Pottery remains from the
Intermediate Bronze Age,
Iron Age II and
Hellenistic era have been found here. An olive press, quarries and a winepress believed to date to the Hellenistic or Early Roman period have been found. Ceramic objects from the late Roman or early Byzantine periods have also been found, and a burial cave, with remains dating to
Byzantine and the beginning of the
Umayyad periods (sixth–seventh centuries CE).
Middle Ages In 1265 Sultan
Baibars divided the village between the
emirs '''Ala' al-Din Taibars al-Zahiri
and Ala' al-Din 'Ali al-Tunkuzi'' when the villages of Palestine were divided up between those who fought against the
Crusaders.
Ottoman Empire In 1517 the village was incorporated into the
Ottoman Empire with the rest of Palestine. During the
16th and
17th centuries, Baqa belonged to the
Turabay Emirate (1517-1683), which encompassed also the
Jezreel Valley,
Haifa,
Jenin,
Beit She'an Valley, northern
Jabal Nablus,
Bilad al-Ruha/Ramot Menashe, and the northern part of the
Sharon plain. Baqa was mentioned in an
Ottoman document in 1538, as a five-family small village with 11 non-married people. In 1596, Baqa al-Gharbiyye appeared in Ottoman
tax registers as being in the
Nahiya of Jabal Shami, part of the
Sanjak of Nablus. It had a population of 5
Muslim households who paid a fixed tax rate of 33.3% on wheat, barley, summer crops, goats or beehives, and a press for olives or grapes; a total of 12,000
akçe. Half of the revenue went to the
waqf of
al-Haramayn as-Sarifayn. In 1838 it was noted as a village,
Bakah, the west, in the western ''Esh-Sha'rawiyeh'' administrative region, north of
Nablus. In 1870, the French explorer
Victor Guérin described the village as built on a low hill with
wells and
cisterns that looked ancient. He estimated the population to be 1500. In 1871 (1288
AH), an Ottoman census listed the village in the
nahiya (sub-district) of al-Sha'rawiyya al-Sharqiyya. In 1882 the
Palestine Exploration Fund's
Survey of Western Palestine described Baqa al-Gharbiyye as a village of moderate size that stood out in the landscape with a few
olive trees and orchards to the south.
British Mandate In the
1922 census of Palestine conducted by the
British Mandate authorities, Baqa Gharbiyeh had a population of 1,443; 1442 Muslim and one
Anglican Christian. In the
1931 census of Palestine, Baqa was recorded as having a population of 1,640 Muslims living in 403 houses. These numbers included the nearby smaller locality El Manshiya. with a total land area of 21,116
dunams, according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 861 dunams were designated for plantations and irrigable land, 18,986 for
cereals, while 76 dunams were built-up (urban) areas. File:Jatt 1942.jpg|Baqa al-Gharbiyye 1942 1:20,000 File:Qaffin 1945.jpg|Baqa al-Gharbiyye 1945 1:250,000
Israel visiting
MK Fares Hamdan in Baka El-Garbiyya, September 1956 . In the early years of
Israeli independence, Baqa al-Gharbiyye was one of the headquarters of the Israeli military administration. The land holdings of the town, which had been 21,116 dunams in 1945, were reduced to 8,228 dunams by 1962, mostly due to expropriation in 1953–1954. The merger was dissolved on 1 November 2010. Baqa al-Gharbiyye is separated from its
West Bank sister city,
Baqa ash-Sharqiyya (or
Baqa East), by the
Israeli West Bank barrier which in this section coincides with the
Green Line. As a result, a concrete wall topped with barbed wire runs through one neighbourhood. As the
Israeli foreign minister in April and June 2008,
Tzipi Livni raised the possibility of territorial exchange with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. She proposed transferring Israeli Arab communities, among them Baqa al-Gharbiyeh, to the Palestinian side of the border. The Palestinians rejected the proposal. == Demographics ==