Remains of a Frankishbovaria (=farm) has been noted,[4] while sherds from the Mamluk and Ottoman era have also been found.[3]
Ottoman era
The village was (re-)founded in 1834, during the Ottoman era, by three Christian Greek Orthodox families who purchased the land from Jenin Muslims.[5] In 1838 "Zabedet" was noted as a Greek Christian village in the Haritheh area, north of Nablus.[6]
In 1882, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described it as a "moderate sized village at the south edge of the arable plain called Wady es Selhab, supplied by a well on the east, with a low hill covered with brushwood on the south."[7]
The Latin Catholic mission established its presence in the village in 1883.[5]
In 1945 Village Statistics Zababida had a population of 870; 90 Muslims and 780 Christians,[12] and the jurisdiction of the village was 5,719 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey.[13] 2,510 dunams were used for plantations and irrigable land, 3,067 dunams for cereals,[14] while 16 dunams were built-up (urban) land.[15]
In 1961, the population of Zababide was 1,474,[16] of whom 1,077 were Christian.[17]
Post-1967
Zababdeh came under Israeli occupation along with the rest of the West Bank during the 1967 Six-Day War. The population of Kufeir Zababida in the 1967 census conducted by Israel was 1,520, of whom 329 originated from the Israeli territory.[18]
According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics 2007 census, there were 3,665 residents,[1] of which roughly two-thirds are Christians,[19] divided into Roman Catholic (Latin), Greek Orthodox, Greek Catholic and Anglican communities. For two decades, from 1974–75 until he was posted to a position as parish priest in Gaza in 1995, the village priest was Manuel Musallam, a Fatah activist and native of Birzeit, who developed excellent educational facilities in the village that attracted commuting Muslim students from Jenin.[5] The city also has a Muslim minority; both communities live without conflicts.[5]
Families
Awwad
Dawoud
Daibes
Diab
Esaid (Saeed)
Kasbari
Khalil Ibrahim
Sharqawi
Turkman
Two Khoury families related only by marriage
Abu-Zaineh
Antabil
Abu Sahliya
Obaid
Musallam
In media
Zababdeh was featured in a short film Salt of the Earth: Palestinian Christians in the Northern West Bank, which examined the lives of nine Palestinian Christians living in and around the cities of Jenin and Nablus. Released by Salt Films, Inc., in 2004, the film was produced by Presbyterian missionaries Marthame and Elizabeth Sanders while they lived and worked in the Palestinian Christian village of Zababdeh.[20]
^64% according to [1]: "Zababdeh is one of the larger Villages with significant Christian populations in the north of the West Bank with 2,251 Christians out of 3,500 citizen."
