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73-473: The town had a population of 5,420 in 1948, located 15 kilometers southwest of Ramla . Most of the population fled after the fall of al-Qubeiba and Zarnuqa in late May, but armed males were forced back. Israeli Occupation forces took the town on June 5 and expelled the remaining population. It is a significant site for post-biblical Jewish history, as it was the location of the Council of Jamnia , considered

146-721: A Gath (believed to be Tell es-Safi ) and Gath-rimmon or Gittaim (in or near Ramla). Archaeological excavations in Ramla conducted in 1992–1995 unearthed the remains of a dyeing industry ( Dar al-Sabbaghin , House of the Dyers) near the White Mosque; hydraulic installations such as pools, subterranean reservoirs and cisterns; and abundant ceramic finds that include glass, coins and jar handles stamped with Arabic inscriptions. Excavations in Ramla continued into 2010, led by Eli Haddad, Orit Segal, Vered Eshed, and Ron Toueg, on behalf of

219-577: A Muslim village in the Gaza district. An Ottoman village list from 1870 found that Yibna had a population of 1,042 living in 348 houses, although this number only counted adult males. In 1882, the Palestine Exploration Fund 's Survey of Western Palestine described Yibna as a large village partly built of stone and situated on a hill. It had olive trees and corn to the north, and gardens nearby. In 1921, an elementary school for boys

292-615: A decade later, the population had increased nearly 25%; the 1931 census recorded 10,347 people (8,157 Muslims, 2,194 Christians, five Jews, and two Druze ), in a total of 2,339 houses. Ramla was connected to wired electricity (supplied by the Zionist-owned Palestine Electric Company ) towards the end of the 1920s. Economist Basim Faris noted this fact as proof of Ramla's higher standard of living than neighbouring Lydda. In Ramla, he wrote, "economic demands triumph over nationalism" while Lydda, "which

365-484: A determined local Christian cleric refused Sulayman's requests for plots in the middle of Lydda. Infuriated, he attempted to have the cleric executed, but his local adviser Raja ibn Haywa dissuaded him and instead proposed building a new city at a superior, adjacent site. In choosing the site, Sulayman utilized the strategic advantages of Lydda's vicinity while avoiding the physical constraints of an already-established urban center. Historian Moshe Sharon holds that Lydda

438-629: A hill and inhabited by Samaritans . The geographer al-Maqdisi , writing around 985, said that "Yubna has a beautiful mosque . From this place come the excellent figs known by the name of Damascene ." The geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi wrote that in Yubna there was a tomb said to be that of Abu Hurayra , a Companion of the Prophet . The author of the Marasid also adds that tomb seen here is also said to be that of Abd Allah ibn Sa'd , another Companion of

511-475: A late Bronze Age occupation. A large Philistine favissa (deposit of cultic artifacts) was discovered on Temple Hill. Two excavation seasons in the 2000s led by Professor Dan Bahat revealed some Iron Age remains. Pottery sherds of the Iron Age and Persian period were discovered at the surface of the tell. In Roman times, the city was known as Iamnia , also spelled Jamnia . It was bequeathed by Herod

584-466: A market town for the surrounding area's agricultural products, and as a center for dyeing, weaving and pottery. It was also home to many Muslim religious scholars . Sulayman built an aqueduct in the city called al-Barada, which transported water to Ramla from Tel Gezer , about 10 kilometers (6 mi) to the southeast. Ramla superseded Lydda as the commercial center of Palestine. Many of Lydda's Christian, Samaritan and Jewish inhabitants were moved to

657-571: A mixed Jewish–Arab town within the state of Israel. Arab homes of those who left in Ramla were given by the Israeli government to Jews, first Holocaust refugees from Europe and then immigrants from Arab and Muslim countries. In February 1949, the Jewish population was over 6,000. Ramla remained economically depressed over the next two decades, although the population steadily mounted, reaching 34,000 by 1972. A 2013 Israeli police report documented that

730-402: A more ancient city, visited " Rama , or Ramleh, where there are remains of the walls from the days of our ancestors, for thus it was found written upon the stones. About 300 Jews dwell there. It was formerly a very great city; at a distance of two miles (3 km) there is a large Jewish cemetery." In the 1480s, in the late Mamluk era, Felix Fabri visited Ramla and described (among other things)

803-515: A population of 129 households, an estimated 710 persons, all Muslims. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 25% on a number of crops, including wheat, barley, summer crops, sesame seeds and fruits, as well as goats, beehives and vineyards; a total of 34,000 akçe . Three quarters of the revenues went to a waqf (religious endowment). In the French campaign in Egypt and Syria in 1799, it was shown on

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876-402: A population of 15,160 (11,900 Muslims and 3,260 Christians). Ramla was part of the territory allotted to a proposed Arab state under the 1947 UN Partition Plan . However, Ramla's geographic location and its strategic position on the main supply route to Jerusalem made it a point of contention during the 1947–1948 civil war , followed by the internationalised 1948 Arab–Israeli War . A bomb by

949-620: A provincial capital shortly before the arrival of the First Crusaders ( c.  1099 ), after which it became the scene of various battles between the Crusaders and Fatimids in the first years of the 12th century. Later that century, it became the centre of a lordship in the Kingdom of Jerusalem , a Crusader state established by Godfrey of Bouillon . Ramla had an Arab -majority population before most were expelled during

1022-450: Is an inscription stating that on the 15th of Muharram , of the year 425 (=10th of December, 1033 CE), there came an earthquake of great violence, which threw down a large number of buildings, but that no single person sustained an injury. In the city of Ramla there is marble in plenty, and most of the buildings and private houses are of this material; and, further, the surface thereof they do most beautifully sculpture and ornament. They cut

1095-464: Is ten minutes' walk from Ramleh, is still averse to such a convenience as electric current, and so is not as yet served; perhaps the low standard of living of the poor population prevents the use of the service at the present rates, which cannot compete with petroleum for lighting". Sheikh Mustafa al-Khairi was mayor of Ramla from 1920 to 1947. The 1938 village statistics list the population ("Ramle, Er") as 11,950. The 1945/46 survey gives 'Ramle'

1168-515: The 1948 Arab–Israeli War . The town was subsequently repopulated by Jewish immigrants. Today, Ramla is one of Israel's mixed cities , with a population 76% Jewish and 24% Arab. The Umayyad prince and governor of Palestine , Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik , founded Ramla as the seat of his administration, replacing Lydda , the Muslims' original provincial capital. Sulayman had been appointed governor by his father Caliph Abd al-Malik before

1241-624: The Bronze Age Hyksos . It has been in use from the Middle Bronze Age until the 12th century CE, when it was abandoned. Ramla Ramla or Ramle ( Hebrew : רַמְלָה , Ramlā ; Arabic : الرملة , ar-Ramleh ) is a city in the Central District of Israel . Ramle is one of Israel's mixed cities , with significant numbers of both Jews and Arabs. The city was founded in the early 8th century CE by

1314-620: The Franciscan church. Napoleon used the hospice as his headquarters during his Palestine campaign in 1799. The Ramla Museum is housed in the former municipal headquarters of the British Mandatory authorities. The building, from 1922, incorporates elements of Arab architecture such as arched windows and patterned tiled floors. After 1948, it was the central district office of the Israeli Ministry of Finance . In 2001,

1387-675: The Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). In January 2021, archaeologists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Haifa University announced the discovery of six engravings on 120,000-year-old aurochs bone near the city of Ramla in the open-air Middle Paleolithic site of Nesher Ramla. According to  archaeologist Yossi Zaidner, this finding was definitely the oldest in the Levant . Three-dimensional imaging and microscopic analysis were used to examine

1460-631: The Umayyad caliph Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik as the capital of Jund Filastin , the district he governed in Bilad al-Sham before becoming caliph in 715. The city's strategic and economic value derived from its location at the intersection of the Via Maris , connecting Cairo with Damascus , and the road connecting the Mediterranean port of Jaffa with Jerusalem . It rapidly overshadowed

1533-578: The White Mosque . It was not completed until the reign of Sulayman's successor Caliph Umar II ( r.  717–720 ). The Sulayman's construction works were financially managed by a Christian from Lydda, Bitrik ibn al-Naka. The remains of the White Mosque, dominated by a minaret added at a later date, are visible in the present day. In the courtyard are underground water cisterns from the Umayyad period. From early on, Ramla developed economically as

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1606-518: The hammam there; "built in a wonderous and clever fashion". In the early days of the Ottoman period, in 1548, a census was taken recording 528 Muslim families and 82 Christian families living in Ramla. On 2 March 1799 , Napoleon Bonaparte occupied Ramla during his unsuccessful bid to conquer Palestine, using the Franciscan hospice as his headquarters. The village appeared as 'Ramleh' on

1679-497: The house of Ibelin , was important in the Kingdom of Jerusalem and later in the Kingdom of Cyprus . Salvage excavations at the west of the tell unearthed a stash of 53 Crusader coins of the 12th and 13th centuries. Ibelin was first sacked by Saladin before his army was comprehensively routed at the Battle of Montgisard in late 1177. In August 1187, it was retaken by Saladin and burned down, and ceased for some time to form part of

1752-546: The Central District ranks fourth among Israel's seven districts in terms of drug-related arrests. Today, five of Israel's prisons are located in Ramla, including the maximum-security Ayalon Prison and the country's only women's prison, called Neve Tirza . In 2015, Ramla had one of Israel's highest crime rates. The Tower of Ramla , also known as the White Tower, was built in the 13th century. It served as

1825-672: The Crusaders' kingdom. The Jewish traveler Benjamin of Tudela (1130–1173) identified Jamnia ( Jabneh ) of classical writers with the Ibelin of the Crusades. He places the ancient city of Jamnia at three parasangs from Jaffa and two from Ashdod ( Azotus ). During the Mamluk period (13th–16th centuries), Yibna was a key site along the Cairo—Damascus road, which served as a center for rural religious and economic life. Ibelin's parish church

1898-596: The Early Muslim period) to provide Ramla with a steady supply of water. Use of the cistern was apparently discontinued at the beginning of the tenth century (the beginning of the Fatimid period), possibly due to the fact that the main aqueduct to the city went out of use at that time. The Crusaders built a cathedral in the first half on the 12th century, converted into a mosque when the Mamluks conquered Ramla in

1971-570: The Great upon his death to his sister Salome I . Upon her death, it passed to the Roman emperor Augustus , who managed it as a private imperial estate , a status it was to maintain for at least a century. After Salome's death, Iamnia came into the property of Livia , the future Roman empress, and then to her son Tiberius . During the First Jewish–Roman War , when the Roman army had quelled

2044-491: The Jarrahids, who continued to dominate the surrounding countryside. The following decade was marked by peace, but, in 1024, the Jarrahids renewed their rebellion. The Fatimid general Anushtakin al-Dizbari secured Ramla for a few months, but the Jarrahids overran the city that year, killing and harassing several inhabitants and seizing much of the population's wealth. They appointed their own governor, Nasr Allah ibn Nizal. In

2117-627: The Jewish militia group Irgun went off in the Ramla market on 18 February, killing 7 residents and injuring 45. After a number of unsuccessful raids on Ramla, the Israeli army launched Operation Dani . Ramla was captured on 12 July 1948, a few days after the capture of Lydda. The Arab resistance surrendered on July 12, and most of the remaining inhabitants were expelled . A disputed claim, advanced by scholars including Ilan Pappé , characterizes this as ethnic cleansing . By November 1949, there were about 2,000 Arabs in Ramla and Lod. Ramla became

2190-573: The Mediterranean coast. Sulayman established his city in Lydda's vicinity, avoiding Lydda proper. This was likely due to a lack of available space for wide-scale development and agreements dating to the Muslim conquest in the 630s that, at least formally, precluded him from confiscating desirable property within Lydda. In a tradition recorded by the historian Ibn Fadlallah al-Umari (died 1347),

2263-492: The Prophet. In 2007, remains ranging from the early Islamic period until the British Mandate period were uncovered. An additional kiln, and part of a commercial/industrial area were uncovered at the west of the tell in 2009. The Crusaders called the city Ibelin and built a castle there in 1141. Two excavation seasons led by Professor Dan Bahat starting in 2005 revealed the main gate. Its namesake noble family,

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2336-608: The West, is known under the name of Filastin. The armies of the First Crusade took the hastily evacuated town without a fight. In the early years of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem though, control over this strategic location led to three consecutive battles between the Crusaders and Egyptian armies from Ascalon , a Fatimid-held town along the southern coast of Palestine. As Crusader rule stabilized, Ramla became

2409-482: The adjacent city of Lydda , whose inhabitants were relocated to the new city. Not long after its establishment, Ramla developed as the commercial centre of Palestine , serving as a hub for pottery, dyeing, weaving, and olive oil, and as the home of numerous Muslim scholars . Its prosperity was lauded by geographers in the 10th–11th centuries, when the city was ruled by the Fatimids and Seljuks . It lost its role as

2482-576: The besieging Roman forces, for the right to settle in Yavne and teach his disciples. Upon the fall of Jerusalem, his school functioned as a re-establishment of the Sanhedrin . Byzantine period finds from excavations include an aqueduct east of the tell, and a kiln. The world's largest wine factory from the Byzantine period has been uncovered by Israeli archaeologists, after a two-year excavation process;

2555-712: The birthplace of modern Rabbinic Judaism. It is also significant in the history of the Crusades , as the location of the House of Ibelin . In many English translations of the Bible, it is known as Yavne or Jabneh / ˈ dʒ æ b n ə / . In classical antiquity , it was known as Jamnia ( Koinē Greek : Ἰαμνία , romanized:  Iamníā ; Latin : Iamnia ); to the Crusaders as Ibelin ; and before 1948, as Yibna. ( Arabic : يبنا ) Based on written sources and archaeology,

2628-532: The bone. The six lines ranged in length from 38 to 42 millimeters. The city has historically suffered severe damage from several major earthquakes, including the 1033 Jordan Rift Valley earthquake , 1068 Near East earthquake , smaller earthquakes in 1070 and 1546, and the 1927 Jericho earthquake . In May 2006, a naturally sealed-off underground space now known as Ayyalon Cave was discovered near Ramla, outside Moshav Yad Rambam . The cave sustains an unusual type of ecosystem, based on bacteria that create all

2701-546: The building became a museum documenting the history of Ramla. The Commonwealth War Cemetery is the largest of its kind in Israel, holding graves of soldiers fallen during both World Wars and the British Mandate period. A tradition reported by Ishtori Haparchi (1280–1355) and other early Jewish writers is that Ramla was the biblical Gath of the Philistines . Initial archaeological claims seemed to indicate that Ramla

2774-604: The city was destroyed by the Jarrahids , a branch of the Tayy tribe. Nonetheless, the 10th-century Jerusalemite geographer al-Muqaddasi described Ramla as "a fine city, and well built; its water is good and plentiful; it fruits are abundant". He noted that it "combines manifold advantages, situated as it is in the midst of beautiful villages and lordly towns, near to holy places and pleasant hamlets", as well as bountiful fields, walled towns and hospices. The geographer further noted

2847-462: The city's disadvantages included the severe muddiness of the place during the rainy winter season and its hard, sandy grounds due to its distance from natural water sources. The limited drinking water gathered in the city's cisterns were generally inaccessible to the poorer inhabitants. By 1011–1012, the Jarrahids controlled all of Palestine, except for the coastal towns, and captured Ramla from its Fatimid garrison, making it their capital. The city and

2920-400: The city's significant commerce and "excellent markets", lauding the quality of its fruits and bread as the best of their kind. During this period, Ramla was one of the major centers for the production and export of oil extracted from unripe olives, known as anfa kinon ( Greek : ὀμφάκιον, ὀμφάχινον; Latin : omphacium; Arabic : زيت الأنفاق ), and used in cuisine and medicine. Conversely,

2993-419: The end of his reign in 705 and continued in office through the reign of his brother Caliph al-Walid I ( r.  705–715 ), whom he succeeded. He died as caliph in 717. Ramla remained the capital of Palestine through the Fatimid period (10th–11th centuries). Its role as the principal city and district capital came to an end shortly before the arrival of the First Crusaders in 1099. It received its name,

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3066-612: The energy they need chemically, from the sulfur compounds they find in the water, with no light or organic food coming in from the surface. A bulldozer working in the Nesher cement quarry on the outskirts of Ramla accidentally broke into the cavern. The finds have been attributed to the cave's isolation, which led to the evolution of a whole food chain of specially developed organisms, including several previously unknown species of invertebrates . With several large halls on different levels, it measures 2,700 metres (8,900 ft) long, making it

3139-495: The fall of nearby al-Qubayba and Zarnuqa , most of the population of Yibna fled to Isdud , but Yibna's armed males were forced back to Yibna by Isdud 's militiamen. According to the official history, the Israeli Givati Brigade was interested in evacuating the village. On June 5, after a brief firefight, they took the village and found it deserted apart from a few old people who were expelled. Refugees fleeing

3212-399: The following year, al-Dizbari drove the Jarrahids out of Ramla, but was recalled to Egypt in 1026. In 1029, he returned and routed the Jarrahids and their Bedouin allies. Persian geographer Nasir-i-Khusrau visited the city in 1047, remarking: Ramla is a great city, with strong walls built of stone, mortared, of great height and thickness, with iron gates opening therein. From the town to

3285-531: The food supply to dwindle. Seven more species of troglobite crustaceans and springtails were discovered in "Noah's Ark Cave", as the cave has been dubbed by journalists, several of them unknown to science. According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), a total of 63,462 people were living in Ramla at the end of 2004. In 2001, the ethnic makeup of the city was 80% Jewish, 20% Arab (16% Muslim Arabs and 4% Christian Arabs ). Ramla

3358-523: The history of Yavneh/Jabneh/Yibna goes back to the Iron Age and possibly to the Bronze Age . The Hebrew Bible mentions Yavneh repeatedly, as does Josephus . For more see Yavne . Salvage excavations carried out in 2001 by the Israel Antiquities Authority uncovered several burials at the northern foot of the original tell. Most of the burials are dated to the later Iron Age . One burial points to

3431-618: The importance of its wine was exemplified by its use by emperor Justin II in 566 at his table during his coronation feast. The historian al-Baladhuri (d. 892 CE) mentioned Yibna as one of ten towns in Jund Filastin conquered by the Rashidun army led by Amr ibn al-As during the Muslim conquest of the Levant . The 9th-century historian Ya'qubi wrote that it was an ancient city built on

3504-516: The insurrection in Galilee , the army then marched upon Iamnia and Azotus , taking both towns and stationing garrisons within them. According to rabbinic tradition, the tanna Yohanan ben Zakkai and his disciples were permitted to settle in Iamnia during the outbreak of the war, after Zakkai, realizing that Jerusalem was about to fall, sneaked out of the city and asked Vespasian , the commander of

3577-480: The map of Pierre Jacotin compiled during this campaign. In 1838, Edward Robinson found Ramleh to be a town of about 3000 inhabitants, surrounded by olive-groves and vegetables. It had few streets, and the houses were made of stone and were well-built. There were several mosques in the town. In 1863, Victor Guérin noted that the Latin (Catholic) population was reduced to two priests and 50 parishioners. In 1869,

3650-411: The map that Pierre Jacotin compiled that year as 'Ebneh'. An American missionary, William Thomson , who visited Yibna in 1834, described it as a village on hill inhabited by 3,000 Muslims who worked in agriculture. He wrote that an inscription on the mosque indicated that it had been built in 1386, while Denys Pringle indicates 1337 as the construction year of the minaret. In 1838, Yibna was noted as

3723-432: The marble here with a toothless saw, which is worked with 'Mekka sand'. They saw the marble in length, as is the case with wood, to form the columns; not in across; they also cut it into slabs. The marbles that I saw here were of all colours, some variegated, some green, red, black and white. There is, too, at Ramla, a particular kind of fig, and this they export to all the countries round. This city Ramla, throughout Syria and

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3796-457: The minaret of the White Mosque ( al-Masjid al-Abyad ) erected by Caliph Suleiman in the 8th century, of which only remnants are to be seen today. The tower is six stories high, with a spiral staircase of 119 steps. The Pool of Arches, also known as St. Helen's Pool and Bīr al-Anezīya, is an underground water cistern built during the reign of the Abbasid caliph Haroun al-Rashid in 789 CE (in

3869-504: The new city. Although the traditional accounts are in agreement that Lydda almost immediately fell into obscurity following the founding of Ramla, narratives vary about the extent of Sulayman's efforts to transfer Lydda's inhabitants to Ramla, some holding that he only demolished a church in Lydda and others that he demolished the city altogether. Al-Ya'qubi (died 839) noted Sulayman razed the houses of Lydda's inhabitants to force their relocation to Ramla and punished those who resisted. In

3942-468: The population was given as 3,460; 3000 Muslims, 400 Greek Orthodox and 60 Catholics. In 1882, the Palestine Exploration Fund 's Survey of Western Palestine noted that there was a bazaar in the town, "but its prosperity has much decayed, and many of the houses are falling into ruins, including the Serai ." Expansion began only at the end of the 19th century. In 1889, 31 Jewish worker families settled in

4015-509: The sea-coast is a distance of three leagues. The inhabitants get their water from the rainfall, and in each house is a tank for storing the same, in order that there may always be a supply. In the middle of the Friday Mosque [White Mosque], also, is a large tank: and from it, when it is filled with water, anyone who wishes may take. The area of the mosque measures two hundred paces ( Gam ) by three hundred. Over one of its porches ( suffah )

4088-565: The seat of a seigneury in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the Lordship of Ramla within the County of Jaffa and Ascalon . It was a city of some economic significance and an important way station for pilgrims travelling to Jerusalem. The Crusaders identified it with the biblical Ramathaim and called it Arimathea . Around 1163, the rabbi and traveller Benjamin of Tudela , who also mistook it for

4161-496: The second half of the 13th century, when they added a round minaret, an entrance from the north, and a mihrab . The Great Mosque of Ramla, also known as the El-Omari Mosque, it is in architectural terms Israel's largest and best-preserved Crusader church. The Hospice of St Nicodemus and St Joseph of Arimathea on Ramla's main boulevard, Herzl Street, is easily recognized by its clock-faced, square tower. It belongs to

4234-485: The singular form of raml (sand), from the sandy area in which it sat. Sulayman's motives for founding Ramla were personal ambition and practical considerations. The location of Ramla near Lydda, a long-established and prosperous city, was logistically and economically advantageous. The area's economic importance was based on its strategic location at the intersection of the two major roads linking Egypt with Syria (the so-called " Via Maris ") and linking Jerusalem with

4307-551: The state's expenditures. In the late 9th century the Muslim inhabitants were composed mainly of Arabs and Persians, while the clients of the Muslims were Samaritans. The golden age of Ramla under the Umayyads and Abbasids, when the city overtook Jerusalem as a trade center, later gave way to a period of political instability and war beginning in the late 10th century. The Egypt-based Fatimids conquered Ramla in 969 and ten years later

4380-445: The subject of one of his paintings. The work, named for the village, was one of a series of four on destroyed Palestinian villages that he produced in 1988 in order to resist the cancellation of Palestinian history; the others being Yalo , Imwas and Bayt Dajan . The harbour of ancient Yavneh has been identified on the coast at Minet Rubin (Arabic) or Yavne-Yam (Hebrew), where excavations have revealed fortification going back to

4453-595: The surrounding places were plundered by the Bedouin, impoverishing much of the population. The Jarrahids brought the Alid emir of Mecca , al-Hasan ibn Ja'far , to act as caliph in defiance of the Fatimids. The development was short-lived, as the Jarrahids abandoned al-Hasan after Fatimid bribes, and the caliphal claimant left the city for Mecca. A Fatimid army led by Ali ibn Ja'far ibn Fallah wrested control of Ramla from

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4526-406: The third-largest limestone cave in Israel. One of the finds was an eyeless scorpion, given the name Akrav israchanani honouring the researchers who identified it, Israel Naaman and Hanan Dimentman. All ten specimen of the blind scorpion found in the cave had been dead for several years, possibly because recent overpumping of the groundwater has led the underground lake to shrink, and with it

4599-466: The tomb of Abu Huraira since the 12th century. After Israel's capture of Yibna in 1948, the shrine was taken over by Sephardic Jews who consider the tomb as the burial place of Rabbi Gamaliel of Yavne . The village became part of the Ottoman Empire in 1517. In the 1596 Ottoman tax registers, it fell under the nahiya (subdistrict) of Gaza , part of the liwa' (district) of Gaza , with

4672-519: The town, which had no Jewish population at the time. In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities , 'Ramleh' had a population of 7,312 (5,837 Muslims , 1,440 Christians and 35 Jews). The Christians were further noted by denomination: 1,226 Orthodox , 2 Syriac Orthodox (Jacobites), 150 Roman Catholics , 8 Melkite Catholics , 4 Maronite , 15 Armenian , 2 Abyssinian Church and 36 Anglicans . Less than

4745-469: The village were fired at 'to increase [their] panic.' After 1948, a number of Israeli villages were founded on Yibna's land: Kfar HaNagid and Beit Gamliel in 1949, Ben Zakai in 1950, Kfar Aviv (originally: "Kfar HaYeor") in 1951, and Tzofiyya in 1955. Archaeological excavations have revealed that part of the pre-1948 Arab village at Yibna was built on top of a Byzantine-period cemetery and refuse pits. Palestinian artist Sliman Mansour made Yibna

4818-459: The words of al-Jahshiyari, Sulayman "founded the town of al-Ramla and its mosque and thus caused the ruin of Lod [Lydda]". The Abbasids toppled the Umayyads in 750, confiscating the White Mosque and all other Umayyad properties in Ramla. The Abbasids annually reviewed the high costs of maintaining the Barada canal, though starting under the reign of Caliph al-Mu'tasim it became a regular part of

4891-712: Was "too Christian in ethos for the taste of the Umayyad rulers", particularly following the Arabization and Islamization reforms instituted by Abd al-Malik. According to al-Jahshiyari (died 942), Sulayman sought a lasting reputation as a great builder following the example of his father and al-Walid, the respective founders of the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem and the Great Mosque of Damascus . The construction of Ramla

4964-407: Was Sulayman's "way to immortality" and "his personal stamp on the landscape of Palestine", according to Luz. The first structure Sulayman erected in Ramla was his palatial residence, which dually served as the seat of Palestine's administration ( diwan ). The next structure was the Dar al-Sabbaghin (House of the Dyers). At the center of the new city was a congregational mosque , later known as

5037-399: Was converted into a mosque, to which a minaret was added during the Mamluk period in 1337. The minaret survives until today, while the mosque (the former Crusader church) was blown up by the Israeli army in 1950. The Mausoleum of Abu Huraira , a maqam (religious shrine), in Yibna was described as "one of the finest domed mausoleums in Palestine". The site has been considered by Muslims as

5110-603: Was established nearby by refugees from Germany, followed by a Youth Aliyah village, Givat Washington , in 1946. In 1944-45 , Yibna had a population of 5,400 Muslims and 20 Christians, while the total land area was 59,554 dunams , according to an official land and population survey. In addition there were 1,500 nomads living around the village. A total of 6,468 dunams of village land was used for citrus and bananas, 15,124 were used for cereals, 11,091 were irrigated or used for orchards, of which 25 were planted with olive trees, while 127 dunams were classified as built-up areas. Yibna

5183-439: Was founded in Yibna. By 1941-42 it had 445 students. A school for girls was founded in 1943, and by 1948 it had 44 students. In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Yibna had a population of 1,791; all Muslims, increasing in the 1931 census to 3,600, of whom all were Muslims except for seven Christians, two Jews and one Baháʼí , living in a total of 794 houses. In 1941, Kibbutz Yavne

5256-683: Was in the territory allotted to the Jewish state under the 1947 UN Partition Plan . In mid-March 1948, a contingent of Iraqi volunteers moved into the village. In a Haganah reprisal on March 30, two dozen villagers were killed. On April 21, the Iraqi village commander was arrested by the British authorities for the drunken shooting of two Arabs. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli war , residents of Zarnuqa sought refuge in Yibna, but left after Yibna's inhabitants accused them of being traitors. On 27 May, following

5329-474: Was not built on the site of an ancient city, although in recent years the ruins of an older city were uncovered to the south of Ramla. Earlier, Benjamin Mazar had proposed that ancient Gath lay at the site of Ras Abu Hamid east of Ramla. Avi-Yonah , however, considered that to be a different Gath, usually now called Gath-Gittaim. This view is also supported by other scholars, those holding that there was, both,

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