Hittin

Ziyara (Arabic: زِيَارَة, romanized: Ziyāra) is the Druze pilgrimage observed annually between 25 and 28 April at the Shrine of Shu'ayb, the shrine which Druzians believe contains the purported tomb of prophet Shu'ayb. It is officially recognized as a public holiday in Israel.

Nabi Shuʿayb (also transliterated Neby Shoaib, Nabi Shuaib, or Nebi Shu'eib, meaning "the Prophet Shuaib"), known in English as Jethro's tomb, is a religious shrine west of Tiberias, in the Lower Galilee region of Israel, containing the purported tomb of prophet Shuayb, identified with the biblical Jethro, Moses' father-in-law. The complex hosting the tomb is the most important religious site in the Druze religion. A Druze religious festival takes place in the shrine every year in April. The Prophet Shuayb was an object of traditional veneration by the Druze through Israel. The shrine figured down to the Israeli-Arab war of 1948 as a place where Druze took vows (nidhr) and made ziyarat ("pilgrimages"). After the 1948 war, Israel placed the maqam (shrine) under exclusive Druze care. The tomb of the Prophet Shuaib, originally built outside the village of Hittin, has been a site of annual pilgrimage for the Druze for centuries, with its first mention in historical sources dating back to the 12th century CE. The modern structure dates to 1880.

The Battle of Hattin took place on 4 July 1187, between the Crusader states of the Levant and the forces of the Ayyubid sultan Saladin. It is also known as the Battle of the Horns of Hattin, due to the shape of the nearby extinct volcano of that name. The Muslim armies under Saladin captured or killed the vast majority of the Crusader forces, removing their capability to wage war. As a direct result of the battle, Muslims once again became the eminent military power in the Holy Land, re-capturing Jerusalem and most of the other Crusader-held cities and castles. These Christian defeats prompted the Third Crusade, which began two years after the Battle of Hattin.

Kfar Zeitim (Hebrew: כְּפַר זֵיתִים, lit. Village of Olives) is a moshav in northern Israel. Located adjacent to Tiberias, it falls under the jurisdiction of Lower Galilee Regional Council. In 2022 it had a population of 819.

Ahuzat Naftali (Hebrew: אֲחֻזַּת נַפְתָּלִי, lit. Estate Naftali) is a site in the Galilee region not far from Tiberias, near kibbutz Lavi and south of Karnei Hittin. Ahuzat Naftali was established as a moshav under the jurisdiction of the Lower Galilee Regional Council in 1949.

Lavi (Hebrew: לָבִיא, lit. Lion) is a kibbutz in northern Israel. Located 310 meters above sea level and 10 minutes from Tiberias, it falls under the jurisdiction of Lower Galilee Regional Council. In 2022 it had a population of 604.

Arbel (Hebrew: אַרְבֵּל) is a moshav in northern Israel. Located beside Mount Arbel next to the Sea of Galilee near Tiberias, it falls under the jurisdiction of Lower Galilee Regional Council. In 2022 its population was 756. Arbel was established in 1949 by demobilized soldiers on the lands of the depopulated Arab-Palestinian village of Hittin. It was initially a moshav shitufi, but became a moshav ovdim in 1959.

Mount Nitai (Hebrew: הר נתאי, Har Nitai), sometimes spelled Nitay, is a mountain in Israel situated west of the Sea of Galilee and north of the city of Tiberias. Har Nitai is named after Nittai of Arbela. The cliffs of Nitai and Arbel are visible when looking southwest from Capernaum on the shore of the Sea of Galillee.In 2018, Severino Caruso, a young French man accompanying groups of pilgrims in Israel, identified Mount Nittai of Arbela as the plausible place where Christ spent a week in retreat with his apostles, far from the tumult of the world, in order to introduce them to specific teaching with a view to their future mission in the Church. His research is based on the descriptions of a Mystic work entitled: “The Gospel as it was revealed to me” by Maria Valtorta, a Catholic mystic, who, through vision and supernatural immersion, would have witnessed all the biblical events in the public life of Jesus of Nazareth, from 1943 to 1947. The descriptions of the work allowed the engineer and researcher Jean-François Lavère to authenticate many of the original places that saw Jesus pass during his public life. Severino Caruso then perceived the historical significance of this discovery, which he made in the Arbel Valley, which confirms that the visions of Maria Valtorta seem to be authentic. He published a testimonial french book on the subject in 2021 entitled: “The Arbel Valley and the election of the twelve apostles” Centro Valtortiano edition.

Khirbat al-Wa'ra al-Sawda' (Arabic: خربة الوعرة السوداء) was a Palestinian Arab village in the Tiberias Subdistrict. In 1945, the village had a population of 1,870 Arabs. It was depopulated during the 1947–1948 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine on April 18, 1948. It was located 7.5 km northeast of Tiberias. Some of the villagers fled to Syria while others migrated to the central Galilee.

On November 2, 1948, two squads of Israeli Defense Forces soldiers captured an encampment of Bedouins at Khirbat al-Wa'ra al-Sawda' in the eastern Galilee. While some soldiers guarded the Arabs, others went to a nearby hilltop where the headless bodies of two Israeli soldiers were found. In retaliation, the Arabs' dwellings were destroyed and 15 or 16 adult males were shot, 14 of whom died. The victims' bodies were buried in a cave adjacent to the place where they were killed. In the 1950s, the Israeli National Water Project was dug through the cave, and the Mawassi people took the bones to another cave. During the 1980s the bones were moved to a common grave in the Muslim cemetery in Eilabun.

Hamaam (Arabic: حمام; Hebrew: חַמָּם), or Wadi Hamam, is an Arab village in northern Israel, located near the Sea of Galilee, at the foot of Mount Nitai and across the Wadi Hamam valley from Mount Arbel. It is the easternmost part of the al-Batuf Regional Council. In 2022 its population was 1,561.

The sieges of Tiberias occurred in late 1742 and the summer of 1743 when the Ottoman governor of Damascus, Sulayman Pasha al-Azm, twice attempted and failed to eliminate the increasingly powerful, Tiberias-based multazim (tax farmer), Zahir al-Umar, and destroy his fortifications. Sulayman Pasha operated under orders from the imperial government to execute Zahir, and was militarily backed by the governors of Sidon and Tripoli, as well as the district governors of Nablus, Jerusalem, Gaza, and Bedouin levies. Zahir and his family, the Banu Zaydan, controlled and fortified several places in the Galilee, with Zahir based in Tiberias, and his brother, Sa'd al-Umar, in nearby Deir Hanna. In 1737 and 1738, Zahir had intensified his raids, incursions, and operations to areas under the jurisdiction of Damascus, prompting the imperial orders to eliminate him and his local allies. The first siege of Tiberias lasted for nearly three months, with Sulayman Pasha unable to breach the fortifications and forced to withdraw to lead the Hajj caravan to Mecca. Zahir strengthened Tiberias, while unsuccessfully lobbying the imperial government through the French merchants of Acre and the Jewish community in Tiberias, who attempted to leverage their contacts in the imperial capital, Constantinople. Shortly after his return to Damascus, Sulayman Pasha renewed the campaign in July 1743, with more troops and weapons. He attempted to reduce Deir Hanna, which supplied Tiberias with arms and provisions, but died suddenly in his camp. Zahir soon after reached a détente with Sulayman Pasha's successor, As'ad Pasha al-Azm. The next fourteen years were generally free of hostilities with Damascus, which enabled Zahir to focus on occupying the port of Acre in the 1740s.