Khirbat Bayt Lid

Khirbat Bayt Lid (Arabic: خربة بيت لد‎) was a Palestinian Arab village in the Tulkarm Subdistrict. It was depopulated by its Arab inhabitants during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.

Khirbat Bayt Lid

خربة بيت لد

Khirbet Beit Lid[1]
Village
Etymology: El Mughair=the caves[2]
1870s map
1940s map
modern map
1940s with modern overlay map
A series of historical maps of the area around Khirbat Bayt Lid (click the buttons)
Khirbat Bayt Lid
Location within Mandatory Palestine
Coordinates: 32°19′04″N 34°53′33″E
Palestine grid140/191
Geopolitical entityMandatory Palestine
SubdistrictTulkarm
Date of depopulation5 April 1948[1]
Area
(2,969 Arab, 2,220 Jewish)[3]
 • Total5,336 dunams (5.336 km2 or 2.060 sq mi)
Population
 • Total460
Cause(s) of depopulationFear of being caught up in the fighting
Current LocalitiesNordia[5][6]

History

500 meters north of Khirbat Bayt Lid was El Mughair, which was described in 1882 by PEF's Survey of Western Palestine as "a small mud hamlet, with caves. The water supply is from springs a mile to the west."[7]

Originally, the people of Khirbat Beit Lid came from Beit Lid to farm the lower plain village land. Gradually they settled in the village so they could be closer to their land.[6]

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Kherbet Bait Lid had a population of 206 Muslims,[8] increasing in the 1931 census to 298 Muslim, in a total of 75 houses.[9]

In the 1945 statistics the population of Khirbat Bayt Lid was 460 Muslims[4] with a total of 5,336 dunams of land, of which 2,969 were owned by Arabs, 2,220 by Jews and 147 was public lands.[3]

Of this, Arabs used 64 dunams for irrigated and plantation land, 2,877 for cereals,[10] while 22 dunams were classified as built-up areas.[11]

Land UsageArabJewishPublic
Citrus and bananas---
Irrigated and plantation647
Cereal2,8772,213-
Urban22-1
Cultivable2,9412,220-
Non-cultivable6-146
Khirbat Bayt Lid (Khirbet Beit Lid) 1939 1:20,000
Khirbat Bayt Lid (Kh. Beit Lid) 1945 1:250,000

1948, aftermath

In early 1948 the villagers grew fearful over news about fighting, and left for Beit Lid, where they had relatives, believing that they would return in some weeks. According to one villager, Husni 'Abd al-Latif 'Atawat; "They left all their belongings in Khirbat Bayt Lid. The Jews occupied it, and they could not return."[12]

The kibbutz Nordia was established on village land in August 1948,[5][6] while Ganot Hadar is situated 500 meter northeast of the village site, but not on village land.[6] Benny Morris writes that HaYogev is close to the Khirbat Bayt Lid site.[13]

References
  1. Morris, 2004, p. xviii, village #189. Also gives cause of depopulation
  2. Palmer, 1881, p. 175
  3. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 75
  4. Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 21
  5. Morris, 2004, p. xxi, settlement #23.
  6. Khalidi, 1992, p. 550.
  7. Conder and Kitchener, 1882, p. 135
  8. Barron, 1923, Table IX, Sub-district of Tulkarem, p. 28
  9. Mills, 1932, p. 53
  10. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 126
  11. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 176
  12. Esber, 2008, pp. 296, 321. Interviewed by the author in Zarqa, Jordan, in 2001
  13. Morris, 2004, p. xxii, settlement #148

Bibliography
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