SIKHNIN or SOGANE

SIKHNIN or SOGANE (Heb. סִיכְנִין), town in Galilee, 20 stadia (3 mi.; c. 5 km.) from Arabah (Jos., Life, 265). It was one of the places fortified by Josephus during his command in Galilee in 66 C.E. (Wars, 2:573; Life, 188). Talmudic sources praise the fertility of the valley in which it was situated (Bikat Sikhnin; Mid. Tan. 26:9). Several scholars, including R. Judah, R. Ḥanina b. Teradyon, and R. Joshua, are mentioned either as residents of or as visitors in Sikhnin. A local synagogue is referred to in the Jerusalem Talmud (Meg. 4:5, 75b). In crusader times it was a fief known as Zachanin, for which the Teutonic order and the Barlais family contended. Remains on the site include Roman, Byzantine, and Arab pottery, as well as two tombs of venerated Muslims (maqām). It is the present-day Sakhnīn, an Arab village in Israel, numbering about 7,400 inhabitants in 1968 and 22,600 in 2002, 94% of them Muslims. In 1995 Sikhnin received municipal status. Its area extends to 3.7 sq. mi. (9.7 sq. km.). In 2004, the local soccer team, Iḥud Beni Sikhnin, became the first Arab soccer team to win Israel's State Cup. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: S. Klein (ed.), Sefer ha-Yishuv (1939), S.V.; Avi-Yonah, Geog, 136. (Michael Avi-Yonah)