En-Harod

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EN-HAROD

EN-HAROD (Heb. עין ֲח דֹר).

Ancient

Spring where Gideon and his people camped during his war against the Midianites and the place where he selected the men for his night ambush (Judg. 7:1). It is identified with a spring on a northwestern spur of Mt. Gilboa, and may also be the unnamed fountain where Saul camped against the Philistines (i Sam. 29:1). From Byzantine times it was believed that the battle between David and Goliath took place at En-Harod. The Arabs thus called it Ain Jalud ("Spring of Goliath"), by which name it became famous as the site of the Mongol defeat by the Mamluk sultan Kotuz in 1260.

En-Harod is also an unidentified locality which was the home of Shammah and Elika, two of David's warriors (ii Sam. 23:25; cf. i Chron. 11:27).

[Michael Avi-Yonah]

Modern

En-Harod is the name of two kibbutzim in the Harod Valley, one affiliated with Ha-Kibbutz ha-Me'uḥad and the other with Iḥud ha-Kevuẓot ve-ha-Kibbutzim. The original En-Harod was founded in 1921 at the foot of Mt. Gilboa near Harod Spring by a pioneer group of *Gedud ha-Avodah. They set up two tent camps and started draining the malarial swamps of the "Nuris Bloc" recently acquired by the *Jewish National Fund. At En-Harod, the principles of the "large and growing kibbutz" were worked out in its first years and laid down by Shelomo *Lavi. At the same time, fierce discussions were held between members accepting the Gedud ha-Avodah doctrine of a countrywide commune of kibbutzim and others who demanded that every village constitute a separate economic unit. The former concentrated at neighboring *Tel Yosef, and the latter at En-Harod. When the Gedud declined, most of its groups associated themselves with En-Harod, eventually forming Ha-Kibbutz ha-Me'uḥad. In 1929 the En-Harod settlement was transferred to the northern rim of the valley, on the slope of the Ẓeva'im (Qūmī) Ridge. In the 1930s, the kibbutz quickly increased in membership, intensified its farming, and opened manufacturing enterprises. Exposed to frequent attacks during the 1936–39 Arab riots, special night squads of the Haganah were set up and trained at En-Harod, under Orde *Wingate. In the Israeli War of Independence (1948), a Palmah group from En-Harod dislodged the Arab Legion from its positions menacing the Harod Valley at Zirʿīn (Yizre'el) and al-Mazar on Mt. Gilboa. In the 1951–52 split in the Kibbutz Me'uḥad movement, members of En-Harod were about equally divided between Mapai and the *Aḥdut-Avodah faction of Mapam, causing the settlement to be split between Iḥud ha-Kevuẓot ve-ha-Kibbutzim and Ha-Kibbutz ha-Me'uḥad, the latter setting up a new kibbutz adjoining the veteran settlement in the northwest. Both kibbutzim developed highly intensive farming (beehives, dairy cattle, poultry, fishery, fields crops, and orchards) and each had a number of industrial enterprises (at En-Harod "Iḥud," stainless steel sanitary equipment, other metal products, a printing press, and a guest house, and at En-Harod "Me'uḥad," steel works, a furniture factory, medical and industrial recording equipment, and software). Tel Yosef and En-Harod maintained the Bet Sturman Museum and Study Center containing collections and documents on the region's nature, history, and settlement history; nearby, a large open-air stage for art performances was set up. There was also a museum for contemporary art, Mishkan la-Ommanut (see *Museums, Israel). In 1968 En-Harod "Me'uḥad" had 760 inhabitants, and En-Harod "Iḥud" had 690. In the mid-1990s the population of En-Harod "Me'uḥad" was approximately 875, and the population of En-Harod "Iḥud" was approximately 720. At the end of 2002 the population of En-Harod "Me'uḥad" was 809 and the population of En-Harod "Iḥud" was 559.