Umm Batin
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Umm Batin אום בטין أم بطين |
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 Umm Batin
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| Coordinates: 31°16′49.12″N 34°53′5.47″E / 31.2803111°N 34.8848528°ECoordinates: 31°16′49.12″N 34°53′5.47″E / 31.2803111°N 34.8848528°E | |
| District | Southern |
| Council | Al-Kasom |
| Founded | 2004 |
| Area | 6,000 dunams (6 km2 or 2 sq mi) |
| Population (2015) | 3,080 |
| • Density | 510/km2 (1,300/sq mi) |
| Name meaning | Hidden Mother |
Umm Batin (Arabic: أم بطين; Hebrew: אום בטין) is a Bedouin village in southern Israel. Located in the northern Negev desert, 12 km northeast of Beersheba and adjacent to the highway 60, it falls under the jurisdiction of al-Kasom Regional Council. In 2015 it had a population of 3,080.
The village name derives from the Arabic words for mother, umm (أمّ), and hidden, batin (باتين). Translated, Umm Batin can mean either Hidden Mother or Mother of the Hidden. The historical origins of the village name are not well-documented.
Prior to the establishment of Israel, the Negev Bedouins were a semi-nomadic society that had been through a process of sedentariness since the Ottoman rule of the region. During the British Mandate period, no legal framework was established to justify and preserve land ownership. Thus Israel’s land policy was adopted to a large extent from the Ottoman land regulations of 1858 as the only legal precedent.
Israel has continued the Ottoman policy of sedentarization of Negev Bedouins. In the 1950s Israel re-settled two-thirds of the Negev Bedouin in an area that was under a martial law. Several townships were built for them, offering better living conditions, infrastructure, sanitation, health and education, and municipal services.
As of today, according to the information of Israel Land Administration, over 60% of the Negev Bedouin live in seven settlements in the Negev desert with approved plans and developed infrastructure: Hura, Lakiya, Ar'arat an-Naqab (Ar'ara BaNegev), Shaqib al-Salam (Segev Shalom), Tel as-Sabi (Tel-Sheva), Kuseife and the city of Rahat, the largest among them. These townships cannot resolve the issue of high population density and illegal construction in the Negev absolutely, so besides expanding existing towns, the Israeli government has decided to construct 13 additional settlements with modern infrastructure for the Negev Bedouin, and Umm Batin is one of them.
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