is commonly a historic or prehistoric fragment of pottery, although the term is occasionally used to refer to fragments of stone and glass vessels, as well. Occasionally, a piece of broken p ...

s from the late

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

, early

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

and the Medieval eras have been found here.

Ottoman era

Zawata, like all of

Palestine __NOTOC__ Palestine may refer to: * State of Palestine, a state in Western Asia * Palestine (region), a geographic region in Western Asia * Palestinian territories, territories occupied by Israel since 1967, namely the West Bank (including East ...

was incorporated into the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...

in 1517. In the 1596 tax registers, it was part of the ''

nahiya A nāḥiyah ( ar, , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level division w ...

'' ("subdistrict") of Jabal Sami, part of the larger

Sanjak of Nablus The Nablus Sanjak ( ar, سنجق نابلس; tr, Nablus Sancağı) was an administrative area that existed throughout Ottoman rule in the Levant (1517–1917). It was administratively part of the Damascus Eyalet until 1864 when it became part o ...

. It had a population of 11 households, all

s. The inhabitants paid a fixed tax rate of 33,3% on agricultural products, including wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, goats and beehives, in addition to occasional revenues and a press for olive oil or grape syrup, and a fixed tax for people of Nablus area; a total of 6,944

akçe The ''akçe'' or ''akça'' (also spelled ''akche'', ''akcheh''; ota, آقچه; ) refers to a silver coin which was the chief monetary unit of the Ottoman Empire. The word itself evolved from the word "silver or silver money", this word is deri ...

. In 1838, Edward Robinson noted Zawata ‘’on the hill-side,’’ part of the ''Jurat 'Amra'' district, south of Nablus. In 1870,

Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (15 September 1821 – 21 Septembe 1890) was a French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included Greece, Asia Mino ...

noted ''Zaouata'' as "a village on a high hill with white limestone slopes, some used for quarrying. The number of the inhabitants is 300. Below the hill a rich spring, 'Ain Zawata, supplies water to the village and irrigates a small valley. During our visit large herds of sheep were crowding around the spring." In 1882, the PEF's ''

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 the ...

'' (SWP) described Zawata as: "a village of moderate size, on a hill, with springs in the valley to the north."

British mandate era

In the

1922 census of Palestine The 1922 census of Palestine was the first census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine, on 23 October 1922. The reported population was 757,182, including the military and persons of foreign nationality. The divisi ...

conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Zawata had a population of 214 Muslims,Barron, 1923, Table IX, p
24
/ref> increasing in the 1931 census, to 247 Muslims, in 73 houses.Mills, 1932, p
66
/ref> In the 1945 statistics the population was 330 Muslims,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p
19
/ref> while the total land area was 3,558

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, according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 13 dunams were for citrus and bananas, 334 for plantations and irrigable land, 1,842 for cereals, while 31 dunams were classified as built-up areas.

Jordanian era

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. In 1961, the population of Zawata was 466.

Post 1967

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, Zawata has been 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 ...

, and according to the Israeli census of that year, the population of ''Zawata'' stood at 591, of whom 28 were registered as having come from Israel. After the 1995 accords, 31% of Zawata land is defined 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 ...

land, 32% is

Area B The Palestinian enclaves are areas in the West Bank designated for Palestinians under a variety of U.S. and Israeli-led proposals to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The enclaves are often compared to the nominally self-governing black ...

land, while the remaining 37% is defined as Area C. Part of the village land has been confiscated for the construction of an Israeli military road. This road also cuts off Zawata from its northernmost land.Zawata Village Profile
ARIJ, pp. 15-16

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * *

External links

*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 11:
IAAWikimedia commons

Zawata Village Profile

Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem The Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem (ARIJ; ar, معهد الابحاث التطبيقية - القدس) is a Palestinian NGO founded in 1990 with its main office in Bethlehem in the West Bank. ARIJ is actively working on research project ...

(ARIJ)
Zawata, aerial photo
ARIJ
Development Priorities and Needs in Zawata
ARIJ {{Nablus Governorate Nablus Governorate Villages in the West Bank Municipalities of the State of Palestine