Shoval () is a

kibbutz A kibbutz ( / , ; : kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1910, was Degania Alef, Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economi ...

in southern

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 in the northern

Negev The Negev ( ; ) or 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 southern end is the Gulf of Aqaba and the resort town, resort city ...

desert near the

Bedouin The Bedouin, Beduin, or Bedu ( ; , singular ) are pastorally nomadic Arab tribes who have historically inhabited the desert regions in the Arabian Peninsula, North Africa, the Levant, and Mesopotamia (Iraq). The Bedouin originated in the Sy ...

city of

Rahat Rahat (, ) is an Arab Bedouin city in the Southern District (Israel), Southern District of Israel. In , it had a population of . As such, it is the largest Bedouin city in Israel, and the only one to have city council (Israel), city status. Ra ...

, it falls under the jurisdiction of

Bnei Shimon Regional Council The Bnei Shimon Regional Council (, ''Mo'atza Azorit Bnei Shim'on'', ''lit.'' Regional Council 'Sons of Shimon'), is a regional council in the northern Negev in the south of Israel. Most of its territory lies north of Beersheba and the rest bounds ...

. In it had a population of .

Etymology

The kibbutz founders wanted to name it "

Eilat Eilat ( , ; ; ) is Israel's southernmost city, with a population of , a busy port of Eilat, port and popular resort at the northern tip of the Red Sea, on what is known in Israel as the Gulf of Eilat and in Jordan as the Gulf of Aqaba. The c ...

" as they wanted to settle near the

Red Sea The Red Sea is a sea inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. Its connection to the ocean is in the south, through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait and the Gulf of Aden. To its north lie the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and th ...

, however, the naming committee chose the name Shoval.
The origin of the name is from two passages in the

Books of Chronicles The Book of Chronicles ( , "words of the days") is a book in the Hebrew Bible, found as two books (1–2 Chronicles) in the Christian Old Testament. Chronicles is the final book of the Hebrew Bible, concluding the third section of the Jewish Ta ...

:
:''″The sons of Se'ir: Lotan, Shoval, Tziv'on, 'Anah, Dishon, Etzer and Dishan.″''
1 Chronicles 1:38
:''″The descendants of Y'hudah: Peretz, Hetzron, Karmi, Hur and Shoval.″''

History

The kibbutz was founded on 6 October 1946 as part of the 11 points operation by a gar'in whose members were of

Hashomer Hatzair Hashomer Hatzair (, , 'The Young Guard') is a Labor Zionism, Labor Zionist, secular Jewish youth movement founded in 1913 in the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, Austria-Hungary. It was also the name of the Hashomer Hatzair Workers Party, the ...

and

immigrants Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not usual residents or where they do not possess nationality in order to settle as permanent residents. Commuters, tourists, and other short- ...

who had survived the Patria disaster planned by zionists against the freedom of movement for people. File:שובל- שובל בראשיתה-JNF000660.jpeg, Shoval 1946 File:Shoval v.jpg,

Yiftach Brigade The 11th Brigade (also known as the Yiftach Brigade) is a reserves unit in the Israel Defense Forces, composed mainly of fighters that completed their compulsory service in the Egoz Unit, Unit 621 – 'Egoz'. History In the 1948 Arab–Israeli ...

camp at Shoval. 1948

Economy

Shoval has two major sources of income;

agriculture Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created ...

and

plastics Plastics are a wide range of synthetic or semisynthetic materials composed primarily of polymers. Their defining characteristic, plasticity, allows them to be molded, extruded, or pressed into a diverse range of solid forms. This adaptab ...

manufacturing. Its

dairy farm Dairy farming is a class of agriculture for the long-term production of milk, which is processed (either on the farm or at a dairy plant, either of which may be called a dairy) for the eventual sale of a dairy product. Dairy farming has a h ...

is one of the largest in the area and is managed as a partnership with kibbutz Na'an. It also has a vast area of

arable land Arable land (from the , "able to be ploughed") is any land capable of being ploughed and used to grow crops.''Oxford English Dictionary'', "arable, ''adj''. and ''n.''" Oxford University Press (Oxford), 2013. Alternatively, for the purposes of a ...

where

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

barley Barley (), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains; it was domesticated in the Fertile Crescent around 9000 BC, giving it nonshattering spikele ...

and

potatoes The potato () is a starchy tuberous vegetable native to the Americas that is consumed as a staple food in many parts of the world. Potatoes are underground stem tubers of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'', a perennial in the nightshade famil ...

are grown. In addition there are several

chicken coop Poultry farming is the form of animal husbandry which raises poultry, domesticated birds such as chickens, Domestic duck, ducks, turkey (domesticated), turkeys and domesticated goose, geese to produce chicken meat, meat or Egg as food, eggs for ...

s that are mainly used to raise chickens for

meat Meat is animal Tissue (biology), tissue, often muscle, that is eaten as food. Humans have hunted and farmed other animals for meat since prehistory. The Neolithic Revolution allowed the domestication of vertebrates, including chickens, sheep, ...

. The kibbutz also operates a plastic seals manufacturing plant named Seal Jet.

Arava Power Company Arava Power Company (APC) Arava Power is a utility-scale renewables Developer-IPP that pioneered Israeli utility-scale PV market. The company founded in 2006 on Ketura in the Arava Valley. On June 5, 2011, APC inaugurated Israel's first medium- ...

operates a

solar farm A photovoltaic power station, also known as a solar park, solar farm, or solar power plant, is a large-scale grid-connected photovoltaic power system (PV system) designed for the supply of merchant power. They are different from most building ...

on Shoval's land. This 24 acre farm can produce 6.4 MW using 22100 JA Solar panels.

Education

In 1963, a regional high school was built named Mevo'ot HaNegev in the kibbutz. The school serves pupils of the ages of 12–18 from the kibbutz and the surrounding settlements. The education system in the kibbutz also includes kindergartens and the young students learn in the Nitzanei HaNegev

elementary school A primary school (in Ireland, India, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, South Africa, and Singapore), elementary school, or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary ...

in Beit Kama. The kibbutz also hosts an ulpan for teaching the

Hebrew language Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and remained in regular use as a first language unti ...

and its students study and work in the kibbutz.

Notable people

Yehuda Bauer Yehuda Bauer (; 6 April 1926 – 18 October 2024) was a Czech-born Israeli historian and scholar of the The Holocaust, Holocaust. He was a professor of Holocaust studies at the Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry at the Hebrew Univer ...

, historian * Itzhak Bentov, engineer and scientist * Elazar Granot, former member of the

Knesset The Knesset ( , ) is the Unicameralism, unicameral legislature of Israel. The Knesset passes all laws, elects the President of Israel, president and Prime Minister of Israel, prime minister, approves the Cabinet of Israel, cabinet, and supe ...

* Yehudit Kafri, poet and author * Danny Robas, musician

References

{{Authority control Kibbutzim Kibbutz Movement Populated places established in 1946 Populated places in Southern District (Israel) 1946 establishments in Mandatory Palestine