Kfar Ruth

Kfar Ruth combines agricultural holdings with employment outside the settlement and businesses offering rural visitor activities.[3][2] It lies in the Ayalon Valley near Modi'in.[1][2] A 2021 report listed it among the communities of the Hevel Modi'in Regional Council.[6]

The moshav's residential area is separated from the other land belonging to its agricultural holdings, a layout resulting from security and topographical constraints.[3] The surrounding area contains archaeological remains, including ancient wine presses and ritual baths.[5]

Kfar Ruth was established in 1977.[4] An official settlement-names reference traces its name to Kfar Rutha or Kfaruta on the Madaba Map and identifies the historical site with nearby Khirbet Kfar Lut.[4] A 2022 account instead says the moshav was named for Khirbet Ruth.[5] The Madaba Map is a sixth-century mosaic map of the Land of Israel and surrounding areas; it was discovered in 1884 during restoration of a Byzantine church in Madaba, east of the Jordan River.[2] Among its named towns and villages around Jerusalem is Kfar Rutha.[2]

Ozery and Menachem were among the moshav's original founders and raised their three sons there.[1] They grew flowers for export to Europe, together with a variety of fruits and vegetables.[1] Their acquaintance began when Ozery was seeking a Yemenite community to host students participating in a summer program.[1]

Since the early 1980s, the moshav had, in practice, 40 families holding rights in agricultural holdings of 33.75 dunams each, including a residential plot of 1.6 dunams.[3] Housing was concentrated in a central residential “camp,” apart from the remaining land in the holdings.[3]

On January 2, 1991, a Planning Committee approved a proposed organizational change to a community settlement retaining 40 agricultural holdings and adding 160 housing units, but the change never took effect.[3] The formal decision of 1991 specified holdings of 12 dunams each, whereas a 2020 Israel Land Authority regularization framework proposed 33.75 dunams per holding.[3]

That framework was recorded in Israel Land Authority management resolution 4991, dated November 29, 2020.[3] It envisaged continued advancement of a local outline plan allocating 300 housing units, the full quota under National Outline Plan 35.[3] In December 2021, the Planning Committee recommended to the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development that the moshav's standard be set at 40 holdings of 33.75 dunams each, totaling 1,350 dunams.[3]

The 2021 committee protocol records a land-boundary dispute involving the Aharon family, whose claim concerning the location of the moshav's land relied on court judgments from 1999.[3] It presents the Israel Land Authority's position that its first map of the moshav excluded the disputed area and that its records contained no map including it.[3] The protocol also says the family's requests for an injunction were rejected by both the District Court and the Supreme Court.[3]

In December 2021, Kfar Ruth had 70 members and 40 agricultural holdings.[3] Some residents earned their living from agriculture, but a larger number worked outside the moshav, including as employees and in professional occupations; other residents were retired.[3] The same planning record described 40 families as having held rights in the agricultural holdings since the early 1980s.[3]

Agricultural cultivation at Kfar Ruth included 465 dunams of temporary land in the Anava area that had been fully cultivated since 1977.[3] A 2013 Israel Land Authority map showed an area of 1,947 dunams for the moshav, together with 128 dunams of roads.[3] Under the 2020 regularization framework, the settlement requested land-use allocations of 853 dunams for agriculture, 257 for housing, 60 for non-agricultural employment, and 180 for private open space.[3]

By 2008, Kfar Ruth attracted visitors to a nursery, winery, apiary, and rural restaurants.[2] The Druri family had opened the Tzomchim nursery four years before that report, with a plan for 40 dunams of flowering houseplants and cyclamens as its principal crop.[2]

Shai Spector's apiary began in 1979 as a hobby operation with six hives and became a commercial enterprise in 1982.[7] Its activities included producing varietal honey and pollinating agricultural crops.[7] A boutique honey shop opened at the site in 2005 and, in 2025, sold honey from many different floral sources.[7]

Ruth Winery is a family boutique winery established by Tal Maor, who learned grape growing and winemaking from his grandfather and father.[2][8] In 2008, its setting was described as surrounded by greenhouses and overlooking wooded hills.[2] In 2017, the kosher winery produced red wines from Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, Malbec, and Carignan, alongside dessert wines, rosé, and a port-style wine aged outdoors for three years.[8]

Aladdin Farm is an ecological olive farm in Kfar Ruth operated by Rimon Artzi and Azzam Nasser.[5] In 2014, it was a cooperative Israeli-Palestinian venture that had operated for more than 20 years and offered a family destination with a petting area and activities such as pita-making.[9] By 2022, the farm covered 18 dunams and hosted olive harvesting, oil-making, flour-grinding demonstrations, and pita baking.[5]

Artzi and Nasser had worked together for 37 years by 2022.[5] Artzi said they had built the farm from scratch to bring people closer to the land, describing it as “a place of calm and an example for children” of Jews and Arabs working the land together.[5]