Kharbatha al-Misbah

Location

Kharbatha al Misbah is located 12.5 km west of Ramallah. It is bordered by Beit Ur al Fauqa to the east, Beit Ur at Tahta to the north, Beit Sira to the west, and Beit Liqya to the south.

Etymology

Ḫarbatā /Ḫarbata/ is an Aramaic toponym meaning “the ruin”. The second part of the name means "lamp".

History

In 1838, it was noted as a Muslim village called Khurbata in the Lydda administrative region.

In 1863, Victor Guérin found 400 inhabitants, along with ruins identified as the remains of a Christian church. He further noted five or six cisterns as well as ancient tombs. He described it an ancient place founded on the site of a Hebrew settlement whose original name had been lost.

Albert Socin found an official Ottoman village list from 1870 that shows Charabta, in the Lydda district, had a population of 194 living in 71 houses, although the count included only men. Hartmann gives the number of houses as 78.

In 1882, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described the village, then called Khurbetha ibn es Seba, as "a small village on a ridge, with a well to the east."

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Kherbet al-Mesbah had a population of 369, all Muslim. In the 1931 census it had increased to a population of 488, still all Muslim, in 121 inhabited houses.

In the 1945 statistics, the population of Khirbat el Misbah was 600, all Muslims, who owned 4,438 dunams of land according to an official land and population survey. 1,026 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 2,133 used for cereals, while 25 dunams were built-up (urban) land.

File:el Misbah 1944.jpg|Khirbat el Misbah 1944 1:20,000 from 1919 survey File:Burj 1945.jpg|Khirbat el Misbah 1945 1:250,000 (bottom right quadrant)

Jordanian era

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Kharbatha al-Misbah came under Jordanian rule.

The Jordanian census of 1961 found 942 inhabitants in Kh. Misbah.

There are two mosques in the town: Omri Mosque and al-Kawthar Mosque. The former was built atop the ruins of an ancient church and was renovated in 1965. Within the town, still lay Ancient Roman cemeteries. It has been governed by a village council.

1967-present

Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Kharbatha al-Misbah has been under Israeli occupation.

After the 1995 accords, 19% of village land was classified as Area B, while the remaining 81% was classified as Area C. Israel has confiscated 61 dunams of village land in order to build the Israeli settlement of Beit Horon.

References

Bibliography

References

1. [http://www.elections.ps/pdf/Municipal_Elections_Results_EN_(2).pdf West Bank] {{webarchive. link. (2008-12-19 Local Elections ( Round two)- Successful candidates by local authority, gender and No. of votes obtained, Kharbatha Misbah p 22)
2. [http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/Kharbatha_al_Misbah_vp_en.pdf Kharbatha al Misbah Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 4
3. (February 2018). "Preliminary Results of the Population, Housing and Establishments Census, 2017". [[State of Palestine]].
4. Palmer, 1881, p. [https://archive.org/stream/surveyofwesternp00conduoft#page/313/mode/1up 313]
5. link. (2007-08-14 Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem. 16 January 2006.)
6. Marom, Roy. (2023). "Early-Ottoman Palestinian Toponymy: A Linguistic Analysis of the (Micro-)Toponyms in Haseki Sultan’s Endowment Deed (1552)". Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins.
7. Palmer, Name Lists, 1881.
8. Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, Appendix 2, p. [https://archive.org/stream/biblicalresearch03robiuoft#page/121/mode/1up 121]
9. Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, p. [https://archive.org/stream/biblicalresearch03robiuoft#page/n83/mode/1up 66]
10. Guérin, 1875, p. [https://archive.org/stream/descriptiongog01gu#page/347/mode/1up 347]
11. Socin, 1879, p. [https://archive.org/stream/zeitschriftdesde01deut#page/149/mode/1up 149]
12. Hartmann, 1883, p. [https://archive.org/stream/bub_gb_BZobAQAAIAAJ#page/n946/mode/1up 138]
13. Conder and Kitchener, 1882, SWP II, p. [https://archive.org/stream/surveyofwesternp03conduoft#page/15/mode/1up 15]
14. Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Ramallah, p. [https://archive.org/stream/PalestineCensus1922/Palestine%20Census%20%281922%29#page/n19/mode/1up 17]
15. Mills, 1932, p. [https://archive.org/details/CensusOfPalestine1931.PopulationOfVillagesTownsAndAdministrativeAreas 50]
16. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. [http://users.cecs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/yabber/census/VSpages/VS1945_p26.jpg 26]
17. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20I/Ramallah/Page-065.jpg 65]
18. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20II/Ramallah/Page-112.jpg 112] {{Webarchive. link. (2020-11-07)
19. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20III/Ramallah/Page-162.jpg 162] {{Webarchive. link. (2020-11-07)
20. Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. [http://users.cecs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/yabber/census/JordanCensusPages/JordanCensus1961-p24.pdf 24]
21. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/GeoPoints/Kh__al_Misbah_1314/Article_9139.html History of the Village] Palestine Remembered.
22. [http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/Kharbatha_al_Misbah_vp_en.pdf Kharbatha al Misbah Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 16