Hi,
The article in Haaretz in 04.07.2019, talking about information removed from the Archive of Israel made look on things again. I did knew there was a village where the industrial area the factory is in. I realized the Tell sitting just on the industrial area entrance, is something which is part of this village which called Iraq al-Manshiyya.
The village, you can read about in Wikipedia a little bit, As I did. But the article had pictures, and those worth an hundred words. Showing what was here, and what ruined during Israel Independence war.
But don’t get me wrong. One of the interviews in Haaretz article, said clearly: “It was their village or our village”. It was not directly attached to the main subject of the article. As the subject was how material about actions taken in 1948 (such as deporting villagers from their houses), is been removed from Israel archive.
While the discussion about things had to be done or not, is one thing. But removing information from the archive to not having the discussion is another thing. And it wrong, apart from illegal.
The internet website Zochrot.com (“Remembers” in female declension), set people to understand there were village here. It is very useful for me and brother Nathan as we playing our game of recognizing places in old photos of Israel. We send it over to each other on whatsapp, and it is really hard. Unless you have you have some point to catch in to. This website helped us realize what were the Palestinians villages that were ruined around our grown up neighborhood of Ramot (Jerusalem).
A map showing the location of the factory over the lands of Iraq al-Manshiyya (source: palestineremembered.com)
The evacuation of Iraq al-Manshiyya in 1948 (from the photo collection of Beno Rothenberg)
International force escorting the evacuation of Iraq al-Manshiyya in 1948 (from the photo collection of Beno Rothenberg)