Nazla (; also spelled al-Nazlah, Nazle, Annazla or en-Nuzleh) is a

Palestinian Palestinians () are an Arab ethnonational group native to the Levantine region of Palestine. *: "Palestine was part of the first wave of conquest following Muhammad's death in 632 CE; Jerusalem fell to the Caliph Umar in 638. The indigenous p ...

town in the

Gaza Strip The Gaza Strip, also known simply as Gaza, is a small territory located on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea; it is the smaller of the two Palestinian territories, the other being the West Bank, that make up the State of Palestine. I ...

, in the North Gaza Governorate of the

State of Palestine Palestine, officially the State of Palestine, is a country in West Asia. Recognized by International recognition of Palestine, 147 of the UN's 193 member states, it encompasses the Israeli-occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and th ...

. It was formerly a municipality but was merged with the nearby city of

Jabalia Jabalia, also spelled Jabalya (), is a city in the Gaza Strip, Palestine, located north of Gaza City, in the North Gaza Governorate of the Gaza Strip. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Jabalia had a population of 172, ...

. Nazla is located a few kilometers north of

Gaza City Gaza City, also called Gaza, is a city in the Gaza Strip, Palestine, and the capital of the Gaza Governorate. Located on the Mediterranean coast, southwest of Jerusalem, it was home to Port of Gaza, Palestine's only port. With a population of ...

History

Nazla has been identified as the site of the

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

-era town of Asalea (Ασαλέα in

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

). Asalea belonged to the city of Gaza during that period.Bitton-Ashkelony and Kofsky, 2004, p
45
/ref> A celebrated

Christian A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a Monotheism, monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the wo ...

figure in Byzantine Gaza was Alaphion of Asalea who was known to be pious and was one of the early missionaries who helped spread Christianity in the area. In the 6th century

Madaba Map The Madaba Map, also known as the Madaba Mosaic Map, is part of a floor mosaic in the early Byzantine church of Saint George in Madaba, Jordan. The mosaic map depicts an area from Lebanon in the north to the Nile Delta in the south, and fro ...

, Asalea is marked by three towers, a gate and a segment of a wall.

Ottoman era

In 1863, the French explorer

Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (; 15 September 1821 – 21 September 1890) was a French people, French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included ...

found the village to have about 150 inhabitants. An Ottoman village list of about 1870 showed that Nazle had 114 houses and a population of 414, though the population count included only men. In 1883, the PEF's '' Survey of Western Palestine'' (SWP) described Nazla as a "small hamlet" and a suburb of Jabalia. To the east of Nazla was a well.

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, Nazla had a population of 694, all Muslim,Barron, 1923, Table V, Sub-district of Gaza, p
8
/ref> increasing in the 1931 census to 944, still all Muslims, in 226 houses.Mills, 1932, p
5
/ref> In the 1945 statistics Nazla had a population of 1,330, all Muslims, with 4,510

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 of land, according to an official land and population survey.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p
46
/ref> Of this, 36 dunams were for citrus and bananas, 547 for plantations and irrigable land, 1,141 used for cereals, while 24 dunams were built-up land.

1948, and after

During

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

ian rule following the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 Arab–Israeli War, also known as the First Arab–Israeli War, followed the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. The civil war becam ...

, Nazla was one of six localities to establish a village council to administer its affairs. Israel occupied the Gaza Strip during the 1967

Six-Day War The Six-Day War, also known as the June War, 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states, primarily United Arab Republic, Egypt, Syria, and Jordan from 5 to 10June ...

. In the 1970s and 1980s, Israel developed building projects in Nazla, offering

Palestinian refugee Palestinian refugees are citizens of Mandatory Palestine, and their descendants, who fled or were expelled from their country, village or house over the course of the 1948 Palestine war and during the 1967 Six-Day War. Most Palestinian refug ...

families subsidized rates to resettle there.United Nations. ''Yearbook of the United Nations 1987''. (1992). p. 340.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

External links

Welcome To Nazla
*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 19
IAA Wikimedia commons
{{North Gaza Governorate North Gaza Governorate Former municipalities Neighborhoods in Palestine