al-Jura الجورة | |
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 Part of the former village site, in 2015 | |
| Etymology: the Hollow[1] | |
.jpg) 1870s map.jpg) 1940s map.jpg) modern map.jpg) 1940s with modern overlay mapA series of historical maps of the area around Al-Jura (click the buttons) | |
  al-Jura Location within theMandatory Palestine | |
| Coordinates:31°39′57″N34°33′17″E / 31.66583°N 34.55472°E /31.66583; 34.55472 | |
| Palestine grid | 107/119 |
| Geopolitical entity | Mandatory Palestine |
| Subdistrict | Gaza |
| Date of depopulation | November 4–5, 1948[4] |
| Area | |
• Total | 12,224dunams (12.224 km2; 4.720 sq mi) |
| Population (1945) | |
• Total | 2,420[2][3] |
| Cause(s) of depopulation | Military assault byYishuv forces |
| Current Localities | Ashkelon[5] |
Al-Jura (Arabic:الجورة) was aPalestinian village that was depopulated by Israeli militias during the1948 Arab-Israeli war, located immediately adjacent to the towns ofAshkelon and the ruins of ancientAscalon. In 1945, the village had a population of approximately 2,420 mostlyMuslim inhabitants. Though defended by theEgyptian Army, al-Jura was nevertheless captured byIsrael'sGivati Brigade in a November 4, 1948, offensive as part ofOperation Yoav.
Its residents had their origins inEgypt,Hebron, andBedouin communities.[6]
TheShrine of Husayn's Head was located outside the town, until it was destroyed by the Israeli army in 1950.
The founder and spiritual leader of theHamas militant organizationAhmed Yassin was born in al-Jura.
Al-Jura (El-Jurah) stood northeast of and immediately adjacent to the mound ofancient and medievalAscalon.
Byzantine ceramics have been found here, together with coins dating to the seventh century CE.[7]
In the first Ottomantax register of 1526/7 the village was unpopulated.[8] By 1596 CE, however, the village had been refounded as part of thenahiya of Gaza and namedJawrat al-Hajja. It had 46Muslim households, an estimated population of 253; who paid a total of 3,400akçe in taxes.[9]
Marom andTaxel have shown that during the seventeenth to eighteenth centuries, nomadic economic and security pressures led to settlement abandonment around Majdal ‘Asqalān, and the southern coastal plain in general. The population of abandoned villages moved to surviving settlements, while the lands of abandoned settlements continued to be cultivated by neighboring villages. Thus, al-Jura absorbed the lands of al-Rasm and al-Bira, the last one separated from the village by the lands of al-Majdal.[8]
The SyrianSufi teacher and traveller Mustafa al-Bakri al-Siddiqi (1688–1748/9) visited Al-Jura in the first half of the eighteenth century, before leaving forHamama.[10]
In 1838,Edward Robinson notedel-Jurah as a Muslim village, located in the Gaza district.[11]
In 1863 the French explorerVictor Guérin visited the village, which he calledDjoura, and found it to have three hundred inhabitants. He further noted that he could see numerous antiquities, taken from the ruined city, and that the inhabitants of the village grew handsome fruit trees, as well as flowers and vegetables.[12] An Ottoman village list from about 1870 found that the village had a population of 340, in a total of 109 houses, though the population count included men, only.[13][14]
In the late nineteenth century, the village of Al-Jura was situated on flat ground bordering on the ruins of ancientAscalon.[15] It was rectangular in shape and the residents were Muslim. They had a mosque and a school which was founded in 1919.[10]
In the1922 census of Palestine conducted by theBritish Mandate authorities, Jura had a population of 1,326 inhabitants, allMuslims,[16] increasing in the1931 census to 1,754, consisting of 1752 Muslims and 2 Christians, in a total of 396 houses.[17]
By the 1940s the school had 206 students.
[10]In the1945 Village StatisticsEl Jura had an estimated population of 2,420 Muslims,[2] with a total of 12,224dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.[3] Of this, 481 dunams were used for citrus and bananas, 7,192 for plantations and irrigable land, 2,965 for cereals,[18] while 45 dunams were built-up land.[19]
In addition to agriculture, residents practicedanimal husbandry which formed was an important source of income for the town. In 1943, they owned 115 heads ofcattle, 7sheep over a year old, 92goats over a year old, 47camels, 7horses, amule, 130donkeys, 970fowls, and 227pigeons.[20]
At the end of November 1948, Coastal Plain District troops carried out sweeps of the villages around and to the south ofMajdal. Al-Jura was one of the villages named in the orders to theIDF battalions and engineers platoon, that the villagers were to be expelled to Gaza, and the IDF troops were "to prevent their return by destroying their villages". The path leading to the village was to be mined. The IDF troops were ordered to carry out the operation "with determination, accuracy and energy".[21] The operation took place on 30 November. The troops found "not a living soul" in Al-Jura. However, the destruction of the villages was not completed immediately due to the dampness of the houses and the insufficient amount of explosives.[22]
In 1992, the village site was described: "Only one of the village houses has been spared; thorny plants grow on the parts of the site not built over byAshqelon."[5] The site is incorporated intoAshkelon National Park.[23]
TheShrine of Husayn's Head[24] was aFatimid-era shrine located on a hill outside Al-Jura that was reputed to have held the head ofHusayn ibn Ali between c.906 CE and 1153 CE.[25][26][27]
It was considered the mostimportant Shi'a shrine in Palestine,[28] but was destroyed by the Israeli army in 1950, a year afterhostilities ended, on the orders ofMoshe Dayan. It is thought that the demolition was related to efforts to expel the remainingPalestinian Arabs from the region.[26]
ولد إسماعيل عبد السلام أحمد هنية يوم 23 يناير/كانون الثاني 1962 (أو 1963) في قطاع غزة بمخيم الشاطئ للاجئين، الذي كانت أسرته قد لجأت إليه من قرية الجورة الواقعة في قضاء مدينة عسقلان المحتلة.
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