Kafr Zita

Kafr Zita (Arabic: كفر زيتا, romanized: Kafr Zaytā, also spelled Kfar Zita, Kafr Zayta, Kfar Zeita, Keferzita or Kafr Zeita) is a town in northern Syria, administratively part of the Hama Governorate, located 30 kilometers north of Hama.^[1] Nearby localities include Kafr Nabudah and al-Habit to the northwest, Khan Shaykhun to the northeast, Mork to the east, Suran to the southeast, al-Lataminah, Halfaya and Mahardah to the south, Tremseh to the southwest and Kirnaz and Hayalin. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics, Kafr Zita had a population of 17,052 in the 2004 census. It is also the center of a nahiyah ("subdistrict"), part of the Mhardeh District, that consists of seven localities with a combined population of 39,032 in 2004.^[2]

Kafr Zita كفر زيتا Kafr Zayta
Town
Kafr Zita, in 2013
Kafr Zita Location in Syria
Coordinates: 35°22′25″N 36°36′6″E
Country	Syria
Governorate	Hama
District	Mahardah
Subdistrict	Kafr Zita
Population  (2004)
• Total	17,052
Time zone	UTC+2 (EET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+3 (EEST)

Etymology

The first word of Kafr Zita, which is Kafr, is a Syriac word for "farm" or "village".^[3] The second word 'Zita' is another Syriac word which refers to olive oil.^[4] The village is known for cultivation of olives which is still until now one of the main crops of the village. Also pistachio became popular recently regarding to its better economic revenue.

History

The ruins of a church dating to the Byzantine period in the 5th-century and a mosque dating to the Umayyad period in the 7th-century are located in Kafr Zita.^[5]

In the late Ottoman era between the 18th-19th centuries, the residents of Kafr Zita, which at that time was one of the largest villages in the area north of the Orontes River, were regularly in arrears for tax payment and had to obtain financial assistance.^[6]

During the period of the French Mandate in Syria, Kafr Zita, like many of the surrounding localities, was organized as a collective farming village.^[7] In 1975 the nahiyahs ("subdistricts") of Kafr Zita and Mhardeh were joined together to form the mantiqah ("district") of Mhardeh, with the latter as capital.^[8]

On 16 December 2012, during the Syrian uprising against the government of Bashar al-Assad that began in early 2011, government forces combating rebels bombed Kafr Zita, leaving three children dead, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR).^[9] On 20 December rebels claimed to have captured Kafr Zita and a string of other nearby towns during an offensive against government forces in the vicinity of Hama.^[10] In September 2013, Abu Shafiq checkpoint (35.375°N 36.652°E / 35.375; 36.652) which is between Kafr Zita and Morek, was captured by rebels.^[11][12] However, on 22 September 2014, it was reported that the rebels targeted the checkpoint.^[13] By early January 2014, the town was controlled by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.^[14] However, later on, ISIL was removed from the town by the rebels.

On 20 August 2019, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the rebel and Islamic factions including jihadist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham had withdrawn from Kafr Zita in north Hama province.^[15]

Demographics

Kafr Zita's inhabitants are predominantly Sunni Muslim Mawalis. In the early 20th-century they, along with the inhabitants of nearby Suran, were still proud of their Mawali origins.^[16] The Mawali were non-Arab Muslim nomadic tribes who dominated the desert regions of northern Syria for centuries before being forced out to the vicinity of Hama and Aleppo in the 18th century by the Annizah, a Bedouin tribal confederation from the Najd region of the Arabian Peninsula.^[17]

See also

• 2014 Kafr Zita chemical attack

References

1. "Kfar Zita - Wikimapia". Wikimapia.
2. General Census of Population and Housing 2004. Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). Hama Governorate. (in Arabic)
3. Publishers, HarperCollins. "Appendix II - Semitic Roots". ahdictionary.com. Retrieved 2024-08-18.
4. "English to Assyrian Dictionary". One English Assyrian Dictionary.
5. Bulletin de la Société historique et archéologique de l'Orne. 63-71. (1945). p. 73. (in French)
6. Phillip, 1992, p. 274.
7. Comité de l'Asie française, 1933, p. 132.
8. Centre d'études et de recherches URBAMA (France), 1986, p. 463.
9. Camp residents flee Syria warplanes: NGO. Agence France Presse. 2012-12-17.
10. UN sees no prospect of end to Syria violence. Al-Jazeera English. 2012-12-20.
11. قتيلا للنظام وإعدامات ميدانية بحماة Aljazeera, 21/9/2013
12. فيق ريف حماه الشمالي Aljazeera, 21/9/2013
13. Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, 22/9/2014
14. Al Qaida fighters pushed from much of northern Syria, but fighting still rages The Sacramento Bee, 5 January 2014
15. "Fearing to fall in a complete siege, the factions and jihadi groups withdraw from Khan Shaykhun city and towns and villages south of it in the northern countryside of Hama". Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (in Arabic). 20 August 2019.
16. Comité de l'Asie française, 1933, p. 131.
17. Nelles Guide, 1999, p. 22.

Bibliography

• Comité de l'Asie française (1933). L'Asie française (in French). Vol. 33–34. Comité de l'Asie française.
• Nelles Guide (1999). Syria and Lebanon. Hunter Publishing, Inc. ISBN 3886181057.
• Phillip, Thomas (1992). The Syrian Land in the 18th and 19th Century: The Common and the Specific in the Historical Experience. F. Steiner. ISBN 3515056858.
• Centre d'études et de recherches URBAMA (France) (1986). Petites villes et villes moyennes dans le monde arabe (in French). Vol. 2. Université de Tours. ISBN 9782869060128.