Khirbat al-Mansura

Tel Yokneam, also spelled Yoqne'am or Jokneam (Hebrew: תֵּל יָקְנְעָם), is an archaeological site located in the northern part of the modern city of Yokneam Illit, Israel. It was known in Arabic by a variant name, Tell Qamun (Arabic: تل قامون), believed to be a corruption of the Hebrew name. The site is an elevated mound, or tel, spanning around 40 dunams (10 acres/4 ha) and rising steeply to a height of 60 meters (200 ft). With a few brief interruptions, Yokneam was occupied for 4,000 years, from the Middle Bronze Age to the Ottoman Empire.The ancient settlement at Tel Yokneam is first mentioned in Egyptian sources as a city conquered by Pharaoh Thutmose III. It appears later in the Hebrew Bible as a city defeated by Israelite leader Joshua and settled by the Tribe of Levi. It is mentioned twice in Roman sources. During the Crusades, it was called Caymont, or Cain Mons, recalling a legend that Yokneam was the site of Cain's death. For a period, it was the center of the Lordship of Caymont, the smallest seigneurie of the Crusader state of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.The earliest archaeological features of Yokneam date from the Chalcolithic period, in the fourth millennium BCE. The first structures date from the beginning of the second millennium BCE. During the Middle and Late Bronze Ages (2000–1200 BCE), Yokneam was for the most part a fortified city, which was razed during a period known as the Late Bronze Age collapse. During the Iron Age, the city was razed and rebuilt several times; events which are attributed to the biblical accounts of the conquests by Joshua, King David, Hazael of Aram-Damascus, and the Neo-Assyrian Empire. The period between the 10th and 8th centuries BCE is considered Yokneam's golden age, during which it extended beyond the mound's limits. The city was protected at that time by a massive fortification system. During Persian rule (539–330 BC) Yokneam was a dense, unfortified and cosmopolitan city, housing Jews, Phoenicians and Persians. Very little has been found in Yokneam from the Hellenistic, Roman, and Byzantine periods (333 BCE–634 CE), because the settlement was probably located on a different hill, south of Tel Yokneam. The remains of a Byzantine church were found in the southern part of the mound. After the Islamic conquest of 634 AD, a well-planned city was established on the mound by the Abbasid Caliphate. It was gradually abandoned, and was struck by an earthquake in 1033 CE. In the 12th century CE, the Crusaders built a fortified city on the site, the largest since the Iron Age.< The city eventually fell to the Muslims, and was rebuilt by the Mamluks during the 14th century CE. After the Ottoman conquest of 1517 CE, a fortress was built in the 18th century, and later abandoned in the 19th century.The site, which had remained abandoned, was surveyed by the Palestine Exploration Fund in 1878, and by Avner Raban in the 1970s. It was first excavated as part of a "Yoqne'am Regional Project" run by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Israel Exploration Society. The excavations, between 1977 and 1988, were directed by the archaeologist Amnon Ben-Tor. Some of the digs were also headed by Renate Rosenthal and Yuval Portugali. Two other sites were studied in that project: Tel Qashish and Tel Qiri. Further excavations were conducted on the acropolis by Miriam Avissar, in 1993.Today there is an archaeological park and a visitor center on the mound. The park is operated by the Israel Antiquities Authority and the municipality of Yokneam Illit. It was created as part of a conservation project, with the participation of school students from Yokneam Illit.

Yokneam Illit (Hebrew: יָקְנְעָם עילית), also Yoqne'am Illit and Jokneam Illit, is a city in northern Israel. It is located in a hilly region of the lower Galilee at the base of the Carmel Mountains, and overlooks the Jezreel Valley. It is 21 kilometres (13 miles) from Haifa and 80 kilometres (50 mi) from Tel Aviv. Yokneam is known as Israel's "Startup Village," because its high-tech hub is surrounded by forest and small communities.Yokneam Illit was founded in 1950 and became a local authority in 1967, and a city in 2007. The city is located alongside the country's major highways – Highway 70 and Highway 6. In 2021 it had a population of 24,158. Starting in 1989 when a new mayor, Simon Alfassi, was elected, the economic structure of Yokneam Illit changed from a centralized dependence on two large factories to a dispersed base of many small high-tech companies. As the number and size of the companies grew, Yokneam and the small communities around it began to attract young entrepreneurs and developers who were looking for a less urban alternative to the Tel Aviv area. It now has over 100 high-tech companies, and exports of approximately 5 billion US dollars annually.The policy of the municipality is to build low-density, spacious homes to preserve the landscape and views from every home. Although real estate prices are low relative to the Tel Aviv area, its high rate of growth in recent years has pushed prices up faster than in similar-sized cities.

Yokneam (Hebrew: יָקְנְעָם) is a moshava in the Northern District of Israel. Located on the outskirts of the city of Yokneam Illit on the border of the Jezreel Valley and the Menashe Heights, it falls under the jurisdiction of the Megiddo Regional Council and is administrated by a local committee which is elected every five years. In 2021 it had a population of 1,376.

Yokneam–Kfar Yehoshua railway station (Hebrew: תחנת הרכבת יקנעם-כפר יהושע) is an Israel Railways passenger station situated on the Jezreel Valley railway. The station serves Yokneam Illit, Kiryat Tiv'on, Ramat Yishai and the surrounding area. The station is located between Yokneam and Kfar Yehoshua, east of Highway 70 and south of Highway 722. It is served by one to two trains per hour in each direction.

Qira (Arabic: قِيرة) was a Palestinian Arab village, located 23 kilometers southeast of Haifa. It was locally referred to as Qira wa Qamun.Its people were Arab tenants, some of whom from the Bedouin tribes of Ka'abiye and Sa'adih. They settled the land during the late 19th century. The land of the village was owned by three Christian families from Beirut and Haifa. The land was purchased by the Yishuv in the 1920s and the villagers were gradually expelled. Yokneam Moshava and HaZore'a were built on former village land. The occupation of Qira by pre-state Israeli forces on 1 March 1948 finished the expulsion process.

Kfar Tikvah (Hebrew: כפר תקוה, in English means: Village of Hope) is an Israeli institution near Kiryat Tiv'on, where the disabled live together in the style of a kibbutz.

Giv'ot Zaid (Hebrew: גבעות זייד, lit. Hills of Zaid) was a kibbutz in northern Israel.

HaZore'a (Hebrew: הַזּוֹרֵעַ, lit. The Sower, named after the neighbouring Tel Zariq, Hebrew: תל זריק) is a kibbutz in northern Israel established in 1936 by German Jews. It is the only kibbutz that was established by members of the Werkleute movement. Located in the western rim of the Jezreel Valley, it falls under the jurisdiction of Megiddo Regional Council. In 2021 it had a population of 933.

The Rabin Pre-Military Academy (full name: המכינה הקדם-צבאית להכשרת מנהיגות חברתית ע"ש יצחק רבין; HaMekhina HaKdam-Tzva'it LeHakhsharat Manhigut Hevratit Al Shem Yitzhak Rabin—The Pre-army Preparatory Program for Training Social Leadership, named for Yitzhak Rabin) is a secular mechinah for high-school graduates in Israel, located at the Oranim College in the Western Galilee. Founded in 1998, the program features intensive studies in a range of subjects focusing on the sociopolitics of Israel, its history focusing on the pre-state pioneering settlers, Jewish studies, and humanistic-ideological aspects of current events, as well as personal development. The studies are combined with volunteer service in the public school system of outlying communities. The 10-month residential program defers compulsory military service in the framework of the post-secondary "year of service" (sh'nat sherut), after which its graduates are inducted into the Israel Defense Forces. The academy was founded and still directed by Danny Zamir who is a deputy battalion commander in the reserves.

Beit She'arim necropolis (Hebrew: בֵּית שְׁעָרִים, "House of Gates") is an extensive necropolis of rock-cut tombs near the remains of the ancient Jewish town of Beit She'arim. In early modern times the site was the Palestinian village of Sheikh Bureik; it was depopulated in the 1920s as a result of the Sursock Purchases, and identified as Beit She'arim in 1936 by historical geographer Samuel Klein.The partially excavated archaeological site known as Beit She'arim National Park consists of the rock-cut tombs and some remains of the town itself. The site is managed by the National Parks Authority. It borders the town of Kiryat Tiv'on on the northeast and is located five kilometres west of the moshav named after the historical location in 1926, a decade prior to its archaeological identification. It is situated 20 km east of Haifa in the southern foothills of the Lower Galilee. In 2015, the necropolis was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The town's vast necropolis is carved out of soft limestone and contains more than 30 burial cave systems. When the catacombs were first explored by archaeologists in the 20th-century, the tombs had already fallen into great disrepair and neglect, and the sarcophagi contained therein had almost all been broken-into by grave-robbers in search for treasure. This pillaging was believed to have happened in the 8th and 9th centuries CE based on the type of terra-cotta lamps found in situ. The robbers also emptied the stone coffins of the bones of the deceased. During the Mameluk period (13th-15th centuries), the "Cave of the Coffins" (Catacomb no. 20) served as a place of refuge for Arab shepherds. Lieutenant C. R. Conder of the Palestine Exploration Fund visited the site in late 1872 and described one of the systems of caves, known as "The Cave of Hell" (Mŭghâret el-Jehennum). While exploring a catacomb, he found there a coin of Agrippa, which find led him to conclude that the ruins date back to "the later Jewish times, about the Christian era." Benjamin Mazar, during his excavations of Sheikh Abreik, discovered coins that date no later than the time of Constantine the Great and Constantius II.Although only a portion of the necropolis has been excavated, it has been likened to a book inscribed in stone. Its catacombs, mausoleums, and sarcophagi are adorned with elaborate symbols and figures as well as an impressive quantity of incised and painted inscriptions in Hebrew, Aramaic, Palmyrene, and Greek, documenting two centuries of historical and cultural achievement. The wealth of artistic adornments contained in this, the most ancient extensive Jewish cemetery in the world, is unparalleled anywhere.

Sheikh Bureik (Arabic: الشيخ بريك او الشيخ اِبريق), locally called Sheikh Abreik or Sheikh Ibreik in recent times, was a Palestinian Arab village located 10 miles (16 km) southeast of Haifa. Situated at an ancient site that shows evidence of habitation as early as the Iron Age, it was known as Beit She'arayim in the Roman and Byzantine periods and became an important center of Jewish learning in the 2nd century, with habitation continuing during the Early Islamic period and limited signs of activity from the Crusader period.The village appears under the name Sheikh Bureik in 16th century Ottoman archives. Named for a local Muslim saint to whom a shrine was dedicated that remains standing to this day, it was a small village whose inhabitants were primarily agriculturalists. Rendered tenant farmers in the late 19th century after the Ottoman authorities sold the village lands to the Sursuk family of Lebanon, the village was depopulated in the 1920s after this family of absentee landlords in turn sold the lands to the Jewish National Fund. A new Jewish settlement, also named Sheikh Abreik, was established there in 1925. Excavations at the site in 1936 revealed the ancient city, known in Greek as Besara and identified as Beth Shearim by Benjamin Mazar. The excavated part of the ancient town has become the Beit She'arim National Park, which is managed by the Israel Nature and Parks Authority.

Beit She'arim (Hebrew: בית שערים / Imperial Aramaic: בית שריי / Bet Sharei) or Besara (Greek: Βήσαρα) was a Roman-era Jewish village from the 1st century BCE until the 3rd century CE which, at one time, was the seat of the Sanhedrin. The village was later known as Sheikh Bureik, and was depopulated in the early 1920s as a result of the Sursock Purchase. In the mid-2nd century, the village briefly became the seat of the rabbinic synod under Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi (compiler of the Mishnah), who was buried in the adjoining necropolis.It is today part of the Beit She'arim National Park.