Mazkeret Batya () (lit. "Batya Memorial") is a local council in central

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

located southeast of

Rehovot Rehovot (, / ) is a city in the Central District (Israel), Central District of Israel, about south of Tel Aviv. In it had a population of . Etymology Israel Belkind, founder of the Bilu (movement), Bilu movement, proposed the name "Rehovot ...

and from

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

. Mazkeret Batya spans an area of 7,440

dunam A dunam ( Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; ; ; ), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area analogous in role (but not equal) to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amo ...

s (7 km²). In it had a population of . The mayor of Mazkeret Batya is Gaby Gaon.

History

Mazkeret Batya, initially Ekron, was established on November 7, 1883 by 11 ultra-Orthodox Jewish farmers from Russia, one of them Yaakov Laskovsky. It was the first agricultural settlement of the Hovevei Zion movement. The land was purchased by Baron Rothschild to promote Jewish agriculture in Israel. Rabbi Shmuel Mohilever was instrumental in mobilizing funding. Mohilever's remains were later reinterred in the Mazkeret Batya cemetery. In 1887 the name was changed to Mazkeret Batya, in memory of Betty Solomon de Rothschild, mother of Baron Edmond James de Rothschild. The history of the founding is described in the book "Rebels in the Holy Land", by the historian Sam Finkle where he writes about the community's struggle to uphold the laws of the sabbatical year despite fierce opposition. The economy of the village was originally based on dry farming, which continued even after the Mekorot Company constructed a pipeline to bring water from

. In 1947, Mazkeret Batya was home to 475 people. According to a

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

conducted in 1922 by the British Mandate authorities, Mazkeret Batya (then Ekron) had a population 368 Jews. During the Mandate era, a Jewish police station was established in Mazkeret Batya to safeguard the local roads. In the

War of Independence Wars of national liberation, also called wars of independence or wars of liberation, are conflicts fought by nations to gain independence. The term is used in conjunction with wars against foreign powers (or at least those perceived as foreign) ...

, convoys to besieged Jerusalem left from Mazkeret Batya. A field hospital operated there to care for

Haganah Haganah ( , ) was the main Zionist political violence, Zionist paramilitary organization that operated for the Yishuv in the Mandatory Palestine, British Mandate for Palestine. It was founded in 1920 to defend the Yishuv's presence in the reg ...

fighters wounded at Latrun.Society for Preservation of Israel Heritage Sites
According to one source, at the end of the British Mandate for Palestine, the British tried to hand the nearby Aqir airfield and camp to the Palestinian Arabs, apparently without success. Due to its proximity to

, Mazkeret Batya has experienced a growth spurt, becoming a mixed community of religious and secular Jews. Historic landmarks include Beit Ha'Itut (Signal House), the Great Synagogue, Beit Meshek HaBaron ("The Baron's Farmhouse", now housing a cultural center), the saqiya-type water-rising system with its wooden wheels, well and pool, and an old farmyard.

Notable People

Shira Elinav, footballer

Twin towns — sister cities

Mazkeret Batya is twinned with: * Celle, Germany *

Calgary, Alberta Calgary () is a major city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Alberta. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a Metropolitan area, metropolitan population of 1,481,806 making it the List of ...

, CanadaHarry Sanders, "'Shalom,' from Israel," Calgary Sunday Sun 25 Jan. 1998: S7 *

Meudon Meudon () is a French Communes of France, commune located in the Hauts-de-Seine Departments of France, department in the Île-de-France Regions of France, region, on the left bank of the Seine. It is located from the Kilometre Zero, center of P ...

, France * Memphis, United States

References

External links

The "Gesher" community of Mazkeret Batya Kehila Datit of Mazkeret Batya
{{Authority control Populated places established in 1883 Jewish villages in the Ottoman Empire Jewish villages in Mandatory Palestine Local councils in Central District (Israel) 1883 establishments in the Ottoman Empire