Kibbutz Shomria, located in south of Israel in the Negev desert near the town of Lehavim, has undergone quite a few upheavals. The kibbutz was first established as a Nahal settlement in 1965. The name of the kibbutz “Shomria” was chosen because it was established in the year that marked 70 years since the beginning of the activity of “Hashomer Hatzair” movement.
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Today, the kibbutz that began as a kibbutz of the Hashomer Hatzair and even commemorates its name, is a religious kibbutz with the majority of residents from the Gush Katif (Gaza Settlements) evacuees.
In 2005, when the Gush Katif settlements were evacuated as part of the disengagement from Gaza, a group of families, most of them from the evacuated settlement of Atzmona, and some were even former Yamit evacuees (in the Sinai) who moved to Atzmona, found themselves evacuated again. They decided that the disengagement would not disengage the community they had built and refused to evacuate to the hotels and resorts offered to them by the government.
Instead of vacating, they set up a tent city near Netivot and called it “Emuna” (Faith). They lived there for six months, setting up a school, a synagogue, and lots and lots of tents. They even celebrated bar mitzvahs and weddings there and announced that they would not vacate until a suitable solution was found.
About 40 minutes from this tent city, near the Green Line border in the southern Hebron Mountains, was a small kibbutz that didn’t really take off. The kibbutz had only 11 families.
Yonatan Bashi, who was then chairman of the Disengagement Administration, and himself from the religious kibbutz, recognized the plight of these and those and made the link. The original kibbutz members evacuated and the Gush Katif evacuees took their places and established the religious kibbutz Shomria, keeping the original name.
Today the community in Shomria is flourishing, there is a dairy farm, field crops, an olive grove, a chicken coop and even guest rooms.
Photos: Kibbutz Shomria
