| Hula Valley | |
|---|---|
 View of Hula Valley | |
| Naming | |
| Native name | |
| Geology | |
| Type | Valley |
| Geography | |
| Country |  Israel |
| State/Province | Northern District |
| Population center | Kiryat Shmona |
| Coordinates | 33°06′12″N35°36′33″E / 33.10333°N 35.60917°E /33.10333; 35.60917 |
 Interactive map of Hula Valley | |
| Designations | |
|---|---|
| Official name | Hula Nature Reserve |
| Designated | 12 November 1996; 29 years ago (1996-11-12) |
| Reference no. | 868[1] |
TheHula Valley (Hebrew:עמק החולה,romanized: ʿEmeq haḤūlā;Arabic:سهل الحولة,romanized: Sahl al-Ḥūlat) is avalley and fertileagricultural region in northernIsrael with abundant fresh water that used to be Lake Hula before it was drained. It is a major stopover for birds migrating along theGreat Rift Valley betweenAfrica,Europe, andAsia.
Lake Hula and themarshland surrounding it were a breeding ground for mosquitoes carryingmalaria and thus were drained in the 1950s.[2] A small section of the valley was later reflooded in an attempt to revive a nearly extinctecosystem. An estimated 500 million migrating birds now pass through the Hula Valley every year.[3]
Different names referred to Lake Hula in the past. In the1st century, the Roman Jewish historianJosephus termed itSemechonitis (Greek:Σημεχωνίτις,romanized: Sēmekhonítis),John Lightfoot writing it asSamochonitis.[4] In theBabylonian Talmud, it is called the Lake of Sivekhi (יַמָּהּ שֶׁל סִיבְכִי,Siḇəḵi). Both names are identified with the placenameŠamḫuna found in theAmarna letters written in theAkkadian languagec. 1360 BCE.[5]
TheWaters of Merom has sometimes been used in scientific literature, although that term refers specifically tosprings on the western side of the valley.
Prior to its drainage in the early 1950s, Lake Hula was 5.3 km (3.3 mi) long and 4.4 km (2.7 mi) wide, extending over 12-14 square kilometers. It was about 1.5 m (4 ft 11 in) deep in summer and 3 m (9.8 ft) deep in winter. The marsh-like lake was fed by several perennial springs.[6] The lake attracted human settlement from earlyprehistoric times.Paleolithicarchaeological remains were found near the "Daughters of Jacob Bridge" at the southern end of the valley. The first permanent settlement, Enan (Mallaha), dates from 9,000–10,000 years ago and was discovered in the valley.
The Hula Valley was a main junction on the important trade route connecting the large commercial centre ofDamascus with theEastern Mediterranean coast andEgypt. During theBronze Age, the cities ofHazor andLaish were built at key locations on this route approximately 4,000 years ago. At some point, the area came under the control of theIsraelites, until it was captured by theNeo-Assyrian Empire's armies underTiglath-Pileser III (reigned 745–727 BC) and its inhabitants were driven away. TheBible records theWaters of Merom, a lake in the valley, as the site of avictory ofJoshua over theCanaanites.[7]
Throughout theHellenistic,Roman,Byzantine and early Arab periods (fourth century BCE to eighth centuries CE) rural settlement in the Hula Valley was uninterrupted. During theSeleucid Empire, the townSeleucia Samulias was founded on the lake shore.
SeveralDiocletian boundary stones have been discovered in the valley, preserving the names of otherwise unknown Late Roman villages.[8][9][10]
Traditional crops wererice (as early as the Hellenistic period),cotton andsugar cane (brought by theArabs following their conquest in 636),sorghum andmaize (brought after the discovery of the Americas).Water buffalo were introduced in the eighth century supplyingmilk and serving as beasts of burden.
In the 19th century, the valley, mainly marshy ground and a shallow lake, was inhabited by GhawaranehBedouin[11] who wove matting from thepapyrus with which they built their homes.John MacGregor, a Victorian adventurer, was captured with his boat, the "Rob Roy", by dark-skinnedBedouin living in the Hula marshes. He was responsible for the first modern maps of the area.[12] Mortality rates were very high due to thespread of malaria.[citation needed] In 1882, a traveler wrote that the region was "among the finest hunting grounds in Syria," home to "panthers, leopards, bears, wild boars, wolves, foxes, jackals, hyenas, gazelles and otters." During World War II, officers of the British Army wrote about hunting birds there.
In 1908, the Ottoman government granted a concession to drain the marsh to a French firm, which sold it to Lebanese businessmen. In 1933, during theBritish Mandate, theZionistPalestine Land Development Company was awardedthis concession by the Mandatory government and drew up plans to drain and irrigate the valley which brought scientific expeditions to the area.[12]
A visitor to the area in the 1930s reported that thevillages in the area harvested thepapyrus for weaving. They used two distinct styles of loom: one for fine mats for interior use, and a second producing longer, coarser mats which were used for constructing huts and shelters.[13]
The first modern Jewish settlement in the Hula Valley,Yesud HaMa'ala on the western shore of the lake, was established in 1883 during theFirst Aliyah.
In 1948 there were 35 villages in the Hula Valley—12 Jewish and 23 Arab.[14]
The Hula Valley lies within the northern part of theSyrian-African Rift Valley at an elevation of about 70 meters above sea level, and covers an area of 177 square kilometers (25 km by 6–8 km).[dubious –discuss] On both sides of the valley are steep slopes: theGolan Heights to the east and theUpper Galilee'sNaftali Mountains to the west rise to 400 to 900 metersabove sea level.Basalt hills of about 200 meters above sea level along the southern side of the valley intercept theJordan River, and are commonly referred to as the basalt "plug", the Korazim block, orKorazim Plateau (actually a temporary geologicbase level), as they restrict water drainage downstream into theSea of Galilee.
The Hula Valley has aMediterranean climate of hot dry summers and cool rainy winters, although its enclosure within two mountain ranges leads to more extreme seasonal and daily temperature fluctuations than in coastal areas. Annualrainfall varies greatly between different parts of the valley and ranges from about 400 millimeters in the south of the valley, to up to 800 millimeters in the north of the valley. More than 1,500 millimeters of precipitation falls on theAnti-Lebanon mountains only a few kilometers north of the valley, mostly in the form of snow, feeding underground springs and the sources of theJordan River including theHasbani River,Banias River,Dan River and the el-Malaha Brook, all eventually flowing through the valley, and which, before its drainage, could not easily be distinguished because of the marsh.[15]
G. Schumacher, visiting the region in 1883, described the Hula valley in the following terms:
Ard el Huleh. The whole country of the marshes of the Huleh Lake, a swampy territory thickly overgrown with papyrus. It abounds insnipe, wild ducks,francolins and many other kinds of birds, and is consequently much resorted to by the hunter, but as carefully avoided by the inhabitants on account of the noxious fever.[16]
The draining operations, carried out by theJewish National Fund (JNF), began in 1951 and were completed by 1958. In 1955 the Israeli government invited John Zuckerman to visit Israel as advisor on a project.[17] It was achieved by two main engineering operations: the deepening and widening of the Jordan River downstream; and two newly-dug peripheral canals diverting the Jordan at the north of the valley. The drying out caused the extinction or extirpation of the uniqueendemic or near-endemic fauna of the lake, including thecyprinid fishMirogrex hulensis or Hula bream,[18] thenemacheilid fishNun galilaeus or Galilean stone loach, and thecichlid fishTristramella intermedia or Hulan shortjaw tristramella.[19]
Though perceived at the time as a great national achievement for Israel, with the advent of the modern environmental movement, it became evident that the transformation of the swamp into agricultural land involved significant trade-offs and had effects on the ecosystem that had not been perceived in the first half of the twentieth century, when the major concerns had been the reduction of malaria-bearingmosquitoes and improving economic productivity. In 1963, a small (3.50 km2) area of recreated papyrus swampland in the southwest of the valley was set aside as the country's firstnature reserve. Concern over the draining of the Hula was the impetus for the creation of theSociety for the Protection of Nature in Israel.[20]
Draining the Hula turned out to be a mixed blessing. Water polluted with chemical fertilizers began flowing into theSea of Galilee, lowering the quality of its water. The soil, stripped of natural foliage, was blown away by strong winds in the valley, and the peat of the drained swamp ignited spontaneously, causing underground fires that were difficult to extinguish.[3] Eventually part of the valley was transformed back into a wetland habitat.
The work of a number of scientists and nature lovers made it possible for at least a small part of Hula'swetlands to be preserved. In 1964 the Hula Nature Reserve was officially inaugurated.[21] The Hula Nature Reserve is listed by theRamsar Convention on Wetlands, as a Wetland of International Importance.[22]
Hula Lake Park is located in the southern part of the Hula Valley, north of the nature reserve and distinct from it. It was established as part of a JNF rehabilitation project.[23] In the early 1990s part of the valley was flooded again in the wake of heavy rains. It was decided to develop the surrounding area and leave the flooded area intact. The new site has become the second home for thousands of migrating birds in the autumn and spring.[24] The lake covers an area of one square kilometer, interspersed with islands that serve as protected bird nesting sites. It has become a major stopover formigrating birds flying from Europe to Africa and back, and also a majorbirdwatching site. In 2011, Israeliornithologists confirmed that Lake Hula is the stopover point for tens of thousands of cranes migrating from Finland to Ethiopia every winter. In Israel, farmers set out food for them to keep them from damaging crops near the lake.[25][26]
Some 24,000 ha of the northern Hula Valley, including the nature reserve, has been recognised as anImportant Bird Area (IBA) byBirdLife International because it supports populations of many species of birds, especiallyraptors andwaterbirds, either as breeding residents, winter visitors or passagemigrants. These includemarbled teals,pygmy cormorants,sociable lapwings,European honey buzzards,greater andlesser spotted eagles,eastern imperial eagles,Levant sparrowhawks,lesser kestrels andDead Sea sparrows.[27]
In November 2011 theHula painted frog, classified as extinct since 1996 by the IUCN as a result of the marsh drainage, reappeared to park patrollers in HaHula. The reappearance was confirmed by theIsrael Nature and Parks Authority. Since the discovery of the first specimen at least ten more have been found, all in the same area. The IUCN has accordingly reclassified the species ascritically endangered.[28]
Archaeological findings in 2009 show that thehominids who inhabited the area exploited Lake Hula fish. Analysis of the fish remains recovered from the archaeological site ofGesher Benot Ya'aqov (GBY) has shown that they exploited a wide range of fish includingcatfish,tilapia andcarp. Some of the carp were over a meter long.[29] Tools to light fires and crack nuts were also discovered at the site.[30]
In December 2007 Israel issued a set of three stamps featuring the Hula nature reserve.[31]
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