Sekaka Diamonds Exploration

Iskaka () is a Palestinian town in the Salfit Governorate of the State of Palestine, in the northern West Bank, 27 kilometers southwest of Nablus. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, it had a population of 1,198 in 2017.

Location

Iskaka is east of Salfit. It is bordered by As Sawiya to the east, Al Lubban ash Sharqiya to the east and south, Salfit to the south and west, and Marda, Yasuf and Jamma'in to the north.

History

Ceramics from the Byzantine era have been found here.

The village is identified with '' Casale Esckas'' mentioned in a Frankish text of the year 1244. Sherds from the Crusader/Ayyubid and the Mamluk eras have been found here.Finkelstein, 1997, p. 611

It is also suggested that this is ''Suchah'', a place mentioned in the Samaritan chronicles.

Ottoman era

Iskaka was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with all of Palestine, and in 1596 it appeared in the tax registers under the name of ''Skaka'', as being in the ''nahiya'' ("subdistrict") of Jabal Qubal, part of the Sanjak of Nablus. It had a population of 37 households; who were all Muslims. They paid a fixed tax-rate of 33.3% on agricultural products, including wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, goats and beehives, in addition to occasional revenues, a press for olive oil or grape syrup; a total of 5,042 akçe.Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 131 Sherds from the early Ottoman era has also been found here.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, the village formed part of the highland region known as Jūrat ‘Amra or Bilād Jammā‘īn. Situated between Dayr Ghassāna in the south and the present Route 5 in the north, and between Majdal Yābā in the west and Jammā‘īn, Mardā and Kifl Ḥāris in the east, this area served, according to historian Roy Marom, "as a buffer zone between the political-economic-social units of the Jerusalem and the Nablus regions. On the political level, it suffered from instability due to the migration of the Bedouin tribes and the constant competition among local clans for the right to collect taxes on behalf of the Ottoman authorities."

In 1870, Victor Guérin noted it as an ancient village, on a hill planted with olive trees.

In 1870/1871 (1288 AH), an Ottoman census listed the village with a population of 27 households in the ''nahiya'' (sub-district) of Jamma'in al-Awwal, subordinate to Nablus.

In 1882, the PEF's ''Survey of Western Palestine'' described ''Iskaka'' as: "a small village with ruined towers and rock-cut tombs, surrounded by olives and standing on high ground. The water supply is from a well."

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, ''Sekaka'' had a population of 127 Muslims,Barron, 1923, Table IX, Sub-district of Nablus, p
25
/ref> increasing in the 1931 census to 186 Muslims in 48 occupied houses.

In the 1945 statistics the population was 260 Muslims while the total land area was 5,311 dunams, according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 1,309 were allocated for plantations and irrigable land, 1,624 for cereals, while 12 dunams were classified as built-up areas.

Jordanian era

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases