Aderet () is a moshav in central

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

. Located in the

Judea Judea or Judaea (; ; , ; ) is a mountainous region of the Levant. Traditionally dominated by the city of Jerusalem, it is now part of Palestine and Israel. The name's usage is historic, having been used in antiquity and still into the pres ...

n foothills in the Adullam region, south of

Beit Shemesh Beit Shemesh () is a city council (Israel), city located approximately west of Jerusalem in Israel's Jerusalem District. A center of Haredi Judaism and Modern Orthodoxy, Beit Shemesh has a population of 170,683 as of 2024. The city is named afte ...

, west of

Gush Etzion Gush Etzion (, ' Etzion Bloc) is a cluster of Israeli settlements located in the Judaean Mountains, directly south of Jerusalem and Bethlehem in the West Bank. The core group includes four Jewish agricultural villages that were founded in 1943� ...

and overlooking the Valley of Elah, it falls under the jurisdiction of

Mateh Yehuda Regional Council Mateh Yehuda Regional Council (, ''Mo'atza Azorit Mateh Yehuda'', ) is a Regional council (Israel), regional council in the Jerusalem District of Israel. In 2024 it was home to 51,125 people. The name of the regional council stems from the fact t ...

. In it had a population of .

History

The moshav was founded in the early 1959 by Jewish immigrants from Romania. All of the initial settlers, however, left the site. In 1963, the government re-established the town and brought in Jewish immigrants from the

Atlas Mountains The Atlas Mountains are a mountain range in the Maghreb in North Africa. They separate the Sahara Desert from the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean; the name "Atlantic" is derived from the mountain range, which stretches around through M ...

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

. Its name was taken from

Book of Ezekiel The Book of Ezekiel is the third of the Nevi'im#Latter Prophets, Latter Prophets in the Hebrew Bible, Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) and one of the Major Prophets, major prophetic books in the Christian Bible, where it follows Book of Isaiah, Isaiah and ...

17:8, meaning "mighty" in the phrase "mighty vine", a symbol of reborn Israel.Bitan, Hanna: 1948-1998: Fifty Years of 'Hityashvut': Atlas of Names of Settlements in Israel, Jerusalem 1999, Carta, p.2, (Hebrew). English translation follows the Judeo-Arabic translation of the Hebrew "''aderet''" = ביזאלה (بِزاله), in Ezekiel 17:8, published in Yosef Tobi's ''Poetry, Judeo-Arabic Literature and the Geniza'', Tel-Aviv 2006, pp. 56; 62 (Hebrew) The name recalls the viticulture in the area. The residents were involved in poultry farming and other agricultural activities until the late 1980s, when the village evolved into a dormitory community for

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

(40 km) and

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

(65 km). In 1997 a new neighborhood was built, bringing the population to over 110 families. An additional building project started in late 2006 for seventy plots.

Education

There are two

kindergarten Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cen ...

s in the moshav. School-age children are bused outside the community primarily to either

Alon Shvut Alon Shvut () is an Israeli settlement in the West Bank, established in June 1970 over lands confiscated from the nearby State of Palestine, Palestinian town of Khirbet Beit Zakariyyah. It is part of the Gush Etzion, Etzion bloc of the West Ban ...

or Rosh Tzurim. A mechina (pre-military preparatory), open to both religious and non-religious students, was founded after the year 2000. There are four synagogues in Aderet, and the chief rabbi is Moshe Dadon.

Tourism

In the vicinity of Aderet are a

vineyard A vineyard ( , ) is a plantation of grape-bearing vines. Many vineyards exist for winemaking; others for the production of raisins, table grapes, and non-alcoholic grape juice. The science, practice and study of vineyard production is kno ...

and several archeological sites from the Roman and

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

eras in Adullam Grove Nature Reserve, including Horvat 'Ethri and Khirbet Midras from the period of the

Bar Kokhba revolt The Bar Kokhba revolt (132–136 AD) was a major uprising by the Jews of Judaea (Roman province), Judaea against the Roman Empire, marking the final and most devastating of the Jewish–Roman wars. Led by Simon bar Kokhba, the rebels succeeded ...

. The cave of Adullam, famous as a refuge for

David David (; , "beloved one") was a king of ancient Israel and Judah and the third king of the United Monarchy, according to the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament. The Tel Dan stele, an Aramaic-inscribed stone erected by a king of Aram-Dam ...

during his period of flight from King

Saul Saul (; , ; , ; ) was a monarch of ancient Israel and Judah and, according to the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament, the first king of the United Monarchy, a polity of uncertain historicity. His reign, traditionally placed in the late eleventh c ...

, is 1 km south of Aderet, and the ancient site of Sokho, now famous for its annual flowering of lupines, is 2 km north.

Gallery

File:View_of_Elah_Valley_from_atop_Aderet,_March_2015.jpg, Panoramic view of Elah Valley as seen from atop Moshav Aderet File:Houses_in_Aderet,_March_2015.jpg, Houses in Aderet File:General_view_of_Aderet,_March_2015.jpg, General view of Aderet File:Israeli_co-operative_settlement_(Moshav),_known_as_Aderet.jpg, Houses and gardens in Aderet File:Country_road_near_Aderet,_Israel._March_2015.jpg, Country road near Aderet File:Aderet,_skyline_of_Israeli_Moshav,_March_2015.jpg, Aderet

References

{{Authority control Moshavim Populated places established in 1961 Medieval sites in Israel Populated places in Jerusalem District 1961 establishments in Israel Moroccan-Jewish culture in Israel Valley of Elah