Jiljilyya


Jiljilyya is a Palestinian village in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the northern West Bank.

Location

Jiljilyya is located northeast of Ramallah. It is bordered by Al Mazra'a ash Sharqiya to the east, Sinjil to the east and north, 'Abwein to the north, west and south, and by Silwad to the south.

Identification with Gilgal

first drew the connection to Biblical Gilgal in 1838, as did van de Velde and Victor Guérin in 1870. In 1882, SWP noted: "The name suggests its identity with Gilgal, a town in the mountains near Bethel. This Gilgal is mentioned as though above Bethel, which does not agree exactly with the position of Jiljilia, and of Beitin, but the descent into the great
valley, Wady el Jib, may account for the expression, 'went down to Bethel."
In the 20th century, archaeologist W.F. Albright disagreed with this identification, while Abel agreed with it.

History

Pottery sherds from the Iron Age II, Roman, Byzantine Byzantine/Umayyad, and the Crusader/Ayyubid eras have been found here.

Ottoman era

The village was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with all of Palestine, and in 1596 it appeared in the Ottoman tax registers as Jinjiliyya, being in the nahiya of Quds, part of the liwa of Quds. It had a population of 8 households, all Muslims. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 33.3% on various agricultural products, including wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, vineyards, fruit trees, goats and/or beehives, in addition to "occasional revenues"; a total of 2,600 akçe. Pottery sherds from the early Ottoman era have also been found here.
In 1838 Edward Robinson noted Jiljilia on his travels in the region, and connected it with ancient Gilgal. He further noted it as a Muslim village, located in the Beni Zeid district, north of Jerusalem.
In 1870 Victor Guérin found Djildjilia to have 200 inhabitants, while an Ottoman village list of about the same year counted 14 houses and a population of 49 in dschildschilija, though the population count included only men.
In 1882, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described Jiljilia as: "A large village on the top of a high hill, with a well to the south, and a few olives. The ridge is arable land."
In 1896 the population of Dschildschilja was estimated to be about 138 persons.

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Jeljelieh had a population of 162 Muslims, increasing in the 1931 census to 212 Muslims, in 47 houses.
In the 1945 statistics, the population was 280 Muslims, while the total land area was 7,283 dunams, according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 1,897 were plantations and irrigable land, 1,940 for cereals, while 16 dunams were classified as built-up areas.

Jordanian era

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Jiljilyya came under Jordanian rule. It was annexed by Jordan in 1950.
The Jordanian census of 1961 found 490 inhabitants in Jiljiliya.

Post-1967

Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Jiljilyya has been under Israeli occupation.
After the 1995 accords, 99.3% of village land was classified as Area A, while the remaining 0.7% was classified as Area B.