Danna

For the island in Scotland, see Danna, Scotland.

Danna
Danna
Arabic	دنه
District	Baysan
Coordinates	32°36′46.5″N 35°28′27.5″E / 32.612917°N 35.474306°E / 32.612917; 35.474306Coordinates: 32°36′46.5″N 35°28′27.5″E / 32.612917°N 35.474306°E / 32.612917; 35.474306
Population	190 (1945)
Area	6,614 dunums 6.6 km²
Date of depopulation	28 May 1948
Cause(s) of depopulation	Expulsion by Yishuv forces

Danna (Arabic: دنه‎) was a Palestinian village 13 kilometres north of Baysan that was captured by the Israel Defence Force during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.^[1]

History

In 1596, Danna was part of the Ottoman Empire, nahiya (subdistrict) of Shafa under the liwa' (district) of Lajjun with a population of 5 Muslim families. It paid taxes to the Ottoman government on a number of crops, including wheat and barley, and other types of produce, such as goats and beehives.^[2]

Johann Ludwig Burckhardt, a Swiss traveler to Palestine who passed through the area around 1817, mentioned the village without providing an description.^[3][4]

In the late nineteenth century, the village of Danna was situated on a slope, and was surrounded by farmland. There was a spring with a watering trough to the west. The village houses were built of stone and mud.^[5]

At the time of the 1931 census, Danna had 28 occupied houses and a population of 149 Muslims.^[6]

The village was shaped like a rectangle whose longer sides were aligned in a north-south direction. During the British Mandate the village expanded and new houses, constructed of stone and adobe brick, were built along the road to the nearby village of Kafra. It was classified in this period as a hamlet in the Palestine Index Gazetteer. There were a few shops and a mosque which contained the shrine of a Shaykh Daniyal. The village spring provided water for all the residents, who all were Muslim. The villagers worked primarily in rainfed agriculture. In 1944/45 a total of 5,097 dunums was allotted to cereals; 14 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards. Grass and leafy vegetation grew on the slopes and peaks of the neighboring mountains and were used for grazing.^[7]

The village today

According to the Palestinian historian Walid Khalidi, 1992, the remaining structures on the village land are:

"Bushes, cactus plants, thorns, and grass now grow around piles of rubble on the village site. Thick weeds grow in the wadi and near the springs. The lands in the area are cultivated by Israeli farmers."^[7]

See also

• List of Arab towns and villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War

References

1. ^ Morris, 2004, p. xvii village #111. Also gives cause of depopulation.
2. ^ Hütteroth, Wolf-Dieter and Kamal Abdulfattah (1977), Historical Geography of Palestine, Transjordan and Southern Syria in the Late 16th Century. Erlanger Geographische Arbeiten, Sonderband 5. Erlangen, Germany: Vorstand der Fränkischen Geographischen Gesellschaft. p. 157.
3. ^ Burckhardt, 1822, p.342.
4. ^ Also cited in Khalidi 1992, p. 46 (wrongly cited to p. 842)
5. ^ Conder, Claude Reignier and H.H. Kitchener: The Survey of Western Palestine. London: Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 1881, II, p.83. Quoted in Khalidi, 1992, p.46
6. ^ E. Mills, ed (1932). Census of Palestine 1931. Population of Villages, Towns and Administrative Areas. Jerusalem: Government of Palestine. p. 78. 
7. ^ ^{a b} Khalidi, 1992, p.46

Bibliography

• Burckhardt, John Lewis, 1784-1817 (1822): Travels in Syria and the Holy Land Edition: reprint, Published by J. Murray, 668 pages.
• Conder, Claude Reignier and H.H. Kitchener (1881): The Survey of Western Palestine: memoirs of the topography, orography, hydrography, and archaeology. London:Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund. vol 2
• Hadawi, Sami (1970), Village Statistics of 1945: A Classification of Land and Area ownership in Palestine, Palestine Liberation Organization Research Center, http://www.palestineremembered.com/Articles/General-2/Story3150.html 
• Khalidi, Walid (1992), All That Remains, Washington D.C.: Institute for Palestine Studies, ISBN 0887282245 
• Morris, Benny, (second edition 2004 third printing 2006) The Birth Of The Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-00967-7

External links

• Welcome To Danna
• Danna, from the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center