Kfar Giladi () is a

kibbutz A kibbutz ( / , ; : kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1910, was Degania Alef, Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economi ...

in the Galilee Panhandle of northern

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 south of

Metula Metula () is a town in the Northern District of Israel. It abuts the Israel-Lebanon border, and had a population of in . History Bronze and Iron Age Metula is located near the sites of the biblical cities of Dan, Abel Beth Maacah, and Ijon ...

on the

Naftali Mountains Naftali Mountains () is a mountain range between Lebanon and Upper Galilee, Israel. The western side gradually changes into the highlands of southern Lebanon. The eastern side sharply descends into the Hula Valley of Israel. They are a part of t ...

above the

Hula Valley The Hula Valley () is a valley and fertile agricultural region in northern Israel with abundant fresh water that used to be Lake Hula before it was drained. It is a major stopover for birds migrating along the Great Rift Valley between Africa ...

and along the Lebanese border, it falls under the jurisdiction of

Upper Galilee Regional Council The Upper Galilee Regional Council (, Romanization of Hebrew, translit. ''Mo'atza Azorit HaGalil HaElyon'') is a regional council (Israel), regional council in Israel's Upper Galilee region, bordered by the Mevo'ot HaHermon Regional Council and the ...

. In , it had a population of . Kfar Giladi is also notable for archaeological discoveries such as

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

and

Chalcolithic The Chalcolithic ( ) (also called the Copper Age and Eneolithic) was an archaeological period characterized by the increasing use of smelted copper. It followed the Neolithic and preceded the Bronze Age. It occurred at different periods in di ...

findings as well as the remains of a

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

mausoleum dating from

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 Roman civilization *Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...

times.

History

Kfar Giladi was founded in 1916 by members of

Hashomer Hashomer (, 'The Watchman') was a Jewish defense organization in Palestine founded in April 1909. It was an outgrowth of the Bar-Giora group and was disbanded after the founding of the Haganah in 1920. Hashomer was responsible for guarding Je ...

on land owned by the

Jewish Colonisation Association The Jewish Colonisation Association (JCA or ICA; ) was an organisation created on September 11, 1891, by Baron Maurice de Hirsch. Its aim was to facilitate the mass emigration of Jews from Russia and other Eastern European countries, by settling ...

. It was named after Israel Giladi, one of the founders of the Hashomer movement. The area was subject to intermittent border adjustments between the British and the French, and in 1919, the British relinquished the northern section of the Upper Galilee containing

Tel Hai Tel Hai ( , "Hill of Life") is a name of the former Jewish settlement in northern Galilee, the site of an early battle between Jews and Arabs heralding the growing civil conflict, and of a monument, tourist attraction, and a college. It is curren ...

, Hamra, and Kfar Giladi to the

French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...

jurisdiction. After the Arab attack on Tel Hai in 1920, it was temporarily abandoned. Ten months later, the settlers returned. Several older buildings stand on the kibbutz that memorialize previous battles on the site, before and during the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 Arab–Israeli War, also known as the First Arab–Israeli War, followed the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. The civil war becam ...

. In 1921 a top secret arms store was dug 10 metres into the hillside. Measuring 5 by 5 metres square and 2 metres high its entrance was concealed in a stable. It was never discovered by the Mandate authorities. Between 1916 and 1932, the population totaled 40–70. In 1932, the kibbutz absorbed 100 newcomers, mainly young immigrants. From 1922 to 1948, between 8,000–10,000 Jewish immigrants were smuggled into Palestine through Kibbutz Giladi, circumventing the Mandatory ban on Jewish immigration. The immigrants came from Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq, Afghanistan and Eastern Europe. In an operation known as Mivtzah HaElef, 1,300 Jewish children were smuggled out of Syria between 1945 and 1948. At the kibbutz, the children were dressed in work clothes and hidden in the kibbutz chicken coops and cowsheds. In August 2006, during the

2006 Lebanon War The 2006 Lebanon War was a 34-day armed conflict in Lebanon, fought between Hezbollah and Israel. The war started on 12 July 2006, and continued until a United Nations-brokered ceasefire went into effect in the morning on 14 August 2006, thoug ...

, twelve reserve IDF soldiers were killed after being hit by a

Katyusha Katyusha () is a diminutive of the Russian name Ekaterina or Yekaterina, the Russian form of Katherine Katherine (), also spelled Catherine and Catherina, other variations, is a feminine given name. The name and its variants are popular in c ...

rocket launched by

Hezbollah Hezbollah ( ; , , ) is a Lebanese Shia Islamist political party and paramilitary group. Hezbollah's paramilitary wing is the Jihad Council, and its political wing is the Loyalty to the Resistance Bloc party in the Lebanese Parliament. I ...

from

Southern Lebanon Southern Lebanon () is the area of Lebanon comprising the South Governorate and the Nabatiye Governorate. The two entities were divided from the same province in the early 1990s. The Rashaya and Western Beqaa districts, the southernmost distr ...

. The group of artillery gunners were gathering on the kibbutz in preparation for action in the conflict.

Gaza war

During the

Gaza war The Gaza war is an armed conflict in the Gaza Strip and southern Israel fought since 7 October 2023. A part of the unresolved Israeli–Palestinian conflict, Israeli–Palestinian and Gaza–Israel conflict, Gaza–Israel conflicts dating ...

, northern Israeli border communities, including Kfar Giladi, faced targeted attacks by

and Palestinian factions based in Lebanon, and were evacuated.

2024 Israeli invasion of Lebanon

On 30 September 2024, the

Israeli Defense Forces Israeli may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the State of Israel * Israelis, citizens or permanent residents of the State of Israel * Modern Hebrew, a language * ''Israeli'' (newspaper), published from 2006 to 2008 * Guni Israeli (b ...

(IDF) launched a limited ground invasion into

. On that same day, the IDF declared that Kfar Giladi became a closed military area. File:כפר גלעדי - החצר-JNF008584.jpeg, Kfar Giladi 1930 File:שדה בכפר גלעדי בעמק החולה-JNF034433.jpeg, Kfar Giladi 1930 File:כפר גלעדי - מראה כללי.-JNF044251.jpeg, Kfar Giladi 1934 File:Zoltan Kluger. Kfar Gileadi (Upper Galilee).jpg, Kfar Giladi 1937 File:Kfar Giladi.jpg,

Palmach The Palmach (Hebrew: , acronym for , ''Plugot Maḥatz'', "Strike Phalanges/Companies") was the elite combined strike forces and sayeret unit of the Haganah, the paramilitary organization of the Yishuv (Jewish community) during the period of th ...

camp at Kfar Giladi. 1948 File:Kfar Giladi ii.jpg, Members of the Palmach from Kfar Giladi on exercise. c. 1947

Landmarks

Eight historic buildings built in 1922 are being preserved and restored. Built of Galilee stone and materials imported from Lebanon, they are among the few remaining vestiges of early kibbutz housing.

Archaeology

Neolithic and Chalcolithic remains

An archaeological site at Kfar Giladi was excavated in 1957 and 1962.Kaplan, J., Kfar Giladi, Israel Exploration Journal, 8:274, 1958 It revealed remains four stages of occupation in different periods. An early

stage was suggested to date between 6400 and 5800 BC. Finds included

Dark faced burnished ware Dark faced burnished ware or DFBW is the second oldest form of History of pottery in Palestine, pottery developed in the western world, the oldest being Dotted wavy line pottery from Africa. It was produced after the earliest examples from the in ...

with incisions and

rope A rope is a group of yarns, Plying, plies, fibres, or strands that are plying, twisted or braided together into a larger and stronger form. Ropes have high tensile strength and can be used for dragging and lifting. Rope is thicker and stronger ...

patterns.

Flint Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Historically, flint was widely used to make stone tools and start ...

s included

axe An axe (; sometimes spelled ax in American English; American and British English spelling differences#Miscellaneous spelling differences, see spelling differences) is an implement that has been used for thousands of years to shape, split, a ...

adze An adze () or adz is an ancient and versatile cutting tool similar to an axe but with the cutting edge perpendicular to the handle rather than parallel. Adzes have been used since the Stone Age. They are used for smoothing or carving wood in ha ...

arrowhead An arrowhead or point is the usually sharpened and hardened tip of an arrow, which contributes a majority of the projectile mass and is responsible for impacting and penetrating a target, or sometimes for special purposes such as signaling. ...

s and denticulated

sickle A sickle, bagging hook, reaping-hook or grasshook is a single-handed agricultural tool designed with variously curved blades and typically used for harvesting or reaping grain crops, or cutting Succulent plant, succulent forage chiefly for feedi ...

blade elements. Similar finds were located in a later neolithic stage including a female

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolinite, ). Most pure clay minerals are white or light-coloured, but natural clays show a variety of colours from impuriti ...

figurine dating between 5800 and 5400 BC. Two later periods of occupation were attributed to

occupations similar to

Wadi Rabah The Wadi Rabah culture is a Pottery Neolithic archaeological culture of the Southern Levant, dating to the middle of the 5th millennium BCE. Research This period was first identified at the ancient site of Jericho (Tell es-Sultan) by British ar ...

. Another nearby Neolithic site was excavated in 1973. They found

Byblos point Byblos ( ; ), also known as Jebeil, Jbeil or Jubayl (, locally ), is an ancient city in the Keserwan-Jbeil Governorate of Lebanon. The area is believed to have been first settled between 8800 and 7000BC and continuously inhabited since 5000BC. D ...

s and tips of Jericho points and Amuq points, polished cutting axes, chisels and fine-toothed sickles. Finds were similar to

Tell Ramad Tell Ramad () is a prehistoric, Neolithic tell at the foot of Mount Hermon, about southwest of Damascus in Syria. It was inhabited as early as 10,000-8000 BC. History The tell was the site of a small village of , which was first settled in the ...

Mausoleum Yad Hezekiah – Giv'at ha-Shoqet

In 1961, J. Kaplan conducted an excavation at Giv'at ha-Shoqet, a hill located southwest of the built area of Kfar Giladi, and revealed a

mausoleum A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be considered a type o ...

with three burial levels. The uppermost level, Stratum I, contained an empty sarcophagus inscribed with the

Hebrew name A Hebrew name is a name of Hebrew origin. In a more narrow meaning, it is a name used by Jews only in a religious context and different from an individual's secular name for everyday use. Names with Hebrew origins, especially those from the ...

Hezekiah, indicating it belonged to a

individual. Kaplan proposed that the mausoleum was built to house this sarcophagus. The layer below, Stratum II, situated beneath the mausoleum floor, contained seven rectangular graves, some featuring lead coffins adorned with depictions such as

Hercules Hercules (, ) is the Roman equivalent of the Greek divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena. In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures. The Romans adapted the Gr ...

; one of them had a gold diadem and bracelet adorned with

semi-precious stones A gemstone (also called a fine gem, jewel, precious stone, semiprecious stone, or simply gem) is a piece of mineral crystal which, when cut or polished, is used to make jewelry or other adornments. Certain rocks (such as lapis lazuli, opal, ...

. The lowest stratum (stratum III) included a marble sarcophagus belonging to Heracleides. Kaplan identified two usage periods: the first (Stratum I and III) dating to no later than the

Severan dynasty The Severan dynasty, sometimes called the Septimian dynasty, ruled the Roman Empire between 193 and 235. It was founded by the emperor Septimius Severus () and Julia Domna, his wife, when Septimius emerged victorious from civil war of 193 - 197, ...

(192–235 AD), with Hezekiah and Heracleides buried, and the second (Stratum II) with the seven graves dating around 290–310 AD.

Climate

References

External links

Official website

Jewish Agency for Israel

* ttps://www.facebook.com/groups/2347516312/ Facebook group for former volunteers and for kibbutzniksbr>movie taken in the 1930s
{{Authority control Kibbutzim Kibbutz Movement Populated places established in 1916 1916 establishments in Ottoman Syria Archaeological sites in Israel Populated places in Northern District (Israel)