Nahalal
Encyclopedia
Moshav
Moshav is a type of Israeli town or settlement, in particular a type of cooperative agricultural community of individual farms pioneered by the Labour Zionists during the second aliyah...
in northern Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
.
Its name derives from a Biblical village in the tribe of Zebulun
Tribe of Zebulun
According to the Hebrew Bible, the Tribe of Zebulun was one of the Tribes of Israel....
. Covering 8,500 dunam
Dunam
A dunam or dönüm, dunum, donum, dynym, dulum was a non-SI unit of land area used in the Ottoman Empire and representing the amount of land that can be plowed in a day; its value varied from 900–2500 m²...
s, it falls under the jurisdiction of Jezreel Valley Regional Council
Jezreel Valley Regional Council
Jezreel Valley Regional Council is a regional council in northern Israel that encompasses most of the settlements in the Jezreel Valley. It includes 15 kibbutzim, 15 moshavim, 6 communal settlements and two Bedouin villages...
. In 2008 it had a population of 907.
Founded in 1921, it was the first moshav ovdim.
History
The modern moshav was established in 1921. Its founders immigratedAliyah
Aliyah is the immigration of Jews to the Land of Israel . It is a basic tenet of Zionist ideology. The opposite action, emigration from Israel, is referred to as yerida . The return to the Holy Land has been a Jewish aspiration since the Babylonian exile...
to Mandate Palestine
Mandate Palestine
Mandate Palestine existed while the British Mandate for Palestine, which formally began in September 1923 and terminated in May 1948, was in effect...
from Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
in what is known as the Second Aliyah
Second Aliyah
The Second Aliyah was an important and highly influential aliyah that took place between 1904 and 1914, during which approximately 40,000 Jews immigrated into Ottoman Palestine, mostly from the Russian Empire, some from Yemen....
and Third Aliyah
Third Aliyah
The third Aliyah refers to the third wave of the Jewish immigration to Israel from Europe who came inspired by Zionist motives between the years 1919 and 1923 . A symbol of the start of the third immigration wave is the arrival of the boat "Roselan" in the Jaffa Port on December 19, 1919...
between 1904 and 1914 (at the end of the Ottoman
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
rule), some of whom had been members of the first kibbutz
Kibbutz
A kibbutz is a collective community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economic branches, including industrial plants and high-tech enterprises. Kibbutzim began as utopian communities, a combination of socialism and Zionism...
, Degania. After working in farming communities for a decade, they dreamt of establishing a communal farming community similar to a kibbutz
Kibbutz
A kibbutz is a collective community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economic branches, including industrial plants and high-tech enterprises. Kibbutzim began as utopian communities, a combination of socialism and Zionism...
, but they wanted to keep their individual family structure (kibbutzim had communal dining and children slept in separate housing).
The moshav was established on 11 September 1921 on land that had been given to them by the Jewish National Fund
Jewish National Fund
The Jewish National Fund was founded in 1901 to buy and develop land in Ottoman Palestine for Jewish settlement. The JNF is a quasi-governmental, non-profit organisation...
.
The small rivulets created marshes, which attracted Anopheles
Anopheles
Anopheles is a genus of mosquito. There are approximately 460 recognized species: while over 100 can transmit human malaria, only 30–40 commonly transmit parasites of the genus Plasmodium, which cause malaria in humans in endemic areas...
mosquitoes that spread malaria
Malaria
Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease of humans and other animals caused by eukaryotic protists of the genus Plasmodium. The disease results from the multiplication of Plasmodium parasites within red blood cells, causing symptoms that typically include fever and headache, in severe cases...
. Heeding the warnings of the experts among them, like Dr. Hillel Yaffe
Hillel Yaffe
Hillel Yaffe was a Russian Jewish physician and Zionist leader who immigrated to Palestine during the First Aliyah. He was instrumental in curing malaria among the Jewish population of Palestine in the early 20th Century, and helped improve the medical infrastructure of the Yishuv during the same...
, an expert on the war against malaria, they temporarily settled on a nearby hill, near the Arab village of Ma'lul
Ma'lul
Ma'alul was a Palestinian village, made up primarily of Palestinian Christians, that was depopulated and destroyed by Israel during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Located six kilometers west of the city of Nazareth, many of its inhabitants became internally displaced refugees, after taking refuge in...
. Later, the founders came down from the hill and divided the land.
The village layout in Nahalal, devised by architect Richard Kauffman, became the pattern for many of the moshavim established before 1948; it is based on concentric circles, with the public buildings (school, administrative and cultural offices, cooperative shops and warehouses) in the center, the homesteads in the innermost circle, the farm buildings in the next, and beyond those, ever-widening circles of gardens and fields. initially to 80 equal parts, 75 parts to the members and 5 parts for the agricultural school (the first two parts and the last three parts contain the agricultural school). This equal parceling of the land became the trademark geometric shape of Nahalal.
Education
In 1929, a Girls' Agricultural Training Farm was established at Nahalal by Hana Meizel of the Women's International Zionist OrganizationWomen's International Zionist Organization
The Women's International Zionist Organization , is a volunteer organization dedicated to social welfare in all sectors of Israeli society, the advancement of the status of women, and Jewish education in Israel and the Diaspora.-History:...
, and in the 1940s it became a co-educational farming school of the Youth Aliyah
Youth Aliyah
Szold was initially skeptical about the merits of Freier's proposal, as she believed that Germany offered better educational opportunities for Jewish children than Palestine. However, Hitler's rise to power convinced her otherwise. The Nuremberg Laws were enacted in 1935 and on 31 March 1936 German...
movement.
Notable residents
- Assi DayanAssi DayanAsaf "Assi" Dayan is an Israeli film director, actor, screenwriter and producer.-Personal life:Assi Dayan is the youngest son of Israeli general and minister of defence Moshe Dayan and peace activist Ruth Dayan . He has two siblings: politician and author Yael Dayan, born 1939, and sculptor Ehud ...
, (born 1945), film director, actor, screenwriter, and producer - Moshe DayanMoshe DayanMoshe Dayan was an Israeli military leader and politician. The fourth Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces , he became a fighting symbol to the world of the new State of Israel...
, Minister of Defense - Shmuel DayanShmuel DayanShmuel Dayan was a Zionist activist during the British Mandate of Palestine and an Israeli politician who served in the first three Knessets.-Biography:...
- Yael DayanYael DayanYaël Dayan is an Israeli politician and author. She served as a member of the Knesset between 1992 and 2003, and is currently the chair of Tel Aviv city council. She is the daughter of Moshe Dayan and sister of Assi Dayan.-Biography:...
, MK and daughter of Moshe - Yehonatan GeffenYehonatan GeffenYehonatan Geffen also known as Yonatan Gefen, is an Israeli author, poet, songwriter, journalist, and playwright.- Biography :...
, musician - Amos HadarAmos HadarAmos Hadar is a former Israeli politician who served as a member of the Knesset for the Alignment between 1974 and 1981.-Biography:Born in Nahalal during the Mandate era, Hadar was a member of the HaNoar HaOved youth movement. He became secretary of Nahalal, and also volunteered for the Bnei...
, member of the Knesset - Aryeh NehemkinAryeh NehemkinAryeh Nehemkin is a former Israeli politician who served as Minister of Agriculture from 1984 until 1988.Born in Nahalal during the Mandate Era, Nehemkin was a Haganah member between 1943 and 1948...
, Minister of Agriculture - Moshe PeledMoshe PeledMoshe Peled may refer to:*Moshe Peled, an Israeli politician who served as a Knesset member between 1992 and 1999.*Moshe Peled, an Israeli general during the Yom Kippur War...
- Amir Pnueli
- Nissan RilovNissan RilovNissan Rilov was an Israeli painter and one of the first and few children to live in Nahalal , the first Zionist moshav in Palestine.Rilov served in the Special Night Squads , the Haganah, and the British Army during World War II...
- Meir ShalevMeir ShalevMeir Shalev is an Israeli writer. He is the son of the Jerusalemite poet Yitzchak Shalev. His cousin Zeruya Shalev is also a writer.- Biography :...
, writer - Hannah SzenesHannah SzenesHannah Szenes , often anglicized as Hannah Senesh was a Hungarian Jew, one of 37 Jews from the British Mandate for Palestine that were trained by the British army to parachute into Yugoslavia during the Second World War in order to help save the Jews of Hungary, who were about to be deported to...
Note:
- Ilan RamonIlan RamonIlan Ramon was a fighter pilot in the Israeli Air Force, and later the first Israeli astronaut....
, Israel's first and only astronaut, is buried in the Nahalal cemetery, though he never lived in Nahalal.
External links
- Official website
- Degania & Nahalal UNESCO
- Nahalal Jewish Agency for Israel
- LIFE Magazin, Jul 5, 1937, "Jews made a garden" - aerial photo of Nahalal (page 55), and a girl from Girls' Agricultural Training Farm (page 54), at Google Books.
- 25 Mind-Blowing Aerial Photographs Around the World at twistedsifter.com - better aerial photograph at #9, by Yann Arthus-BertrandYann Arthus-BertrandYann Arthus-Bertrand is a French photographer, journalist, reporter and environmentalist.- Early life :Yann Arthus-Bertrand was born in Paris on March 13, 1946 in a renowned jewellers' family founded in 1803 by Claude Arthus-Bertrand and Michel-Ange Marion. His sister Catherine is one of his...
.