Tekoa () is an

Israeli settlement Israeli settlements, also called Israeli colonies, are the civilian communities built by Israel throughout the Israeli-occupied territories. They are populated by Israeli citizens, almost exclusively of Israeli Jews, Jewish identity or ethni ...

organized as a community settlement in the

West Bank The West Bank is located on the western bank of the Jordan River and is the larger of the two Palestinian territories (the other being the Gaza Strip) that make up the State of Palestine. A landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...

, located 20 km northeast of

Hebron Hebron (; , or ; , ) is a Palestinian city in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Hebron is capital of the Hebron Governorate, the largest Governorates of Palestine, governorate in the West Bank. With a population of 201,063 in ...

, 16 km south of

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 ...

and in the immediate vicinity of the Palestinian village of Tuqu'. It falls under the jurisdiction of Gush Etzion Regional Council. In it had a population of . The international community considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank illegal under international law, but the Israeli government disputes this.

History

Founding

Tekoa was established in 1975 as a Nahal outpost in the vicinity of the Palestinian village of Tuqu'. In 1977 it was handed over to civilian residents. It is named after the hometown of the Biblical prophet Amos, which is usually identified with Khirbet Tuqu' (located 3km away adjacent to the Palestinian village of Tuqu'). Tekoa is built on 1071

dunam A dunam ( Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; ; ; ), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area analogous in role (but not equal) to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amo ...

of land which, according to ARIJ, Israel confiscated from the Palestinian citizens of Tuqu'. The town is located 5 miles south of

Bethlehem Bethlehem is a city in the West Bank, Palestine, located about south of Jerusalem, and the capital of the Bethlehem Governorate. It had a population of people, as of . The city's economy is strongly linked to Tourism in the State of Palesti ...

at the foot of Herodion ("Herod's Palace").

Archaeology and landmarks

Ancient caves and caves that were dug in the karst chalk stone of the Nachal Tekoa or Wadi Khureitun, named after Chariton the Confessor, by monks from the Lavras of Saint Chariton and his successor Euthymius the Great, are right behind Tekoa.

Geography

Tekoa is located above sea level on a ridge surrounded on three sides by a deep canyon, Nahal Tekoa, that runs east to the

Dead Sea The Dead Sea (; or ; ), also known by #Names, other names, is a landlocked salt lake bordered by Jordan to the east, the Israeli-occupied West Bank to the west and Israel to the southwest. It lies in the endorheic basin of the Jordan Rift Valle ...

. It has a mean annual rainfall of 410mm, an average annual temperature of 17 degree Celsius, and an average annual humidity of c. 60 percent.
"Tuqu' Town Profile", Applied Research Institute-Jerusalem. 2008. Retrieved on 2012-03-13.

Demographics

Tekoa is populated by a mix of

religious Zionist Religious Zionism () is a religious denomination that views Zionism as a fundamental component of Orthodox Judaism. Its adherents are also referred to as ''Dati Leumi'' (), and in Israel, they are most commonly known by the plural form of the fi ...

s and

secular Secularity, also the secular or secularness (from Latin , or or ), is the state of being unrelated or neutral in regards to religion. The origins of secularity can be traced to the Bible itself. The concept was fleshed out through Christian hi ...

Israelis Israelis (; ) are the Israeli citizenship law, citizens and nationals of the Israel, State of Israel. The country's populace is composed primarily of Israeli Jews, Jews and Arab citizens of Israel, Arabs, who respectively account for 75 percen ...

. Many new immigrants from the former Soviet Union also live in Tekoa. In 2015, the population numbered 3,671. The former chief rabbi of Tekoa, Menachem Froman, a founding member of Gush Emunim, maintained close ties with

PLO The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO; ) is a Palestinian nationalist coalition that is internationally recognized as the official representative of the Palestinian people in both the occupied Palestinian territories and the diaspora. ...

and

Hamas The Islamic Resistance Movement, abbreviated Hamas (the Arabic acronym from ), is a Palestinian nationalist Sunni Islam, Sunni Islamism, Islamist political organisation with a military wing, the Qassam Brigades. It has Gaza Strip under Hama ...

leaders. Rabbi Froman taught at the local

hesder Hesder ( "arrangement"; also Yeshivat Hesder ) is an Israeli yeshiva program which combines advanced Talmudic studies with military service in the Israel Defense Forces, usually within a Religious Zionist framework. The program allows Orthodox J ...

yeshiva A yeshiva (; ; pl. , or ) is a traditional Jewish educational institution focused on the study of Rabbinic literature, primarily the Talmud and halacha (Jewish law), while Torah and Jewish philosophy are studied in parallel. The stu ...

headed by

Rabbi A rabbi (; ) is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi—known as ''semikha''—following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of t ...

Adin Steinsaltz. Froman died in 2013.

Economy

In 1989, the Tekoa Agro-Technology Farm established in 1986 was named Enterprise of the Year by the Israeli Journal of Agricultural Settlements.

Arab-Israeli conflict

In May 2001, two Israeli boys from Tekoa, Koby Mandell and Yosef Ishran, were killed, by unknown person(s) who were never apprehended. In September 2001 an Israeli was shot and killed in Tekoa when militants opened fire on her family's car. In February 2002, two Israelis were killed in a shooting attack near Tekoa. The Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades claimed responsibility for the attack.

Status under international law

Like all Israeli settlements in the

Israeli-occupied territories Israel has occupied the Golan Heights of Syria and the Palestinian territories since the Six-Day War of 1967. It has previously occupied the Israeli occupation of the Sinai Peninsula, Sinai Peninsula of Egypt and southern Lebanon as well. Prio ...

, Tekoa is considered illegal under international law, though Israeli disputes this. The international community considers Israeli settlements to violate the

Fourth Geneva Convention The Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (), more commonly referred to as the Fourth Geneva Convention and abbreviated as GCIV, is one of the four treaties of the Geneva Conventions. It was adopted in August 1 ...

's prohibition on the transfer of an occupying power's civilian population into occupied territory. Israel disputes that the Fourth Geneva Convention applies to the Palestinian territories as they had not been legally held by a sovereign prior to Israel taking control of them. This view has been rejected by the

International Court of Justice The International Court of Justice (ICJ; , CIJ), or colloquially the World Court, is the only international court that Adjudication, adjudicates general disputes between nations, and gives advisory opinions on International law, internation ...

and the

International Committee of the Red Cross The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is a humanitarian organization based in Geneva, Switzerland, and is a three-time Nobel Prize laureate. The organization has played an instrumental role in the development of rules of war and ...

.Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory
International Court of Justice, 9 July 2004. pp. 44-45

Notable residents

* Rabbi Menachem Froman, rabbi and peace activist * Dr. Stephen Wiesner, physicist whose proposals launched the field of

quantum information Quantum information is the information of the state of a quantum system. It is the basic entity of study in quantum information theory, and can be manipulated using quantum information processing techniques. Quantum information refers to both t ...

theory, including quantum money (which led to quantum key distribution), quantum multiplexing (the earliest example of oblivious transfer) and superdense coding * Marc Zell, lawyer.

References

External links

Tekoa website
{{Authority control Populated places established in 1975 Israeli settlements in the West Bank Gush Etzion Regional Council Hebrew Bible cities 1975 establishments in the Israeli Military Governorate Community settlements