Zibqine is a town in South

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...

, from the capital,

Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint o ...

, 4 km from the border with

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 ...

and above sea level. It was heavily damaged in the

2006 Lebanon-Israel war The 2006 Lebanon War, also called the 2006 Israel–Hezbollah War and known in Lebanon as the July War ( ar, حرب تموز, ''Ḥarb Tammūz'') and in Israel as the Second Lebanon War ( he, מלחמת לבנון השנייה, ''Milhemet Leva ...

and underwent a heavy process of rebuilding.

Name

According to E. H. Palmer, the name probably comes from the Arabic word for "to bind", or "confine".

History

In 1596, it was named as a village, ''Zibqin,'' in the Ottoman ''

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 ...

'' (subdistrict) of

Tibnin Tebnine ( ar, تبنين ''Tibnīn'', also Romanized ''Tibnine'') is a Lebanese town spread across several hills (ranging in altitude from 700m to 800m (2,275 ft to 2,600 ft) above sea level) located about east of Tyre (Lebanon), i ...

under the ''

liwa' Sanjaks (liwāʾ) (plural form: alwiyāʾ) * Armenian: նահանգ (''nahang''; meaning "province") * Bulgarian: окръг (''okrǔg''; meaning "county", "province", or "region") * el, Διοίκησις (''dioikēsis'', meaning "province" ...

'' (district) of

Safad Safed (known in Hebrew as Tzfat; Sephardic Hebrew & Modern Hebrew: צְפַת ''Tsfat'', Ashkenazi Hebrew: ''Tzfas'', Biblical Hebrew: ''Ṣǝp̄aṯ''; ar, صفد, ''Ṣafad''), is a city in the Northern District of Israel. Located at an eleva ...

, with a population of 12 households and 12 bachelor, all Muslim. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 25% on agricultural products, such as

wheat Wheat is a grass widely cultivated for its seed, a cereal grain that is a worldwide staple food. The many species of wheat together make up the genus ''Triticum'' ; the most widely grown is common wheat (''T. aestivum''). The archaeologi ...

barley Barley (''Hordeum vulgare''), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains, particularly in Eurasia as early as 10,000 years ago. Globally 70% of barley p ...

, olive trees, goats and beehives, in addition to "occasional revenues" and winter pastures; a total of 3,172 akçe.Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 182 In 1875,

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 Min ...

found the village to contain eighty

Metawileh Lebanese Shia Muslims ( ar, المسلمون الشيعة اللبنانيين), historically known as ''matāwila'' ( ar, متاولة, plural of ''mutawālin'' ebanese pronounced as ''metouali'' refers to Lebanese people who are adherents ...

. He further "observed a great pool, constructed with regularly cut stones, and several broken columns. On the chapter of one he saw a mosaic representing a cross ''fleuronnée'', which proves that it came from a

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * C ...

." In 1881, the PEF's ''Survey of Western Palestine'' (SWP) described it: "Small ruined village on a hill, surrounded by brushwood; contains about thirty Moslems . and has olives and arable land to the south. The water is supplied by cisterns." During the

, on 13 July, 12 civilians were killed by

i missiles, fired on the house of the late

Mukhtar A mukhtar ( ar, مختار, mukhtār, chosen one; el, μουχτάρης) is a village chief in the Levant: "an old institution that goes back to the time of the Ottoman rule". According to Amir S. Cheshin, Bill Hutman and Avi Melamed, the muk ...

. All the victims belonged to the Bzeih family, and they included 6 women and 5 children, aged between 11 and 78 years of age. There was no Hezbollah activity in the vicinity at the time of the attack. The

IDF IDF or idf may refer to: Defence forces * Irish Defence Forces * Israel Defense Forces *Iceland Defense Force, of the US Armed Forces, 1951-2006 * Indian Defence Force, a part-time force, 1917 Organizations * Israeli Diving Federation * Interac ...

gave no explanations as to why the house had been attacked.HRW, 2007, pp
87
88

References

Bibliography

* * * * * *

External links

*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 3
IAAWikimedia commons
Localiban *http://zebqine.com {{Coord, 33, 10, N, 35, 16, E, display=title, region:LB_type:city_source:GNS-enwiki Populated places in the Israeli security zone 1985–2000 Populated places in Tyre District Shia Muslim communities in Lebanon