Beit Sira

Etymology

According to Palmer, Beit Sira means "The house of the fold". Bayt Sīrā /Bēt Sīra/ is an ancient toponymic survival, meaning House of Sira. The second part of the name may originate from the Biblical female name Š’rh (

Location

Beit Sira is located 14.9 km (horizontally) west of Ramallah. It is bordered by Kharbatha al-Misbah, Beit Liqya, and Beit Ur al-Tahta to the east, Saffa to the north, the Green Line (the Armistice Line 1949) to the west, and Bayt Nuba to the south.

History

Ottoman Era

In the 1596 tax records, Beit Sira was a part of the nahiya ("subdistrict") of Ramla, part of Gaza Sanjak, in the Ottoman Empire, with a population of 17 Muslim household. The villagers paid a fixed tax-rate of 25% on agricultural products, including wheat, barley, summer crops, vineyards, fruit trees, goats and beehives, in addition to occasional revenues; a total of 4,500 akçe. All of the revenue went to a Waqf.

In 1838, it was noted as a Muslim village in the Ibn Humar District, part of the er-Ramleh area.

In 1863 Victor Guérin noted Beit Sira as a considerable village on the summit of a rocky hill. A saint, revered under the name of Neby Sira, had a sanctuary there with his tomb. Socin, citing an official Ottoman village list compiled around 1870, noted that Bet Sira had 39 houses and a population of 125, though the population count included only men. Hartmann found that Bet Sira had 29 houses.

In 1873, Clermont-Ganneau was told that Beit Sira supposedly housed the tomb of Neby Sira, a son of Jacob and brother to Neby Ma'in (possibly Benjamin), the founder of Bir Ma'in.

In 1883, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described it: "A small village on a swell in the low hills. A main road passes through it. The water supply is artificial."

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Beit Sira had a population of 381 Muslims, increasing in the 1931 census to 460 Muslims in 113 houses.

In the 1945 statistics the population was 540, all Muslims, while the total land area was 4,687 dunams, according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 205 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 1,924 for cereals, while 23 dunams were classified as built-up (urban) areas.

File:Bir Ma'in 1944.jpg|Beit Sira 1944 1:20,000 from 1919 survey File:Burj 1945.jpg|Beit Sira 1945 1:250,000

Jordanian era

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

The Jordanian census of 1961 found 746 inhabitants in Beit Sira.

Israeli occupation

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

After the 1995 accords, 9.3% of Beit Sira land was classified as Area B, the remaining 90.7% as Area C. In 2012, approximately 78% of the village population worked in the Israel labor market. Israel has confiscated 1,499 dunams of land from Beit Sira for the construction of the Israeli settlement of Maccabim, presently part of Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut.

According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Beit Sira had a population of 2,840 inhabitants in 2006. In the 2007 PCBS census, there were 2,749 people living in the town. By 2017, the population was 3,343.

References

Bibliography

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References

1. (February 2018). "Preliminary Results of the Population, Housing and Establishments Census, 2017". [[State of Palestine]].
2. Palmer, 1881, p. [https://archive.org/stream/surveyofwesternp00conduoft#page/287/mode/1up 287]
3. link. (November 19, 2016 Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem. 5 July 2004.)
4. Marom, R.. (2023). "Early-Ottoman Palestinian Toponymy: A Linguistic Analysis of the (Micro-)Toponyms in Haseki Sultan’s Endowment Deed (1552)". Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins.
5. [https://web.archive.org/web/20140907030420/http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/Beit_Sira_vp_en.pdf Beit Sira Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 4
6. Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 156
7. Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, Appendix 2, p. [https://archive.org/stream/biblicalresearch03robiuoft#page/120/mode/1up 120]
8. Guérin, 1868, pp. [https://archive.org/stream/descriptiongog01gu#page/337/mode/1up 337]-338
9. Socin, 1879, p. [https://archive.org/stream/zeitschriftdesde01deut#page/147/mode/1up 147]. Socin placed it in the ''Beni Malik'' district
10. Hartmann, 1883, p. [https://archive.org/stream/bub_gb_BZobAQAAIAAJ#page/n926/mode/1up 118]
11. Clermont-Ganneau, 1896, vol 2, pp. [[iarchive:archaeologicalre02cler/archaeologicalre02cler_bw.pdf. 78]] ff.
12. Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p. [https://archive.org/stream/surveyofwesternp03conduoft#page/16/mode/1up 16]
13. Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Ramallah, p. [https://archive.org/stream/PalestineCensus1922/Palestine%20Census%20%281922%29#page/n18/mode/1up 16]
14. Mills, 1932, p. [https://archive.org/details/CensusOfPalestine1931.PopulationOfVillagesTownsAndAdministrativeAreas 47]
15. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. [http://cs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/yabber/census/VSpages/VS1945_p26.jpg 26]
16. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20I/Ramallah/Page-064.jpg 64]
17. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20II/Ramallah/Page-111.jpg 111]
18. Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20III/Ramallah/Page-161.jpg 161]
19. Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. [http://users.cecs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/yabber/census/JordanCensusPages/JordanCensus1961-p24.pdf 24]
20. [http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/Beit_Sira_vp_en.pdf Beit Sira Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 16
21. [http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/Beit_Sira_vp_en.pdf Beit Sira Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 9
22. [http://vprofile.arij.org/ramallah/pdfs/vprofile/Beit_Sira_vp_en.pdf Beit Sira Village Profile], ARIJ, p. 17
23. [http://www.pcbs.gov.ps/Portals/_pcbs/populati/pop07.aspx Projected Mid -Year Population for Ramallah & Al Bireh Governorate by Locality 2004- 2006] [[Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics]].
24. [http://www.pcbs.gov.ps/Portals/_PCBS/Downloads/book1487.pdf 2007 PCBS Census]. [[Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics]]. p.114.