Ma'alot-Tarshiha (; ) is a city in the Northern District in Israel, about east of Nahariya, and about above sea level. The city was established in 1963 through a municipal merger of the Arab town of Tarshiha and the Jewish town of Ma'alot, creating a unique type of mixed city. In , it had a population of .
History
Tarshiha Excavations of a 4th-century burial cave in the village unearthed a cross and a piece of glass engraved with a menorah.
Crusader sources from the 12th and 13th century refer to Tarshiha as Terschia, Torsia, and Tersigha.Petersen, 2001, p. 293 The King had initiated the settlement of Crusader (Latin, Frankish) people in nearby Mi'ilya ("Castellum Regis"), and from there settlement spread out to Tarshiha.Ellenblum, 2003, pp. 44, fig 1. 68, 95, 213 In 1160, Torsia and several surrounding villages were transferred to a Crusader named Iohanni de Caypha (Johannes of Haifa).Strehlke, 1869, pp. 2-3, No. 2; Cited in Röhricht, 1893, RRH, p. 89, No. 341; cited in Frankel, 1988, pp. 263, 267 By 1217, the village was probably inhabited by Crusader ("Frankish") people.Strehlke, 1869, p. 41, no. 49; Cited in Ellenblum, 2003, p. 53 In 1220 Joscelin III´s daughter Beatrix de Courtenay and her husband Otto von Botenlauben, Count of Henneberg, sold their land, including Tersyha, to the Teutonic Knights.Strehlke, 1869, pp. 43- 44, No. 53; cited in Röhricht, 1893, RHH, p. 248, No. 934 (2); cited in Frankel, 1988, p. 263 In 1266, Tarshiha was raided by Crusader troops.
According to popular Arabic etymology, the name may have meant "Artemisia Mountain" in the Canaanite language, where Arabic ṭūr for "mountain" and shīḥ for Artemisia vulgaris (mugwort, or common wormwood) could be identified. E. H. Palmer (1881) explains the name as Teir meaning "a fortress", and Shīḥ, "a fragrant herb".
Ottoman era Incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with the rest of Palestine, the village of Tarshiha was raided by the Lebanese feudal chief, Mansur ibn Furaykh in 1573. The daftar of 1596 show the village to be under the administration of the nahiye of Akka, with a population of 107 households ("khana") and 3 bachelors, all Muslim. The inhabitants paid taxes on "occasional revenues", bees and goats. The village was also taxed for a press, used either of olives or for grapes. Total revenue was 17,660 akçe.Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 192. Quoted in Petersen, 2001, pp. 293-4Note that Rhode, 1979, p. 6 writes that the register that Hütteroth and Abdulfattah studied was not from 1595/6, but from 1548/9
In the early 18th century, the village was under control of Sheikh Husayn who was based in the Jiddin fortress,Cohen, 1973, p. 9. Quoted in Petersen, 2001, p. 294 while later in the Ottoman period it became one of the major cotton-producing villages of Galilee, and the administrative center of the nahiya.Cohen, 1973, pp. 12, 121. Quoted in Petersen, 2001, p. 294 Mariti visited the village (which he called Terschia) in 1761, and wrote that it "abounds with water; which adds greatly to the fertility of its cotton plants, its fruit-trees, and above all its tobacco".Mariti, 1792, p. 339
In the early 19th century (pre-1859), William McClure Thomson visited the village, which was still a subdistrict center, and noted its residents numbered about 3,000, the majority Muslims and one-fifth Christians. He opined that Tarshiha's Muslim inhabitants were "uncommonly profane, boorish and insolent" but their manners had improved from the past due to the influence of its resident reformist sheikh, Ali al-Maghrebi ('Aly el Mughraby'), who preached a "sort of Moslem Protestantism" and promoted charity and respect for Christians. Victor Guérin, who visited in 1875, found that Tarshiha "consists of four quarters, under the jurisdiction of as many different sheikhs. There are 2,000 Moslems, who have their mosques. The Christians occupy their own quarters: with the exception of a few families they are all Uniate Melkite Greeks, and number about 500."Guérin, 1880, pp. 63-64, as translated by Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p. 149
In 1881 the Palestine Exploration Fund's Survey of Western Palestine described Tarshiha as: "a very large village, containing about 1,500 Moslems and 300 Christians; there is a fine mosque with minarets newly built, also an old one; the houses are well-built; a new and handsome church has been built in the Christian quarter".Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p. 149 In 1883, Laurence Oliphant visited and wrote that Tershicha was home to around 2,000 people, most of whom were followers of Ali Al-Mughrabi, an Islamic sheikh and reformer who immigrated from North Africa.Oliphant, Laurence (1887). Haifa, or Life in Modern Palestine. London. pp. 112–113 A population list from about 1887 showed Tarshiha to have about 4,855 inhabitants; 4,000 Muslims and 855 Christian.Schumacher, 1888, p. 190
British Mandate era
In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Tarsheha had a population of 1,880 residents; 1,521 Muslims, 358 Christians and 1 Druze,Barron, 1923, Table XI, Sub-district of Acre, p. 36 where the Christians were 298 Melkite, 53 Orthodox and 7 Church of England.Barron, 1923, Table XVI, p. 49 The population had increased in the 1931 census to a total of 2522; 2047 Muslims and 475 Christians, in a total of 584 houses.Mills, 1932, p. 103
In the 1945 statistics the population of Tarshiha was 3,840; 3140 Muslims and 690 Christians.Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 5Village Statistics The Palestine Government, April 1945 , p. 3Khalidi, 1992, p. 19Morris, 1987, p. 239. Gives the population as 4–5,000. 4/5 Muslim. The total population of Tarshiha combined with Al-Kabri was 5,360 Arabs, with 47,428 dunams of land.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 41 Of this, a total of 743 dunums of land in the two places was used for citrus and bananas, 5,301 were plantation and irrigable land, 14,123 for cereals,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 81 while 252 dunams were built-up (urban) land.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 131
Residents of Ma'alot-Tarshiha interviewed in early 1980s recalled Tarshiha as being the leading village in the area with a population of 3,000 including 700 Christians. The Christians had established a successful handcrafts industry. The villages main crop was tobacco. There was a tobacco growers union which ran a trucking cooperative. In the mid-1930s it was learnt that the Sursock family were going to sell land in the Jaqtoun valley. A delegation from the village travelled to Beirut and was able to buy the land. After clearing and draining it was divided into plots which were distributed by lottery to the participating families. Tarshiha was the first Palestinian village to establish a development fund by collecting £1 a year from each adult male resident.Middle East International No 151, 5 June 1981; Publishers Lord Mayhew, Dennis Walters MP Editor Michael Adams; Per A Christiansen p.16
Tarshiha played a role in the Syrian campaign or operation Exporter during World War II, which was the invasion of the Allies of the Grand Syria (currently Syria and Lebanon), at the time controlled by the Vichy government, between June and July 1941 when the region of Grand Syria served as a base for supporting the Nazis during the Anglo-Iraqi War. On the day of the liberation of Tyre, 8 June 1941, the advance of the Australians "took place from the ground early in the morning on Sunday. The main push was in the direction of Tarshiha from the north. It started at 6 in the morning and Tyre was occupied at 16.30."
1948 Palestine war
Tarshiha was in the territory allotted to the Palestinians under the 1947 UN Partition Plan.
Following the establishment of the state of Israel Tarshiha was surrounded on three sides by the Israeli army and the border with Lebanon to the North. Tarshiha and sixteen smaller villages established a regional committee which organised the reopening of schools, regulated imports from Lebanon as well as attending to security and defence.Middle East International No 151
In the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Tarshiha was attacked by the newly formed Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during Operation Hiram. Three Israeli planes bombed Tarshiha on the evening of 29 October, killing at least 24 and causing a flight of the population, forming a part of the broader 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight. This was followed by a prolonged artillery barrage and a further air raid the following morning. The village defenders and most of the inhabitants retreated north into Lebanon.Khalidi, 1992, pp.13,477O'Ballance, Edgar (1956) The Arab-Israeli War. 1948. Faber & Faber, London. pp. 188, 190. Writes of an Arab Liberation Army garrison in the village. By the end of the day the IDF had captured the town. A UN observer reported that on 1 November 1948 the Arab villages around Tarshiha were deserted and extensively looted by Israeli forces. The New York Times added that the looting appeared systematic, as Israeli army trucks were used carrying off the looted goods.Khalidi, 1992, p.6
By December 1948 around 700 villagers, mostly Christians, had returned to the village.Morris, 1987, pp. 194, 225, 239. 100 Muslims and 600 Christians. Families from Tarshiha began arriving in Beirut shortly after the conquest of the village and lived in rented rooms around Bourj el Barajneh which at that time was a suburb on the fringe of the city. About half of the 3,000 villagers arriving in Lebanon settled there in what became Bourj al Barajneh refugee camp. They took on most of the leadership roles and remained the majority population for many years. In 1981 it was estimated 4–5,000 Tarshihans were living in the camp. Those villagers who were unable to reach Beirut in 1948 were rounded up and sent by train to Aleppo were they became the largest group in al-Neirab Camp.Middle East International No 152, 19 June 1981; Publisher Christopher Mayhew, Editor Michael Adams; Per A. Christiansen p.16
Any Arab who had not registered, as of November 1948, was regarded as illegal and if caught deported. An American Quaker relief worker with the American Friends Service Committee described a raid on Tarshiha on 15 January 1949. All males over sixteen were questioned by a panel of eight Israelis. 33 heads of families and 101 family members, aged 1 year to 79 years, were selected for deportation. They were robbed and expelled via 'Ara to Jenin. A UN observer in Jenin reported that their homes were being re-populated by large numbers of Jewish refugees from Austria.Morris, 1993, p. 145
State of Israel The abandoned houses in Tarshiha were initially taken over by Jews from Romania. When they were moved on to new settlements the houses were demolished. Around 600 villagers remained after 1948. They were joined by others expelled from nine other local villages. In December 1949 the Israeli Foreign Ministry blocked an IDF plan to clear Tarshiha and five other villages along the Lebanon border of their remaining Arab populations to create an Arab-free zone.Morris, 1987, p. 242 Arabs in the Galilee remained under Martial Law until 1966.
Ma'alot-Tarshiha merger
In 1963, Tarshiha was merged with Ma'alot, a development town for Jewish immigrants from Romania, Iran and Morocco, established in 1957.