1 2 3 4 14 15 Lorem ipsum Chapter Three | The se�lement in Gaza From the Beginning of Zionism Un�l the Six Day War (1967) And so it happened that the heads of the ins�tu�ons were unresponsive to the repeated pleas of the Jews of Gaza to renew the opera�on of the Anglo-Pales�ne Bank branch in the city.16 Upon the renewal of the Jewish se�lement in Gaza, the Jewish school, called 'Samson', was also renovated.17 Only a�er mul�ple pressures by the residents, the Zionist leadership agreed to dispatch teachers to Gaza.18 Even at the school's prime, it had no more than 14 students, and for the most part of that period, it numbered less than ten students. Thanks to dona�ons, a library was opened in the school, which held very few books. The Jewish se�lement in Gaza depleted due to economic reasons. In 1927, the Jewish community in Gaza numbered 50 individuals. They lived amongs the Arabs and retained amicable rela�ons with their Arab neighbors.19 Two years later, everything changed. The End of the Jewish Community in Gaza In the month of Av, 5689 (August, 1929), during the 1929 riots in Hebron, the Arabs of Gaza tried to massacre the Jews of Gaza, as happened to the Jews of Hebron. The Jews gathered at the hotel in town. With the help of the A-Shawa family from the Arab nobility in Gaza,20 the Bri�sh managed to protect them from the Arab mob who sieged the hotel, and transfer them in the dead of night by train to Lod, and from there, to Tel Aviv.21 The story of the Jewish community of Gaza during the 1929 riots was pushed aside from the na�onal recollec�on. It is not documented, except for the men�oning of the fact that 'the Jewish community in Gaza ceased to exist during the 1929 riots.' In the full report of the Bri�sh Inves�ga�ve Commi�ee (The Shaw Commission), which inves�gated the 1929 riots at the end of that year, the events in Gaza were not even men�oned, and no single Jew from Gaza's Jewish community was invited to tes�fy before the commi�ee. The 1929 riots wiped out the Jewish community in Gaza. All a�empts to renew the Jewish se�lement in the city in the following years that followed, failed. Gaza became a city 'clean' of Jews. Kfar Darom and the War of Independence (1948) From the beginning of the 1930s, the city of Gaza was empty of Jews, but in the southern part of the Gaza Strip, Jewish se�lement began popping up. Most of the land in the Gaza Strip was fer�le. A single wetland in the area (Bissat a-Dir) was northwest of the town Deir al-Balah. In the early 1930s, it was bought by a citrus grower from Rehovot, named Tuvia Ziskind Miller. He planted an orchard and premium dates trees there, and dug a 38-meter well, which produced about 100 cubic meters per hour. However, the fate of these efforts was grim. In the events of 5696-5699 (The 1936-1939 riots) the Arabs uprooted the date planta�on and orchard, and blocked the well.22 In 5704 (1944), the Jewish Na�onal Fund (JNF) set its sights on that land.23 A�er nego�a�ons with Tuvia Miller in the month of Av 5705 (August 1945), the JNF purchased it from him. It was a small piece of land, in terms of area (only 26.25 hectares) and was certainly insufficient for the establishment of a well-grounded, solid se�lement, but at the end of Yom Kippur 5707 (October 1946), when the Zionist leadership and the Hagana headquarters decided to raise 11 Hebrew outposts in one night in the Negev (in response to the "Morrison Plan"24 which threatened to tear up the Negev from the future Jewish State), one of these outposts was planned for the area on the outskirts of Deir al-Balah. The kibbutz established by the Religious Kibbutz Movement was named a�er the Talmudic 'Kfar Darom' (The Southern Village) - like the name of the Jewish se�lement that existed there during the Mishna era. About forty 19-year-olds se�led on that land, ten of them girls. Some received agricultural training at the "Religious Youth Village" agricultural school, but most had no agricultural training at all. Kfar Darom was not the first Religious Kibbutz in the region. On 22 of Shevat 5703 (01/26/1943) A pioneer group of 12 members arrived and started building Kibbutz Be'erot Yitzhak, about five kilometers southeast of Gaza. On the 22nd of Tammuz 5707 (06/30/1947), on the anniversary of the "Black Sabbath", Kibbutz Sa'ad broke ground. It was located not far from Be'erot Yitzhak. Its establishment method was somewhat similar to that of the Homa and Migdal (Tower and Stockade) se�lements. In the year before the incep�on of the State of Israel, there were three religious kibbutzim in the northern Negev: Two near Gaza and one near Deir al-Balah. In the absence of available sources of income, the members of Kfar Darom went to work in the Bri�sh Army camps. These are now known as the Refugee Camps of Nuseirat and Al-Bureij. The religious kibbutz sent some members with farming and security experience to help the se�lers. From the beginning, the kibbutz was designed to func�on as an auxiliary farm rather than an agricultural farm. A�er the se�lers dug a well in the place, the Jewish Agency budgeted The installa�on of a sprinkler system for a 13.5 hectare farm. On top of that, they began construc�ng the infrastructure for the dairy and poultry branches, and a factory was also built: A diamond polishing factory shared by seven farms. Some members were sent for professional training in more established farms, and others seeked Torah studies. Some cultural ac�vi�es were also held, either by the members themselves and with the help of outside lecturers. 1 The program of the 'Samson' school in Gaza, in the year 5683 (1922-23) 2 A le�er from the Jews of Gaza to the Zionist leadership in Jerusalem בשורה אחת on 09/29/1929 3 The inaugura�on of Kfar Darom in 5708 (1948) 4 The map of the 11 outposts in the Negev
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