Safed

Safed ( ; Arabic: صَفَد, romanized: Ṣafad), also known as Tzfat and officially as Zefat (Hebrew: צְפַת, romanized: Ṣəp̄aṯ), is a city in the Northern District of Israel. Located at an elevation of up to 937 m (3,074 ft), Safed is the highest city in the Galilee and in Israel. In 2022, 93.2% of the population was Jewish and 6.8% was counted as other.

Safed has been identified with Sepph (Σέπφ), a fortified town in the Upper Galilee mentioned in the writings of the Roman Jewish historian Josephus. The Jerusalem Talmud mentions Safed as one of five elevated spots where fires were lit to announce the Rosh Chodesh and holidays during the Second Temple period. Safed attained local prominence under the Crusaders, who built a large fortress there in 1168. It was conquered by Saladin 20 years later, and demolished by his grandnephew al-Mu'azzam Isa in 1219. After a treaty with the Crusaders in 1240, a larger fortress was erected and expanded and reinforced in 1268 by the Mamluk sultanBaybars, who developed Safed into a major town and the capital of a new province spanning the Galilee.

After a century of general decline, the stability brought by the 1517 Ottoman conquest ushered in nearly a century of growth and prosperity in Safed, during which time Jewish immigrants from across Europe developed the city into a center for wool and textile production and the mystical Kabbalah movement. It became known as one of the Four Holy Cities of Judaism. As the capital of Safed Sanjak, it was the main population center of the Galilee, with large Muslim and Jewish communities. Despite the fortunate governorship of Fakhr al-Din II in the early 17th century, the city underwent a general decline and, by the mid-18th century, was eclipsed by Acre. Druze and Muslim locals raided the Jewish community in 1834 and 1838. Many Jewish residents perished in the 1837 Galilee earthquake; through the philanthropy of Moses Montefiore, its synagogues and homes were rebuilt. Safed's population reached 24,000 toward the end of the 19th century, divided roughly equally between Jews and Muslims, with a small Christian community. Muslim merchants played a key role as middlemen in the grain trade between local farmers and traders in Acre, while the Ottomans promoted the city as a center of Sunni jurisprudence. Safed's conditions improved during this period, with the establishment of a municipal council and several banks.

By 1922, Safed's population had dropped to around 8,700; roughly 60% Muslim, 33% Jewish, and the remainder Christian. Amid rising ethnic tension throughout Mandatory Palestine, Safed's Jews were attacked in an massacre of 19 August 1929 and 22 Jews were killed. The city's population had risen to 13,700 by 1948, overwhelmingly Arab, though the city was proposed to be part of a Jewish state in the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine. During the 1948 Palestine war, Arab factions attacked and besieged the Jewish quarter, which held out until Jewish paramilitary forces captured the city after heavy fighting, precipitating British forces to withdraw. Most of the city's predominantly non-Jewish population fled or were expelled as a result of Operation Yiftach and the nearby Ein al-Zeitun massacre, and were not allowed to return after the war, such that today the city has an almost exclusively Jewish population. That year, the city became part of the then-newly established state of Israel.

Safed has a large Haredi community and remains a center for Jewish religious studies. It hosts Ziv Medical Center and the Zefat Academic College. Safed is a major subject in Israeli art; it hosts an Artists' Quarter. Several prominent art movements played a role in the city, most notably the School of Paris. However the Artists' quarter has declined since its golden age in the second half of the 20th century. Due to its high elevation, the city has warm summers and cold, often snowy winters. Its mild climate and scenic views have made Safed a popular holiday resort frequented by Israelis and foreign visitors. In 2024 it had a population of 38,687.