Hanajira

Al-Hanajira (also Arab al-Hanajira, al-Hanajra or el-Hanajreh) was one of the five principal Bedouin tribes inhabiting the Negev Desert prior to the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Its territory stretched north-south between Deir al-Balah and Gaza and east to the lands of the Tarabin bedouin, straddling the Hejaz Railway line. Under the British Mandate, the territory was divided between its Gaza and Beersheba. The largest clan was Abu Middein. In the 1931 British census of Palestine, Abu Middein numbered 1,419, Nuseirat numbered 1,104, Sumeiri 772, and al-Dawahra 461, bringing the total to 3,735. By the summer of 1946 the population increased to 7,125. In 1981 the population living in the Gaza Strip was roughly 10,000.

In 1830, the Acre-based governor of Gaza, Abdullah Pasha, concentrated his forces to put down a rebellion in Jabal Nablus, leaving Gaza and the Negev relatively unsecured. The Bani Attiya tribe of Wadi Araba sought to exploit the lack of state authority and encroached upon the territories of the Negev Bedouin tribes, including the Beersheba plains, without the permission of Salman Ali Azzam al-Huzayl, the Tiyaha chief of the area. Al-Huzayl subsequently formed a coalition with the Hanajira and evicted the Bani Atiyya after four battles at Wadi Ar'ara, Tell Rakhima, Wadi Abu Tulul and al-Mashash. The Palestine Exploration Fund reported that in the late 19th century, the Hanajira grew tobacco and watermelons at Khirbet Emkemen between Khan Yunis and Rafah.

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