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For the city in northwestern Syria, see Baniyas. For the processor formerly codenamed Banias, see Pentium M.

For the Indian social group, see Bania.

Caesarea Philippi should not be confused with Caesarea Maritima, on the Mediterranean, (now Caesarea in Israel) or with Caesarea Mazaca in Cappadocia.

Banias (Paneas: Template:Lang-gr Template:Lang-ar Template:Lang-he) is an archaeological site by the uninhabited former city of Caesarea Philippi, located at the foot of Mount Hermon (Ba'al-Hermon, Template:Lang-ar, Jabal esh-Shaiykh) in the Golan Heights. The site is 150Km north of Jerusalem and 60Km southwest from Damascus. The city was located within the region known as the "Panion" (the region of the Greek god Pan). Named after the deity associated with the grotto and shrines close to the spring called "Paneas".

The temenos (sacred precinct) included a temple, courtyards, a grotto and niches for rituals was dedicated to Pan was constructed on an elevated, 80 m. long natural terrace along the cliff which towered over the north of the city. A four-line inscription in the base of one of the niches of the temenos relates to Pan and Echo, the mountain nymph, dated to 87 CE.

In the distant past, a giant spring gushed from a cave set in the limestone bedrock, to tumble down the valley and flow into the Hula marshes. Currently it is the source of the Nahal Hermon stream. Whereas previously the Jordan River rose from the malaria-infested Hula marshes, it now rises from this spring and two others at the base of Mount Hermon. The flow of the spring has decreased greatly in modern times. The water no longer gushes forth from the cave, but only seeps from the bedrock below it.

Pagan associations

Alexander the Great's conquests started a process of Hellenisation in Egypt and Syria that continued for some 1,000 years. Paneas was first settled in the Hellenistic period. The Ptolemaic kings, in the 3rd century BC, built a cult centre there.

Panias is a spring, known also known Fanium, named for the Arcadian Pan, the Greek god, a goat-footed god of victory in battle , isolated rural areas, music, goat herds, hunting, herding, and of sexual and spiritual possession. It lies close to the fabled 'way of the sea' mentioned by Isaiah. along which many armies of Antiquity marched. Paneas was certainly an ancient place of great sanctity, and when Hellenised religious influences began to overlay the region, the cult of its local numen gave place to the worship of Pan, to whom the cave was therefore dedicated. The pre-Hellenic deity associated with the site was variously called Ba'al-gad or Ba'al-hermon.

In extant sections of the Greek historian Polybius's history of 'The Rise of the Roman Empire', a Battle of Panium is mentioned. This battle was fought in 198 BC between the Macedonian armies of Ptolemaic Egypt and the Seleucid Greeks of Coele-Syria, led by Antiochus III. Antiochus's victory cemented Seleucid control over Phoenicia, Galilee Samaria and Judea until the Maccabean revolt. It was these hellenised Seleucids built a pagan temple dedicated to Pan at Paneas.

Roman

Herodian city

On the death of Zenodorus in 20 BC, the Panion (Template:Lang-gr), which included Paneas was annexed to the Kingdom of Herod the Great. He erected here a temple of 'white marble' in honour of his patron. In 3 BCE, Philip II (also known as Philip the Tetrarch) founded a city at Paneas, which became the administrative capital of Philip's large tetrarchy of Batanaea encompassing the Golan and the Hauran. Flavius Josephus in his Antiquities of the Jews refers to the city as Caesarea Paneas; the New Testament as Caesarea Philippi, to distinguish it from Caesarea Maritima on the Mediterranean coast. In 14 CE Philip II named it Caesarea (in honour of the Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus) and 'made improvements' to the city. His image was placed on a coin issued in 29/30 CE to commemorate the city's foundation. This was considered as idolatrous by Jews, but followed in the Idumean tradition of Zenodorus.

On the death of Philip II in 33 CE the tetrachy was incorporated into the province of Syria with the city given the autonomy to administer its own revenues.

In 61 CE, king Agrippa II renamed the administrative capital Neronias in honour of the Roman emperor Nero, but this name had a short life in usage, and was discarded several years later, in 68 CE. Agrippa also carried out urban improvements

During the First Jewish–Roman War, Vespasian rested his troops at Caesarea Philippi over July 67 CE, holding games for a period of 20 days before advancing on Tiberias to crush the Jewish resistance in Galilee.

Gospel association

In the Synoptic Gospels, Jesus is said to have approached the area near the city, but without entering the city itself. While in this area, he asked his closest disciples who men thought him to be. Accounts of their answers, including the Confession of Peter, are to be found in the Matthew, Mark, and Luke, as well as in the Gospel of Thomas.

In Mark, they replied that Jesus was thought to be John the Baptist, or Elias, or some other prophet, but Saint Peter gave his own view and confessed his belief that Jesus was the messiah (Christ). Jesus predicted his destiny, and when Peter rebuked him. In Matthew, the Peter's expression of belief that Jesus was the Messiah is the occasion for Jesus designating him as the rock on which the Church was to be built. In Luke, the site where this is said to have occurred is located near Bethsaida, after the Sermon on the Mount, and Peter affirms his belief Jesus is 'the Christ of God'. In all three, the apostles are asked to keep this revelation as secret.

A woman from Paneas, who had been bleeding for 12 years, is said to have been miraculously cured by Jesus. According to tradition, after she had been cured, she had a statue of Christ erected.

Byzantium

On attaining the position of Emperor of the Roman Empire in 361 Julian the Apostate instigated a religious reformation of the Roman state, as part of a programme intended to restore its lost grandeur, pagan character and strength. He supported the restoration of Hellenic paganism as the state religion. In Paneas this was achieved by replacing the Christian symbols. In the history ofSozomen, there is a description of the circumstances surrounding the replacement of a statue of Christ:-

'Having heard that at Casarea Philippi, otherwise called Panease Paneades, a city of Phoenicia, there was a celebrated statue of Christ, which had been erected by a woman whom the Lord had cured of a flow of blood. Julian commanded it to be taken down, and a statue of himself erected in its place; but a violent fire from the heaven fell upon it, and broke off the parts contiguous to the breast; the head and neck were thrown prostrate, and it was transfixed to the ground with the face downwards at the point where the fracture of the bust was; and it has stood in that fashion from that day until now, full of the rust of the lightning.'

Caliphate

In 635 Paneas gained favourable terms of surrender from the Muslim army of Khalid ibn al-Walid after it had defeated Heraclius’s forces. In 636 a, second, newly formed Byzantine army advancing on Palestine used Paneas as a staging post on the way to confront the Muslim army at Yarmuk.

The depopulation of Paneas after the Muslim conquest was rapid, as its traditional markets disappeared. Only 14 of the 173 Byzantine sites in the area show signs of habitation from this period. The hellenised city thus fell into a precipitous decline. At the council of al-Jabiyah, when the administration of the new territory of the Umar Caliphate was established, Paneas remained the principal city of the district of al-Djawlan (the Golan) in the jund (military Province) of Dimshq (Damascus), due to its strategic military importance on the border with Filistin (Palestine).

Around 780 CE the nun Hugeburc visited Caesarea and reported that the town 'had' a church and a great many Christians, but her account does not clarify whether any of those Christians were still living in the town at the time of her visit.

The transfer of the Abbasid Caliphate capital from Damascus to Baghdad inaugurated the flowering of the Islamic Golden Age at the expense of the provinces. With the decline of Abbasid power in the tenth century, Paneas found itself a provincial backwater in a slowly collapsing empire, as district governors began to exert greater autonomy and used their increasing power to make their positions hereditary. The control of Syria and Paneas passed to the Fatimids of Egypt.

Al-Ya'qubi at the end of the 9th. century reaffirms that Paneas was still the capital of al-Djawlan in the jund of Dimshq, although by then the town was known as Madīnat al-Askat (city of the tribes) with its inhabitants being Qays, mostly of the Banu Murra with some Yamani families.

Due to the Byzantine advances under Nicephorus Phocas and John Zimisces into the Abbasid empire, a wave of refugees fled south and augmented the population of Madīnat al-Askat. The city was taken over by an extreme Shī‘ah sect of the Bedouin Qarāmita in 968. In 970 the Fatimids again briefly took control only to lose it again to the Qarāmita. The old population of Banias along with the new refugees formed a Sunni sufi ascetic community. In 975 the Fatimid al-'Aziz wrested control in an attempt to subdue the anti-Fatimid agitation of Mahammad b. Ahmad al-Nablusi and his followers and to extend Fatimid control into Syria. al-Nabulusi’s school of hadith was to survive in Banias under the tutelage of Arab scholars such as Abú Ishaq (Ibrahim b. Hatim) and al-Balluti.

Crusaders

The Crusaders arrival in 1099 quickly split the mosaic of semi-independent cities of the Seljuk Kingdom of Damascus. Baniyas fell to the crusaders in 1148.

With the arrival of fresh troops in Palestine King Baldwin broke the three month old truce of February 1157 by raiding the large flocks that the Turkomans has pastured in the area of Caesarea Philippi (Baniyas). In the 1157 Baniyas became the principal centre of Humphrey of Toron's crusader Fiefdom, along with him being the constable of Kingdom of Jerusalem, after it had first been granted to the Hospitallers by King Baldwin. The Knights Hospitallers having fallen into a ambush relinquished the fiefdom. Humphrey in his turn was besieged in Baniyas, King Baldwin was able to break the siege, only to be ambushed at Jacob's ford in June 1157. The Fresh troops arriving from Antioch and Tripoli were able to relieve the besieged crusaders. within the Lordship of Beirut. It was captured by Nūr ed-Din on 18 November 1164. The Franks had built a castle at Hunin, (Château Neuf) in 1107 to protect the trade route from Damascus to Tyre. After Nūr ed-Din's ousting of the Crusader Humphrey of Toron from Baniyas, Hunin was at the front line securing the border defences against the Saracen garrison at Baniyas.

Ibn Jubayr the geographer, traveller and poet from al-Andalus described Baniyas:

This city is a frontier fortress of the Muslims. It is small, but has a castle, round which, under the walls flows a stream. This stream flows out from the town by one of the gates, and turns a mill…The town has broad arable lands in the adjacent plain. Commanding the town is the fortress, still belonging to the franks, called Hunin, which lies 3 leagues distant from Baniyas. The lands in the plain belong half to the franks and half to the Muslims; and there is here the boundary called Hadd al Mukasimah-“the boundary of the dividing.” The muslims and the franks apportion the crops equally between them, and their cattle mingle freely without fear of any being stolen.”

After the death of Nūr ed-Din in May 1174 King Amaury led the crusader forces in a siege of Baniyas. The Governor of Damascus allied himself with the crusaders and released all his Frankish prisoners. With the death of King Amaury in July 1174 the crusader border became unstable. In 1177 king Baldwin IV of Jerusalem ("the leper") laid seige to Baniyas and again the crusader forces withdrew after receiving tribute from Samsan al-Din Ajuk, the Governor of Baniyas.

In 1179 al-Malik al-Nâsir Ṣalāḥ ad-Dīn Yūsuf ibn Ayyūb (Saladin) took personal control of the forces of Paneas and created a protective screen across the Huela through Tel el-Qadi (Tel Dan).

In 1187 Saladin ordered al-Afdal (his son) to sent an envoy to Count Raymond III of Tripoli requesting safe passage through his principality of Galilee and Tiberias. Raymond was obliged to grant the request under the terms of his treaty with Saladin. al-Afdal's force of 7,000 horsemen left Baniyas and encountered a force of 150 Knights Templar led by Gerard de Ridefort, Grand Master of the Knights Templar. The Templar force was destroyed in the encounter. Saladin then besieged Tiberias, after 6 days the town fell. On 4 July 1187 Saladin defeated the crusaders coming to relieve Tiberias at the Battle of Hattin.

In the first decade of the thirteenth century Baniyas was partially destroyed by an earthquake. Jahârkas the local amir rebuilt the burj (the fortress tower) in 1204 (AH 597). Named as Kŭl’at es-Subeibeh in 1846 by B B Edwards.

In March 1219 Khutluba was forced to relinquish Baniyas and destroy its fortress. The city was then passed to al'Adil and his son al-Mu'azzam.

Baniyas along with Toron (now the modern town of Tebnine)and Safed and were recovered by the Franks through treaty in 1229, just two years after al-Mu'azzam's death on November 11, 1227, by Frederick II from Sultan al-Kamil.

British Mandate to contemporary

The Syria-Lebanon-Palestine boundary was a product of the post-World War I Anglo-French partition of Ottoman Syria. British forces had advanced to a position at Tel Hazor against Turkish troops in 1918 and wished to incorporate all the sources of the Jordan River within the British controlled Palestine. Due to the French inability to establish administrative control, the frontier between Syria and Palestine was fluid. Following the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, and the unratified and later annulled Treaty of Sèvres, stemming from the San Remo conference, the 1920 boundary extended the British controlled area to north of the Sykes Picot line, a straight line between the mid point of the Sea of Galilee and Nahariya. In 1920 the French managed to assert authority over the Arab nationalist movement and after the Battle of Maysalun, King Faisal was deposed. The international boundary between Palestine and Syria was finally agreed by Great Britain and France in 1923 in conjunction with the Treaty of Lausanne, after Britain had been given a League of Nations mandate for Palestine in 1922. Banyas (on the Quneitra/Tyre road) was within in the French Mandate of Syria. The border was set 750 metres south of the spring.

In 1941 Australian forces occupied Banyas in the advance to the Litani during the Syria-Lebanon Campaign; Free French and Indian forces also invaded Syria in the Battle of Kissoué. Banias's fate in this period was left in a state of limbo since Syria had come under British military control. After the cessation of WWII hostilities, and at the time Syria was granted Independence (April 1946), the former mandate powers, France and Britain, bilaterally signed an agreement to pass control of Banias to the British mandate of Palestine. This was done against the expressed wishes of the Syrian government who declared France's signature to be invalid. While Syria maintained its claim on Banias in this period, it was administered from Jerusalem.

Following the 1948 Arab Israeli War, and the signing of the General Armistice Agreements in 1949, and DMZs included in the Armistice with Syria in July 1949, were "not to be interpreted as having any relation whatsoever to ultimate territorial arrangements." Israel claimed sovereignty over Demilitarised zone (DMZ), on the basis that, "it was always part of the British Mandated Territory of Palestine." Moshe Dayan and Yosef Tekoah adopted a policy of Israeli control of the DMZ and water sources at the expense of Israel’s international image. The Banias spring remained under Syrian control, while the Banias River flowed through the contested Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and into Israel.

In 1951 the tensions in the area were raised when, in the lake Huleh area (10 km from Banias), Israel initiated a project to drain the marsh land to bring 15,000 acres into cultivation. The project caused a conflict of interests between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Arab villages in the area and drew Syrian complaints to the United Nations. On 30 march in a meeting chaired by David Ben-Gurion the Israeli government decided to assert Israeli sovereignty over the DMZs, consequently 800 inhabitants of the villages were forcibly evacuated from the DMZ. From 1951 Israel refused to attend the meetings of the Israel/Syria Mixed Armistice Commission. This refusal on the part of Israel not only constituted a flagrant violation of the General Armistice Agreement, but also contributed to an increase of tension in the area. The Security Council itself strongly condemned the attitude of Israel, in its resolution of 18 May 1951, as being "inconsistent with the objectives and intent of the Armistice Agreement"

Under UN auspices and with encouragement from the Eisenhower administration 9 meetings took place between 15 January and 27 January 1953, to regularise administration of the 3 DMZs. At the eighth meeting Syria offered to adjust the armistice lines, and cede to Israel's 70% of the DMZ, in exchange for a return to the pre 1946 International border in the Jordan basin area, with Banias water resources returning uncontested to Syrian sovereignty. On 26 April, the Israeli cabinet met to consider the Syrian suggestions; with head of Israel’s Water Planning Authority, Simha Blass, in attendance. Blass noted that while the land to be ceded to Syria was not suitable for cultivation, the Syrian map did not suit Israel’s water development plan. Blass explained that the movement of the International boundary in the area of Banias would affect Israel’s water rights. The Israeli cabinet rejected the Syrian proposals but decided to continue the negotiations by making changes to the accord and placing conditions on the Syrian proposals. The Israeli conditions took into account Blass’s position over water rights and Syria rejected the Israeli counter offer.

On 4 June 1953 Jordan and Syria concluded a bilateral plan to store surface water at Maqarin (completed in 2006 as Al Wehdah Dam, ), so as to be able to utilise the water resources of the Yarmouk river in the Yarmouk-Jordan valley plan, funded through the Technical Cooperation Agency of the United States of America, the UNRWA and Jordan.

In 1953, Israel unilaterally started a water diversion project within the Jordan River basin by the Israeli National Water Carrier. This caused shelling from Syria and friction with the Eisenhower Administration; the diversion was moved to the southwest. September 1953 Israel advanced plans to divert water to help irrigate the coastal Sharon Plain and eventually the Negev desert by launching a diversion project on a nine-mile channel midway between the Huleh Marshes and Lake Galilee (Lake Tiberias) in the central DMZ to be rapidly constructed. Syria claimed that it would dry up 12,000 acres of Syrian land. The UNTSO Chief of Staff Major General Vagn Bennike of Denmark noted that the project was denying water to two Palestinian water mills, was drying up Palestinian farm land and was a substantial military benefit to Israel against Syria. The US cut off aid to Israel. The Israeli response was to increase work. UN Security Council Resolution 100 “deemed it desirable” for Israel to suspend work started on the 2nd September “pending urgent examination of the question by the Council”. Israel finally backed off by moving the intake out of the DMZ and for the next three years the US kept its economic sanctions by threatening to end aid channelled to Israel by the Foreign Operations Administration and insisting on tying the aid with Israel's behaviour. The Security Council ultimately rejected Syrian claims that the work was a violation of the Armistice Agreements and drainage works were resumed and the work was completed in 1957.

1955 US ambassador Johnson negotiated the Jordan Valley Unified Water Plan.

After the 2nd Arab summit conference in Cairo of January 1964 (with the backing of all 13 Arab League members), Syria in a joint project with Lebanon and Jordan, started the development of the water resources of Banias for a canal along the slopes of the Golan toward the Yarmouk River. While Lebanon was to construct a canal form the Hasbani River to Banias and complete the scheme. The project was to divert 20 to 30 million cubic metres of water from the river Jordan tributaries to Syria and Jordan for the development of Syria and Jordan. This led to military intervention from Israel, first with tank fire and then, as the Syrians shifted the works further eastward, with airstrikes.

On June 10th, 1967, the last day of the Six Day War, Golani Brigade forces quickly invaded the village of Banias where a caliphate era Syrian fort stood. Eshkol's priority on the Syrian front was control of the water sources. This action has meant that Israel utilizes all water resources for the agricultural development of the Negev Desert. In 1967 Rafi Rubinstein was able to see the poverty that Israeli policies has caused to the Palestinian citizens of Israel and why the Syrian had fought for the Palestinians cause.

The southern slopes of Mount Hermon (Jebel esh-Sheikh) as well as the Golan Heights, were unilaterally annexed by Israel in 1981.

Jordan being a country that borders on the Jordan has riparian rights to water from the Jordan basin and upper Jordan tributaries. Due to the water diversion projects the flow to the river Jordan has been reduced from 1,300/1,500 million cubic metres (mcm)to 250/300 mcm. Where the water quality has been further reduced as the flow of the river Jordan is made of run-off from agricultural irrigation and saline springs.

The water agreement forms a part of the broader political treaty which was signed between Israel and Jordan in 1994, and the articles relating to water in this agreement do not correspond with Jordan’s rights to water as they were originally claimed. The nature and significance of the wider 1994 treaty meant that the water aspect was forced to cede importance and priority in negotiations, giving way to areas such as borders and security in terms of armed force, which were perceived by decision-makers as being the most integral issues to the settlement.

These problems can be seen to have emerged in 1999, when the treaty’s limitations were revealed by events concerning water shortages in the Jordan basin. A reduced supply of water to Israel due to drought meant that, in turn, Israel which is responsible for providing water to Jordan, decreased its water provisions to the country, provoking a diplomatic disagreement between the two and bringing the water component of the treaty back into question.

Israel's complaints that the reduction in water from the tributaries to the river Jordan caused by the Jordan/Syrian dam look to go unheeded due to the conflict of interest between Israel and her neighbours.

Tel Dan

While Baniyas does not appear in the Old Testament, Philostorgius, Theodoret, Benjamin of Tudela and Samuel ben Samson all incorrectly identified it with Laish (Tel el-Qadi renamed as Tel Dan). While Eusebius of Caesarea accurately places Dan/Laish in the vicinity of Paneas at the fourth mile on the route to Tyre. Eusebius's identification was confirmed by E Robinson in 1838 and subsequently by archaeological excavations at Tel-Dan and Caesarea Philippi

Notables from Paneas

• Al-Wadin ibn ‘Ata al-Dimashki (d. 764 or 766) - an Arabic scholar from the Umayyad era

See also

• List of places associated with Jesus
• Water politics in the Middle East

References

Footnotes

1. Wilson, John F (2004) Banias: The Story of Caesarea Philippi, Lost City of Pan I.B.Tauris, ISBN 1850434409 p.2
2. Philippe Bourgeaud, The Cult of Pan in Ancient Greece, tr.K.Atlass & J.Redfield, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and London 1988
3. Isaiah 9:1
4. Kent, Charles Foster (1912), Biblical Geography and History, reprinted by Read Books, 2007 ISBN 1406754730 pp 47-48
5. Bromiley, Geoffrey W. (1995) International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: A-D, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, ISBN 0802837816 p 569
6. Perseus Digitital Library. TUFTS University Polybius Book 16 para 18
7. Perseus Digitital Library. TUFTS University Polybius Book 16 para 19
8. Perseus Digitital Library. TUFTS University Polybius Book 16 para 20
9. Chambers Dictionary of Etymology: The Origins and Development of Over 25,000 English Words, Robert K. Barnhart, Sol Steinmetz (eds.)(1999) Chambers Harrap Publishers L, ISBN 0550142304, p. 752
10. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) Caesarea Philippi: Banias, the Lost City of Pan, I.B.Tauris, ISBN 1850434409 p 9
11. Gospel of Matthew. 16:13
12. Josephus Flavius Antiquities of the Jews Book 18, chapter 2, para. 1
13. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid. pp 20-22
14. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid. p 23
15. Madden, Frederic William (1864) History of Jewish Coinage, and of Money in the Old and New Testament, B. Quaritch, p. 114
16. Josephus, Flavius, 'War of the Jews, Book 3, chapter 10, para. 7: 'As for Panium itself, its natural beauty had been improved by the royal liberality of Agrippa, and adorned at his expenses.'
17. Emil Schürer, Fergus Millar, Géza Vermès (1973) The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (175 B.C.-A.D. 135), Continuum International Publishing Group, ISBN 0567022420 p. 494
18. Mark 8: 27-33, Matthew. 16; 13-23 and Luke 9: 18-22.
19. Fitzmyer, Joseph A. (1991) A Christological Catechism: New Testament Answers, Paulist Press, ISBN 0809132532 p 62
20. Luke; 8:43. Mark 5:23 Matthew 9:20
21. Louis Félicien Joseph Caignart de Saulcy, Edouard de Warren (1854) ibid p.418
22. Norwich, John Julius (1988) Byzantium; the Early Centuries, Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-011447-5 pp 88-92
23. Brown, Peter, The World of Late Antiquity, W. W. Norton, New York, 1971, ISBN 0393958035 p. 93.
24. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 99
25. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p.114
26. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid pp 115-116
27. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid pp 118-119
28. Gregorian, Vartan (2003) Islam: A Mosaic, Not a Monolith, Brookings Institution Press, ISBN 081573283X p 26-38
29. Salibi, Kamal Suleiman (1977), Syria Under Islam: Empire on Trial, 634-1097, Caravan Books, 1977 ISBN 0882060139
30. Applied History Research Group , University of Calgary, "The Islamic World to 1600", Last accessed October 30, 2008
31. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 121
32. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 122
33. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 122
34. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 123
35. Richard, Jean (1999) The Crusades c.1071-c.1291 Cambridge University press ISBN 0-521-62566-1 p 67
36. ^ Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 145
37. Richard, Jean (1999) ibid pp 175-176
38. ʻIzz al-Dīn Ibn al-Athīr (Translated 2006) The Chronicle of Ibn Al-Athīr for the Crusading Period from Al-Kāmil Fīʼl-taʼrīkh: The Years AH 491-541/1097-1146, the Coming of the Franks And the Muslim Response Translated by Donald Sidney Richards Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. ISBN 0754640787 pp 148-149
39. Murphy-O'Connor, Jerome (2008) The Holy Land: An Oxford Archaeological Guide from Earliest Times to 1700 Oxford University Press US, ISBN 0199236666 p 326
40. ^ Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid pp 146-147
41. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 148
42. Hindley, Geoffrey. (2004) The Crusades: Islam and Christianity in the Struggle for World Supremacy Carroll & Graf Publishers, ISBN 0786713445 p 97
43. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 150
44. B B Edwards and E A Park (1846) Bibliotheca Sacra and Theological Review Allen, Morrill, and Wardwell, p 193
45. Robinson, Edward Biblical researches in Palestine, 1838-52. A journal of travels in the year 1838. By E. Robinson and E. Smith. Drawn up from the original diaries, with historical illustrations, by Edward Robinson. p 437
46. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 150
47. Fromkin, David (1989). A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East. New York: Owl, ISBN 0-8050-6884-8.
48. ^ MacMillan, Margaret (2001) Peacemakers: The Paris Conference of 1919 and Its Attempt to End War J. Murray, ISBN 0719559391 pp 392-420
49. Shapira, Anita (1999) Land and Power; The Zionist Resort to Force, 1881-1948. Stanford University press, ISBN 0-8047-3776-2 pp 98-110
50. Exchange of Notes Constituting an Agreement respecting the boundary line between Syria and Palestine from the Mediterranean to El Hammé. Paris, March 7, 1923.
51. Wilson John F (2004) Ibid pp 177-178
52. Australian Government Australian war memorials department, Official Histories – Second World War Volume II – Greece, Crete and Syria (1st edition, 1953)
53. Australian Government, Australian war memorials department, Official Histories – Second World War Volume II – Greece, Crete and Syria (1st edition, 1953), Chapter 16, The Syrian Plan, See Map p 334
54. Fectio
55. Wilson John F (2004) ISBN 1850434409, p 178 Syria claimed that France’s signature on the border agreement was invalid, but the British would not discuss the situation. A ‘Demilitarised zone’ was created at the three disputed points along the border, one of which was the territory around Banias, with Syria withdrawing troops, but continuing to lay claim to the territory within the zone. Thus from the beginning of the Syrian state to the Six Day War, there was no settled border.
56. Shlaim, Avi (2000) The Iron Wall; Israel and the Arab World Penguin Books, ISBN 978-0-140-28870-4 p 69
57. Syria Israel Armistice Agreement UN Doc S/1353 20 July 1949
58. The first Arab summit conference ratified the Arab strategy to thwart Israel’s NWC Plan . The strategy was designed to divert Jordan’s tributaries and prepare the Arab armies for the defence of the engineering operations. Shemesh, Moshe (2008) Arab Politics, Palestinian Nationalism and the Six Day War: The Crystallization of Arab Strategy and Nasir's Descent to War, 1957-1967 Sussex Academic Press, ISBN 1845191889 p 67
59. ^ Shlaim, Avi (2000) ibid pp 71-73 The experts concluded that it was not just unnecessary but actually damaging to Israel’s agriculture and ecology
60. ^ UN Doc S/2157Security Council resolution 93 of 18 May 1951: Noting the complaint with regard to the evacuation of Arab residents from the demilitarised zone: (a) Decides that Arab civilians who have been removed from the demilitarised zone by the Government of Israel should be permitted to return forthwith to their homes and that the Mixed Armistice Commission should supervise their return and rehabilitation in a manner to be determined by the Commission; (b) Holds that no action involving the transfer of persons across international frontiers, across armistice lines or within the demilitarised zone should be undertaken without prior decision of the Chairman of the Mixed Armistice Commission;
61. Shlaim, Avi (2000) ibid p 75
62. ^ Shlaim, Avi (2000) Ibid pp 75-76 At the eighth meeting on 13 April, the Syrian delegates seemed very anxious to move forward and offered Israel around 70% of the DMZ’s. Significant results were achieved and a number of suggestions and summaries put in writing, but they required decisions by the two governments. The Israeli cabinet convened on 26 April to consider the Syrian suggestions for the division of the DMZs. Simha Blass, head of Israel’s Water Planning Authority, was invited to the meeting. Dayan showed Blass the Syrian suggestions on the map. Blass told Dayan that although most of the lands that Israel was expected to relinquish were not suitable for cultivation, the map did not suit Israel’s irrigation and water development plans...Although phrased in a positive manner, this decision appears to have killed the negotiations. It involved changes to the preliminary accord and new conditions that made it difficult to go forward. At the last two meetings, on 4 and 27 May Israel presented its new conditions. These were rejected by Syria, and the negotiations ended without agreement...That a set of proposals that had the support of the political and military elite was emasculated because it did not satisfy the requirements of a water expert seems surprising. it suggests lack of leadership and lack of statesmanship on Ben Gurion's part when it came to the crunch. In the final analysis, it was Israel's insistence on exclusive and unfettered rights over the lakes and the Jordan river that seems to have upset the apple cart. An opportunity for an agreement with a major adversary existed and was allowed to slip away. Yet the fact that the negotiations came so close to success is in it self significant because it shows that, contrary to popular Israeli perceptions, Syria was capable of behaving in a practical, pragmatic and constructive fashion. There was definitely someone to talk to on the other side.
63. Haddadin, Munther J. (2006) Water Resources in Jordan: Evolving Policies for Development, the Environment, and Conflict Resolution Resources for the Future, ISBN 1933115327 p 239
64. UN Doc S 3182 UN Security Council Resolution 100 of 27th October 1953
65. UN Doc S/4271 Letter dated 25 February 1960 from the representative of Israel to the President of the Security Council 25 February 1960
66. Cronin, Patrick M. (2008) The Evolution of Strategic Thought Routledge, ISBN 0415459613 p 189
67. The diversion consisted of:-
    1. Diversion of tributaries in Lebanon.

    A The upper Hasbani- the excavation of a canal from the Hasbani springs in the hasbaya region and a canal from the wadi Shab’a for carrying water to the kawkaba tunnels and from there to the Litani River. (This project would transport 40-60 million cubic metres of water annually).

    B. The Middle hasbani-two diversion points-tyhe first in the hasbani riverbed; the second in wadi sarid. The Hasbani ans Sarid would flow in a canal to the banias and from there to the Yarmuk. According to the plan, 20-30 million cubic metres of water would flow annually to Syria (if Lebanon did not divert the hasbani’s floodwater to the Litani, the Sarid canal could transport up to 60 million cubic metres of water a year).

    C. The Wazani Spring in the Lower Hasbani Riverbed-this would include an irrigation canal (carrying 16 million cubic metres of water a year) for local use in Lebanon; an irrigation canal in Syria (8 million cubic metres a year); and three pumping units to transport the Wanzani’s overflow to Syria via the Sarid-Banias canal at a rate of 26 million cubic metres a year.

    2. Diversions in Syrian territory

    A. Diversion of the Banias-The diversion plan for the banias called for a 73 kilometre long canal to be dug 350 metres above sea level that would link the banias with the Yamuk. The canal would carry the Banias’s fixed flow plus the overflow from the hasbani (including water from the Sarid and Wazani). The Banias diversion would provide 90 million cubic metres of water for irrigation of riverine areas. The designers calculated that eighteen months would be sufficient for executing the plan. The cost was estimated at five million Pounds Sterling (including two tunnels), that is, approximately two million pounds more than the Arab plan.

    B. The butayha Project-The Syrians feared that if the Arabs implemented their diversion plan, Israel would block the batayha Valley inhabitants, annual pumping of 22 million cubic metres from the Jordan as proposed in the Johnson plan. In order to guarantee the villagers their vital water supply, the Arab plan contained a proviso designed to incorporate primary and secondary canals from the Sea of Galilee.

    3. The water plans in Jordan.

    The construction of a dam in the Kingdom of Jordan (the Mukheiba dam on the Yarmuk River) was designed to hold 200 million cubic metres of water. Work on the dam would take 30 months at a cost of ten and one quarter million Pounds Sterling. The Mukheiba Dam (and the Makarin Dam) would hurt Israel if it was incorporated into the diversion plans for the Jordan River’s northern sources, and without the Mukheiba dam all of the diverted water would flow back to the Yarmuk and return to the Jordan’s riverbed south of the Sea of galilee. Excluding this plan, the rest of the Jordan’s water projects correspond with the main parts of the Johnson Plan.

    Shemesh, Moshe (2008) Arab Politics, Palestinian Nationalism and the Six Day War: The Crystallization of Arab Strategy and Nasir's Descent to War, 1957-1967 Sussex Academic Press, ISBN 1845191889 pp 49-50
68. ^ Shlaim, Avi (200) ibid pp 229-230 In January 1964 an Arab League summit meeting convened in Cairo. The main item on the agenda was the threat posed by israel's diversion of water from the north to irrigate the south and the expected reduction in the water supplies available to Syria and Jordan. The reaction of the summit to this threat was deadly serious. The preamble to its decision stated,

    The establishment of Israel is the basic threat that the Arab nation in its entirety has agreed to forestall. And Since the existence of Israel is a danger that threatens the Arab nation, the diversion of the Jordan waters by it multiplies the dangers to Arab existence. Accordingly, the Arab states have to prepare the plans necessary for dealing with the political, economic and social aspects, so that if necessary results are not achieved, collective Arab military preparations, when they are not completed, will constitute the ultimate practical means for the final liquidation of Israel.

69. Political Thought and Political History: Studies in Memory of Elie Kedourie By Elie Kedourie, M. Gammer, Joseph Kostiner, Moshe Shemesh, Routledge, (2003) ISBN 0714652962 p 165
70. Segev, Tom (2007) 1967; Israel and the war that transformed the Middle East Little, Brown ISBN 978-0-316-72478-4 p 399
71. Segev, Tom (2007) Ibid p 398 I saw our kibbutzim, so beautiful, so lush, and, really-it was beautiful. You see all that farming land and you see what a kibbutz is. And with them , everything's so neglected, poverty, so much poverty, barbed wire fences and ditches." He was convinced that the view from the Golan Heights had fuelled the Syrian hatred. "It must get to the Arabs. I'm almost certain that was one of the reasons why they kept shooting at us."
72. Amery, Hussein A. and Wolf, Aaron T. (2000) Water in the Middle East: A Geography of Peace University of Texas Press, ISBN 029270495X p 37
73. J. A. Allan, ‘The Jordan-Israel Peace Agreement – September 1994’, in Allan and J. H. O. Court, (1996) Water, Peace and the Middle East: Negotiating Resources in the Jordan Basin (I. B. Tauris Academic Studies, London, St. Martin's Press ), ISBN 1860640559 pp. 207/21
74. Ha'aretz ‘A dry Israel must cut water flow to Jordan’ by A. Cohen, 15th March 1999 as quoted in Hydro-Peace in the Middle East: Why no Water Wars?: A Case Study of the Jordan River Basin SAIS Review - Volume 22, Number 2, Summer-Fall 2002, pp. 255-272 and Allan John Anthony, (2001) The Middle East Water Question: Hydropolitics and the Global Economy I.B.Tauris, ISBN 1860648134 p 220
75. Ha'aretz 18 October 2006, ‘Environmentalists: New dam may cause Jordan River to dry up’ By Tzafrir Rinat,
76. A Biblical History of Israel By Iain William Provan, V. Philips Long, Tremper Longman Published by Westminster John Knox Press, 2003 ISBN 0664220908 pp 181-183
77. Wilson, John Francis. (2004) ibid p 150
78. Louis Félicien Joseph Caignart de Saulcy, Edouard de Warren (1854) Narrative of a Journey Round the Dead Sea, and in the Bible Lands; in 1850 and 1851. Including an Account of the Discovery of the Sites of Sodom and Gomorrah Parry and M'Millan, pp 417-418
79. Louis Félicien Joseph Caignart de Saulcy, Edouard de Warren (1854) ibid p 418

Bibliography

• al-Athīr, ʻIzz al-Dīn Ibn (Translated 2006) The Chronicle of Ibn Al-Athīr for the Crusading Period from Al-Kāmil Fīʼl-taʼrīkh: The Years AH 491-541/1097-1146, the Coming of the Franks And the Muslim Response Translated by Donald Sidney Richards Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. ISBN 0754640787
• Brown, Peter The World of Late Antiquity, W. W. Norton, New York, 1971, ISBN 0393958035
• Flavius, Josephus The Jewish War ISBN 0-14-044-420-3
• Fitzmyer, Joseph A. (1991) A Christological Catechism: New Testament Answers Paulist Press, ISBN 0809132532
• Gregorian, Vartan (2003) "Islam: A Mosaic, Not a Monolith", Brookings Institution Press, ISBN 081573283X
• Hindley, Geoffrey. (2004) The Crusades: Islam and Christianity in the Struggle for World Supremacy Carroll & Graf Publishers, ISBN 0786713445
• Kent, Charles Foster (1912) Biblical Geography and History reprinted by Read Books, 2007 ISBN 1406754730
• Murphy-O'Connor, Jerome (2008) The Holy Land: An Oxford Archaeological Guide from Earliest Times to 1700 Oxford University Press US, ISBN 0199236666
• Norwich, John Julius (1988) “Byzantium; the Early Centuries” Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-011447-5
• Polybius The Rise of the Roman Empire, Translated by Ian Scott-Kilvert Contributor Frank William Walbank, Penguin Classics, 1979 ISBN 0140443622
• Richard, Jean (1999) The Crusades c.1071-c.1291 Cambridge University press ISBN 0-521-62566-1
• Salibi, Kamal Suleiman (1977) Syria Under Islam: Empire on Trial, 634-1097 Caravan Books, 1977 ISBN 0882060139
• Wilson, John Francis. (2004) Caesarea Philippi: Banias, the Lost City of Pan I.B.Tauris, ISBN 1850434409

Suggested reading on water issues

Water for the Future: The West Bank and Gaza Strip, Israel, and Jordan By U.S. National Academy of Sciences, Inc NetLibrary, Jamʻīyah al-ʻIlmīyah al-Malakīyah, Committee on Sustainable Water Supplies for the Middle East, National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences (U.S.) Published by National Academies Press, 1999 ISBN 030906421X,

External links

• Jewish Agency for Israel.The Nahal Hermon Reserve (Banias).
• Jewish Encyclopedia: Cæsarea Philippi
• Caesarea Philippi entry in historical sourcebook by Mahlon H. Smith
• Banyas

• Seleucid Empire
• Ptolemaic Empire
• Coele-Syria
• Hellenistic sites in Syria
• Roman sites in Syria
• Ancient Greek sites in Syria
• Pan cult sites
• Ancient Jewish Roman history
• Golan Heights
• New Testament cities
• Holy cities
• Classical sites on the Golan Heights
• Medieval sites on the Golan Heights
• Crusade places
• Geography of Syria
• History of Syria
• Archaeological sites in Syria
• Rivers of Israel
• Rivers of Syria
• Settlements established in the 1st century BC
• Disputed territories
• Villages depopulated during the Arab-Israeli conflict