Welcome To Sarafand al-Kharab - صرفند الخراب (צרפנד אל-ח'ראב)

District of al-Ramla Ethnically cleansed days ago	العربية Google Earth
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Statistic & Fact

Value

Occupation Date

April 20, 1948

Distance From District

7 (km) West of al-Ramla

Elevation

50 (meters)

Before & After Nakba, Click Map For Details

Pre-Nakba Map showing before and after destruction

Map Location

See location #12 on the map

View from satellite

Military Operation

Operation Nachshon

Attacking Units

Giv'ati Brigade

Exodus Cause

Fear of Jewish attack, or of being caught in the fighting

Village Temains

Sarafand al-Kharab was mostly destroyed with the exception of few houses remain standing and one of its schools.

Ethnically Cleansing

Sarafand al-Kharab inhabitants were completely ethnically cleansed.

Pre-Nakba
Land Ownership

Ethnic Group	Land Ownership (Dunums)*
Arab	3,545
Jewish	1,611
Public	347
**Total	5,503

*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics
**Town Lands' Demarcation Maps

Land Usage
As of 1945

Land Usage	Arab (Dunum)*	Jewish (Dunum)*
Citrus Groves	3,148	1,087
Irrigated & Plantation	49	15
Planted W/ Cereal	310	189
Built up	33	0
Arable	3,507	1,291
Non-Arable	352	320

*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics

Population

Year	Population*
1922	862
1931	974
1945	1,040
1948	1,206
Est. Refugees 1998	7,409

*Sourced from British Mandate's Village Statisitics

Number of Houses

Year	Number of Houses
1931	206
1948	255

Near By Towns

Zionist Colonies ↖	Zionist Colonies ↑ (N)	Sarafand al-'Amar ↗
al-Nabi Rubin ←	Sarafand al-Kharab	→ Bir Salim
	↓ Wadi Hunayn

Schools

An elementary school for boys which was founded in 1920, and in 1945 it had an enrollment of 258 boys. This school was also shared with Wadi Hunayn, Bir Sa1im, and al-Nabi Rubin villages. A girls' school was also established in 1945, and when it opened its doors it had an enrollment of 46 girls (one of the schools remains standing to this date).

Water Supply

The villagers irrigated their crops from the many artesian wells they had drilled.

Exculsive Jewish Colonies
That Usurped Village Lands

Nes Tziyyona, Yad Eli'ezer, and Beyt Chanan.

Village Before Nakba

The village stood on a flat spot in the middle of the coastal plain. It was linked by a spur to a highway to the west that intersected with a highway between Ramla and Jaffa. It was also known as Sarafand al-Sughra ('the smaller Sarafand'), to distinguish it from its larger sister village, Sarafand al-Kubra ('the larger Sarafand'), 5 km to the northeast. Sarafand al-Sughra has been identified with an unnamed Crusader locality, based on the evidence of architectural remnants (vaults) in the village. It was probably inhabited in the sixteenth century; the fact that Ottoman records list a 'Sarafand al-Kubra' suggests that this village's smaller counterpart, Sarafand al-Sughra, also existed in 1596. The Egyptian Sufi traveler Mustafa al-Dumyati (d. 1764) reported visiting the shrine of Luqman in Sarafand (see Sarafand al-'Amar). The village may have acquired the name Sarafand al-Kharab ('Sarafand of the ruins') in the early nineteenth century. When Edward Robinson passed by the area in 1838, he reported that there were two villages with the name of Sarafand, one of which was inhabited and the other ruined. The latter was probably Sarafand al-Kharab. The village was repopulated during the late nineteenth century, as is indicated by the maps of the Survey of Western Palestine .

During the late 1920s Sarafand al-Kharab was briefly reduced to ruins once again, after British forces burned it. This was in retaliation for the killing of British soldiers who had entered the village drunk, violating the sensibilities of the inhabitants and, apparently, committing some offense that enraged the villagers. Many of them were displaced by this incident, and some of them settled, at least temporarily, in adjacent villages. After some time, however, the village recovered and was rebuilt. Its houses were built in rows, attached to each other, and were made of mud and straw or cement. There were 110 Christians among the 1,040 villagers; the rest were Muslims.

In 1920 the villagers built their own school; it became a full elementary school with 258 students in the mid-1940s and was attended by students from the neighboring villages of Wadi Hunayn, Bir Salim, and al-Nabi Rubin. The number of students from Wadi Hunayn alone amounted to about one-fourth of the schools' total enrollment. A girls' school was also established in 1945 and had 46 students in that year.

Sarafand al-Kharab's economy was primarily agricultural. The villagers irrigated their crops from the many artesian wells they had drilled. Fertile soil and the availability of irrigation water made possible the cultivation of fruits and vegetables, which yielded handsome revenues. Citrus fruits constituted the principal crop; in 1944/45 a total of 3,148 dunums was devoted to citrus and bananas and 268 dunums were allocated to cereals; 49 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards.

Village Occupation and Ethnic Cleaning

Israeli historian Benny Morris indicates that the villagers, fearing a Jewish attack, fled on 20 April 1948. A week before that, on 12 April, a New York Times story quoted 'Jewish sources' as saying that one of their units had struck deep into Arab territory and had blown up twelve houses on the outskirts of Ramla and two neighboring villages. One of those villages may have been Sarafand al-Kharab. An additional factor that prompted the villagers to leave was the Giv'ati Brigade's Operation Nachshon (see Bayt Naqquba, Jerusalem sub-disctrict), which led to the massacre of Deir Yasin (Jerusalem sub-disctrict) on 9 April. But the village may not have come under Israeli occupation until mid-May (around the same time as its sister village of Sarafand al-'Amar and neighboring Bir Salim were occupied).

Zionists Colonies on Village Lands

Zionists established the settlement of Nes Tziyyona (130148) in 1882; it is now a large town, and many of its buildings are on the village land of Sarafand al-Kharab. Yad Eli'ezer (131149), established in the early 1950s, is on village land but is no longer a separate, distinct locality. It was named after Eliezer Margolin, a commander of the British army's Jewish Legion during World War I who, disobeying orders, allowed his troops to use British weapons from the military base in Sarafand al-'Amar against Palestinian nationalists in 1921. The settlement of Beyt Chanan (128149), to the west of the site, was established in 1948; although close by, it is not on village lands.

Village Today

A major part of the village has been destroyed. Many houses, however, remain; no more than six of them, including the house of Muhammad Darwish, are occupied by Israeli families. Most of them have gable roofs and rectangular doors and windows. One house is comprised of two-story and has a slanted roof. The school is used by Israeli students. A pond and a pump house in the orchard of Mahmud Yusuf Darwish are still undamaged. Castor oil (ricinus) plants and mulberry trees grow on the site. The cemetery is overgrown with cactus plants. The surrounding lands are cultivated by Israelis.

Source

Dr. Walid al-Khalidi, 1992: All That Remains.

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قرية صرفند - تصوير جوي 1947

Posted by صفافي أصيل

الشهيد البطل اللواء توفيق جبر ابن صرفند الخراب اول شهيد في حرب غزة

Posted by احمد حمدان 2

Display Name	Clan/Hamolah	Country of Residence
يعقوب درويش ابراهيم	ابراهيم	Michigan, USA
fayaz anbar	-	damascus syria, damascus syria
abu malik	-	indiana, usa
موسى حمدان	حمدان	عمان/الاردن, الاردن
ابومحمد	-	السعوديه, السعوديه
em rashed	hamdan	jordan, jordan
Anas Alghawi	الغاوي	Jordan, Jordan
عزمي حمدان	Hamdan	Jordan, Jordan
بسام رزق أبو رزق	أبو رزق	عمان - المملكة الاردنية الهاشمية, Palestine
رياض ذيب عبدالله حمدان	حمدان	السعوديه, السعوديه
قصي إبراهيم	ابراهيم	الاردن
majdi issa hamdan	Hamdan	riyadh, Jordan
فلسطينيه وبفتخر	نور الدين	جده, السعوديه
maher anbar	anbar	-
Abu Ramzy	ibrahim	California, USA
فؤاد وائل فؤاد	حمدان	-
نادر صالح	الصالح / حمدان	الزرقاء, الاردن
مريم جمال حمدان	-	الكويت, الكويت
زينب حمدان	-	الكويت, الكويت
رائد حمدان	-	عمان, الاردن
نور فلسطين	-	الكويت, الكويت
غازي	صرفند الخراب	الاردن, عمان
رائد سمير حمدان	حمدان	المصيون
عرفات احمد حمدان	حمدان	jerusalem-silwan
توفيق يحيى حمدان	حمدان	jerusalem-kalandia
ثائر يحيى حمدان	حمدان	jerusalem-kalandia
HAMDAN3	-	-
HAMDAN2	-	-
محمد يحيى حمدان	حمدان	القدس
ياسر ابراهيم	-	عمان, الاردن
نهاد ابراهيم ابراهيم	ال ابراهيم	-
يزن ابراهيم	-	عمان, الاردن
وداد بدير	-	-
tala tayseer ibrahim	-	عمان, الأردن
سليم ابراهيم	ابراهيم	-
أبوماجد	حمدان	-
اياد محمد حمدان حمدان	حمدان	DOHA, قطر
Hisham Riad Hamdan	Hamdan	Riyadh, Riyadh
احمد حمدان	حمدان	-
shawki mohammad hamdan	hamdan	nasr city, egypt
hamada76	Hamdan	Canada
ابراهيم	ابراهيم	-
احمد حمدان	حمدان	-
حكمت زكي	جاد الله	palestine, بيت عور
teisir ibrahim	-	-
YOUSEF ANBAR	anbar	-
mahmud alsahli	ALSAHLI	DAMASCUS, SYRIA

All Registered Members

كل ما تبقى من صرفند الخراب منذ النكبة Duration: 4 min 38 sec
Histroian Nicholas Boyak calls on the Newzeland government to applogies for the Sarfand's massacre Duration: 4 min 59 sec

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