Hadera, courtesy, Wikipedia |
In the
Biblical period, the site of present day Hadera was part of the territory of
the Israelite tribe of western Menasheh. Since the Arab occupation in the 7th
century, the area slowly gave way to swampland, in which state in remained
until the Jews returned at the end of the 19th century. In 1883, Yehoshua
Hankin, acting on behalf of various Russian Jewish national societies from Latvia and Lithuania, purchased
6,500 acres of land from the owner, Selim Khuri, a Christian
effendi. The site was near the Arab settlement of El-Chuderah, south
of the ancient town Cæsarea, above the mouth of the Nahr el-Mefdshir, which flows into the Wâdi el-Chuderah (Hadera Stream). This
was the largest purchase of land in Israel up to that time. The first settlers –
ten families and four guards – came to the site on the holiday of Tu Bishvat,
1891, and lived in a building known as the Khan
near what is today Hadera's main synagogue. Baron
Rothschild's surveyor, Yitzhak Goldhar, claimed that Hadera was
founded on the site of the former town called Gedera of Caesarea, the ancient Gador as mentioned
in the Mishnah supplementary writing of the Tosefta Shevi'it, ch. 7. Archaeologist
Benjamin Mazar preferred to locate
Gador at Tel Gador on the coast south of Hadera’s Giv'at Olga neighborhood.
The first
settlers drained the vast malarial swamps and planted groves of citrus fruit and
fields of grain. Old tombstones in the local cemetery reveal that out of a
population of 540, 210 died of malaria. But the people persevered and by
the early twentieth century, Hadera had become the regional economic center. Beginning
in 1909, Hashomer guards kept watch over the
fields to prevent incursions by the neighboring Bedouin. In 1913, the settlement
included forty households, as well as fields and vineyards, stretching over
30,000 dunams. The village of Kfar Brandeis,
named after the chief justice of the US Supreme Court was established south of
Hadera in 1927 but became part of the city in the 50s.
Land
disputes in the area were resolved by the 1930s, and the population had grown
to 2,002 in 1931. The Hapoel Hadera
Football Club was founded during this time. This followed the founding of
the Maccabi Hadera Footbal Club established
in 1914. Free schooling was introduced in the city in 1937 in all schools apart
from those operated by the Histadrut labor union. Hadera's population increased
dramatically in 1948 as immigrants flocked to the country. Most of the
newcomers were from Europe, but 40 Yemenite families also settled there.
In 1952,
Hadera was declared a city, with jurisdiction over an area of 53,000 dunams.
The next year, Israel's first paper mill
opened. Financed by investors from Israel, United States, Brazil and Australia, the mill was designed to
meet all of Israel's paper needs.
Also during
the 50s, new neighborhoods were built, among them Givat Olga on the coast, and Beit Eliezer in the east. The Hillel Yaffe Medical Center had its
beginnings in 1957. It was named after a medical pioneer in Israel, who made Aliyah
from Ukraine in 1891. Hadera is also the location of the Orot Rabin Power Plant, Israel's
largest power station. In 1987, the Democratic
School and the Technoda
Technological Education and Science Center were established.
In the
1990s, large numbers of Russian and Ethiopian immigrants settled in
Hadera. Long considered a safe place by its residents, the city was jolted by
several acts of terrorism,
including the killing of 4 civilians when a terrorist opened fire on
pedestrians at a bus stop on October 28, 2001. Soon thereafter, 6 people were
massacred at a Bat Mitzvah. In 2005, just 1 month after the Zionist expulsion of
Jews from Gaza, and with Zionist approval, a suicide bomber blew himself
up at a falafel stand killing seven
civilians and injuring 55, 5 in severe condition. However, since the
construction of the nearby Security Barrier, the frequency of such
incidents has dropped drastically. On August 4, 2006 during the Second Lebanon
War, three rockets fired from Lebanon by Hezbollah hit Hadera. Hadera is 50
miles south of the Lebanese border and this marked the farthest point inside
Israel hit by Hezbollah’s rocket barrage.
In the
2000s, the city center was rejuvenated with the construction of a high-tech business park and the world's
largest desalination plant. Nahal Hadera
Park and Hasharon Park are
located on the city’s outskirts. Hot water gushing from the Hadera power plant
draws schools of hundreds of sandbar and dusky sharks every winter.
Scientists are researching the rare phenomenon, which is unknown in the
vicinity. It is speculated that the water, which is ten degrees warmer than the
rest of the Mediterranean may be the
attraction.
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