Agricultural Colonies
THE JEWISH ENXYCLOPEDIA
(Palestine
began with the planting of tlie geranium, and led to the buililiiig. by Baron ile Uotlisehild, of a ])erfume ilistillerv.
Tlie total |>oiiiilaliou of the settlement in
was 802 pei-soiis. The persecution of the Jews in Russia in 1881 did more than any otlier event to brinir about the prac181»8
tical colonization of Palestine by .lews; ((rtjiinly. it gave it the first impulse. At that time emigration began in earnest, and IJussian-Jewish refugees mignited in masses. In nearly every Jewish center of Europe emigration committees were formed. The
248
the attacks of the phylloxei-a.
duced as much as
The colony has
pro-
15.(MM) hectoliters (H9G,300 gallons)
of wine' in a year, besides a ([uantity of good brandy. Over 20,000 mulberry-trees, used in silkworm culture, as well as a large nmnber of fruit-trees, such as the almond, fig, pomegranate, apple. an<l citron, thrive in the settlement. Every family in the colony inliabits a stone dwelling, with a flower- and marketgarden, aiul owns a horse and cart, together with at least one cow and some poultry. The indebteilness of each family to Baron Rothschild is being gradually li<iuidated. The colony supports a synagogue, a school, a public bath, a nursery garden, a library, a town liail, anil a hospital. The internal affairs of the coiumunity are administered by an elective committee of settlers(Dalman in "Zeitschriftdes Deutschen Palilstina-Vereins." 1893. xvi. 194 et seq.: " Palastina," 1892-98; "Die Welt," 1897, No. 27; Luncz, "Luah." 1896-1900; Leo Mozkin in "Die Welt," 1898, No. 36).
A
party of ninety Russian-Jewish students, members of the Society Bilu, migrated to Palestine in 1882, and set to work as coiinnon laborers, hoping to save enough money to found a separate agricultural colony. They took for their motto the word
ITn Adminislratiou
BuililiiiB df the
(From a
Zikron Ya'akob Colony.
lihoio^raph.)
emigrants organized themselves into small communities, such as the 50 families from Kiev and Elizabethgrad and the " 'Am "Olam " (Perpetual People), who migrated to the United States of America, and founded colonies in Louisiana and Dakota: and the Biluits,
who selected
Palestine as their future dwell-
ing-place.
At first the colonization of Palestine met with little encouragement from the Alliance Israelite Universelle; and the communities that expected support from that body were greatly disappointed. I?ut the strong faith and self-reliance evinced by those that did venture to Palestine? convinced Baron Edmond Rothschild of the possibility of successfully colonizing the country, and he took the colonies under lie
his care.
The year 18S3witnes.sed the foundation of the first of the Russian-Jewish Agricultural Colonies in Palestine. This community, which was called Rishon le-Zion {Ajun-Kara), consisted of only si. Russian immigrants who established themselves on the road between Jaffa and Oaza. one hour and a half southeast from Jaffa and about one hour from the Mediterranean Sea. the site of the ancient En-hakkore Soon after they ha43 acres), numbered 2()0 in 1890. Five years later it had increased to 450, and in 1898 to 531, exclusive of the members of the administration and of the dav-laborers. The number of dwellings increased from 44 in 1890 to G2 in ls98. The chief products of the colony are wine and brandy, which are exported to Egypt, ConstanFirst tinople, Russia, Germany, and to the
Russian- United States. Overamillionandahalf Jewish of vines have been planted. An enorColony in mous cellar has been built, fitted with Palestine, modern machinery and presses for the manufacture as well as the preservaJlostof the grape-vines planted have been imported from America.and grafted with Freucli varieties, the vines being thus made unsusceptible to tion of wine.
(Bilu),
which
an abbreviation made up of
is
the initial letters of Thy V^h apV JVI ("House of Jacob, come, let us go! ). These young men, some of whom were graduates of Russian universities, at first suffered many privations: but in 1884. through the efforts of .Tehiil Michael Pinnes. together with a number of inunigrants from Kharkov who purchased one-fifth of the land, they joined the Ghederali colony, which was started liy the Chovevei Zion Society of Paris. Ghederah, named after the village of Katra, is situated about four miles southwest of Ekron, and covers an urea of 330 hectares (815 acres). One-fourth of this is under wheat; and on the remainderabout 200,000 grape- vines and different kinds of fruit trees have been planted. The colonists have a synagogue, a school, and a pharmacy. In 1898 twenty families settled in the colony, and the total ])opulation amounted to 130 (Mozkin makes the number 69). This colony was supported by the Russian Chovevei Zion Society but recently it has been taken under the protection of the Jewi.sh Colonization Association of London. Reuben Lehrer, of Kherson, bought, likewise in 1882, 135 hectares (336 acres), in Wadi-el Hanin, about two miles from Rishon le-Zion, and founded
a colony called Naljalat Reuben, by selling some of the land to liussinii ininiigrants. In 1896 the settlement numbered 18 families, or about 100 individuals, and in 1898 had increa.sed to 121 persons. It has a large orange-grove. 1.50,000 grape-vines, and many thousands of fruit-trees of various kinds. The founder, Retiben Lehrer. occupies himself with apiculture. In 1895 his 200 hives brought an income of 4.000 francs (§772). The colony received support
from the Odessa Aid Society, and recently the Jewish Colonization Association of London granted it a loan of 100,000 francs {.?19.300i. In 1882 some Jewish inimiLrants from Rumania founded the colony Zikron Ya'akob in Samaria. Tins is the largest and finest of all the Zikron colnnies in Palestine. It lies about four Ya'aljob miles east of the Jlediterraneau, and Colonies, about ten miles from Haifa. The population is about 1,000 (200 families)^ and the tract occupied is about 1,4.54 hectares (3,035 acres). The colonists engage in various occupations, such as growing wheat, breeding silkworms, keeping bees, and raising vegetables. As evidence of the
