Municipality type D in Nablus, State of Palestine
Rujeib (Arabic: روجيب) is a Palestinian town in the Nablus Governorate of the State of Palestine, in the northern West Bank, located 3 kilometers southeast of Nablus. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS), the town had a population of 5,964 inhabitants in 2017.[1]
Location
Rujeib is located 4.3 km south east of Nablus. It is bordered by Beit Furik to the east, ‘Awarta to the south, and Nablus to the north and west.[3]
History
There was a human habitation here during the Chalcolithic era.[4][5]
Sherds from the Late Bronze Age/Iron Age I,[5] Hellenistic,[5][6][7] Roman[5][6] and Byzantine[5][6] eras have been found here.
It has been suggested that Rujeib was the Crusader village Ragabam, which was one of the villages exchanged with Bethany by King Baldwin I and given as a fief to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.[8][9] Pottery from the Crusader era have also been found here.[5]
Ottoman era
In 1517, the village was included in the Ottoman empire with the rest of Palestine, and in the 1596 tax-records it appeared as Rujib, located in the Nahiya of Jabal Qubal in the Nablus Sanjak. The population was 16 households and 1 bachelors, all Muslim. They paid a fixed tax rate of 33.3% on agricultural products, such as wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, goats and beehives, a press for olive oil or grape syrup, in addition to occasional revenues and a fixed tax for people of Nablus area; a total of 3,600 Akçe.[10]
In 1838, Raujib was noted in the El-Beitawy district, east of Nablus, together with Beita, Haudela and Awarta.[11] In 1850/51 de Saulcy noted Roujib on a lower hill than Beit Dejan.[12]
In 1870, Victor Guérin noted that Rujeib was a "village of three hundred inhabitants more, on a hill whose flanks were formerly, in several places, exploited as a quarry. Cactus hedges serve as enclosures for some gardens."[13]
In 1882, the Palestine Exploration Fund's Survey of Western Palestinedescribed Rujib as "A village of moderate size to the east of the plain so named, with a few olives round it."[14]
British Mandate era
In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Rujib had a population of 250 Muslims,[15] increasing in the 1931 census to 277 Muslims, in 58 houses.[16]
In the 1945 statistics, Rujeib had a population of 390 Muslims[17] while the total land area was 7,038 dunams, according to an official land and population survey.[18] Of this, 235 dunams were used for plantations and irrigable land, 3,410 for cereals,[19] while 30 dunams were classified as built-up (urban) areas.[20]
Jordanian era
In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Rujeib came under Jordanian rule.
In 1961, the population of Rujeib was 628 persons.[21]
Post 1967
Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Rujeib has been under Israeli occupation. The population in the 1967 census conducted by Israel was 831, of whom 30 originated from the Israeli territory.[22]
After the 1995 accord 28% of Rujeib’s lands were classified as Area B, the remaining 72% as Area C. Israel has confiscated 169 dunams of land from Rujeib for construction of the Israeli settlement of Itamar.[23]
