View source for Al-Bassa

{{about|the Palestinian village|the town in Syria|Al-Bassah, Syria}}
{{pp-extended|small=yes}}
{{Infobox settlement
| name                    = Al-Bassa
| native_name             = البصة
| native_name_lang        = ar
| other_name              =
| settlement_type         = 
<!-- images, nickname, motto -->
| image_skyline           = File:Bassa church.jpg
| image_caption           = 
<!-- maps and coordinates -->
| pushpin_map             = Mandatory Palestine | pushpin_map_caption     = Location within [[Mandatory Palestine]] | image_map               = {{Historical map series|default=2|date1=1870s|date2=1940s|date3=modern|date4=1940s with modern overlay|width=225|name=al-Bassa}} | map_caption             = A series of historical maps of the area around Al-Bassa (click the buttons)
| pushpin_mapsize         = 200
| coordinates             = {{coord|33|04|39|N|35|08|39|E|type:city_region:PS|display=inline,title}}
| grid_name               = [[Palestine grid|Palestine&nbsp;grid]]
| grid_position           = 164/276
<!-- location -->
| subdivision_type        = [[Geopolitical entity]]
| subdivision_name        = [[Mandatory Palestine]]
| subdivision_type1       = [[Districts of Mandatory Palestine|Subdistrict]]
| subdivision_name1       = [[Acre Subdistrict, Mandatory Palestine|Acre]]
<!-- established -->
| established_title1      = Date of depopulation
| established_date1       = 14 May 1948<ref>Morris, 2004,  p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=uM_kFX6edX8C&pg=PR17 xvii], village #78. Also gives cause(s) of depopulation.</ref>
| established_title2      = Repopulated dates
<!-- area -->
| unit_pref               = dunam
| area_total_km2          = 25.2
| area_total_dunam        = 25,258
<!-- population -->
| population_as_of        = 1945
| population_total        = 2,950<ref name=1945p4>Department of Statistics, 1945, p. [http://users.cecs.anu.edu.au/~bdm/yabber/census/VSpages/VS1945_p04.jpg   4]</ref><ref name=Hadawi40>Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi,  1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20I/Acre/Page-040.jpg  40] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180915151708/http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20I/Acre/Page-040.jpg |date=2018-09-15 }}</ref>
<!-- blank fields (section 1) -->
| blank_name_sec1         = Cause(s) of depopulation
| blank_info_sec1         = Expulsion by [[Yishuv]] forces
| blank1_name_sec1        = Secondary cause
| blank1_info_sec1        = Military assault by [[Yishuv]] forces
| blank3_name_sec1        = Current Localities
| blank3_info_sec1        = [[Betzet]],<ref name=Khalidipp89>Khalidi, 1992, pp. 8-9</ref> [[Rosh HaNikra (kibbutz)|Rosh HaNiqra]],<ref name=Khalidipp89/> [[Shlomi, Israel|Shlomi]],<ref name=Khalidipp89/><ref>Morris, 2004,  p.  [https://books.google.com/books?id=uM_kFX6edX8C&pg=PR22 xxii], settlement #153, in 1949-50.</ref> [[Liman, Israel|Tzahal]],<ref name=Khalidipp89/><ref>Morris, 2004,  p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=uM_kFX6edX8C&pg=PR22 xxii], settlement #184, in 1949.</ref> [[Matzuva]]<ref name=Khalidipp89/>
}}

'''al-Bassa''' ({{langx|ar|البصة}}) was a [[Palestinians|Palestinian Arab]] village in the [[Mandatory Palestine]]'s [[Acre Subdistrict, Mandatory Palestine|Acre Subdistrict]]. It was situated close to the [[Blue Line (Lebanon)|Lebanese border]], {{convert|19|km|mi|sp=us}} north of the district capital, [[Acre (city)|Acre]], and {{convert|65|m|ft|sp=us}} above sea level.

During the [[1948 Palestine War]] the village was stormed by [[Haganah]] troops in May 1948 and almost completely razed. Its residents were either [[internally displaced Palestinians|internally displaced]] or expelled to neighboring countries as part of the [[1948 Palestinian expulsion]].<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Bardi|first1=Ariel Sophia|title=The "Architectural Cleansing" of Palestine|journal=American Anthropologist|date=March 2016|volume=118|issue=1|pages=165–171|doi=10.1111/aman.12520}}</ref> Today, the ruins of the village are in the northern quarters of the town of [[Shlomi, Israel|Shlomi]].<ref name="antiquities.org.il">{{cite web | title= El Bassah|website=antiquities.org.il | url=https://www.antiquities.org.il/survey/new/default_en.aspx?pid=13873 | access-date=2022-12-27}}</ref>

==Etymology==
[[Adolf Neubauer]] "proposed to identify this place with the [[Bezet|Batzet]] of the [[Talmud]]".<ref>Neubauer, 1868, p [https://archive.org/stream/lagographiedutal00neub#page/22/mode/1up  22]. References: ''Tos. [[Shevi'it (Talmud)|Shebiit]]'' 4:9, ''Yer. [[Demai (tractate)|Demai]]'' 2:1 (Heb. 8b). See also Grootkerk, 2000, pp. 2–3 and Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p. [https://archive.org/stream/surveyofwesternp01conduoft#page/167/mode/1up 167]</ref> It was called ''Bezeth'' during the [[Roman Empire|Roman]] period, and its Arabic name is ''al-Basah''.<ref name=YonahKhalidi>[[Michael Avi-Yonah|Avi Yonah]], 1976, p. 42. Cited in Khalidi, 1992, p. 6</ref><ref name=Pringlep116/> In the period of [[Crusades|Crusader]] rule in Palestine, it was known as ''Le Bace'' or ''LeBassa''.<ref name=Pringlep116>Pringle, 1997, p.  [https://books.google.com/books?id=-_NbE5obqRMC&pg=PA116  116]</ref> [[Imad ad-Din al-Isfahani]] (d. 1201), a chronicler and advisor to [[Saladin]], referred to the village as ''Ayn al-Bassa'',<ref name=Khalidip6>Khalidi, 1992, p. 6.</ref> '' 'Ayn'' meaning 'spring' in Arabic.

==History==
The site shows signs of habitation in prehistory and the Middle [[Bronze Age]].<ref name=Grootkerkp3/>

An ancient Christian burial place and 18 other archaeological sites were located in the village.

===Roman and Byzantine empires ===
A Jewish settlement stood at the site between 70 and 425 CE.<ref name=Grootkerkp3>Grootkerk, 2000, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=J7UzjipP3l8C&pg=PA3  3]</ref> Blown glass pitchers uncovered in a tomb in al-Bassa were dated to circa 396 CE.<ref name=Whitehousep182>Whitehouse and Corning Museum of Glass, 2002, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=WZVbEO6Y9nAC&pg=PA182   182]</ref>

''The Survey of Western Palestine'', sponsored by the [[Palestine Exploration Fund]], identified al-Bassa as, "probably a Crusading village"; however, archaeological excavations only uncovered architectural evidence of an ecclesiastical farm in operation there between the 5th to 8th centuries.<ref name=Pringlep116/>

===Crusader period===
Although pottery sherds found by archaeologists indicate continuous habitation throughout the Middle Ages, no Crusader-period architectural remains were discovered yet as of 1997.<ref name=Pringlep116/> A capital decorated with a cross once dated to the Crusader period was later re-dated to the [[Timeline of the Palestine region#Byzantine period|Byzantine period]].<ref name=Pringlep116/>

The site was used in 1189 C.E. as a Crusader encampment during a military campaign,<ref>[[Abu Shama]], RHC Or, IV, p. [https://archive.org/stream/recueildeshistor04acad_0#page/406/mode/1up 406]. Cited in Petersen, 2001, p. [https://www.academia.edu/21619490/Gazetteer_3._A-C 111] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190324182652/https://www.academia.edu/21619490/Gazetteer_3._A-C |date=2019-03-24 }}</ref> and a document dated October 1200 recorded the sale of the village by King [[Amalric II of Jerusalem]] to the [[Teutonic Order]].<ref>Strehlke, 1869,  pp. [https://archive.org/stream/tabulaeordinist00stregoog#page/n46/mode/1up 30]-31, No.38. Cited in Petersen, 2001, p. [https://www.academia.edu/21619490/Gazetteer_3._A-C 111] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190324182652/https://www.academia.edu/21619490/Gazetteer_3._A-C |date=2019-03-24 }} and in Ellenblum, 2003, pp.  [https://books.google.com/books?id=riHMZiH_Te4C&pg=PA59  59], [https://books.google.com/books?id=riHMZiH_Te4C&pg=PA146 146]</ref> A-Bassa was the first village listed as part of the domain of the Crusaders during the [[hudna]] (Islamic ceasefire) between the [[Kingdom of Jerusalem#The Kingdom of Acre|Crusaders based in Acre]] and the [[Mamluk Egypt|Mamluk]] sultan al-Mansur ([[Qalawun]]) in 1283.<ref>{{cite journal |author= Barag, Dan |title= A new source concerning the ultimate borders of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem |journal=[[Israel Exploration Journal]] |volume= 29 |year= 1979 |pages= 197–217}}</ref>

===Ottoman Empire===
In 1596, al-Bassa was part of the [[Ottoman Empire]], a village in the ''[[nahiya]]'' (subdistrict) of [[Tibnin]] under the [[Safad Sanjak]], with a population of 76 [[Muslim]] families and 28 Muslim bachelors. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including [[wheat]] [[olive]]s, [[barley]], [[cotton]] and fruits, as well as on goats, beehives and pasture land; a total of 7,000 [[Akçe]].<ref>Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 181.</ref>

In the 18th century, al-Bassa became a zone of contention between [[Zahir al-Umar]] and the chiefs of [[Jabal Amil]] under Sheikh [[Nasif al-Nassar]], while under his successor, [[Jezzar Pasha]], al-Bassa was made the administrative center of the ''[[nahiya]]'' in around 1770.<ref>Cohen, 1973, p 124. Cited in Khalidi, 1992, p.6</ref> In 1799, [[Napoleon Bonaparte]] described al-Bassa as a village of 600 [[Metawali]]s.<ref>Correspondance inédite officielle et confidentielle de Napoléon Bonaparte (Paris, 1819), vol. 4, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=cGsPAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA291 291]</ref> A map by [[Pierre Jacotin]] from [[French campaign in Egypt and Syria|Napoleon's invasion]] of that year showed the place, named as ''El Basa.''<ref>Karmon, 1960, p. [http://www.jchp.ucla.edu/Bibliography/Karmon,_Y_1960_Jacotin_Map_(IEJ_10).pdf 160] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191222063351/http://www.jchp.ucla.edu/Bibliography/Karmon,_Y_1960_Jacotin_Map_(IEJ_10).pdf |date=2019-12-22 }}.</ref>

The European explorer [[Charles William Meredith van de Velde|Van de Velde]] visited "el-Bussa" in 1851, and stayed with the [[sheikh]], Aisel Yusuf, writing that "The clean house of Sheck Yusuf is a welcome sight, and the verdant meadows around the village are truly refreshing to the eye".<ref>Van de Velde, 1854, vol 1, p. [https://archive.org/stream/narrativeajourn00veldgoog#page/n281/mode/1up  252]</ref> He further noted that "The inhabitants of Bussah are almost all members of the Greek Church. A few Musselmans live among them, and a few fellahs of a Bedouin tribe which wanders about in the neighborhood are frequently seen in the street."<ref>Van de Velde, 1854, vol 1, p. [https://archive.org/stream/narrativeajourn00veldgoog#page/n283/mode/1up 254]</ref>

In 1863, the village was visited by [[Henry Baker Tristram]] who described it as a Christian village, where "olive oil, goats´hair, and tobacco, seemed to be principal produce of the district; the latter being exported in some quantities, by way of Acre, to Egypt. Bee-keeping, also, is not an unimportant item of industry, and every house possesses a pile of bee-hives in its yard."
{{hidden begin |title = Quote from Tristram, 1863 |titlestyle = background:lightgrey; text-align:center; }}
{{Cquote|''The houses, excepting the very poorest, seem all alike. Each had a courtyard, with a high wall, for the goats, camels, firewood, and bees. At the end of the yard stands the mud-built house, with a single door opening into its one room. A pillar and two arches run across it, and support the flat roof. The door opens into the stable portion [...] where horses and camels are standing before the manger of dried mud. Stepping up from this, the visitor finds himself at once in the simple dwelling-room of the family. A large matting of flattened rush generally covers one half, and a few cushions are spread in the corner, near the unglazed window. At the further end there are mud stairs leading up to the roof, the summer bedchamber of the family. Furniture there is none, except the few cooking utensils hanging on wooden pegs, a hole in the centre of the floor for holding the fire, with a few loose iron rods across the top, and the quaint wooden cradles of the babies, apparently hereditary heirlooms. In the better houses, there is a mat screen across the platform, behind which sleep the single women and girls. [...] On the top of every house is a wattled booth of oleander boughs, sometimes of two stories, with a wicker-work floor, in which the inhabitants sleep during the hot weather [...] The tough and tenacious leaves of the oleander never shrivel or fall off, and form an effectual shade for many weeks.[...]''|40px|40px|Henry Baker Tristram<ref>Trisdam, 1865, pp.[https://archive.org/stream/landisraelajour01trisgoog#page/n133/mode/1up   85]- [https://archive.org/stream/landisraelajour01trisgoog#page/n134/mode/1up  86]</ref>}}
{{hidden end}}

[[Image:Abandoned Arab house in Bassa.jpg|thumb|El Khouri mansion, 2008]]

In the late 19th century, the village of Al-Bassa was described as being built of stone, situated on the edge of a plain, surrounded by large groves of [[olive]]s and gardens of [[pomegranate]], [[ficus|fig]]s and [[apple]]s. The village had about 1,050 residents.<ref>Conder and Kitchener, 1881, p. [https://archive.org/stream/surveyofwesternp01conduoft#page/145/mode/1up 145]. Also quoted in Khalidi, 1992, p. 8</ref>

The village had a public elementary school for boys (built by the Ottomans in 1882), a private secondary school, and a public elementary school for girls.<ref name=Hassounp26>Hassoun, 2003, p. 26.</ref>

A population list from about 1887 showed that ''el Basseh'' had 1,960 inhabitants; one third Muslim, and two thirds Greek Catholic Christians.<ref>Schumacher, 1888, p. [https://archive.org/stream/quarterlystateme19pale#page/n198/mode/1up 173]</ref>

===British Mandate===
{{Further|Mandatory Palestine}}
The [[Paulet–Newcombe Agreement|Franco-British boundary agreement]] of 1920 described an imprecisely defined boundary between Lebanon and Palestine. It appeared to pass close to the north of al-Bassa, leaving the village on the Palestinian side but cut off from much of its lands.<ref name=Biger>{{cite book |author= Gideon Biger |title= The Boundaries of Modern Palestine, 1840-1947 |url= https://archive.org/details/boundariesmodern00bige |url-access= limited |publisher= RoutledgeCurzon |location= London and New York |year= 2004 |page=[https://archive.org/details/boundariesmodern00bige/page/n147 137] |isbn= 0-7146-5654-2}}</ref> However the French government included al-Bassa in a Lebanese census of 1921 and granted citizenship to its residents.<ref name=Kaufman>{{cite journal |author= Kaufman, Asher |title= Between Palestine and Lebanon: Seven Shi'i villages as a case study of boundaries, identities and conflict |journal= The Middle East Journal |volume= 60 |year= 2006 |issue= 4 |pages= 685–706 |doi= 10.3751/60.4.13}}</ref> Meanwhile, a joint British-French boundary commission was working to determine a precise border, making many adjustments in the process. By February 1922 it had determined a border that confirmed al-Bassa as being in Palestine. This became official in 1923.<ref name=Biger/><ref name=Kaufman/> In 1922, the people of al-Bassa founded a local council which was responsible for managing its local affairs.<ref name=Hassounp26/> The citizenship of the residents was changed to Palestinian in 1926.<ref name=Kaufman/>

The [[1922 census of Palestine|British census of September 1922]] listed a population of 867 Christians, 366 "Mohammedans", 150 [[Metawileh]]s, and 1 Jew.<ref name="census1922">Barron, 1923, Table XI,  Sub-district of Acre, p. [https://archive.org/stream/PalestineCensus1922/Palestine%20Census%20%281922%29#page/n38/mode/1up  36]</ref> The Christians were listed as [[Melkite Greek Catholic Church|Greek Catholic (Melchite)]] (721), Orthodox (120), [[Church of England]] (17), [[Armenian Catholic Church|Armenian Catholic]] (8), and one [[Roman Catholic]].<ref name="census1922"/> Asher Kaufman described the village as being "split between [[Sunni]]s and [[Greek catholicism|Greek Catholics]]".<ref name=Kaufman/> At the [[1931 census of Palestine|1931 census]], which did not distinguish [[Metawali]]s from other Muslims, the village had 868 Muslims, 1076 Christians, and 4 Bahais.<ref>Mills, 1932, p. [https://archive.org/details/CensusOfPalestine1931.PopulationOfVillagesTownsAndAdministrativeAreas 99]</ref>

The 1938 camp of Jewish labourers and [[Notrim]] (police) for construction of [[Tegart's wall]] was located adjacent to the village, and it ultimately became the site of a [[Tegart fort]]. By 1945 the village was home to a regional college.

The village's main economic activity was olive picking.{{citation needed|date=September 2024}} Important public structures at the time of its existence included two mosques, two churches, three schools and 18 other shrines both holy to Muslims and Christians. Al-Bassa was the only Palestinian village in the [[Galilee]] with a Christian high school.<ref name=Mansourp220>Mansour, 2004, p. 220.</ref> Some of Bassa's former public structures have been preserved and are found today within the Israeli localities of [[Shlomi, Israel|Shlomi]] and [[Betzet]].

====Arab Revolt and 1938 massacre====
{{Main|1938 al-Bassa Massacre}}
On 7 September 1938 a massacre of [[Palestinian Arab]]s was perpetrated by the [[British Army]] in the village. The massacre was committed as a part of British efforts to suppress the [[1936-1939 Arab Revolt in Palestine]], and was conducted by a company of the [[Royal Ulster Rifles]] (RUR) and a detachment of the [[11th Hussars]]. The village was razed and about 50 Arabs from the village were collected by the RUR and some attached [[Royal Engineers]]. Some who tried to run away were shot. Then, according to British testimony, the remainder were put onto a bus which was forced to drive over a land mine laid by the soldiers, destroying the bus and killing many of the occupants. The village's inhabitants were then forced to dig a pit and throw all the remnants of the maimed bodies into it. Arab accounts reported torture and other brutality. At least 20 Palestinians were killed in the attack.<ref>Matthew Hughes, The Banality of Brutality: British Armed Forces and the Repression of the Arab Revolt in Palestine, 1936–39, The English Historical Review, Volume CXXIV, Issue 507, April 2009, Pages 313–354, https://doi.org/10.1093/ehr/cep002</ref>

The village of al-Bassa was targeted as a punitive reprisal operation after four Royal Ulster Rifles soldiers were killed and two seriously wounded by a landmine on September 6. Professor Mark McGovern of [[Edge Hill University]] states that the attack on al-Bassa was part of a pattern of British [[counterinsurgency]] tactics:<ref>Mark McGovern, ''The 1938 al-Bassa Massacre and the Royal Ulster Rifles'', Sept 7 2015, https://www.patfinucanecentre.org/legacy-colonialism/1938-al-bassa-massacre-and-royal-ulster-rifles</ref>

<blockquote>"Nor was the massacre at al-Bassa an isolated incident. Rather, it was part of a much wider policy of ‘reprisals’ that marked the British Mandate’s repression of the [[1936-1939 Arab Revolt in Palestine|Arab Revolt]]. As conflict escalated this official reprisals policy saw houses blown up, or groups of houses demolished, property looted, food stores systematically destroyed, forced labour, ‘punitive village occupations’, the imposition of crushing collective fines and wholesale destruction of ‘bad villages’. Torture centres were set up and many Arab prisoners shot ‘while trying to escape’. ‘[[Special Night Squads]]’, consisting of British and Jewish settler policemen and moving at night (often disguised as Arabs) terrorised Arab villages, humiliating and killing Arab civilians."</blockquote>

In 2022, a Nablus businessman, [[Munib al-Masri]] (88) who was shot by British troops in 1944, after an independent review of documentation by two international legal scholars, [[Luis Moreno Ocampo]] and [[Ben Emmerson]], stated that he would present the British government with a 300 page dossier on this and other incidents, seeking accountability and a formal apology for abuses during the period of the British mandate.<ref name="Apology">[https://web.archive.org/web/20221006232908/https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-63145992 'UK apology sought for British war crimes in Palestine'].{{Dead link|date=August 2023|bot=InternetArchiveBot|fix-attempted=yes}} [[BBC News]] 7 September 2022-</ref>

====1940s====
[[File:Bassa church back.jpg|right|thumb|The church in al-Bassa in 2008]]

Al-Bassa was one of the largest, most developed villages in the north of the country, covering a land area of some 20,000 dunams of hills and plains, 2,000 of which were irrigated. A regional commercial center, it contained over sixty shops and eleven coffeehouses, a few of which sat along the [[Haifa]]-[[Beirut]] highway. The active village council had paved roads, installed a system of running water, and oversaw the convening of a wholesale produce market there every Sunday. An agricultural cooperative in the village counted over 150 members that promoted agricultural development, while also providing loans to local farmers. The population of about 4,000 was divided almost evenly between Muslims and Christians. Among the village institutions were a government run elementary school, a "National High School", a [[Greek Orthodox]] church, a Catholic church, and a mosque.<ref name=Benvenistip139/> The village was situated in the territory allotted to the Arab state under the [[1947 UN Partition Plan]].

In the [[Village Statistics, 1945|1945 statistics]], the population had grown to 2,950; 1360 Muslims and 1590 Christians,<ref name=1945p4/><ref>[http://domino.un.org/pdfs/AAC25ComTech7Add1.pdf Government of Palestine, Village Statistics, 1945] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120609143136/http://domino.un.org/pdfs/AAC25ComTech7Add1.pdf |date=2012-06-09 }}, p. 2</ref> with {{Convert|25258|dunum|acre|lk=on}} of land according to an official land and population survey.<ref name=Hadawi40/> Of this, Arabs used 614 dunams for citrus and bananas, 14,699 dunams were plantations and irrigable land; 10,437 were used for cereals,<ref>Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in  Hadawi,  1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20II/Acre/Page-080.jpg 80] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180915151706/http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20II/Acre/Page-080.jpg |date=2018-09-15 }}</ref> while 132 dunams were built-up (urban) land.<ref name=Hadawi130>Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics. ''Village Statistics, April, 1945.'' Quoted in Hadawi, 1970, p. [http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20III/Acre/Page-130.jpg  130] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180915151707/http://www.palestineremembered.com/download/VillageStatistics/Table%20III/Acre/Page-130.jpg |date=2018-09-15 }}</ref>

===1948 Palestine war===
{{Further|1948 Palestine war|1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight}}

{{Nakba}}

Al-Bassa was captured by paramilitary [[Haganah]] forces during the [[1948 Arab–Israeli War]], in [[Operation Ben-Ami]], on May 14, 1948. Al-Bassa's defenders were local militia men. Following its capture, the Haganah's [[Palmach]] forces concentrated the villagers in the local church where they shot and killed a number of youths before chasing the villagers out.<ref name=Quigleyp62>Quigley, 2005, p. 62.</ref>{{refn|Saleh Abdel Jawad, 2007, ''Zionist Massacres: the Creation of the Palestinian Refugee Problem in the 1948 War''. "14 May 1948: Bassa (Acre area, Western Galilee): Indiscriminate killings occur. The Haganah rounds up fleeing civilians in the Greek Orthodox Church and kills at least five people inside the church. A larger group, which includes the young Salim Darweish and his sister Elaine, is taken outside the church and those present are killed. At least 14 are killed."}} One witness to the expulsion said that it was preceded by soldiers shooting and killing five villagers inside the church, while another said seven villagers were shot and killed by soldiers outside the church.<ref name=Benvenistip139>Benvenisti, 2000, pp. [https://archive.org/details/sacredlandscapeb00benvrich/page/139 139] -[https://archive.org/details/sacredlandscapeb00benvrich/page/140  140].</ref>

Al-Bassa's residents were expelled as part of the [[1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight]], and the village was completely destroyed by the Israelis with the exception of a few houses, a church, and a Muslim shrine.

At least 60 of the Christian villagers of Al-Bassa were taken by the Haganah to [[Mazra'a]], where they remained for more than a year.<ref name=Abassi>{{cite journal|last=Abassi|first=Mustafa|author2=Henry Near|title=The General and the Village: The 1948 War and its Aftermath seen from the Sidelines|journal=Israel Affairs|date=January 2007|volume=13|issue=1|pages=24–54|doi=10.1080/13537120601063283|s2cid=144019162}}</ref> Altogether 81 residents of al-Bassa became Israeli citizens as [[internally displaced Palestinians]] who lost their land rights and ended up in places like [[Nazareth]].<ref name=Hassounp26/><ref name=Arrej>[[Areej Sabbagh-Khoury]], The Internally displaced refugees.<!--lost the source, anyone help?--></ref><ref name=Masalhap217>Masalha and Said, 2005, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=xYWNCX-eYRcC&pg=PA217 217]</ref> The only day on which Palestinians did not require a permit to travel during that period was [[Yom Ha'atzmaut|Israel's Independence Day]].<ref name=Masalhap217/> On this day internally displaced Palestinians would visit their former villages.<ref name=Masalhap217/> Wakim Wakim, an attorney from Al-Bassa and a leading member of the [[Association for the Defense of the Rights of the Internally Displaced]] explains: "The day when Israel celebrates is the day we mourn."<ref name=Masalhap217/>

Most of the former villagers of al-Bassa (circa 95%) were pushed north towards [[Lebanon]], concentrating in the [[Dbayeh]] refugee camp near [[Jounieh]] east of [[Beirut]].<ref name=Hassounp26/> Prior to and during the [[Lebanese Civil War]], this camp suffered severe damage in the fighting and was largely destroyed, though it still has a population of some 4,233 people who are mostly [[Palestinian Christian]] refugees.<ref name=Hassounp26/> Other former residents of Al-Bassa and the refugee camp in Lebanon ended up in [[Lansing, Michigan]] where they established an international village club and hold annual gatherings attended by over 300 people.<ref name=Hassounp26/>

[[File:Al Bassa (Palestinian town in Israel) in 1950 after its depopulation, and subsequent repopulation with Israeli immigrants.jpg|thumb|left|Al Bassa in 1950 after its depopulation, and subsequent repopulation with Israeli immigrants. According to Aron Shai, the picture shows "New immigrants on the way home from school in [[Betzet]] (formerly al-Bassa) near the Lebanese border"]]

The site was repopulated by Jewish immigrants and renamed as [[Betzet]] in 1951, and is today a part of the [[State of Israel]].<ref>{{cite book|title=All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_By7AAAAIAAJ |first1=Walid|last1=Khalidi|authorlink=Walid Khalidi|year=1992|location=[[Washington D.C.]]|publisher=[[Institute for Palestine Studies]]|isbn=0-88728-224-5|id={{ISBN|0-88728-224-5}}|pages=8–9}}</ref>

The village was inspected in 1992, when it was found that although most of the houses of Al-Bassa had been destroyed, a number of historic buildings survived, including two churches, a mosque, and a maqam.<ref name=Petersen111>Petersen, 2001, p. https://www.academia.edu/21619490/Gazetteer_3._A-C {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190324182652/https://www.academia.edu/21619490/Gazetteer_3._A-C |date=2019-03-24 }} 111</ref>

==Landmarks==
===Mosque===
According to Petersen, the mosque appears to be a relatively modern construct, probably built in the early 1900s. It consists of a tall square room with a flat roof supported by iron girders. There is a cylindrical [[minaret]] at the north-east corner. There are tall pointed windows on all four sides, and a [[mihrab]] in the middle of the south wall. At the time of the inspection, 1992, the building was used as a sheep pen.<ref name=Petersen111/>

===Maqam===
[[File:Bassa sheikh tomb.jpg|right|thumb|The maqam in 2008]]

The [[maqam (shrine)|maqam]] is located about 20 meters east of the mosque. It consists of two parts: a walled courtyard, and a [[dome]]d prayer room. In the courtyard there is a [[mihrab]] in the south wall, and a doorway in the east wall leads into the main prayer room. [[Pendentive]]s springing from four thick piers support wide arches and the dome. In the middle of the south wall there is a mihrab, next to a simple [[minbar]], made of four stone steps.<ref name=Petersen111/>

==={{anchor|Khirbet Ma'sub}}Khirbet Ma'sub===
The site of Khirbet Ma'sub, immediately to the east of Bassa, is where the Phoenician [[Ma'sub inscription]] was found in the 1880s.

==Culture==
Henry Baker Tristram during his 1863 visit to the village made a detailed description of the women's [[Palestinian costumes]].
{{hidden begin
|title = Quote from Tristram, 1863
|titlestyle = background:lightgrey; text-align:center;
}}
{{Cquote|''[The women´s] dress was unlike any costume we had yet seen; consisting of rather tight blue cotton trousers tied at the ankle, slippers without stockings, a chemise of cotton, blue or white, rather open in front, and over this a long dress, like a cassock, open in front, with a girdle and short sleeves. This robe was plain, patched, or embroidered in the most fantastic and grotesque shapes, the triumph of El Bussah milliners being evidently to bring together in contrast as many colours as possible. The head-dress ...baffles my powers of description, but is very description, but is very interesting, as probably identical with that of the women of Galilee of old. [Such may Mary have worn, as she daily went to the well of Nazareth.] It is called the semadi, and consists of a cloth skull-cap, with a flap behind, all covered with coins -silver, but sometimes gold -and a fringe of coins suspended from it on the forehead. Round the face, from chin to crown, are two stout pads, by way of bonnet-cap, fastened at the top. But outside of these pads is attached a string of silver, not lengthwise, but solidly piled one on another, and hammered severally into a saucer-shape, with a hole drilled through the middle. They usually commence with some half-dozen Spanish dollars at the chin, gradually tapering up to small Turkish silver-pieces of the size of sixpences at the forehead. The weight is no trifle, and one little girl, whose head-gear was handed to me for examination in return for a present of needles, had £30 worth of silver round her cheeks. Many had frontlets of gold coins, and I saw one centre-piece on the fore-head of a sheikh's wife consisting of a Turkish £5 gold piece. All the young ladies thus carry their fortunes on their heads; and this jewelry is the peculium of the wife, and cannot be touched by her husband. An instance in which a Greek priest had insisted on the payment of his fees out of the head-dress of a widow has been recited to me as a case of grievous extortion.''|40px|40px|Henry Baker Tristram<ref>Tristram, 1865, pp. [https://archive.org/stream/landisraelajour01trisgoog#page/n116/mode/1up 68]-[https://archive.org/stream/landisraelajour01trisgoog#page/n117/mode/1up  69]</ref>}}
{{hidden end}}

Weir, after quoting what Tristram wrote about the head-dresses in Al-Bussah, notes that coin headdresses went out of use for daily wear in Galilee at the beginning of the 20th century, but continued to be worn by brides for their weddings.<ref>Weir, 1989, pp.175-176</ref>

==See also==
*[[Depopulated Palestinian locations in Israel]]

==References==
{{reflist|25em}}

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{{refend}}

==External links and references==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20100220023323/http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/al-Bassa/index.html Welcome to al-Bassa]
*[http://www.zochrot.org/en/village/49033 al-Bassa], [[Zochrot]]
*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 3: [http://www.iaa-archives.org.il/zoom/zoom.aspx?folder_id=93&type_id=6&id=8366  IAA], [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Survey_of_Western_Palestine_1880.03.jpg Wikimedia commons] 
*[http://www.alnakba.org/villages/acre/albassa.htm Al-Bassa] at [[Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center]]
*{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20140901141326/http://jalili48.com/pub/xENShowGallery.aspx?Sub=What_Remained_of_the_destroyed&Sub2=Al-Bassah  Al-Bassah]}} Dr. Moslih Kanaaneh
*[https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.albassa.com/   Al-Bassa International Association] - an "international forum" for former residents of al-Bassa.

{{Palestinian Arab villages depopulated during the 1948 Palestine War}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bassa, Al-}}
[[Category:1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine]]
[[Category:Former populated places in Israel]]
[[Category:Arab villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War]]
[[Category:District of Acre]]
[[Category:Massacres committed by the United Kingdom]]