Маалот-Таршиха: История и Население Смешанного Города Израиля

Ma'alot Tarshiha (; ترشيحا, Taršīḥā) is a city in the North 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 Israeli mixed city. As of , the city had a population of .

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. 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. In 1160, Torsia and several surrounding villages were transferred to a Crusader named Iohanni de Caypha (Johannes of Haifa). By 1217, the village was probably inhabited by Crusader ("Frankish") people. 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. In 1266, Tarshiha was raided by Crusader troops.

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. In the early eighteenth century, the village was under control of Shaikh Husayn, while later in the Ottoman period it became one of the major cotton producing villages of Galilee, and the administrative center of the nahiya. 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". 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." 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". A population list from about 1887 showed Tarshiha to have about 4,855 inhabitants; 4,000 Muslims and 855 Christian.

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, where the Christians were 298 Melkite, 53 Orthodox and 7 Church of England. The population had increased in the 1931 census to a total of 2522; 2047 Muslims and 475 Christians, in a total of 584 houses. In the 1945 statistics the population of Tarshiha was 3,840; 3140 Muslims and 690 Christians. The total population of Tarshiha combined with Al Kabri was 5,360 Arabs, with 47,428 dunams of land. 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, while 252 dunams were built up (urban) land. 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. 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, the 8th of 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." During the 1948 Arab Israeli War Tarshiha served as the headquarters of Fawzi al Qawuqji, who headed the Arab Liberation Army. From there he bombarded the Jewish colony of Yechiam. 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.

In the 1948 Arab Israeli War, Tarshiha was attacked by the newly formed Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during Operation Hiram. It was bombed by three Israeli planes on the evening of 28 October. 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. 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. By December 1948 around 700 villagers, mostly Christians, had returned to the village. 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 Allepo were they became the largest group in al Neirab Camp. 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. 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 in order to create an Arab free zone. Arabs in the Galilee remained under Martial Law until 1966. 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. Twenty two teenagers and three teachers from Safed on a class trip were murdered in the attack. They had been sleeping on the floor inside the building. In addition, three Israeli women, one of them seven months pregnant, one four year old child, and two men were killed by the same terrorists in the events before the murder of the school children. A visitor in 1980 estimated that half of the 2,400 Arabs living in the town originated from Tarshiha. 70% of those with jobs worked in the building trade, none of them were farmers. The 3,500 Jewish residents were mostly Moroccan. Few of whom stayed for long periods. During the 1990s post Soviet aliyah in the 1990s, many immigrants settled in the city. Ma'alot Tarshiha was officially recognized as a city in 1996. Nearly 700 Katyusha rockets landed in the vicinity of Ma'alot Tarshiha during the Second Lebanon War. Three Arab residents of the city were killed in a rocket attack.

In 2016, ethnic and religious makeup of the city was 79.2% Jewish and other non Arabs, and 20.8% Arab (10% Muslim, 9.9% Christian, and 0.3% Druze). In 2016, there were 10,600 males and 10,500 females. The population of the city was diverse in age with 30.8% 19 years of age or younger, 14.2% between 20 and 29, 18.1% between 30 and 44, 18.2% from 45 to 59, 5.5% from 60 to 64, and 13.1% 65 years of age or older. The population growth rate in 2016 was −0.4%.

The Tefen Industrial Zone, which includes famous companies such as the Iscar plant was built in the vicinity of Ma'alot Tarshiha by Stef Wertheimer and is major source of employment for the city's residents. In 2007, the jobless rate in Ma’alot Tarshiha was 5.5 percent, compared to 7.9 percent nationally.

In 2001, there were 11 schools and 4,272 students in the city, including 7 elementary schools with an enrollment of 2,000, and 7 high schools with 2,272 students. 58.5% of the city's 12th graders earned a matriculation certificate in 2001. In August 1975, Yeshivat Ma'alot, a Hesder yeshiva, was established, attracting students from all over the world. In recent years the Yeshiva has estimated 300 students per year.

Victor Guérin, after his 1875 visit, wrote that the principal mosque in Tarshiha had been built by Abdullah Pasha, (the Governor of Acre at the time.) He further noted that it was "preceded by a court, then by a porch; surmounted by a cupola, above which springs an elegant minaret." Andrew Petersen, who inspected the mosque in 1993, noted that it was built in "classical Ottoman style with four main elements: a courtyard, an arcade, a domed prayer hall, and a minaret." Lake Monfort, an artificial lake to the east of Ma'alot Tarshiha, has become a local tourist attraction. It was previously known as the Hosen Reservoir. The lake is featured in the city's emblem. In January 2008, Ma'alot Tarshiha hosted the Israel International Chess Championship. The tournament, held at the community center, carried a prize of $20,000. The city has also hosted other international events, among them an international fencing tournament. The "Stone in the Galilee" International Sculpture Symposium has been held annually in Ma'alot Tarshiha since 1991. In this 10 day springtime event, sculptors from Israel and around the world convene at Montfort Lake to create stone sculptures from huge blocks of stone. In 2009, the non profit Docaviv established an annual documentary film festival in the city in an effort to bring "high quality cultural activity to the Israeli periphery."