Merom Golan

Merom Golan combines a kibbutz community with agricultural enterprises, industrial businesses and visitor accommodation in the northern Golan Heights.[1][5] Its activities have included cattle ranching, orchards, vineyards, poultry farming and tourism, while the kibbutz also manages the Mount Bental overlook.[5][3]

The kibbutz lies at the foot of Mount Bental, at approximately 1,000 meters above sea level.[1] Its permanent site, occupied from 1972, is inside the mountain's volcanic crater.[6]

Merom Golan was founded in July 1967 by Ha-Kibbutz ha-Me’uḥad, shortly after the Six-Day War.[2] Young people and older members of kibbutzim in the Hula Valley volunteered to establish outposts on the Golan, seeking to prevent Syrian forces from returning to positions that had threatened the valley's residents for two decades.[7] Their initial community was called Kibbutz Golan; it subsequently moved and became Merom Golan.[7]

Yehuda Harel was among the founders.[8] During and after the war, he belonged to the first Ha-Kibbutz ha-Me’uḥad group to settle at Aleika and Quneitra, whose members later founded the kibbutz.[8] Harel subsequently served as a Knesset member and received the Israel Prize for Agriculture in 2018.[8]

The kibbutz was initially located in the central Golan and moved a few months later to the deserted Syrian town of Kuneitra.[6] Israeli forces had captured the town on June 11, 1967, by which time almost all its inhabitants had left; the kibbutz's location there was at the town's western entrance.[9] In 1972, the community moved to its permanent quarters at Mount Bental.[6]

During a visit in the summer of 1967, cabinet minister Yisrael Galili was asked by residents to promise that the government considered them there to stay.[10] He replied: “You people [should] promise that you will fight any Israeli government that tries to uproot you.”[10]

By 1970, the Golan had twelve settlements, with Merom Golan among those in the north.[2] A 1971 account described the opening of the first school in the Golan area at the kibbutz in Kuneitra and the construction of permanent housing there.[4] At the 28th Zionist Congress, held in Jerusalem on January 18–28, 1972, Yaacov Ronn of Merom Golan spoke as one of five representatives of new settlements during a session on settlement activity.[11] The Congress also reported that the Settlement Department had established more than fifty new settlements throughout the country and along its borders since the Six-Day War.[11]

During the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Merom Golan was heavily shelled, and members were evacuated after Syrian forces reached the kibbutz's perimeter fence.[12] Shelling damaged houses in the community.[13]

Protective infrastructure remained an issue in later years: in 2018, some older homes dating to the kibbutz's establishment lacked individual secure rooms, leaving residents dependent on communal shelters.[14] Following an exchange of fire involving Iranian forces in Syria and Israel that year, about one-sixth of the population was reported to lack direct access to a protective room.[14]

Merom Golan's population was reported as 450 in 2003 and 600 in 2007; the latter figure included 146 kibbutz members.[15][5] A 2014 estimate put the population at approximately 220, while a 2018 report gave a figure of 700.[16][14] These figures are dated estimates from separate reports rather than a consistent census series.

Merom Golan's early economic activities included quarrying tuff, raising farm animals and growing apples.[6] By 2003, agriculture and industry were its principal sources of livelihood, with 150 dunams devoted to deciduous-fruit orchards and export flowers, a beef herd of approximately 1,000 head, and two factories.[15] Its agricultural branches also included vineyards and poultry houses.[5] Industrial enterprises named in 2007 were the Tuff factory and Bental Industries, the latter identified as a defense-industry factory.[5]

Cattle ranching remained a substantial enterprise in 2014, when a ranch managed for the kibbutz by Erez Ashtamker had approximately 1,000 cattle grazing across roughly 3,500 hectares near Kidmat Zvi.[16] Animals were moved between paddocks as forage was used, and daily work included checking herds, tagging cattle, repairing fences and protecting calves from predators.[16] Cattle left behind when residents departed the Golan after 1967 had been gathered by new residents; the local cattle were of the baladi breed.[16] Omer Viner, a Merom Golan resident who arrived in 1967, became an experienced rancher and adviser to the ranching crew.[16]

The kibbutz later added truffles to its agricultural ventures, using specially trained dogs to locate them for collection.[6] A winery at Merom Golan is also documented in a grouping of photographs dating to 1984.[17]

Tourism developed alongside farming and industry.[5] In 2007, the kibbutz had 32 guest cabins, the Coffee Anan café and the Cowboys' Restaurant, and was investing in additional visitor accommodation.[5] Its tourist businesses have also included a resort village and the Bokrim meat restaurant.[6]

The Mount Bental overlook, managed by Merom Golan, stands 1,170 meters above sea level and offers views of Mount Hermon and Druze villages.[3] Old bunkers and trenches remain on the mountain, which served as a strategic observation point and was a site of fighting during the 1973 Yom Kippur War.[3]

Coffee Anan operated on Mount Bental after beginning as a coffee cart and opening as a café in 1999.[18] Its name was inspired by former United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan.[18] The café closed permanently after the site was declared a closed military zone following October 7, 2023.[18]

Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in 1967 and extended its jurisdiction there in 1981, effectively annexing the territory it held.[19][20] United Nations Security Council Resolution 497 rejected the legal effect of that action, while in 2019 United States president Donald Trump signed a proclamation recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan.[20] The annexation remains broadly unrecognized internationally, although the United States and Colombia recognize it.[21]

The closure of Coffee Anan also involved a land-use disagreement.[18] The kibbutz tourism company cited unresolved land-use arrangements and uncertainty about further investment; the Nature and Parks Authority said the café building had been erected in a nature reserve without required permits and that the kibbutz had chosen not to continue the regularization process.[18]