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Al-Khisas, Gaza

Coordinates: 31°38′53″N 34°33′40″E / 31.64806°N 34.56111°E / 31.64806; 34.56111
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al-Khisas
خربة الخِصاص
Khirbat al-Khiṣāṣ
Village
Etymology: the ruin of booths or reed huts[1]
1870s map
1940s map
modern map
1940s with modern overlay map
A series of historical maps of the area around Al-Khisas, Gaza (click the buttons)
al-Khisas is located in Mandatory Palestine
al-Khisas
al-Khisas
Location within Mandatory Palestine
Coordinates: 31°38′53″N 34°33′40″E / 31.64806°N 34.56111°E / 31.64806; 34.56111
Palestine grid108/117
Geopolitical entityMandatory Palestine
SubdistrictGaza
Date of depopulationNovember 4–5, 1948[4]
Area
 • Total6,269 dunams (6.269 km2 or 2.420 sq mi)
Population
 (1945)
 • Total150[2][3]
Cause(s) of depopulationMilitary assault by Yishuv forces
Current LocalitiesAshkelon[5]

Al-Khisas (Arabic: خربة الخِصاص, Khirbat al-Khiṣāṣ) was a Bedouin[6] hamlet in Palestine, located 18.5 kilometers (11.5 mi) northeast of Gaza near the modern city of Ashkelon.[7]

Location

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Al-Khisas was located just west of Ni'ilya, south of Al-Jura.

Al-Khisas, called Khisas, was inhabited in the 15th century. Mamluk records show that in 1459 CE it was endowed was a waqf.[8]

History

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Late Ottoman period

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In 1838, in the late Ottoman era, el Khusas was noted as a place "in ruins or deserted", located in the Gaza district.[9]

An official Ottoman village list from about 1870 showed that Chasas had 6 houses and a population of 35, though the population count included men, only.[10][11]

In 1883, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine found at Khurbet el Khesas "a few heaps of stones with a well near".[12]

British Mandate period

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The modern village was classified as a hamlet in the Palestine Index Gazetter, and was built after World War I.[5] Farmers from neighboring areas first built temporary huts at the site to shelter themselves during the harvest, gradually they settled and built adobe houses.[5] The population relied on neighboring villages Al-Jura and Ni'ilya for medical, educational and administrative services.[5]

In the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Khesas had a population of 102 inhabitants, all Muslims,[13] increasing in the 1931 census to 133, still all Muslims, in 26 houses.[14]

In the 1945 statistics, Al-Khisas had a population of 150 Muslims[2] with a total of 6,269 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.[15] Of this, 191 dunums of village land were used for citrus and bananas, 419 for cereal farming, 2,671 irrigated or used for orchards,[16] while 10 dunams were built-up land.[17]

1948 war; State of Israel

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The village was depopulated during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War between November 4–5, 1948, at the end of Operation Yo'av.[5] The Israeli army found about 150 people in Al-Khisas and nearby Ni'ilya; they were all expelled to Beit Hanoun on the Gaza strip.[18]

In 1992 the village site was described as being "engulfed by the Israeli town of Ashkelon".[5]

References

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  1. ^ Palmer, 1881, p. 361
  2. ^ a b Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 32
  3. ^ a b Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 46
  4. ^ Morris, 2004, p. xix, village #308. Also gives the cause for depopulation
  5. ^ a b c d e f Khalidi, 1992, p.123
  6. ^ גרוסמן, דוד; Grossman, David (1987). "Rural Settlement in the Southern Coastal Plain and the Shefelah, 1835-1945 / היישוב הכפרי במישור-פלשת ובשפלה הנמוכה, 1835-1945". Cathedra: For the History of Eretz Israel and Its Yishuv / קתדרה: לתולדות ארץ ישראל ויישובה (45): 64. ISSN 0334-4657.
  7. ^ al-Khisas, Palestine Remembered, retrieved 2009-10-22
  8. ^ Marom, Roy; Taxel, Itamar (2023-10-01). "Ḥamāma: The historical geography of settlement continuity and change in Majdal 'Asqalan's hinterland, 1270–1750 CE". Journal of Historical Geography. 82: 49–65. doi:10.1016/j.jhg.2023.08.003. ISSN 0305-7488.
  9. ^ Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, Appendix 2, p. 119
  10. ^ Socin, 1879, p. 149 Also noted in the Gaza district
  11. ^ Hartmann, 1883, p. 149
  12. ^ Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p. 252
  13. ^ Barron, 1923, Table V, Sub-district of Gaza, p. 8
  14. ^ Mills, 1932, p. 5.
  15. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 46
  16. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 87
  17. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 137
  18. ^ Morris, 2004, pp. 517-518

Bibliography

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