PLace

Hadatha

Place
Hadatha — حَدَثا
District
Galilee
Subdistrict
Tiberias
Average Elevation
225 m
Distance from Tiberias
12.5 km
Population
Year Arab Total
1931 368 368
1944/45 520 520
Land Ownership (1944/45) in dunums
Year Arab Public Total
1944/45 8621 1689 10310
Land Use (1944/45) in dunums
Use Arab Public Total
Non-Cultivable & Built-up (Total)
Use Arab Public Total
Built-up 38 38
Non-Cultivable 5 1689 1694
43 1689 1732 (17%)
Cultivable (Total)
Use Arab Total
Plantation and Irrigable 199 199
Cereal 8379 8379
8578 8578 (83%)
Number of Houses (1931)
75

The village, located between two small wadis, was to the east and west of a gently sloping, rocky hill. It was surrounded by a basin fed by numerous wadis that carried runoff down from the surrounding heights and merged to form Wadi al-Bira, a tributary of the Jordan. A spring to the east of the site provided the residents with fresh water. Hadatha was linked by a secondary road to the village of Kafr Kama, itself on a highway leading to Samakh on the southern tip of Lake Tiberias. In 1596, Hadatha was a village in the nahiya of Tiberias (liwa' of Safad) with a population of 121. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including wheat and barley, as well as on other types of property, such as goats and beehives.

In the late nineteenth century, Hadatha was a village built of stone and situated on a hilltop. The 150 residents of the village cultivated grapes, figs, and olives. During the British Mandate, the village had a triangular layout, and its houses were spread northwest along the road to Kafr Kama. The people of Hadatha were Sunni Muslims, except for one Christian and one Druze. An elementary school was established in 1897, during the Ottoman period, but it was closed during the British Mandate. Agriculture was based on olives and vegetables. Olive trees were planted mainly in the highlands in the north and east, while vegetables were grown on the lands lying to the east, west, and south. In 1944/45 a total of 8,379 dunums was allocated to cereals; 199 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards. Hadatha was an archaeological site that contained a vaulted structure built over a spring and the remains of a press.

There is some inconsistency in the Israeli accounts of the capture of this village. It was one of a cluster of four villages, including Sirin (in Baysan sub-disctrict), 'Awlam, and Ma'dhar (both in Tiberias sub-disctrict), which an Israeli intelligence report claims were evacuated on 6 April 1948, on orders from the Arab Higher Committee. However, the History of the Haganah states that the same four villages were occupied over a month later, on 12 May, by units of the Golani Brigade, adding that 'the inhabitants fled in fear of the Jews.' This implies that the evacuation was a result of the military operation; the account goes on to say that with this attack, 'the lower Galilee was empty of Arabs.'

There are no Israeli settlements on village land. Zionists established the settlement of Kefar Qish (192230) in 1946 on lands belonging to the nearby village of Ma'dhar.

Stone rubble provides the only indication of the village's location. The fenced-in site is used as a cow pasture, and mulberry and fig trees and cactuses grow on it. The surrounding lands are used by the residents of Kefar Qish and are planted in vegetables and almond trees. Parts of the lower wadis are also fenced in.