Ceramics from the
Byzantine era have been found here.[5]
In 1265, Qaffin was one of the estates given by Sultan
Baibars to his followers after his victory over the
Crusaders.[6] Half of Qaffin was given to
emirRukn al-Din Baibars al-Mu'izzi.[7]
In the 1596
Ottomantax-records a village named Qaffin appeared part of the nahiya (subdistrict) of
Jenin under the liwa' (district) of
Lajjun, with a population of 27
Muslim households. They paid taxes on a number of products, including
wheat,
barley, summer crops,
olives,
goats and
beehives, in addition to occasional revenues and a press for olive oil or grape syrup; a total of 9,000
akçe.[10]
In 1870/1871 (1288
AH), an Ottoman census listed the village in the nahiya of Shafa al-Gharby.[11]
In 1882, the
PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described the village, then named Kuffin as: "A good sized village on the low hills east of the
Plain of Sharon, with a
well on the south side. It has rock cut tombs, and a palm grows near the village."[12]
In the
1945 statistics the population of Qaffin, (including Kh. el Aqqaba and Kh. esh Sheik Meisar) was 1,570 Muslims,[15] and the land area was 23,755
dunams of land according to an official land and population survey.[16] Of this, 5,863 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 8,371 were used for cereals,[17] while 40 dunams were built-up (urban) land.[18]
On 7 February, Bader Harashi (20) had quarreled with an Israeli soldier at the
Separation barrier just outside the village, where he was protesting the
Trump Middle East peace plan. According to Palestinian reports, the soldier, apparently a Druze, left, came back some minutes later in a jeep, opened the door andshot Harashi dead. According to the IDF investigation, Harashi was shot dead when observed preparing to throw a Molotov cocktail.[20]
^Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 161. They also state that this Qaffin does not coincide with the borders of nahiya Jinin, but Zertal, 2016, p.
316 have included it in this place.
^Grossman, David (2004). Arab Demography and Early Jewish Settlement in Palestine. Jerusalem: Magnes Press. p. 257.
^Grossman, D. (1986). "Oscillations in the Rural Settlement of Samaria and Judaea in the Ottoman Period". in Shomron studies. Dar, S., Safrai, S., (eds). Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad Publishing House. p. 345