Al-Midya

Location

Al Midya is located (horizontally) 18.9 km west of Ramallah. It is bordered by Ni'lin to the east and north, the Green Line (the Armistice Line 1949) to the west, and Saffa to the south.

History and archaeology

Iron Age to Byzantine period

Al-Midya is one of several sites identified with ancient Modi'in (also Modi'im and Moditha/Mwdyʽyn/t), hometown of the Hasmonean family. The name is thought to have been preserved in its Arabicised form al-Midya.

The ancient village site is located at Ras al-Midya, S-E of the modern village, where pottery from the Iron Age and later periods has been found. Additional findings include the ruins of structures, watering holes, coins from the Hellenistic and Roman periods, and an underground hiding complex where five coins, including two from the Bar Kokhba revolt (130s CE), were discovered.

According to one theory, Modi'in occupied the site of Khirbet er-Râs, directly to the south-east of the modern village. Other sites in the vicinity were also suggested. Based on the archeological data, as well as the site's location, Raviv suggests that it was a Jewish settlement during the Early Roman period.

Possible family tomb of the Maccabees

Excavations near Midya in the 19th century suggested that graves of the Maccabees were located here. Seven triangular tombs were found, corresponding with the description of the first-century Jewish historian Josephus Flavius, who wrote that the family’s seven pyramid-shaped graves were erected in the same place. In 1870, an ancient structure near the gravesite of Sheikh al-Arabawi/Khirbet Sheikh Gharbawi (Hebrew: Horbat Ha-Gardi), adjacent to al-Midya, was identified as a Hasmonean grave, but this was rejected by another biblical archaeologist, Charles Clermont-Ganneau. Further exploration by the Israel Antiquities Authority in the 21st century suggest the likelihood that Horbat Sheikh Gharbawi (Horbat Ha-Gardi) is either the original family tomb of the Maccabees, or was marking the alleged tomb in the Byzantine period.

Mamluk period

Al-Midya was apparently mentioned during the Mamluk period by the 14th-century Jewish doctor and geographer Ishtori Haparchi.

Ottoman period

16th century

Al-Midya was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with all of Palestine, and in the 1596 tax−records it appeared under the name of Midya as-Sarqiyya as being in the Nahiya of Ramla, part of Gaza Sanjak. It had a population of 25 Muslim households and paid a fixed tax rate of 25% on wheat, barley, summer crops or olives or fruit trees, and a press for olives or grapes; a total of 6,500 akçe.

19th century

In 1870, Victor Guérin visited, and thought that ruins found there were the graves of the Maccabees. However, Clermont-Ganneau made extensive excavations later, and he found Christian crosses in the oldest part of the largest structure. He concluded the ruins were from the 5th century or later, that is, from the Byzantine era.

An official Ottoman village list of about 1870 showed that el-medje had a total of 42 houses and a population of 159, though the population count included men only. It also noted that it was located half an hour east of Jimzu.

In 1882, PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described Midieh as being a village of a "good size", with houses either built of adobe or stone. To the north was a small olive grove, to the south a tank. The most "peculiar feature" they found was named er Ras. It was a high conical knoll, with a maqam on top, and rock-cut tombs on the side.

British Mandate

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Midya had an all-Muslim population of 245, increasing in the 1931 census to 286, still all-Muslim, in 59 houses.

In the 1945 statistics, the population of el Midya was of 320 Muslims, who owned 7,020 dunams of land according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 688 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 2,304 for cereals, while 8 dunams were built-up (urban) land.

File:Shilta 1944.jpg|Al-Midya on 1944 1:20,000 map based on 1919 survey File:Burj 1945.jpg|Al-Midya on 1945 1:250,000 map (upper left quadrant)

Jordanian period

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, al-Midya came under rule.

The Jordanian census of 1961 found 570 inhabitants.

1967-present

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

According to the Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem, Al-Midya's total land area was 6,959 dunams in 1942, but after 1948 most of the village's western land was expropriated, leaving 892 dunams, of which 217 were classified as built-up (urban) areas.

In 1986, when the population amounted to 570 people, largely dependent on agriculture, the villagers were woken at 3:00 a.m. by the arrival of Israeli military vehicles and were informed that a curfew would be in place until 9 pm that day. Throughout the day, roughly 1,000 Israelis, soldiers protecting the operation and workers from the Israeli Lands Administration and Nature Reserve authorities who drove bulldozers to grade a road down a steep hillside to a rough track running below it, and chainsawed an olive grove extending over 1,100 dunams, destroying 3,000 trees. When the devastation was reported, Israel said the razing was to block Al-Midya from encroaching on Israeli state land, claiming that the olive trees were less than five years old, and planted to secure title to the area. Most cut trunks were over half a metre in diameter, suggesting centuries of growth.

After the 1995 accords, 7.4% of village land was classified as Area B, the remainder 92.6% as Area C. Israel has confiscated 186 dunams of land from Al-Midya for the construction of the Israeli settlement of Hashmonaim.

On 3 June 2022, a 17 year-old Palestinian by the name of Odeh Mohammed Odeh was shot dead by IDF personnel in the village.

References

Bibliography

• (p. 341 ff, pic.)
• p. 834-5?
• (pp. 235 239)

References

1. (February 2018). "Preliminary Results of the Population, Housing and Establishments Census, 2017". [[State of Palestine]].
2. [http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/AlMidya.pdf Al Midya Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 4
3. (2015). "Hasmonean Modi'in and Byzantine Moditha: A topographical-historical and archaeological assessment". Palestine Exploration Quarterly.
4. Avi-Yonah, Michael. (1976). "Gazetteer of Roman Palestine". Qedem.
5. Marom, Roy. (2023). "Early-Ottoman Palestinian Toponymy: A Linguistic Analysis of the (Micro-)Toponyms in Haseki Sultan's Endowment Deed (1552)". Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins.
6. [[Yotam Tepper. (1996). "Roman roads in Judaea II: the Jaffa-Jerusalem roads". Tempus Reparatvm.
7. Janai, J.. (1996). "Roman roads in Judaea II: the Jaffa-Jerusalem roads". Tempus Reparatvm.
8. רביב, דביר. (2014). "מחקרי יהודה ושומרון". אוניברסיטת אריאל בשומרון, מו"פ אזורי השומרון ובקעת הירדן.
9. (1983). "Derekh erets". Ḳetsin ḥinukh rashi--"Ba-maḥaneh".
10. Clermont-Ganneau, 1896, p. [https://archive.org/stream/archaeologicalre02cler#page/367/mode/1up 367]
11. [http://www.jposttravel.com/jerusalem_tours/AyalonValley1008.html Ayalon Valley - On the Maccabee trail] {{webarchive. link. (2012-04-25)
12. [https://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/features/the-hasmoneans-were-here-maybe-1.177550 The Hasmoneans were here - maybe]
13. Re'em, 2011, [http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=1712 Horbat Ha-Gardi, Final Report]
14. Finkelstein and Lederman, 1997, pp. 131-134
15. Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 154
16. Guérin, 1875, pp. [https://archive.org/stream/descriptiongogr04gugoog#page/n431/mode/1up 404]- 13, 415-26
17. Clermont-Ganneau, 1896, pp. [https://archive.org/stream/archaeologicalre02cler#page/89/mode/1up 89], [https://archive.org/stream/archaeologicalre02cler#page/219/mode/1up 219], [https://archive.org/stream/archaeologicalre02cler#page/244/mode/1up 244], [https://archive.org/stream/archaeologicalre02cler#page/358/mode/1up 358]-374, (pic) [https://archive.org/stream/archaeologicalre02cler#page/470/mode/1up 470] [https://archive.org/stream/archaeologicalre02cler#page/476/mode/1up 476]
18. Socin, 1879, p. [https://archive.org/stream/zeitschriftdesde01deut#page/157/mode/1up 157] It was noted in the Ramleh district
19. Hartmann, 1883, p. [https://archive.org/stream/bub_gb_BZobAQAAIAAJ#page/n948/mode/1up 140], noted 40 houses
20. Conder and Kitchener, 1882, SWP II, pp. [https://archive.org/stream/surveyofwesternp02conduoft#page/297/mode/1up 297]-298
21. Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Ramleh, p. [https://archive.org/stream/PalestineCensus1922/Palestine%20Census%20%281922%29#page/n23/mode/1up 21]
22. Mills, 1932, p.[https://archive.org/details/CensusOfPalestine1931.PopulationOfVillagesTownsAndAdministrativeAreas 67]
23. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. [http://users.cecs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/yabber/census/VSpages/VS1945_p30.jpg 30]
24. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi (1970), p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20I/al-Ramla/Page-067.jpg 67]
25. ''Village Statistics'' via Hadawi (1970), p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20II/al-Ramla/Page-116.jpg 116].
26. ''Village Statistics'' via Hadawi (1970), p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20III/al-Ramla/Page-166.jpg 166]
27. Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. [http://users.cecs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/yabber/census/JordanCensusPages/JordanCensus1961-p24.pdf 24]
28. link. (2014-05-13 Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem. 14 August 2003.)
29. Kelly and Maghan, 1998, pp. [https://books.google.com/books?id=u1Kn7P_x6_gC&pg=PA94 94]-95
30. [http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/AlMidya.pdf Al Midya Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 15
31. (3 June 2022). "Na een dode journaliste, nog eens vier (!) dode Palestijnen op één dag". krapuul.nl.