Saffarin

Saffarin (Arabic: سفارين‎) is a Palestinian village in the Tulkarm Governorate in the western West Bank, located 11 kilometers South-east of Tulkarm. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Saffarin had a population of approximately 1,037 inhabitants in mid-year 2006.[2] 9.8% of the population of Saffarin were refugees in 1997.[3] The healthcare facilities for Saffarin are designated as MOH level 2.[4]

Saffarin
Municipality type D (Village council)
Arabic transcription(s)
• Arabic	سفارين
Saffarin Location of Saffarin within Palestine
Coordinates: 32°15′43″N 35°06′39″E
Palestine grid	160/185
State	State of Palestine
Governorate	Tulkarm
Government
• Type	Village council
Population  (2006)
• Total	1,037
Name meaning	Sefarin, from personal name[1]

History

Ceramics from the Byzantine era have been found here.[5]

During the Crusader period, Diya' al-Din (1173–1245) writes that there was a Muslim population in the Saffarin.[6][7]

Ottoman era

Saffarin, like all of Palestine was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517. In the 1596 tax registers, part of the nahiya ("subdistrict") of Jabal Sami, part of the larger Sanjak of Nablus. It had a population of 8 households, all Muslims. The inhabitants 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 and a press for olive oil or grape syrup, and a fixed tax for people of Nablus area; a total of 9,167 akçe. 3/24 of the revenue went to the Waqf Halil ar-Rahman.[8]

In 1870 Victor Guérin noted it as a village of 600 persons.[9]

In 1882 the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described Sefarin as: "a small village on a knoll, upon a ridge, supplied by cisterns, with a few olive trees."[10]

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Sufarin had a population of 458 Muslims,[11] increasing in the 1931 census to 444 Muslims, living in 100 houses.[12]

In the 1945 statistics the population of Saffarin was 530 Muslims,[13] with 9,687 dunams of land according to an official land and population survey.[14] Of this, 1,624 dunams were used plantations and irrigable land, 1,384 for cereals,[15] while 13 dunams were built-up (urban) land.[16]

Jordanian era

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Saffarin came under Jordanian rule.

In 1961, the population was 616.[17]

Post 1967

Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Saffarin has been under Israeli occupation.

References

1. Palmer, 1881, p. 190
2. Projected Mid -Year Population for Tulkarm Governorate by Locality 2004- 2006 Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.
3. Palestinian Population by Locality and Refugee Status Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics
4. Health care Facilities Tulkarm Governorate
5. Dauphin, 1998, p. 768
6. Talmon-Heller, 1994, p. 109
7. Talmon-Heller, 2002, p. 134
8. Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 126
9. Guérin, 1875, p. 212
10. Conder and Kitchener, 1882, SWP II, p. 161
11. Barron, 1923, Table XI, Sub-district of Tulkarm, p. 27
12. Mills, 1932, p. 57
13. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 21
14. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 76
15. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 127
16. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 177
17. Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. 27

Bibliography

• Barron, J.B., ed. (1923). Palestine: Report and General Abstracts of the Census of 1922. Government of Palestine.
• Conder, C.R.; Kitchener, H.H. (1882). The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrography, and Archaeology. 2. London: Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
• Dauphin, Claudine (1998). La Palestine byzantine, Peuplement et Populations. BAR International Series 726 (in French). III : Catalogue. Oxford: Archeopress. ISBN 0-860549-05-4.
• Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics (1964). First Census of Population and Housing. Volume I: Final Tables; General Characteristics of the Population (PDF).
• Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics (1945). Village Statistics, April, 1945.
• Guérin, V. (1875). Description Géographique Historique et Archéologique de la Palestine (in French). 2: Samarie, pt. 2. Paris: L'Imprimerie Nationale.
• Hadawi, S. (1970). Village Statistics of 1945: A Classification of Land and Area ownership in Palestine. Palestine Liberation Organization Research Center.
• Hütteroth, Wolf-Dieter; Abdulfattah, Kamal (1977). Historical Geography of Palestine, Transjordan and Southern Syria in the Late 16th Century. Erlanger Geographische Arbeiten, Sonderband 5. Erlangen, Germany: Vorstand der Fränkischen Geographischen Gesellschaft. ISBN 3-920405-41-2.
• Mills, E., ed. (1932). Census of Palestine 1931. Population of Villages, Towns and Administrative Areas. Jerusalem: Government of Palestine.
• Palmer, E.H. (1881). The Survey of Western Palestine: Arabic and English Name Lists Collected During the Survey by Lieutenants Conder and Kitchener, R. E. Transliterated and Explained by E.H. Palmer. Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
• Talmon-Heller, Daniella (1994). "Popular Hanbalite Islam in 12th-13th Century Jabal Nablus and Jabal Qasyūn". Studia Islamica. 79: 103–120.
• Talmon-Heller, Daniella (2002). Riley-Smith, J. (ed.). The Cited Tales of the Wondrous Doings of the Shaykhs of the Holy Land. 1. published in Crusades. Aldershot, Hampshire: Published by Ashgate for the Society for the Study of the Crusades and the Latin East. pp. 111–154. ISBN 0754609189.

External links

• Welcome To Saffarin
• Survey of Western Palestine, Map 11: IAA, Wikimedia commons