Birya


Birya is an agricultural village in northern Israel. Located in the Upper Galilee near Safed, it falls under the jurisdiction of the Merom HaGalil Regional Council. In its population was. It was founded in 1946 on a site adjacent to the Palestinian town of Biriyya.

History

Antiquity

The town of Birya is mentioned in the Talmud.According to the Jewish National Fund,
Jews lived in Birya and environs in Talmudic times. The author of the Shulchan Aruch, Rabbi Joseph Caro is said to have completed one of his works at Birya.

Ottoman era

In 1908, Baron Rothschild purchased land in Birya for the farmers of Rosh Pina. A group of pioneers settled there in 1922 but when their efforts failed, the land was transferred to the Jewish National Fund and afforestation work began.

British Mandate era

In 1945, a group of pioneers affiliated with the Religious Kibbutz Movement settled at a site near Birya Fortress.
In February 1946, after an attack on an Arab Legion camp in the area, the British army searched the village and found arms on the land. All the kvutza members were arrested and the village was occupied by the British military. In response thousands of young Jews from all parts of the country re-established the settlement not far from the original site.
The British withdrew their troops two months later, although the villagers were not released until the following summer. In 1947, Birya had a population of 150.

State of Israel

Modern Birya was founded in 1971. Birya was one of the settlements hit by Katyusha rockets launched by Hezbollah during the Second Lebanon War in 2006. Efforts were made to resuscitate the forest on its outskirts, which suffered severe damage in the war.
The forests were planted by the Jewish National Fund in the 1940s with contributions from within Palestine, as well as the Mizrahi Organization of Great Britain, and the Mizrahi Women of Britain and America.