Azor

Etymology

The earliest occurrence of the name is Babylonian A-zu-ru (in a Neo-Assyrian text from 701 B.C.E.) which is compatible with the Septuagint form Άζωρ (Joshua 19:45). According to scholars, the name may derive from Semitic root ’-Z-R “to gird, encompass, equip”, but "this derivation is highly hypothetical as this root is so far not productive in the toponymy."

The council of the new village named it Mishmar HaShiv'a ('Guardian of the Seven') in honour of seven Israelis soldiers killed near there in 1948, but the government committee in charge of assigning names forced them to change it to Azor on the grounds that preserving Biblical names was more important. However, another new village nearby was later named Mishmar HaShiv'a.

History

The tel of the ancient city is situated in the northern part of modern Azor.

the 16th century, Haseki sultan endowed the lands of Azor to its Jerusalem soup kitchen. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the area belonged to the Nahiyeh (sub-district) of Lod that encompassed the area of the present-day city of Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut in the south to the present-day city of El'ad in the north, and from the foothills in the east, through the Lod Valley to the outskirts of Jaffa in the west. This area was home to thousands of inhabitants in about 20 villages, who had at their disposal tens of thousands of hectares of prime agricultural land.

Notable residents

• Shelly Krolitzky (born 1999), tennis player
• Matvey Natanzon, backgammon player
• Margalit Tzan'ani, singer and tv personality

Main sights

• , archaeological museum

References

References

1. "Azur (Israel)".
2. "Local Authorities in Israel 2005, Publication #1295 - Municipality Profiles - Azor". Israel Central Bureau of Statistics.
3. 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.
4. Meron Benvenisti. (2002). "Sacred Landscape". University of California Press.
5. Marom, Roy. (2022-11-01). "Jindās: A History of Lydda's Rural Hinterland in the 15th to the 20th Centuries CE". Lod, Lydda, Diospolis.
6. Marom, Roy. (2022). "Lydda Sub-District: Lydda and its countryside during the Ottoman period". Diospolis - City of God: Journal of the History, Archaeology and Heritage of Lod.
7. Raffi Khatchadourian. (May 13, 2013). "The Chaos of the Dice".
8. [https://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1118249.html Don't mess around with me], [[Haaretz]]