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Balad al-Shaykh
Balad ash-Sheikh

Balad ash-Sheikh or Balad al-Shaykh is a former Palestinian town located just north of Mount Carmel, 7 kilometers southeast of Haifa. The town is named after Sheikh Abdullah as-Sahli, a renowned Sufi and the town contains a maqam dedicated to him....
, was an Arab village in Palestine
Palestine

Palestine is a name which has been widely used since Roman times to refer to the region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. It is derived from a name used already much earlier for a narrower geographical region, mainly along the coastal region....
, now part of the Israel
Israel

Israel officially the State of Israel , is a country in the Middle East located on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan in the east, and Egypt on the southwest, and contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area....
i town of Nesher
Nesher

Nesher is a city in the Haifa District in Israel. According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics , at the end of 2007 the city had a total population of 21,300....
 where a massacre was perpetrated on the night of December 31 to January 1, 1947. The Palmach
Palmach

The Palmach was the regular fighting force of the Haganah, the unofficial army of the Yishuv during the period of the British Mandate of Palestine....
, an arm of the Haganah
Haganah

Haganah was a Jewish paramilitary organization in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine from 1920 to 1948, which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces....
, attacked the town, firing from the slopes of Mount Carmel
Mount Carmel

Mount Carmel is a coastal mountain range in northern Israel stretching from the Mediterranean Sea towards the southeast. Archaeologists have discovered ancient wine and oil presses at various locations on Mt....
, in retribution for the killing of 39 Jews during the Haifa Oil Refinery massacre
Haifa Oil Refinery massacre

Haifa Oil Refinery massacre refers to an incident that took place on December 30, 1947. After operatives of the Zionism paramilitary, the Irgun, threw a number of grenades at a crowd of 100 Arab day labourers who had gathered outside the main gate of the United Kingdom-owned Haifa Oil refinery looking for work, 6 people were killed and 42 wou...
 the day before. The Jewish agency condemned the Irgun for the "act of madness" that preceded the killing of Jewish workers at the Haifa oil refinery but at the same time authorised the raid on Balad al-Shaykh.

Israeli historian Morris
Benny Morris

Benny Morris is a professor of history at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Be'er Sheva, Israel.Morris is identified with the loosely defined group of "New Historians"....
 writes:
The Haganah massively retaliated on the night of 31 December 1947 - 1 January 1948 raiding the villages of Balad al Sheikh and Hawassa, in which many of the refinery's workers lived.






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Balad al-Shaykh
Balad ash-Sheikh

Balad ash-Sheikh or Balad al-Shaykh is a former Palestinian town located just north of Mount Carmel, 7 kilometers southeast of Haifa. The town is named after Sheikh Abdullah as-Sahli, a renowned Sufi and the town contains a maqam dedicated to him....
, was an Arab village in Palestine
Palestine

Palestine is a name which has been widely used since Roman times to refer to the region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. It is derived from a name used already much earlier for a narrower geographical region, mainly along the coastal region....
, now part of the Israel
Israel

Israel officially the State of Israel , is a country in the Middle East located on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan in the east, and Egypt on the southwest, and contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area....
i town of Nesher
Nesher

Nesher is a city in the Haifa District in Israel. According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics , at the end of 2007 the city had a total population of 21,300....
 where a massacre was perpetrated on the night of December 31 to January 1, 1947. The Palmach
Palmach

The Palmach was the regular fighting force of the Haganah, the unofficial army of the Yishuv during the period of the British Mandate of Palestine....
, an arm of the Haganah
Haganah

Haganah was a Jewish paramilitary organization in what was then the British Mandate of Palestine from 1920 to 1948, which later became the core of the Israel Defense Forces....
, attacked the town, firing from the slopes of Mount Carmel
Mount Carmel

Mount Carmel is a coastal mountain range in northern Israel stretching from the Mediterranean Sea towards the southeast. Archaeologists have discovered ancient wine and oil presses at various locations on Mt....
, in retribution for the killing of 39 Jews during the Haifa Oil Refinery massacre
Haifa Oil Refinery massacre

Haifa Oil Refinery massacre refers to an incident that took place on December 30, 1947. After operatives of the Zionism paramilitary, the Irgun, threw a number of grenades at a crowd of 100 Arab day labourers who had gathered outside the main gate of the United Kingdom-owned Haifa Oil refinery looking for work, 6 people were killed and 42 wou...
 the day before. The Jewish agency condemned the Irgun for the "act of madness" that preceded the killing of Jewish workers at the Haifa oil refinery but at the same time authorised the raid on Balad al-Shaykh.

Israeli historian Morris
Benny Morris

Benny Morris is a professor of history at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Be'er Sheva, Israel.Morris is identified with the loosely defined group of "New Historians"....
 writes:
The Haganah massively retaliated on the night of 31 December 1947 - 1 January 1948 raiding the villages of Balad al Sheikh and Hawassa, in which many of the refinery's workers lived. The raiding unit's orders were to 'kill maximum adult males'. The raiders penetrated to the center of Balad al Sheikh, fired into and blew up houses, and pulled out adult males, and shot them. According to the HGS, 'the penetrating units... were forced to deviate from the line agreed upon and in a few cases hit women and children' after being fired upon from inside houses. The Haganah suffered two dead and two injured. Haganah reports put Arab casualties variously at 'about 70 killed', and 21 killed ('including two women and five children') and 41 injured. (Morris, 2004, p. 101).


A contemporary report in The Times refers to 17 Arab dead, including one woman, and thirty-three injured, among them eight women and nine children. The Jewish casualties were three dead and two injured.

During the same day twelve Jews and four Arabs were injured in several cases of bomb throwing and shooting in Haifa.

See also

  • List of massacres committed prior to the 1948 Arab-Israeli war


External links