Kanaker ( Arabic : كناكر ) is a village in southern Syria , administratively part of the Rif Dimashq Governorate , located southwest of Damascus . Nearby localities include Sa'sa' to the west, Beit Saber to the northwest, Khan al-Shih to the north, Zakiyah , al-Taybah , Khan Dannun and al-Kiswah to the northeast, Deir Ali and Jubb al-Safa to the east, Ghabaghib to the southeast, Kafr Nasej and Deir al-Adas to the south and Jabah to the southwest. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics , Kanaker had a population of 13,950 at the 2004 census, making it the largest locality in the nahiyah ("subdistrict") of Sa'sa'. Kanaker marks the western boundary of the Marj al-Suffar plain, south of the right bank of the al-A'waj river.
6-455: In 1838, Eli Smith noted Kanaker's population as being Sunni Muslims . Kanaker was settled by Druze from Mount Lebanon in 1862 and by 1867, the Abu Ras family, a prominent Druze clan and ally of the al-Atrash family, had gained control of the village. When the chief of the al-Atrash, Ismail Pasha, stayed a night at Kanaker, he massacred its Christian inhabitants before launching an attack on
12-555: The Holy Land in 1838 and 1852, acting as an interpreter for Robinson in his quest to identify and record biblical place names in Palestine, which was subsequently published in Robinson's Biblical Researches in Palestine . He is known for bringing the first printing press with Arabic type to Syria . He went on to pursue the task which he considered to be his life's work: translation of
18-994: The 19th century before the two countries had been issuing their independence and new borders. Of note, some of the families that migrated to present-day Jordan, are from Damascus proper. Eli Smith Eli Smith (September 13, 1801 – January 11, 1857) was an American Protestant missionary and scholar. Smith was born in Northford, Connecticut , to Eli and Polly (née Whitney) Smith. He graduated from Yale College in 1821 and from Andover Theological Seminary in 1826. He worked in Malta until 1829, then in company with H. G. O. Dwight traveled through Armenia and Georgia to Persia . They published their observations, Missionary Researches in Armenia , in 1833 in two volumes. Smith settled in Beirut in 1833. Along with Edward Robinson , he made two trips to
24-641: The Bible into Arabic. Although he died before completing the task, the work was completed by C. V. Van Dyck of the Syrian Mission and published in 1860 to 1865. Smith married three times. His first wife was Sarah Lanman Huntington Smith , who was also a missionary. She died in 1836. He then married Maria Ward Chapin, who died in 1842. He married Mehitable (Hetty) Simkins (Butler) Smith on October 7, 1846, in Northampton, Massachusetts . His daughter Mary Elizabeth Smith
30-700: The Christian forces of the Shihab dynasty at Rashaya in Lebanon. Kanaker continued to be inhabited by Druze through 1883 and a certain time beyond. During the Syrian civil war , on 27 July 2011, the Syrian human rights groups reported that eight or eleven people were killed during a Syrian Army raid in Kanaker and about 250 people were arrested. Four tanks and a bulldozer reportedly entered
36-537: The village while another 14 tanks surrounded the place. The rebels surrendered the village in December 2016 and turned themselves in to the Syrian Army. In exchange, they had their status legalized. Some Jordanians from 3 villages in the north of the country, Irbid province (Kharja, Saham and Al nu'aimah) have the surname Kanakri. This relates them to Kanaker. These families migrated from Kanaker-Syria down south to Jordan in
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