Palestinian
Palestinians ( ar, الفلسطينيون, ; he, פָלַסְטִינִים, ) or Palestinian people ( ar, الشعب الفلسطيني, label=none, ), also referred to as Palestinian Arabs ( ar, الفلسطينيين العرب, label=non ...
village in the
Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate
The Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate ( ar, محافظة رام الله والبيرة ') is one of 16 governorates of Palestine. It covers a large part of the central West Bank, on the northern border of the Jerusalem Governorate. Its district ...
, located 21 kilometers northwest of
Ramallah
Ramallah ( , ; ar, رام الله, , God's Height) is a Palestinian city in the central West Bank that serves as the ''de facto'' administrative capital of the State of Palestine. It is situated on the Judaean Mountains, north of Jerusale ...
in the northern
West Bank
The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...
. According to the
Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics
The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS; ar, الجهاز المركزي للإحصاء الفلسطيني) is the official
statistical institution of the State of Palestine. Its main task is to provide credible statistical figures a ...
, the village had a population of 1,476 inhabitants in 2007.
Al-Lubban al-Gharbi has a total land area of 9,694
dunam
A dunam (Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; tr, dönüm; he, דונם), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area equivalent to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amount ...
s, of which 335 are built-up area. Most of the remaining land is either grown with olive and almond orchards or open for continued expansion of the village. However, the
Israeli West Bank barrier
The Israeli West Bank barrier, comprising the West Bank Wall and the West Bank fence, is a separation barrier built by Israel along the Green Line (Israel), Green Line and inside parts of the West Bank. It is a contentious element of the Isr ...
will separate 59% of Lubban al-Gharbi's land from the village's urban area. The village's infrastructure facilities include an elementary school a kindergarten, and two clinics.
Location
Al Lubban al Gharbi is located (horizontally) north-west of
Ramallah
Ramallah ( , ; ar, رام الله, , God's Height) is a Palestinian city in the central West Bank that serves as the ''de facto'' administrative capital of the State of Palestine. It is situated on the Judaean Mountains, north of Jerusale ...
. It is bordered by
Bani Zeid
Bani Zeid ( ar, بني زيد) is a Palestinian town in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the north-central West Bank, located northwest of Ramallah, about 45 kilometers northwest of Jerusalem and about southwest of Salfit. A town of ov ...
and
'Abud
Aboud ( ar, عابود, ''ʿĀbūd'') is a Palestinian village in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate of the State of Palestine, in the central West Bank, northwest of Ramallah and 30 kilometers north of Jerusalem. Nearby towns include al-Lub ...
to the east,
Deir Ballut
Deir Ballut ( ar, دير بلّوط) is a Palestinian town located in the Salfit Governorate in the northern West Bank, south west of Nablus. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, it had a population of 3,195 in 2007.
In 1870 ...
to the north,
Rantis
Rantis ( ar, رنتيس) is a Palestinian town in the West Bank, located in the northwestern Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate, 33 kilometers northwest of Ramallah. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, it had a population of 2 ...
and
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
to the west, and 'Abud to the south.
History
The village is located at an ancient site on the slopes of a hill.Dauphin, 1998, p. 822
Potsherds
This page is a glossary of archaeology, the study of the human past from material remains.
A
B
C
D
E
F
...
from the IA I-II (apparently the 10th and early 9th centuries B.C.E.), have been found, and from the IA II, Persian, Roman,
Byzantine
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
/
Umayyad
The Umayyad Caliphate (661–750 CE; , ; ar, ٱلْخِلَافَة ٱلْأُمَوِيَّة, al-Khilāfah al-ʾUmawīyah) was the second of the four major caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. The caliphate was ruled by the ...
Ayyubid
The Ayyubid dynasty ( ar, الأيوبيون '; ) was the founding dynasty of the medieval Sultanate of Egypt established by Saladin in 1171, following his abolition of the Fatimid Caliphate of Egypt. A Sunni Muslim of Kurdish origin, Saladin ...
,
Mamluk
Mamluk ( ar, مملوك, mamlūk (singular), , ''mamālīk'' (plural), translated as "one who is owned", meaning "slave", also transliterated as ''Mameluke'', ''mamluq'', ''mamluke'', ''mameluk'', ''mameluke'', ''mamaluke'', or ''marmeluke'') i ...
and early Ottoman era.
There are remains of ancient buildings, the stones of which have been reused in some the village's inhabited houses. In the courtyard of the village
mosque
A mosque (; from ar, مَسْجِد, masjid, ; literally "place of ritual prostration"), also called masjid, is a place of prayer for Muslims. Mosques are usually covered buildings, but can be any place where prayers (sujud) are performed, in ...
are the bases of five
columns
A column or pillar in architecture and structural engineering is a structural element that transmits, through compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. In other words, a column is a compression member. ...
that may have formed part of a chapel. Also in the village are
cistern
A cistern (Middle English ', from Latin ', from ', "box", from Greek ', "basket") is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. Cisterns are distinguished from wells by t ...
s carved into the rock, and on the slopes of a neighboring hill to the southwest, there are tombs and grottos carved into the rock. The village has been identified with ''Beit Laban'' in the
Talmud
The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the center ...
, a place known for its wines.
Al-Lubban al-Gharbi has also been identified with the Crusader ''Luban'', or ''Oliban'', mentioned in connection with nearby Casale St. Maria.
Ottoman era
The village was incorporated into the
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...
in 1517 with all of Palestine, and in 1596 it appeared in the tax registers under the name ''Lubban al-Kafr''. It was located in the ''
Nahiya
A nāḥiyah ( ar, , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level division w ...
'' of Jabal Qubal, part of
Nablus Sanjak
The Nablus Sanjak ( ar, سنجق نابلس; tr, Nablus Sancağı) was an administrative area that existed throughout Ottoman rule in the Levant (1517–1917). It was administratively part of the Damascus Eyalet until 1864 when it became part o ...
, with a population of 29
Muslim
Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abraha ...
households. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 33.3% on various agricultural products, such as wheat, barley, summer crops, olives, goats and beehives in addition to "occasional revenues"; a total of 6,954
akçe
The ''akçe'' or ''akça'' (also spelled ''akche'', ''akcheh''; ota, آقچه; ) refers to a silver coin which was the chief monetary unit of the Ottoman Empire. The word itself evolved from the word "silver or silver money", this word is deri ...
.Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 132
In 1838, it was noted as a Muslim village, ''Lubban Rentis'', in ''Jurat Merda'', south of
Nablus
Nablus ( ; ar, نابلس, Nābulus ; he, שכם, Šəḵem, ISO 259-3: ; Samaritan Hebrew: , romanized: ; el, Νεάπολις, Νeápolis) is a Palestinian city in the West Bank, located approximately north of Jerusalem, with a populati ...
.Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, Appendix 2, p. 126 /ref>
French explorer
Victor Guérin
Victor Guérin (15 September 1821 – 21 Septembe 1890) was a French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included Greece, Asia Mino ...
visited the village in 1863, and noted that "The houses appear to be very ancient, and present the particularity that many of them form together a continued whole, as if they were all one house, now divided among separate families. A quantity of ancient materials may be observed in the walls." He further noted that the village had 300 inhabitants.
In 1882 PEF's ''
Survey of Western Palestine
The PEF Survey of Palestine was a series of surveys carried out by the Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) between 1872 and 1877 for the Survey of Western Palestine and in 1880 for the Survey of Eastern Palestine. The survey was carried out after the ...
'' (SWP), the village, (called "Lubban Rentis"), was described a being small, and situated on a knoll beside a Roman road.
British Mandate era
In the
1922 census of Palestine
The 1922 census of Palestine was the first census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine, on 23 October 1922.
The reported population was 757,182, including the military and persons of foreign nationality. The divis ...
conducted by the British Mandate authorities, ''Lubban'' had a population 221 inhabitants, all Muslims,Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Ramleh, p. 22 /ref> increasing in the 1931 census when the village, with the name ''Al-Lubban'' or ''Lubban Rantis'', had 60 occupied houses and a population of 298 Muslims.Mills, 1932, p 21 /ref>
In the 1945 statistics the population of ''El Lubban'' was 340, all Muslims,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p 30 /ref> who owned 9,854
dunam
A dunam (Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; tr, dönüm; he, דונם), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area equivalent to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amount ...
s of land according to an official land and population survey. 1,411 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 1,118 used for cereals, while 6 dunams were built-up (urban) land.
Jordanian era
In the wake of the
1948 Arab–Israeli War
The 1948 (or First) Arab–Israeli War was the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. It formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight on 14 May 1948; the Israeli Declaration of Independence had ...
, and after the
1949 Armistice Agreements
The 1949 Armistice Agreements were signed between Israel and Egypt,Jordanian rule.
The Jordanian census of 1961 found 602 inhabitants in ''Lubban''.
1967-present
Since the
Six-Day War
The Six-Day War (, ; ar, النكسة, , or ) or June War, also known as the 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states (primarily Egypt, Syria, and Jordan) from 5 to 10 Jun ...
in 1967, Al-Lubban al-Gharbi has been under
Israeli occupation
Israeli-occupied territories are the lands that were captured and occupied by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967. While the term is currently applied to the Palestinian territories and the Golan Heights, it has also been used to refer to a ...
.
After the 1995 accords, 2.9% of village land was classified as
Area B
The Palestinian enclaves are areas in the West Bank designated for Palestinians under a variety of U.S. and Israeli-led proposals to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The enclaves are often compared to the nominally self-governing black ...
, he remaining 97.1% as Area C. Israel has confiscated land from Al-Lubban al-Gharbi in order to construct the
Israeli settlement
Israeli settlements, or Israeli colonies, are civilian communities inhabited by Israeli citizens, overwhelmingly of Jewish ethnicity, built on lands occupied by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. The international community considers Israeli se ...
Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem
The Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem (ARIJ; ar, معهد الابحاث التطبيقية - القدس) is a Palestinian NGO founded in 1990 with its main office in Bethlehem in the West Bank. ARIJ is actively working on research proje ...