Beit HaArava

Beit HaArava (, lit. House of the Arava) is an Israeli settlement and kibbutz in the West Bank. Located near the Dead Sea and Jericho at the eponymous Beit HaArava Junction, the intersection of Highway 1 and Highway 90, it falls under the jurisdiction of Megilot Regional Council.
==History==
The village was originally established in 1939 by European members of Zionist youth movements who had fled Nazi Germany to Mandate Palestine via Youth Aliyah. David Coren, later a member of the Knesset, was also amongst the founders. It was named after the biblical village of the same name, located in the Arava plain.
On 20 May 1948, after a failure to reach an agreement with Transjordan's King Abdullah, Beit HaArava and the nearby Kalia were abandoned due to their isolation during the fighting of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. The residents of the villages evacuated to the Israeli post at Sodom. Its members were later temporarily housed in kibbutz Shefayim, and ultimately split into two groups which in 1949 founded the kibbutzim of Gesher HaZiv and Kabri in the Western Galilee.
Beit HaArava was re-established in 1980 as a paramilitary Nahal outpost, and was fully turned over to civilians in 1986. In 2000 the village was moved 5 kilometres westwards. Today it is home to 40 families, 30 of which are kibbutz members, and ten of which are organised as a communal settlement.
== References ==
Category:Communal cities, towns and villages in Israel
Category:Hebrew Bible places
Category:West Bank
Category:Judea and Samaria
Category:Kibbutzim
Category:Kibbutz Movement
Category:Settlements established in 1939
Category:Settlements established in 1980
Category:Nahal settlements
Category:Jewish villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War