Arabbuna is located 3 km northwest of Faqqua and 2 km northeast of Deir Ghazaleh. The village houses are situated on a hill at the foot of Mount Faqqua, a section of Mount Gilboa (known as Mount Gibborim in Hebrew), bordered on the west by the Huhit river, on the west by Wadi Abu Jabir, on the north by Mount Faqqua and on the south by a rivulet of Wadi Abi Jabir.[4]
History
Archeology
Archeologists have found flint tools south of 'Arabbuna. These tools dated to the Upper Paleolithic and Middle Paleolithic periods (300,000 to 10,000 years BP). The tools from the former belong to the Mousterianculture.[5] The village itself is situated on an ancient site. Old stones have been reused in buildings, fences and walls of terraces. Rock cuttings are scattered between houses and orchards. Some of these are identified as ancient tombs. Today the residents of 'Arabbuna use these rock cuttings for storage. A small amount of potsherds and glassware were found in the village and are dated to the Byzantine era. Therefore the village may be the location of a settlement known as "Araba" which existed in the time of Eusebius from the 4th century CE.[6][7]
In 1838 it was noted as a place N 60° E of Jenin.[11]
In 1870 Victor Guérin found Arabbuna to be a small village,[12] and further "south of this village, the foundation of an ancient building, which he does not appear to have examined."[13] In 1870/1871 (1288 AH), an Ottoman census listed the village in the nahiya (sub-district) of Shafa al-Qibly.[14]
In the 1944/5 statistics, the population was 210, all Muslim,[17] with a total of 6,772 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.[18] Of this, 256 dunams were used for plantations and irrigable land, 3,607 dunams for cereals,[19] while 22 dunams were built-up (urban) land.[20]
Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Arabbuna has been under Israeli occupation. The population of 'Arrabuna in the 1967 census conducted by Israel was 270, of whom 42 originated from the Israeli territory.[22]
