Surif () is a Palestinian City in the Hebron Governorate located 25 km northwest of the city of Hebron. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics census, Surif had a population of 17,287 in 2017. The population is entirely Muslim.
Most of the town's 15,000 dunams is used for agriculture, in particular, olives, wheat and barley.The Segregation Separation Wall hits the lands of Surif and Khibet Ad Deir- Hebron district Land Research Center 2004-10-24 The town has seven mosques and four schools.
Ahmad Lafi is the mayor.
History Ottoman period Oral tradition suggests that Surif was founded after the 16th century.Grossman, D. "The expansion of the settlement frontier of Hebron's western and southern fringes". Geography Research Forum, 5, 1982, p. 62. In 1838, Surif was described as a Muslim village between Hebron and Gaza under the administration of Hebron.Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, Appendix 2, p. 117
By the nineteenth century, Ṣurīf and other Hebronite villages had extended their cultivation zones westward into the Shephelah, incorporating nearby ruined sites. This expansion reflected the combined effects of the Ottoman Land Code, local agricultural initiatives, and the stabilization of the region after the decline of Bedouin incursions.Orit Peleg-Barkat, Roy Marom, Gregg E. Gardner, Michael Chernin, and Saleh Kharanbeh, "Rural adaptation and settlement change in the late Islamic Jabal al-Khalīl (Judean Foothills)," Journal of Historical Geography 90 (2025): 87–98.
In 1863 Victor Guérin wrote that Surif had 700 inhabitants. He further noted that beside a birket in the rock, a few cisterns and an ancient column shaft near a small mosque, all the construction was modern.Guérin, 1869, pp. 381-382 An official Ottoman village list from about 1870 showed 87 houses and a population of 265, counting men only.Socin, 1879, p. 161Hartmann, 1883, p. 143 noted 100 houses In 1883, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described Surif as "A small village on a low hill, with olives to the south."They further noted: this may perhaps be the early Christian Sariphsea mentioned in connection with Mar Saba and Bayt Jibrin. See: Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p. 309 In 1896 the population of Surif was 1,164.Schick, 1896, p. 122
British Mandate According to the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Surif had a population of 1,265 inhabitants, all Muslims,Barron, 1923, p. 10 increasing in the 1931 census to 1,640, in 344 inhabited houses.Mills, 1932, p. 33
In the 1945 statistics the population of Surif was 2,190, all Muslims,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p. 23 with a total of 38,876 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. 50 Of this, 3,493 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 11.325 for cereals,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 94 while 54 dunams were built-up (urban) land.Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. Village Statistics, April, 1945. Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. 144
Jordanian rule In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War and the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Surif came under Jordanian rule.
The Jordanian census of 1961 found 2,827 inhabitants in Surif.Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, p. 14
Post-1967 Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Surif has been under Israeli occupation.
Israel has confiscated approximately 1,213 dunams of land from Surif since 2000, and approximately 1,300 dunums of Surif lands will be behind the Israeli West Bank barrier, when it is finished. Surif Town Profile, ARIJ, 2006, p. 14
In April 2023, the village was attacked for three days by dozens of settlers who broke into the village, injured residents with stones and vandalized and burned olive trees and residences. The attack by the settlers was carried out with the backing of an army that used gunfire and tear gas against residents who tried to defend themselves from the attackers. Since 2021, six cases of settler attacks have been documented, which included destruction of crops, damage to residences and injury to residents.
Surif Pogrom (2025) The Surif pogrom refers to a series of violent attacks perpetrated by Israeli settlers, under the protection of the Israeli military, against the Palestinian town of Surif in the southern West Bank during June and July 2025. On 19 June 2025, settlers from a newly established illegal outpost established on pribate Palestinian land opened fire on Palestinian residents attempting to extinguish fires deliberately set in farmland in the al-Qarnat area, murdering 48-year-old Mohammad Ahmad Mahmoud al-Hour and injuring eight others, some critically.التصعيد في الضفة.. شهيد وجرحى برصاص مستوطنين في بلدة صوريف، الأناضول + فلسطين أونلاين، 19 حزيران/يونيو 2025.Wattan News. (2024, November X). مستوطنون يهاجمون منازل المواطنين في بلدة صوريف شمال غرب الخليل. Wattan. Retrieved July 25, 2025, from https://www.wattan.net/ar/news/448448.html On 9 July 2025, another settler raid occurred in the al-Watwat area near the illegal settlement of Bat Ain, during which a 45-year-old Palestinian man was shot in the thigh, others were physically assaulted, and large swathes of agricultural land were set ablaze.إصابات في هجوم المستوطنين على بلدة صوريف غربي الخليل، فلسطين أونلاين، 9 تموز/يوليو 2025. The attacks were part of a broader escalation in settler violence across the West Bank in 2025. The Palestinian Authority's Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission reported more than 2,100 settler attacks in the first half of the year, resulting in at least four Palestinian fatalities and widespread destruction of property and farmland.هيئة مقاومة الجدار والاستيطان: أكثر من 2153 اعتداءً للمستوطنين في النصف الأول من 2025، فلسطين أونلاين.
Demography Surif was originally settled by people from nearby Beit Ummar and possibly others. Some of the residents came from Salqa (a location of unknown identity near GazaGrossman, D. (1986). "Oscillations in the Rural Settlement of Samaria and Judaea in the Ottoman Period". in Shomron Studies. Dar, S., Safrai, S., (eds). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad Publishing House. p. 385), al-Majdal and Gaza. It is also known as "Kuffin a-Tahta" since its residents, as those of Beit Ummar, lived there in the 16th century.Grossman, D. (1986). "Oscillations in the Rural Settlement of Samaria and Judaea in the Ottoman Period". in Shomron Studies. Dar, S., Safrai, S., (eds). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad Publishing House. p. 368
References
Bibliography
External links
Welcome To Surif Surif, Welcome to Palestine Survey of Western Palestine, Map 21: IAA, Wikimedia commons Surif Town (Fact Sheet), Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem, ARIJ Surif Town Profile, ARIJ Surif aerial photo, ARIJ The priorities and needs for development in Surif town based on the community and local authorities’ assessment, ARIJ