Avshalom, Israel

Avshalom is a secular community settlement in the western Negev’s Gaza-border area and is part of the Eshkol Regional Council.[1][2] Its locality code is 1311.[5] In 2015, it was identified as one of the council’s three communal settlements, alongside Tzohar and Shlomit; together, these three communities accounted for 5.5% of the council’s population.[2]

The council then comprised 32 localities—fourteen kibbutzim, fifteen moshavim, and three communal settlements—with some 15,000 residents, and shared a 40-kilometer border with the Gaza Strip.[2] These figures describe the wider council rather than Avshalom alone.[2]

Avshalom was established in 1990, and its founding population consisted of about 50 families of immigrants from the former Soviet Union.[3][1] By December 2016, 28 families had moved to the community during the preceding five years, and 52 houses were being marketed there.[1]

A separate historical locality named Avshalom was a rural center near Yammit in northeastern Sinai.[6] By 1981, that Avshalom and the other listed nearby communities, including two kibbutzim and several moshavim, had a combined population of about 2,000; no separate count was given for Avshalom.[6] The Yammit Region was evacuated in the context of the Camp David Accords and Israel’s peace treaty with Egypt: the last Israelis departed on April 25, 1982, and all of Sinai was in Egyptian hands by April 26.[6] The available account does not establish a connection between that rural center and the present-day Eshkol locality, or specify the former’s individual evacuation date.[6]

In January 2024, Avshalom was included among Eshkol localities covered by a government plan for the phased return of residents to the Gaza-border area.[7] The plan applied to the listed communities more than four kilometers from the border, without providing Avshalom-specific return details or its precise distance from Gaza.[7] In March 2026, Avshalom was among the council’s localities where opening educational institutions was permitted under a limited-area decision, subject to the local authority’s approval and proximity to an approved protected space.[8] That permission did not establish whether or when educational institutions in Avshalom actually opened.[8]

The 2022 census recorded approximately 360 residents in Avshalom, a population density of 2,989.8 people per square kilometer, and growth of 156.1% since the 2008 census.[4] A separate census-based estimate gave a population of 358.8, an estimated 104.9 households, and an average household size of 3.3 people.[9]

The median age in 2022 was 41.[4] Residents aged 0–19 accounted for 27.9% of the population, those aged 20–64 for 60.4%, and those aged 65 or older for 11.8%.[4] Judaism was identified as the locality’s main religion.[4] Within the census category “Jews and others,” 55.1% were Israel-born and 44.9% were born abroad; Europe was recorded as the continent of origin for 54.4% of that population category.[4]

An earlier rural-localities table, titled “Localities 2008 after the 2008 Census,” recorded 136 residents and classified Avshalom under “other Jewish rural settlements,” while the regional-council listing classifies it as a community settlement.[3][5] A May 2020 COVID-19 infographic listed a population of 273 and zero confirmed cases at that time, without explaining the population figure’s reference date or methodology.[10]

Residential affordability was a reason one family chose Avshalom: in a 2016 profile, they described seeking a detached house and yard within their budget.[1] The family reported paying NIS 57,000 for a half-dunam plot and NIS 28,000 for infrastructure development, later combining two caravillas into a six-room, 143-square-meter home with a protected room.[1]

Resident Anat Schwartz described a close-knit, mutually supportive community in which many families had moved from central Israel and lacked relatives nearby.[1] She identified employment as a challenge, saying that some residents commuted to central Israel and that travel to Tel Aviv or Hod HaSharon took about an hour and a half without traffic.[1] These descriptions reflect her experience rather than a survey of the community.[1]

Schwartz also recalled her family’s concerns about proximity to Gaza and rocket fire.[1] During Operation Protective Edge, they chose to remain in Avshalom, partly because their home had a protected room and they felt safer there than at a relative’s home in central Israel.[1] This was the family’s personal assessment of safety, not a comparative security assessment.[1]