Ma'dhar 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 ...

village in the Tiberias Subdistrict. It was depopulated during the 1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine on May 12, 1948, by the Golani Brigade of

Operation Gideon Operation Gideon was a Haganah offensive launched in the closing days of the British Mandate in Palestine, as part of the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine. Its objectives were to capture Beisan (Beit She'an), clear the surrounding vil ...

. It was located 12.5 km southwest of

Tiberias Tiberias ( ; he, טְבֶרְיָה, ; ar, طبريا, Ṭabariyyā) is an Israeli city on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. A major Jewish center during Late Antiquity, it has been considered since the 16th century one of Judaism's F ...

History

Ceramics from the

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 ...

era have been found here. The

Crusaders The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were in ...

referred to Ma'dhar as ''Kapharmater''.Khalidi, 1992, p. 528

Ottoman era

Ma'dhar 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, and by 1596, it was a village under the administration 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 Tiberias, part of

Safad Sanjak Safed Sanjak ( ar, سنجق صفد; tr, Safed Sancağı) was a ''sanjak'' (district) of Damascus Eyalet ( Ottoman province of Damascus) in 1517–1660, after which it became part of the Sidon Eyalet (Ottoman province of Sidon). The sanjak was ce ...

. The village had a population of 17 households, an estimated 94 inhabitants, all Muslim. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 25% on wheat, barley, goats, beehives and orchards; a total of 2,000 Akçe. A map from Napoleon's invasion of 1799 by

Pierre Jacotin Pierre Jacotin (1765–1827) was the director of the survey for the '' Carte de l'Égypte (Description de l'Égypte)'', the first triangulation-based map of Egypt, Syria and Palestine. The maps were surveyed in 1799-1800 during the campaign in E ...

showed the place, named as ''Chara,'' but misplaced. In 1881, 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 the village as having about 250 Muslim residents, in a village made of

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the surface of a rocky planet or moon. More than 90 ...

and other stone. Water was supplied from cisterns and springs. A population list from about 1887 showed ''Madher'' to have about 975 inhabitants; all Muslims.

British Mandate era

At the time of the 1922 census of Palestine, Madhar had a population of 347 Muslims,Barron, 1923, Table XI, p
39
/ref> increasing slightly to 359 Muslims living in 91 houses by the 1931 census.Mills, 1932,
83
/ref> By the 1945 statistics, the village population was 480 Muslims, and the total land area was 11,666 dunums of land. 498 dunams were irrigated or used for orchards, 10,766 used for cereals, while 63 dunams were built-up (urban) land.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p
172
/ref> Ma'dhar had a school founded by the Ottomans, but closed during the British Mandate period. Ma'dhar contained a mosque and still has the ruins of a church, a burial ground, and ruined Crusader fortress called ''Casel de Cherio''.

Post 1948

In 1992, the village site was described: "The site has been fenced in and is used as an Israeli grazing area. A large cluster of cactus grows in the midst of the stone rubble of houses, and there is a well, capped with a pump, in the center of the site. About 20 m to the west of the well is a drinking trough for animals. Eucalyptus, doum palm, and chinaberry trees grow on the site."

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * (Thomson, 1882, p
329

External links

Ma'dhar

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 6
IAAWikimedia commons
{{Palestinian Arab villages depopulated during the 1948 Palestine War Arab villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War District of Tiberias