Sandala, Israel

Sandala
Sandala mosque, 2007
Hebrew	צַנְדַלָה, סַנְדַלָה
Arabic	صندله
Council	Gilboa Regional Council
Coordinates	32°31′N 35°19′E
Population	1,500 (2006)
Sandala

Sandala (Arabic: صندله‎; Hebrew: צַנְדַלָה, סַנְדַלָה‎‎) is an Arab village in the North District of Israel. Located near Afula, it falls under the jurisdiction of Gilboa Regional Council. In 2006 it had a population of 1,500. All of them are of one family named "Al-Omari" who are believed to be descendants of The Second Khalifa of Islam -Umar ibn al-Khattāb.

History

Old house in Sandala, 2007

Archaeological excavations in the nucleus of the ancient village, near the mosque, has revealed pottery fragments dating to the early Islamic and Mamluk periods.

According to a local tradition, the present village was established in the 18th-century by two brothers from the nearby village Arranah, which is today part of the West Bank. When Edward Robinson passed by Sandala in 1838, he described it as a "small site of ruined foundations," while later in the 19th-century, Guérin noted the village, and the Survey of Western Palestine described it as a "small village on the edge of the plain, built of stone and mud, supplied by cisterns, and surrounded by plough-land."

At the time of the 1931 British Mandate census, Sandala had 36 occupied houses and a population of 189 Muslims. By 1945, Sandala had 220 inhabitants, all classified as Arabs. They owned a total of 3,217 dunams of land, while 32 dunams were public.

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War it was captured by the Israeli Army and later by the Iraqi Army. In the ceasefire agreements with Jordan it was passed to Israel.^{[citation needed]}

Petersen, who visited the village in 1994, describes a new mosque in the center of the village, apparently constructed on older foundations. The area around the mosque formed the core of the old village, parts of which had been demolished, while the rest was scheduled for demolition. The remaining structures formed a square, containing various houses and courtyards. According to Petersen, some of the deserted houses appeared to incorporate earlier structures, including transverse arches and cross-vaulted rooms, possibly of a medieval origin.

See also

• List of Arab localities in Israel

Bibliography

• Alexandre, Yardenna (29/9/2009): Sandala, Final Report, Hadashot Arkheologiyot, no.121
• 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
• Guérin, M. V. (1874): Description Géographique, Historique et Archéologique de la Palestine. Samarie
• 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 
• Mokary, Abdalla (5/10/2008): Sandala, Final Report, Hadashot Arkheologiyot, no.120
• Palmer, E. H. (1881): The survey of Western Palestine: Arabic and English name lists collected during the survey by Lieutenants Conder and Kitchener, R. E. Transliterated and explained by E.H. Palmer.
• Petersen, Andrew (2001), A Gazetteer of Buildings in Muslim Palestine: Volume I (British Academy Monographs in Archaeology), Oxford University Press, ISBN 9780197270110, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0197270115  p. 289
• Robinson, Edward, Eli Smith (1841): Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petraea: A Journal of Travels in the Year 1838a, Published by Crocker & Brewster,Item notes: v. 3

External links

• Welcome To Sandala