TEL MOND

TEL MOND (Heb. תֵּל מוֹנְד), moshavah with municipal council status in central Israel, in the southern Sharon, 6 mi. (10 km.) N. of Kefar Sava. Its area is about 3 sq. mi. (8 sq. km.). Tel Mond was founded in 1929 upon the initiative of Sir Alfred Mond (later Lord Melchett), who planted large citrus groves and enlisted the participation of other British Jews through his Palestine Plantations Company. Tel Mond became the center for a group of smallholder villages (the "Tel Mond Bloc"). After 1948 many immigrants were absorbed there, partly from a ma'barah\>\> (immigrant transit camp) which was later transformed into a permanent housing scheme. In 1954 Tel Mond received local council status. In 1970 the village had 3,060 inhabitants. Its economy was based principally on citriculture. By the mid-1990s its population had increased to 4,060, rising further to 7,260 in 2002. The majority of residents now worked outside the moshavah. (Efraim Orni / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)