Beit Sira

Coordinates: 31°53′15″N 35°02′39″E / 31.88750°N 35.04417°E / 31.88750; 35.04417
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Beit Sira
Municipality type D (Village council)
Arabic transcription(s)
 • Arabicبيت سيرا
 • LatinBayt Sira (official)
Beit Sira
Beit Sira
Beit Sira is located in State of Palestine
Beit Sira
Beit Sira
Location of Beit Sira within Palestine
Coordinates: 31°53′15″N 35°02′39″E / 31.88750°N 35.04417°E / 31.88750; 35.04417
Palestine grid154/143
StateState of Palestine
GovernorateRamallah and al-Bireh
Government
 • TypeVillage council
Area
 • Total3,120 dunams (3.1 km2 or 1.2 sq mi)
Population
 (2017)[1]
 • Total3,343
 • Density1,100/km2 (2,800/sq mi)
Name meaningThe house of the fold[2]

Beit Sira (Arabic: بيت سيرا) is a Palestinian village in the central West Bank, located 22 kilometers west of Ramallah and is a part of the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate. The village is situated along the Green Line. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, around 4,000 dunams of its land became a part of the "No-Man's Land" strip between the north-central West Bank and Israel. Currently Beit Sira's jurisdiction is 3,120 dunams, of which 441 dunams are built-up areas and the remainder is open spaces for future construction or agricultural land.[3]

Etymology[edit]

Bayt Sīrā /Bēt Sīra/ is an ancient toponymic survival, meaning House of Sira. The second part of the name may originate from the Biblical female name Š’rh (< *ši’r-at).[4]

Clermont-Ganneau suggested that Beit Sira, along with its shrine Neby Sira, believed by locals to be a son of Jacob, corresponds to the biblical town "Uzzen Sheera," which according to the Books of Chronicles, was built by a daughter of Ephraim.[5] In the same biblical narrative, Sheera is also said to be the builder of Lower and Upper Bethoron,[6] today identified with the nearby towns of Beit 'Ur al-Tahta and Beit 'Ur al-Fauqa, respectively.[7]

Location[edit]

Beit Sira is located 14.9 kilometers (9.3 mi) (horizontally) west of Ramallah. It is bordered by Kharbatha al-Misbah, Beit Liqya, and Beit Ur al-Tahta to the east, Saffa to the north, the Green Line (the Armistice Line 1949) to the west, and Bayt Nuba to the south.[8]

History[edit]

Ottoman Era[edit]

In the 1596 tax records, Beit Sira was a part of the nahiya ("subdistrict") of Ramla, part of Gaza Sanjak, in the Ottoman Empire, with a population of 17 Muslim household. The villagers paid a fixed tax-rate of 25% on agricultural products, including wheat, barley, summer crops, vineyards, fruit trees, goats and beehives, in addition to occasional revenues; a total of 4,500 akçe. All of the revenue went to a Waqf.[9]

In 1838, it was noted as a Muslim village in the Ibn Humar District, part of the er-Ramleh area.[10]

In 1863 Victor Guérin noted Beit Sira as a considerable village on the summit of a rocky hill. A saint, revered under the name of Neby Sira, had a sanctuary there with his tomb.[11] Socin, citing an official Ottoman village list compiled around 1870, noted that Bet Sira had 39 houses and a population of 125, though the population count included only men.[12] Hartmann found that Bet Sira had 29 houses.[13]

In 1873, Clermont-Ganneau was told that Beit Sira supposedly housed the tomb of Neby Sira, a son of Jacob and brother to Neby Ma'in (possibly Benjamin), the founder of Bir Ma'in.[14]

In 1883, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described it: "A small village on a swell in the low hills. A main road passes through it. The water supply is artificial."[15]

British Mandate era[edit]

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Beit Sira had a population of 381 Muslims,[16] increasing in the 1931 census to 460 Muslims in 113 houses.[17]

In the 1945 statistics the population was 540, all Muslims,[18] while the total land area was 4,687 dunams, according to an official land and population survey.[19] Of this, 205 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 1,924 for cereals,[20] while 23 dunams were classified as built-up (urban) areas.[21]

  • Beit Sira 1944 1:20,000 from 1919 survey
    Beit Sira 1944 1:20,000 from 1919 survey
  • Beit Sira 1945 1:250,000
    Beit Sira 1945 1:250,000

Jordanian era[edit]

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Beit Sira came under Jordanian rule.

The Jordanian census of 1961 found 746 inhabitants in Beit Sira.[22]

Israeli occupation[edit]

Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Beit Sira has been under Israeli occupation.

After the 1995 accords, 9.3% of Beit Sira land was classified as Area B, the remaining 90.7% as Area C.[23] In 2012, approximately 78% of the village population worked in the Israel labor market.[24] Israel has confiscated 1,499 dunams of land from Beit Sira for the construction of the Israeli settlement of Maccabim, presently part of Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut.[25]

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Beit Sira had a population of 2,840 inhabitants in 2006.[26] In the 2007 PCBS census, there were 2,749 people living in the town.[27] By 2017, the population was 3,343.[1]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b Preliminary Results of the Population, Housing and Establishments Census, 2017 (PDF). Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) (Report). State of Palestine. February 2018. pp. 64–82. Retrieved 2023-10-24.
  2. ^ Palmer, 1881, p. 287
  3. ^ Beit Sira: A Palestinian Village on the verge of diminishing Archived November 19, 2016, at the Wayback Machine Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem. 5 July 2004.
  4. ^ Marom, Roy; Zadok, Ran (2023). "Early-Ottoman Palestinian Toponymy: A Linguistic Analysis of the (Micro-)Toponyms in Haseki Sultan's Endowment Deed (1552)". Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins. 139 (2).
  5. ^ Clermont-Ganneau, 1896, vol 2, p. 79
  6. ^ 1 Chronicles, 7, 22-24
  7. ^ John Gray (January 1949). "The Canaanite God Horon". Journal of Near Eastern Studies. 8 (1): 27–34. doi:10.1086/370902. JSTOR 542437.
  8. ^ Beit Sira Village Profile, ARIJ, p. 4
  9. ^ Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 156
  10. ^ Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, Appendix 2, p. 120
  11. ^ Guérin, 1868, pp. 337-338
  12. ^ Socin, 1879, p. 147. Socin placed it in the Beni Malik district
  13. ^ Hartmann, 1883, p. 118
  14. ^ Clermont-Ganneau, 1896, vol 2, pp. 78 ff.
  15. ^ Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p. 16
  16. ^ Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Ramallah, p. 16
  17. ^ Mills, 1932, p. 47
  18. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 26
  19. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 64
  20. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 111
  21. ^ Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 161
  22. ^ Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. 24
  23. ^ Beit Sira Village Profile, ARIJ, p. 16
  24. ^ Beit Sira Village Profile, ARIJ, p. 9
  25. ^ Beit Sira Village Profile, ARIJ, p. 17
  26. ^ Projected Mid -Year Population for Ramallah & Al Bireh Governorate by Locality 2004- 2006 Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.
  27. ^ 2007 PCBS Census. Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. p.114.

Bibliography[edit]

External links[edit]

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