Taibe, Galilee

Historical geographer Yeshayahu Press thought the site to be the biblical Hapharaim mentioned in Joshua 19:19 in connection with the tribe of Issachar, by a reversion of its name from what sounded like Afrin ("demons") to a euphemistic sound (lit. "the goodly"), as was common in other Arabic place-names.[5]

It has been proposed that Taibe was Tubi, listed among the places paying tribute to Thutmose III.[6]

North east of the village sarcophagus remains have been found. This area apparently functioned as a graveyard during the Roman and Byzantine eras.[7]

During the Crusader period there was a castle here called (Le) Forbelet (in medieval Arabic: 'Afrabala).[8] It was probably Hospitaller and dependent on nearby Belvoir.[8] Yaqut (1179–1229) noted about the village, which he called Afrabala: "A place in the Jordan Ghaur (or low-land), near Baisan and Tabariyyah."[9]

In July 1182 the castle was the background of the pitched large-scale Battle of Forbelet between Baldwin IV and Saladin.[10] The castle was sacked by Saladin in 1183, and occupied by the Muslims besieging Belvoir in 1187-88.[8] Parts of the castle keep's basement still survive, as do other installations from the Crusader period.[3][8] Recent excavations indicate that new buildings were constructed alongside the partially destroyed Crusader castle in Mamluk and Ottoman times.[11]

Taibe was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with all of Palestine, and in 1596 it appeared in the tax registers under the name of Tayyibat al-Ism as being in the Nahiya of Shafa of the Liwa of Lajjun. It had a population of 13 Muslim households and paid taxes on wheat, barley, summer crops, and goats or beehives; a total of 5,300 Akçe.[12] Pierre Jacotin named the village Taibeh on his map from 1799.[13]

In 1875, the French explorer Victor Guérin visited the village and described it as poor, but formerly an important city,[14] while in 1882 the Palestine Exploration Fund's Survey of Western Palestine described Taibe as: "A straggling village, of moderate size, lying on flat ground, and containing several good stone houses. There is one in the middle of the village, belonging to the Sheikh, which is larger than the rest."[6]

Taibe village mosque

In a census conducted in 1922 by the British Mandate authorities, Taibeh had a population of 220, all Muslim,[15] while at the time of the 1931 census, At-Taiyiba had 43 occupied houses and a population of 186 Muslims.[16]

In the 1945 statistics Taibe had a population of 280 Muslims counted with 150 Jews at Moledet)[17] with 7,127 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.[18] Of this, 7,103 dunams were used for cereals,[19] while 22 dunams were built-up land.[20]

Since 1948 Taibe has been under Israeli rule. To mark Israel's 60th anniversary in 2008, the dome of the local mosque was painted in the Israeli colors, blue and white.[21][22]

Nearly all the residents of Taibe are members of the Zuabi family, one of the larger 48-Palestinian clans.[23]