Tel Rumeida
Tel Rumeida ', also known as Jabla al-Rahama and Tel Hebron' is an archaeological, agricultural and residential area in the West Bank city of Hebron. Within it, lies a tell whose remains go back to the Chalcolithic period, and is thought to constitute the Canaanite, Israelite and Edomite settlements of Hebron mentioned in the Hebrew Bible and Second Temple period literature.
While most of the site's area is used as an agricultural land, it is also the location of a Palestinian neighbourhood and an Israeli settlement. The international community considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank illegal under international law, but the Israeli government disputes this.
Topological description
Tel Rumeida is an agricultural and residential location on a slope to the west of Hebron's old quarter, running down east from Jebel Rumeida. On the east there is a spring, 'Ain Judēde. It lies at the edge of the administrative H2 zone and extends into a Palestinian quarter. Several Palestinian homes lie on the tel's apex, a further cluster lies north, and to the east by Ein Jadide. Lower down, to the north-east, are three parallel thick-walled vaults called es-Sakawati, and slightly further east the tomb of Sheikh al-Mujahid/Abu es-Sakawati.Much of the land is owned or worked by several Palestinian families, among them the Natshe and Abu Haikals. Three lots of land are regarded as in Jewish ownership, having been purchased in the 19th century by the old Jewish Hebronite community: 2, lots 52 and 53, to the north, and one the south side. The Jewish settlement is called Jesse's Lands. Er-Rumeidy, a Jewish Karaite cemetery containing around 500 tombs, is located to the north-west.
Archaeology
Tel Rumeida is the site of the ancient city of Hebron. Denys Pringle suggests that the site excavated east of the hilltop mosque represents the old Kiryat Arba described by the Dominican pilgrim Burchard of Mount Sion in 1293 as "vetus civitas quondam Cariatharbe dicta". The occupational sequence of the settlement is very similar to Jerusalem's.Chalcolithic
The settlement dates back to at least the Chalcolithic period, c. 3500 BCE.Bronze Age
Early Bronze III
During the Early Bronze III the settlement expanded, with a fortified area extending over 30 dunams. This settlement was subsequently abandoned.Middle Bronze
It was reoccupied and rebuilt in the Middle Bronze I–II periods, and girded by cyclopean walls built with stones measuring by.A cuneiform economic text, with 4 personal names and a list of animals, unearthed at the site and dated 17–16 century BCE indicates Tel Rumeida/Hebron was composed of a multicultural pastoral society of Hurrians and Amorites, run by an independent administrative system with its palace scribes perhaps under kingly rule.
Late Bronze
The Late Bronze Age levels have yielded signs of a settlement, including pottery, domestic structures and a scarab of Ramesses II, while the previous Middle Bronze city wall was still in use. According to Jericke, neither Tel Rumeida nor the surrounding Hebron area show signs of a major settlement at this time, throughout this period, when the centre of the region was located in biblical Debir/Khirbet Rabud. Chadwick, however, argues that archaeological findings indicate that Tel Rumeida was a thriving city throughout the Late Bronze period.Iron Age
Iron I
Tel Rumeida was also settled during Iron Age I and IIA, with structures attesting to a walled settlement in the transition from LBA to IA1. Ofer infers on the basis of some material excavated to the north that this was a "Golden Age for Hebron", characterized by intensive settlement. This Iron I city may have been destroyed by Sheshonq I during his campaign in the late-10th century BCE.Iron II
Findings attest to a third phase of settlement from the Iron Age IIA, when Hebron formed part of the Kingdom of Judah, until its destruction during Sennacherib's campaign. Signs of this settlement above the EBIII and MBII fortified city are 8th-century BCE four-room houses, granaries and LMLK seal stamps "for the king, Hebron" on jar handles. Fragments of jars and burnished vessels may suggest that there was a small-scale occupation. Some Bronze Age fortifications were enhanced in the Iron IIB period, possibly by King Hezekiah in anticipation of the Assyrian invasion. After the destruction of this city, a new Iron IIC settlement was established in the second half of the 7th century BCE.Babylonian and Persian periods
The last Israelite settlement at Tel Rumeida was destroyed in 586 BCE, and the town's population city became predominantly Edomite throughout the subsequent Babylonian and Persian periods.Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine periods
In 167 BCE, this Idumean settlement, attested during Hellenistic times was devastated by Judah Maccabee who wrecked its fortress walls, leaving only a gate tower. The Edomite survivors moved downhill to relocate in Machpelah, to remain the majority population of Hebron down to Roman times.During the 2014 excavations, Lot 53 yielded a large, Early Roman period large compound.
The Late Roman period sees a new settlement that survived into the Byzantine period, by which time the centre of the city moved from Tel Rumeida to what is now the Old City of Hebron.
Deir Al Arba'een
On the top of Tel Rumeida are the ruins of the Deir Al Arba'een complex which contains three distinct edifices, consisting of two ruins and a tomb complex. The PEF Survey of Palestine described it as "a modern Arabic work on older foundations". The Deir al-Arba'een was, according to Platt, probably built to fulfill two functions, that of a fortress and government building.One tomb is known as the Tomb of Jesse and Ruth, and another as the tomb the Tomb of as-Saqawātī.
Tomb of Jesse and Ruth
The Jewish settlers of Hebron, carrying on an earlier Hebronite Jewish tradition of reverence for the place, view Deir Al Arba'een as the ancient burial site of two biblical figures: Jesse, father of David, and Ruth the Moabite, David's great-grandmother. The tombs ascribed to Jesse and Ruth are visited frequented, especially during Shavuot, by Jews and converts to Judaism who come to pay homage for Ruth. Over time, the site has also functioned as a small informal prayer space, reflecting its role in contemporary religious practice alongside its traditional identification. Limited maintenance and minor improvements were carried out intermittently, though the site remained relatively undeveloped for much of the late 20th century. A Torah scroll placed inside it by settlers has been removed by the IDF, and the site was vandalized in 2007. Left-wing archaeological critics view the excavations on the site as pretexts for expanding the settlement—the City of David and Susya are compared—a form of 'annexation in the guise of archaeology'.The tomb of as-Saqawātī
Lower down the hill there are 3 parallel vaults in an olive grove, at the eastern end of which is a tomb called as-Saqawātī. It stands next to a mulberry tree bearing an Arabic inscription which refers to a certain Sayyid, or lineal descendant of Mohammad, by the name Muḥammad Ibn ‘Abdallah al-Ḥusayni, from whom a Hebronite clan, the Āl ash-Sharīf, claim descent, saying he was a Maghrebi Arab from the as-Sāqiyah al-Ḥamrā’, from which his nisba, or onomastic for place of descent, seen in the tomb's local name, Saqawātī, is derived. According to this narrative, the person arrived in Jerusalem with Saladin in 1187, taught at the Al-Aqsa Mosque and then settled in Hebron. Moshe Sharon suspects this story to be a fabrication by the clan. A local legend has it that the structure lies in the open because all roofs built over it would collapse. The site is still a place for prayers, especially in times of drought.Property claims
1807–1967
In 1807, Rabbi Haim Yeshua Hamitzri, a Sephardic Jewish immigrant from Egypt, purchased 5 dunams on the periphery of the Old City of Hebron, and, in 1811, signed two lease contracts for 800 dunams of land, among which were 4 plots at Tel Rumeida. The duration of the lease was 99 years. Since his descendant Haim Bajaio, the last Sephardic rabbi in the city, administered it after the Jews were evacuated from Hebron, it is believed that the lease must have been renewed. These properties were appropriated by the Jordanian government in 1948, and the Israeli government in 1967.Jewish claims since 1967
It is on the basis of the original lease taken out for 99 years by Haim Yeshua Hamitzri that the current Jewish settlers, none of whom is related to the original lessee, then asserted a claim to the land in Tel Rumeida, a claim dismissed by Haim Hanegbi, a founder of Matzpen, who argues that settlers in Hebron have no right to speak in the name of the old Jewish families of the city.The Israeli Supreme Court ruled in 2011 that Jews have no right to properties they possessed in places like Hebron and Tel Rumeida before 1948.
Arab claims
According to the Abu Heikal family, they rented the land from Jordanian government's Custodian of Enemy Property. After 1967, a new lease was signed with Israeli government's Custodian of Absentee Property. The Custodian refused to accept the Abu Heikal's rent payments in 1981, but, after an agreement was renegotiated in 2000, the back rent for 1981–2000 was reportedly paid up by the family, and fees were regularly accepted for the following 2 years, after which the land was declared a closed military zone, rent payments were rejected and the family was refused further access.The Abu Heikal's land is subject to increasing encroachment by settlers on the basis of an archaeological claim. Summer water delivery was secured by purchases frem the Hebron municipal water truck until frequent smashing of its windows by settlers forced the council to cancel the deliveries. Christian Peacemaker volunteers who tried to accompany the trucks were detained and received death threats.
In 2005, an Israeli settler company with Jordanian registration, Tal Construction & Investments LTD, took over a 0.75 acre property, whose owners, the Bakri family, had been forced to move out of during the Second Intifada. The company produced documents to the effect that it had legally purchased the property, for $300,000, from a certain Hani Naji al-Batash who in turn claimed he had bought the property from the original owners. A police investigation that year determined that al-Batash had no rights to the area, and that the documents used for the sale transaction were forged. The Bakri family appealed through various Israeli legal venues, with a court recognizing that they had proven they had never sold the contested property, a verdict confirmed by the Israeli Supreme Court in 2014. The company appealed claims rights from Ottoman law and compensation, but in 2019 all settler claims were rejected. The Jerusalem District court rejected an appeal by the construction company, which was ordered to pay the Palestinian owners 579,600 shekels in usage fees. On appeal the sum was reduced by 80,000 shekels due to the settlers' improvements, while it was ruled that the Bakri family be paid 15,000 shekels for expenses incurred. The settlers were evicted.