Beit Jala () is a Palestinian Christian town in the Bethlehem Governorate of Palestine, in the West Bank. Beit Jala is located 10 km south of Jerusalem, on the western side of the Hebron road, opposite Bethlehem, at altitude. In 2017, Beit Jala had 13,484 inhabitants according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. About 80% of the population were Christians (mostly Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic) and about 20% Muslims.
Saint Nicholas – the inspiration for Santa Claus – is the patron saint of Beit Jala, where the Church of Saint Nicholas was built over a crypt where it is believed he lived for a couple years during his time in Palestine.
Etymology
Conder and Kitchener identified Beit Jala with Galem or Gallim (Γαλλιμ) of the Septuagint,Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP III, p. 20 a place in the 9th district of the inheritance of Judah; homonymous with a settlement in Benjamin NE of Jerusalem.
History
Byzantine period A crypt, dating to the 5th or 6th century C.E., was located under the Church of Saint Nicholas in Beit Jala.Pringle, 1993, pp. 93-95
Crusader period In the Crusader era, the village was called Apezala, and the Church of Saint Nicholas was possibly rebuilt during that time.
Ottoman period In 1516, the village was included in the Ottoman Empire with the rest of Palestine. In this century, Beit Jala was a large village of Christian and peasants and it had over ten elders (akabir) who functioned as leaders, with each religious group having separate sets of leaders.Singer, 1994, pp. 34-35. Rare for a single village, it and nearby Bethlehem, served as its own separate jurisdiction instead of being grouped with other villages into a nahiya.Singer, 1994 p. 165 In April 1531, when an Ottoman official went to Beit Jala to register the village's grapevines for tax purposes, the residents refused to seriously answer his questions and mocked the authority of the Ottoman sultan, marking a notable episode of initial local resistance to the Ottoman taxation methods and procedures. By the end of the 16th century, Beit Jala was almost entirely inhabited by Christians. Beit Jala's size rendered it similar to that of a town, with the village being subdivided into four quarters.Singer, 1994, p. 80 The village produced more wheat and barley than surrounding localities and like other villages south of Jerusalem, grape cultivation was greater than olive cultivation. Beit Jala was taxed on these agricultural products as well as figs, honeybees, and goats. It contained one of the six olive presses in the subdistrict of Jerusalem in the 16th century. Despite its large size, Beit Jala was relatively poorer than other villages in the subdistrict.Singer, 1994 pp. 81-82.
In the 1596 tax-records, it appeared as Bayt Jala, located in the Nahiya of Jabal Quds of the Liwa of Al-Quds. The population was 245 households; 6 Muslims and 239 Christians. They paid a fixed tax-rate of 33,3% on agricultural products, which included wheat, barley, olive trees, vineyards, fruit trees, occasional revenues, goats and beehives; a total of 30,000 akçe.Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 121
In 1697 Henry Maundrell passed Beit Jala, and noted that: "no Turk can live in it above two years. By virtue of this report, whether true or false, the Christians keep the Village to themselves without molestation; no Turk being willing to stake his life experimenting the truth of it."Maundrell, 1703, p. 90
In the 17th century, the Christians of Beit Jala offered to become Catholic if the Franciscans paid their jizya tax.
Beit Jala's inhabitants participated in the 1834 peasants' revolt in Palestine against Ibrahim Pasha, the Egyptian governor of Syria. Beit Jala's residents were believed to have taken part in the looting of Egyptian property and on 31 May, Egyptian troops assaulted the village. Ibrahim Pasha put a stop to the attack, but at least 33 men and women were killed in the attack. In addition, the village's livestock was seized. The attack on Beit Jala prompted rebels from the Ta'amira tribe, a local Bedouin tribe, to enter into Bethlehem to help bolster its defense.Thomson, 1860, p. 647.
In 1838, it was noted as a Greek Christian village, located in the Beni Hasan area, west of Jerusalem.Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, Appendix 2, p. 123 The population was estimated to be around 2000 people.Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 2, pp. 322 ff
By the mid-19th century, there were 10 Catholics living in Beit Jala. The Latin Patriarchate founded its first parish in Palestine in Beit Jala in 1853.Kildani, 2010, p. 320 The establishment of the parish faced fierce resistance by the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate and the inhabitants of Beit Jala, leading to several skirmishes and official complaints to the Ottoman authorities by both sides.Kildani, 2010, pp. 324-325. A Latin church was built in Beit Jala and inaugurated on 18 April 1858.Kildani, 2010, p. 326 The Jerusalem Society, a Protestant movement struggled to maintain a presence in Beit Jala in the late 19th century. When a clash between Orthodox and Protestant residents ended with the death of an Orthodox girl, the village's Protestant community was evacuated to al-Karak in Transjordan for six months until compensation was paid to the family of the slain girl.Kildani, 2010, p. 558 In 1866, the Russian ambassador to the Ottoman Empire purchased land in Beit Jala and built a girls' school, the first Russian school to be built in Palestine. It had 60 pupils by 1880 and was assigned a Russian principal. In 1886, it became a teachers' training school and was under the administration of the Palestinian Orthodox Imperial Society.Kildani, 2010, p. 343
Albert Socin found from an official Ottoman village list from about 1870 that Beit Jala had 234 houses and a population of 874 "Latins", though the population count included men, only.Socin, 1879, p. 145 Martin Hartmann found that Beit Jala had 232 houses.Hartmann, 1883, p. 124
In 1883, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described Beit Jala as: "A large and flourishing village of white well-built stone houses, on the slope of a steep hill. The water supply is artificial, with a well in the valley below. The population is said by Pere Lievin to amount to 3,000, of whom 420 are Catholics, and the rest Orthodox Greeks. There is a Greek and a Latin church in the village. There are remarkably fine groves of olives round and beneath the village, and the hill is covered with vineyards which belong to the place."Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p. 20
In 1896 the population of Beit Jala was estimated to be about 2,880 persons.Schick, 1896, p. 126
British Mandate period
In the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Beit Jala had a population of 3,101; 3,060 Christians and 41 Muslims;Barron, 1923, Table VII, Sub-district of Bethlehem, p. 18 where the Christians consisted of 2,628 Orthodox, 358 Roman Catholics, 4 Greek Catholic (Melkites), and 1 each of the Armenian Catholic, Maronite and the Coptic Church.Barron, 1923, Table XIV, p. 45 In the 1931 census the population had decreased to 2,731; 2,529 Christians, 198 Muslims, 3 with "no religion" and 1 Jew; in a total of 631 inhabited houses.Mills, 1932, p. 35
In the 1945 statistics the population of Beit Jala was 3,710; 200 Muslims and 3,510 Christians,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 24 with 13,307 (rural) and 737 (urban) 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. 56 9,860 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 1,064 for cereals,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 101 while 737 dunams were built-up (urban) land.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 151
By the end of the Mandate, the population of Beit Jala was apprixmately 4,000.Khalidi, Walid. Before Their Diaspora A Photographic History of the Palestinians, 1876-1948. Washington, D.C.: Institute for Palestine Studies, 1991, 258.
Jordanian period
In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, Beit Jala came under Jordanian rule.
The Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) began relief operations for refugees in the West Bank in 1950. They also worked with Palestinians who had retained their houses and so were not technically refugees, but who had lost their land or means of making a living because of the war. As part of this relief, the MCC founded a school in Beit Jala which was still in operation as of 1979.
In 1952, an Israel Defense Forces reprisal raid in Beit Jala killed seven civilians; one man, two women and three children. A complaint was lodged that Israel had violated the General Armistice agreement. The United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation issued a condemnation of Israel for breaching the agreement.E H Hutchison, "Violent Truce" A Military Observer Looks at the Arab-Israeli Conflict 1951–1955, pp. 12–16.
In 1961, the population of Beit Jala was 7,966.Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. 07
Post 1967 Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Beit Jala has been under Israeli occupation. Control of the town was assumed by the Palestinian Authority following the 1993 Oslo Accords. According to the Beit Jala Municipality, the city's land holdings have been relegated under different areas of administration. Area A comprises approximately 3,500 dunums, or about 25% of the town's land, which is under Palestinian control. The remaining 75% (Area C) is under Israeli jurisdiction, and 7% of the total Area C is located inside the Municipality border.
According to ARIJ, after the war Israel confiscated 3,147 dunums of Beit Jala land in order to expand the Jerusalem municipal boundaries, later taking further land for the two Israeli settlements of Gilo and Har Gilo, the West Bank barrier and bypass roads.Beit Jala City Profile ARIJ pp. 23-24
During the Second Intifada, militants from the Fatah-affiliated Tanzim group used Beit Jala as a base for launching sniper and mortar attacks on the Israeli settlement of Gilo. Gilo is located on a hilltop across from Beit Jala, partially built on the lands of Beit Jala, Beit Safafa and Sharafat."One more Obstacle to Peace": A new Israeli Neighborhood on the lands of Jerusalem city Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem, 10 March 2007 The Israeli government built a concrete barrier and installed bulletproof windows in homes and schools facing Beit Jala."It's Back-to-School Day for Israeli children on Gilo's front line". Los Angeles Times. 3 September 2001.