Zakariyya
This data is taken mostly from the book ALL THAT REMAINS by Walid Khalidi
Population: 1931: 742, 1945: 1180
Before 1948
The village stood on undulating ground that was underlain by soft white Eocene limestone, in the western foothills of the Heron Mountains. It was next to the road between Bayt Jibrin and the Jerusalem-Jafa highway. This road linked it to other lateral roads and led to Bethlehem and a number of villages, among them Ajjur, Dayr Al-Dubban, and Tall Al-Safi. The village name reflected the cultural continuity of the area's population with the Roman and Byzantine periods; the site was called Caper Zacharia during those times and fell within the adminstrative jurisdiction of Bayt Jibrin. In 1596, Zakaryya was a village in the liwa of Jerusalem, with a population of 259. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including wheat, barley, and olives, as well as on other types of produce, such a goats and beehives.
In the late nineteenth century, Zakariyya stood on the slope above a broad, flat valley, surrounded by extensive olive groves. The village had a rectangular layout and the residents, who were Muslim, built their houses of stone and mud. The older parts of the village were located at its center and in its northern and southern quarters. The center consisted of a mosque, a shrine for a Shaykh Hasan, a busy marketplace, and an elementary school. The village expanded on all sides in modern times, especially to the north and south. The villagers obtained their drinking water from tow communal wells-the al-Saflani well, drilled next to Wadi Ajjur, and the Al-Sarara well, north of the village. Some water also came from domestic wells that gathered rainwater. Rainfed agriculture represented the backbone of the economy; the main crops included grain, beans, fruit, and olives. In 1945 a total of 6,523 dunums was allocated to cereals; 961 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards, of which 440 dunums were planted with olive trees. The second most important occupation of the villagers was animal husbandry. They grazed their goats and sheep on the wild shrubs and grasses that grew on the slopes of the hills and wadis. Near the site of the village were many ancient localities. About 1 Km to the southwest was Tall Zakariyya, which rises 117 m above the plain. The plain to the east has been identified with the Valley of Elah where, according to the Bible (1 Samuel 17), David fought Goliath. Tall Zakariyya was excavated in 1898 and has been identified with Azekah, a town which may have been referred to in a text written on a broken shard that was found at Tall al-Duwayr. Azekah was said to be the place where Joshua triumphed over the Cannanites (Joshua 10:10)
After 1948
Zakariyya first came under attack early in the war in the course of the battles around the Kfar Etzion Block of Jewish settlements south of Bethlehem. Along with Dayr Aban and Bayt Nattif, it was besieged by a Hoganah unit estimated at 100 men by Arab sources quoted by the New York Times. "The punitive expedition " against the villages, in retaliation for the ambush of a Plamach shock force nearby, persisted for a bout twenty-four hours. The Times also said the Israeli forces directed their fire at the villages on 17 and 18 January 1948.
Zakariyya was occupied over nine months later, towards the end of operation ha-Har and Yo'av, when Isreal's operational areas became contiguous in the last week of October 1948. Israeli units broke through at the village on 23 October 1948, linking the Israeli-held parts of the Hebron hills with the Jerusalem corridor. Unlike most of the inhabitants of villages conquered in these operations, the villagers were not displaced at the time of occupation. However, Israeli historian Benny Morris reports that over a year later, towards the end of 1949, the Israeli military drew up a plan to evict the people of Zakariyya, along with those of some seven other villages (mostly in the northen Galilee). But Morris adds that "politcal objections by the Foreign Ministry blocked implementations".
Efforts to expel the people of Zakariyya was one of the longest-lasting of these communities, despite the "appalling" health and food situation in the village, according to Morris. In March 1949, the Israeli Interior Minestry official in charge of the Jerusalem District noted that "in the village there are many good houses, and it is possible to accommodate in them several hundred new immigrants." In January 1950, Ben-Gurion met with his foreign minister, Moshe Sharett, and Jewish National Fund official Yosef Weitz and decided to evict the inhabitants of Zakariyya "(but) without coercion." They were eventually evicted on 9 June 1950-the means of expulsion are not mentioned-and most were transferred to al-Ramla, with some possibly going to Jordan.
The settlement of Zekharya was established in 1950 on village land, close to the village site.
The mosque and a number of houses, some occupied by Jewish residents and others deserted, remain on the site. Large sections of the site itself were covered with wild vegetations. The mosque is in a state of neglect; segments of its walls and roof and the surrounding ground are overgrow with wild vegetations. An Israeli flag is planted on top of the minaret. One of the occupied houses is a two-story stone structure with a flat roof. Its second story windows have round arches and grill work. Parts of the surrounding land are cultivated by Israeli farmers.
Many of the original inhabitants and their descendants reside in the West Bank towns like Hebron, Beit Jala, Aroub and Duheisha camps. Also some are in Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, Scandinavia, and the United States