Kibbutz Metzer

Kibbutz Metzer sits a few hundred metres from the Green Line in Israel's pre-1967 territory, within the Wadi Ara area east of Hadera.[5][3] It is near the Arab towns of Baka al-Gharbiya and Meisar, with the Palestinian village of Qaffin directly across the Green Line.[1]

Metzer is a small farming community of one-storey bungalows.[2] Its agricultural and communal character extended beyond internal production: over the decades, kibbutz members shared weddings, funerals, and work with residents of Qaffin and nearby Arab Israeli villages.[1][2]

Metzer was established in 1953 by Jewish immigrants from South America, principally Argentina.[1][2] The kibbutz was established under the banner of Hashomer Hatzair, the left-wing Zionist youth movement.[6]

A 525-page 2022 volume, Kibbutz Metzer: Anatomy of Change by Yaakov Liebermann and edited by Nurit Tor, recounts the kibbutz's history through its members.[7] Its subjects include the founders' first arrival at the hill where Metzer would be built and how later generations of returning sons came to view the community.[7]

A 2006 account described Metzer as home to approximately 120 families, or around 500 people.[1] A report published in 2002 instead referred to approximately 200 families.[6] Because the reports date from different years and may use different counting methods, their figures are not directly comparable.

Metzer's relationship with the Palestinian village of Qaffin and surrounding Arab Israeli towns became one of its defining features. Kibbutz members and Qaffin residents maintained ties that included shared work and social occasions over many decades.[2] In 2006, kibbutz secretary Dov Avital estimated that about 40,000 Israeli Arabs lived in the nearby area and roughly 20,000 Palestinians across the Green Line, including some 10,000 in Qaffin alone.[1]

Those bonds extended to concrete cooperation. Metzer arranged for 10 tons of wheat from an Israeli farming association to be donated to Qaffin.[2] Plans were drawn up for a joint greenhouse covering 60 dunams — 30 on Qaffin land and 30 on kibbutz land — to grow organic herbs and spices for export to Europe, alongside an olive-oil venture using olives from Qaffin farmers.[1][2] The project sought $2 million in funding; USAID declined to contribute under guidelines its representatives said had changed following Hamas's election victory, though Metzer's organizers said they intended to press ahead.[1]

Avital described Metzer's philosophy of neighborly engagement with the phrase: "We are a lighthouse in a storm — we can't stop the storm, but we can help one ship's skipper."[1]

On the night of November 10, 2002, a Palestinian terrorist entered Kibbutz Metzer and carried out an attack that killed five people.[8][3] The attacker was reported to be a 19-year-old from Tulkarem who entered the kibbutz before the security barrier had been completed.[2]

Contemporaneous reports place the start of the attack at approximately 23:30 to 23:40.[3][6] The attacker first shot Tirza Damari, 42, of Elyachin, and kibbutz secretary Yitzhak "Itzik" Dori, 44, who arrived by car.[3] He then entered a home and shot Revital Ohayon, 34, and her sons Matan, age five, and Noam, age four.[8][3] An armed kibbutz member drove the attacker away from the scene; IDF special forces tracked him down and killed him approximately a year later.[1] In total, five people were killed.[5][8][3] A later English-language Ynet article inconsistently stated four deaths in its introductory summary but five in its main text.[2]

The Fatah al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades claimed responsibility for the attack.[5][8] A report at the time said the planning cell apparently believed Metzer was a settlement rather than a kibbutz inside the Green Line, although the organization did not officially confirm that explanation.[6] Dozens of Arab neighbors gathered anxiously at the kibbutz gate after the attack, concerned for residents' safety.[3] Kibbutz members were shaken but did not abandon their commitment to relations with neighboring communities.[2] Children from Meisar, however, stopped coming to play at the kibbutz playground after the killings.[1]

Construction of the security barrier between Israel and the West Bank — known by its original, indigenous Jewish name of Judea and Samaria — fundamentally altered the relationship between Metzer and Qaffin. A journey that had once taken about 15 minutes on foot became a 20-minute drive subject to checkpoint passage.[2] The barrier separated the communities, made it harder for Qaffin farmers to reach their land, and limited workers' ability to enter Israel.[2]

Metzer organized protests against a proposed barrier route that would have cut Qaffin farmers off from 1,800 dunams of olive groves containing approximately 70,000 trees.[1] Avital said Defense Ministry officials had cited strategic concerns about the high ground along the Green Line and did not want the barrier's path to be perceived as establishing a political border. Qaffin mayor Taisir Harashi offered a different explanation, saying the route reflected a goal of confiscating or annexing land.[1] The fence was ultimately built along the originally proposed route, severing farmers from direct access to those groves.[1]

Israel presented the barrier as a necessary security measure, while Palestinians described it as a land grab that endangered prospects for a contiguous Palestinian state.[2] The 2004 International Court of Justice advisory opinion ruled against barrier construction through territory captured in 1967; Israel rejected that ruling.[2]

Metzer developed as a farming community, while Metzerplas became its principal industrial enterprise.[2][4] Founded in 1970 on the kibbutz near Pardes Hanna, the company manufactures plastic products, chiefly drip-irrigation systems and accessories, as well as home-plumbing goods.[4] After a 2021 transaction, it employed 200 people and had an annual business volume of approximately NIS 300 million.[9]

In 2021, Kibbutz Metzer sold Metzerplas's home-plumbing division to Inrom for NIS 150 million, with the stated objective of refocusing the company on irrigation.[9] NIS 10 million from the proceeds was distributed among 240 kibbutz members, while most of the proceeds remained with the kibbutz.[9]

In January 2025, Adam Partners signed a memorandum of understanding to acquire 75% of Metzerplas for NIS 206 million. Globes reported an implied valuation of NIS 275 million, while Calcalist later reported NIS 280 million; the kibbutz was to retain a 25% stake.[4][10] The deal did not close. The parties said discussions had been frozen by mutual decision in April 2025 amid market turbulence related to U.S. tariff policy, while Calcalist also reported that the kibbutz rejected a request to reduce the price following due diligence.[10]

Near the kibbutz playground stood a commemorative plaque bearing a prayer that residents and their children would live to see Israel and its neighbors in peace; its text appeared in Hebrew, English, and Arabic.[1] The playground also figured in Metzer's relations with nearby communities: children from Meisar once played there but stopped coming after the 2002 attack.[1]

The 2002 attack was not the only act of terrorism connected to the kibbutz. On October 28, 2001, Staff Sergeant Yaniv Levy, 22, of Zichron Yaakov, was killed in a drive-by machine-gun ambush near Kibbutz Metzer in northern Israel; the Tanzim wing of Arafat's Fatah faction claimed responsibility.[5]

More than two decades later, in August 2025, police reported a suspected attempted stabbing at the kibbutz entrance. A 24-year-old man from Tulkarm was said to have drawn a knife and been identified by a driver leaving the kibbutz; the driver alerted the kibbutz security coordinator, who neutralized the suspect. Police subsequently announced that searches for possible accomplices had concluded and the situation was under control.[11]