Degania Bet was founded in 1920 by immigrants from the
Second Aliyah, It was the first planned kibbutz and was designed and built by the German Jewish architect
Fritz Kornberg. During the
1936–39 Arab revolt it served as a base for establishing
tower and stockade settlements. Its population had increased to 290, still all Jewish, by the 1945 census. On 20 May 1948, during the
Battles of the Kinarot Valley, in one of the first battles of the
1948 Arab–Israeli war, the residents of Degania Alef and Bet, assisted by a small number of military personnel, repelled a
Syrian attack and succeeded in halting the advance of the
Syrian army into the
Jordan Valley. ==Economy==