The Besor ( he, נחל הבשור, ''Nahal HaBesor'') is a

wadi Wadi ( ar, وَادِي, wādī), alternatively ''wād'' ( ar, وَاد), North African Arabic Oued, is the Arabic term traditionally referring to a valley. In some instances, it may refer to a wet (ephemeral) riverbed that contains water ...

in southern

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 ...

. The stream begins at Mount Boker (near

Sde Boker Sde Boker ( he, שְׂדֵה בּוֹקֵר, lit. ''Herding Field'') is a kibbutz in the Negev desert of southern Israel. Best known as the retirement home of Israel's first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, it falls under the jurisdiction of Ram ...

), and spills into the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...

near

Al-Zahra Al-Zahra ( ar, الزهراء) is a Palestinian municipality in the Gaza Governorate, south of Gaza, in the central Gaza Strip. It's the home of the University of Palestine, and Ummah Open University. In 2009, it had a population of 3,085. Ther ...

in the

Gaza Strip The Gaza Strip (;The New Oxford Dictionary of English (1998) – p.761 "Gaza Strip /'gɑːzə/ a strip of territory under the control of the Palestinian National Authority and Hamas, on the SE Mediterranean coast including the town of Gaza.. ...

, where it is called Wadi Gaza ( ar, وادي غزة, Wadi Ghazzeh), also spelled Wadi Ghazza or Wadi 'Azza. Further upstream it is marked as Wadi esh-Shallaleh on the 1878 Survey of Western Palestine map. There are several important archaeological sites located in this area. The stream is the largest in the northern Negev, and together with its largest tributaries, the Nahal Gerar, and the Beersheba stream, reaches as far east into the desert as Sde Boker,

Yeruham Yeruham ( he, יְרוֹחַם, ''Yeroham'') is a town ( local council) in the Southern District of Israel, in the Negev desert. It covers 38,584 dunams (~38.6 km²), and had a population of in . It is named after the Biblical Jeroham. Un ...

, Dimona and Arad/ Tel Arad. The Gaza section of the

Coastal Aquifer The water resources of Palestine are fully controlled by Israel and the division of groundwater is subject to provisions in the Oslo II Accord. Generally, the water quality is considerably worse in the Gaza strip when compared to the West ...

is the only significant source of water in the Gaza Strip. The Wadi Gaza runs through a wetland, the Gaza Valley, and as of 2012 it is used as a wastewater dump.

History

In the

Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...

Besor was a ravine or brook in the extreme south-west of Judah, where 200 of

David David (; , "beloved one") (traditional spelling), , ''Dāwūd''; grc-koi, Δαυΐδ, Dauíd; la, Davidus, David; gez , ዳዊት, ''Dawit''; xcl, Դաւիթ, ''Dawitʿ''; cu, Давíдъ, ''Davidŭ''; possibly meaning "beloved one". w ...

's men stayed behind because they were faint, while the other 400 pursued the Amalekites (, ). Between 1951 and 1954, the Yeruham Dam was built on one of the tributaries of the HaBesor Stream.

Geography

The source of Besor River lies at Mount Boker, near

and the educational center Midreshet Ben-Gurion. From there it flows northwest towards the town of Ashalim, where it meets Nahal Be'er Hayil. From there it flows north towards the ancient town of Haluza ( Al-Khalasa). Then it continues northwest until it meets Beersheba River a little to the east from the town of Tze'elim. Near the village of Re'im, Nahal Besor meets the Nahal Gerar river, which is its biggest tributary. One of the tributaries of Besor River reaches kibbutz Urim. Tributaries from south to north: HaRo'e Stream, Boker Stream, Mesora Stream, Zalzal Stream, Revivim Stream, Atadim Stream, Beersheba Stream, Assaf Stream, Amar Stream, Sahaf Stream and Wadi Abu Katrun. Finally, Bezor Stream flows across the Israeli border with the

, and into the Mediterranean sea.

Wadi Gaza Nature Reserve

The Wadi Gaza Nature Reserve was declared a

nature reserve A nature reserve (also known as a wildlife refuge, wildlife sanctuary, biosphere reserve or bioreserve, natural or nature preserve, or nature conservation area) is a protected area of importance for flora, fauna, or features of geological o ...

by the Environmental Quality Authority of

Palestinian Authority The Palestinian National Authority (PA or PNA; ar, السلطة الوطنية الفلسطينية '), commonly known as the Palestinian Authority and officially the State of Palestine,

in June 2000. It is confined to the course of the Wadi and its floodplian and banks within the Palestinian jurisdiction.

Archaeology

PikiWiki Israel 19697 Geography of Israel

Nahal Besor has shown evidence of

epipaleolithic In archaeology, the Epipalaeolithic or Epipaleolithic (sometimes Epi-paleolithic etc.) is a period occurring between the Upper Paleolithic and Neolithic during the Stone Age. Mesolithic also falls between these two periods, and the two are somet ...

sites above

paleolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic (), also called the Old Stone Age (from Greek: παλαιός '' palaios'', "old" and λίθος ''lithos'', "stone"), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone too ...

sediments. Several archaeological sites were excavated by Eann Macdonald in 1929 to 1930 along the Wadi Ghazzeh in lower Nahal Besor that show signs of specialist flint production. Some of these sites were re-excavated in 1969 by Jean Perrot.* Finds of pottery and flints were studied by Ann Roshwalb who found evidence of both

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...

ian and late

Neolithic The Neolithic period, or New Stone Age, is an Old World archaeological period and the final division of the Stone Age. It saw the Neolithic Revolution, a wide-ranging set of developments that appear to have arisen independently in several pa ...

occupations. There are several important

Bronze Age The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...

archaeological sites in this area. Among them are :fr:Tel Gamma, and Tell el-Farah (South). A smaller site of Qubur al-Walaydah is located between them.

Tell Jemmeh/Tel Gamma

Tell Jemmeh (Arabic) or Tel Gamma (תל גמה; Hebrew) is located on the west side of Nahal Besor, near Re'im. The huge site (close to 50,000 m2 in size) shows a continuous occupation from the Late Bronze Age ("Canaanite period") until the Byzantine era. The first archaeological excavations mistakenly identified it as biblical

Gerar Gerar ( ''Gərār'', "lodging-place") was a Philistine town and district in what is today south central Israel, mentioned in the Book of Genesis and in the Second Book of Chronicles of the Hebrew Bible. Identification According to the Internati ...

. The site was continuously settled only between the Middle Bronze IIB (c. 1700–1550 BC) and the Persian period (c. 530–330 BC). During the Iron I (c. 1200–1000 BC) the site was part of the

Philistine The Philistines ( he, פְּלִשְׁתִּים, Pəlīštīm; Koine Greek ( LXX): Φυλιστιείμ, romanized: ''Phulistieím'') were an ancient people who lived on the south coast of Canaan from the 12th century BC until 604 BC, when ...

territory. Tel Gamma has been identified by researchers as the Canaanite city of Yurzah (ירזה), that was cited on the lists of Pharaoh

Thutmose III Thutmose III (variously also spelt Tuthmosis or Thothmes), sometimes called Thutmose the Great, was the sixth pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty. Officially, Thutmose III ruled Egypt for almost 54 years and his reign is usually dated from 2 ...

(15th century BC), as well as in

Amarna letters The Amarna letters (; sometimes referred to as the Amarna correspondence or Amarna tablets, and cited with the abbreviation EA, for "El Amarna") are an archive, written on clay tablets, primarily consisting of diplomatic correspondence between ...

. Yurzah is again mentioned in an inscription of the Assyrian king

Esarhaddon Esarhaddon, also spelled Essarhaddon, Assarhaddon and Ashurhaddon ( Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , also , meaning " Ashur has given me a brother"; Biblical Hebrew: ''ʾĒsar-Ḥaddōn'') was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from the death of hi ...

(seventh century) as one of the cities that rose up against the Assyrian domination and whose queen was deported to

Nineveh Nineveh (; akk, ; Biblical Hebrew: '; ar, نَيْنَوَىٰ '; syr, ܢܝܼܢܘܹܐ, Nīnwē) was an ancient Assyrian city of Upper Mesopotamia, located in the modern-day city of Mosul in northern Iraq. It is located on the eastern ba ...

. The site also features Assyrian style buildings, ancient iron furnaces, a Persian period grain storage shed, and several tombs from the Byzantine period.

Tell el-Farah (South)

Tell el-Farah (South), sometimes referred to as Tell Fara, is on the west side of Nahal Besor, near Ein HaBesor. It was first excavated by

Flinders Petrie Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie ( – ), commonly known as simply Flinders Petrie, was a British Egyptologist and a pioneer of systematic methodology in archaeology and the preservation of artefacts. He held the first chair of Egyp ...

in 1928 to 1929 and again recently excavated in 1999 and 2000 under direction of Gunnar Lehmann of Ben-Gurion University of the

Negev The Negev or Negeb (; he, הַנֶּגֶב, hanNegév; ar, ٱلنَّقَب, an-Naqab) is a desert and semidesert region of southern Israel. The region's largest city and administrative capital is Beersheba (pop. ), in the north. At its sout ...

and Tammi J. Schneider of

Claremont Graduate University The Claremont Graduate University (CGU) is a private, all-graduate research university in Claremont, California. Founded in 1925, CGU is a member of the Claremont Colleges which includes five undergraduate ( Pomona College, Claremont McKenna ...

. As of 2013, it is under excavation again. Petrie first identified the site as Beth-Pelet () and published the excavation reports under the names Beth-Pelet I - II. It has been linked by William Foxwell Albright to the ancient settlement of Sharuhen, although

Tell el-Ajjul Tall al-Ajjul or Tell el-'Ajul is an archaeological mound or '' tell'' in the Gaza Strip. The fortified city excavated at the site dates as far back as ca. 2000-1800 BCE and was inhabited during the Bronze Age. It is located at the mouth of Wad ...

near the estuary of Nahal Besor, and Tel Haror to the north, are also being suggested. The tel is in size high and was an important fortified site in the Middle

. The earliest major settlement that has been uncovered to date is from the Middle Bronze Age II, lasting from ca. 1650 to 1550 BCE. It was controlled by

in the Late Bronze Age and inhabited by

Philistines The Philistines ( he, פְּלִשְׁתִּים, Pəlīštīm; Koine Greek ( LXX): Φυλιστιείμ, romanized: ''Phulistieím'') were an ancient people who lived on the south coast of Canaan from the 12th century BC until 604 BC, whe ...

into the

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly ...

. A

hematite Hematite (), also spelled as haematite, is a common iron oxide compound with the formula, Fe2O3 and is widely found in rocks and soils. Hematite crystals belong to the rhombohedral lattice system which is designated the alpha polymorph of . ...

seal in the shape of the head of a

bull A bull is an intact (i.e., not castrated) adult male of the species ''Bos taurus'' (cattle). More muscular and aggressive than the females of the same species (i.e., cows), bulls have long been an important symbol in many religions, includin ...

was found and identified by

to originate from

Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...

, it showed a bull attacking a

lion The lion (''Panthera leo'') is a large cat of the genus '' Panthera'' native to Africa and India. It has a muscular, broad-chested body; short, rounded head; round ears; and a hairy tuft at the end of its tail. It is sexually dimorphic; adu ...

beneath a

scorpion Scorpions are predatory arachnids of the order Scorpiones. They have eight legs, and are easily recognized by a pair of grasping pincers and a narrow, segmented tail, often carried in a characteristic forward curve over the back and always en ...

. Nahal Besor has been suggested to be the

Brook of Egypt The Brook of Egypt is the name used in some English translations of the Bible for the Hebrew ''Naḥal Mizraim'' ("River of Egypt"), used for the river defining the westernmost border of the Land of Israel. A number of scholars in the past have ...

.Nadav Na'aman
The Brook of Egypt and Assyrian Policy on the Egyptian Border.
Tel Aviv 6 (1979), pp. 68-90 Various

ostracon An ostracon (Greek: ''ostrakon'', plural ''ostraka'') is a piece of pottery, usually broken off from a vase or other earthenware vessel. In an archaeological or epigraphical context, ''ostraca'' refer to sherds or even small pieces of ston ...

s have been recovered from around the site with

Aramaic The Aramaic languages, short Aramaic ( syc, ܐܪܡܝܐ, Arāmāyā; oar, 𐤀𐤓𐤌𐤉𐤀; arc, 𐡀𐡓𐡌𐡉𐡀; tmr, אֲרָמִית), are a language family containing many varieties (languages and dialects) that originated i ...

inscriptions analysed and translated by Joseph Naveh.

Flooding

HaBesor Stream is subject to annual flooding following heavy rains. Some Palestinians have claimed that Israel is at fault for the flooding, due to the opening of one or more dams opened upstream, and in 2015, AFP posted a video showing flooding, entitled "Gaza village floods after Israel opens dam gates." Several days later, AFP published a story acknowledging that "no such dam exists in Israel that could control the flow of water into Gaza, according to a team of AFP reporters on the ground as well as interviews with Israeli and international experts."

References

External links

Official website of the Tell el-Farah excavations, Nahal Besor. Claremont Graduate University.
{{Coord, 31, 17, 13.28, N, 34, 29, 7.12, E, display=title Rivers of Israel Geography of the Gaza Strip Landforms of Southern District (Israel) Rivers of the Gaza Strip Hebrew Bible rivers Negev Hebrew Bible valleys