Al-'Abisiyya or al-'Absiyya (Arabic: العابسية), was a Palestinian Arab village in the District of Safad. It was depopulated during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War on May 29, 1948, by The Palmach's First Battalion of Operation Yiftach. It was located 28.5 km northeast of Safad near to the Banyas River which the village relied on for irrigation.
History Archaeological evidence in the area indicates Roman–Byzantine activity but is not decisive, so the identification rests on converging epigraphic, linguistic, and spatial criteria.
A Greek boundary stone from the reign of Diocletian (284–305 CE) records the village name Οσηα (Osea), from the Aramaic word for "foundation", among the Diocletianic boundary markers associated with Paneas (Banias) in the northern Hula Valley. Osea has been identified with al-ʿĀbsiya based on toponymic preservation through phonetic transformation supported by spatial considerations and related local names.
In the Mamluk period and Early Ottoman periods the site was called Khiyām ʿAbs.
The village contained the khirbas of Tall al-Sakhina, Tall al-Shari'a, and al-Shaykh Ghannam.
In 1881, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described the village as "a collection of mud hovels in the plain of the Huleh, on the Nahr Banias containing seventy Moslems. They till the land, which is arable round the village, there is a large supply of water and some trees near the village."Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p.86
British Mandate era In the 1931 census of Palestine, during the British Mandate for Palestine, the village had a population of 609, all Muslims, in a total of 31 houses.Mills, 1932, p. 105
In the 1945 statistics the population of Al-'Abisiyya (including nearby Azaziyat, Ein Fit and Khirbat es Summan) was 1,220 Muslims, with a total of 15,429 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 69 . Arabs used 4 dunums of land for citrus and bananas, 6,390 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 2,830 for cereals;Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 118 while 17 dunams was built-up (urban) area.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 168
1948, aftermath In May 1948, Sde Nehemia requested, "somewhat shamefacedly", 1,700 dunams of land from the newly depopulated village of Al-'Abisiyya.Morris, 2004, p. 363, note #130, p. 402
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External links Welcome To al-'Abisiyya al-'Abisiyya (Safed), Zochrot Al-'Abisiyya, Villages of Palestine Survey of Western Palestine, Map 2: IAA, Wikimedia commons