Al-Ja’una (الجاعونة) — The Village Buried Beneath Safed’s Shadow

Al-Ja’una was a centuries-old Palestinian village nestled on a hillside just east of the city of Safed (Ṣafad). Known for its olive groves, wheat fields, and commanding views of the Galilean mountains, it was a place of deep roots and rich heritage — home to families whose ancestors had lived there for generations. In 1948, during the Nakba, the villagers of Al-Ja’una were forcibly expelled. The land was swiftly taken over, and in its place, the Israeli settlement of Rosh Pina expanded — a new narrative written over the old, with barely a trace of what once stood. Suggested poetic caption for your photography or visual exhibition: “Al-Ja’una – A Village in Exile, a Memory Unyielding” Today, the hills remain — but the village is gone. My lens sees what maps no longer show: The invisible village beneath manicured paths, The silence where a call to prayer once echoed. Al-Ja’una lives in the hearts of its descendants — in names passed down, in stories whispered at dusk, in the ache of a homeland denied, yet never forgotten. “You may erase the stones, but not the scent of za’atar in the wind.”