KIRYAT EKRON

KIRYAT EKRON (Heb. קִריַת עֶקְרוֹן), semi-urban community, with municipal council status (since 1963), in the Coastal Plain of Israel, 2 mi. (3 km.) S.E. of Reḥovot. The town's area is 0.8 sq. mi. (2.2 sq. km.). Immigrants from Bulgaria and Iraq were housed soon after the Israeli war of independence (1948) in the former Arab village of ʿAqir, abandoned in 1948. The site grew into a modern agglomeration which in 1969 had 4,100 inhabitants, some of whom worked in local plants (e.g., a cotton gin), in farm work, and various enterprises in Reḥovot and elsewhere. In the mid-1990s the population was approximately 5,350, increasing to 9,600 in 2002, with four new neighborhoods created in the expanding community. (Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)