Jimzu

The village was situated on a spot that was only slightly higher than the surrounding land. A secondary road linked it to Lydda and another such road led to the neighboring village of Khirbat al-Duhayriyya. Jimzu has been identified with the Judean town of Gimzo, which was mentioned in the Old Testament (II Chronicles 28:18). The only record of the town during Roman times comes from Talmudic sources. In 1596, Jimzu was a village in the nahiya of Ramla (liwa' of Gaza) with a population of 154. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including wheat, barley, and fruit, as well as on other types of produce, such as goats and beehives.

Edward Robinson visited the village in 1838 and described it as rather large. According to a description from the late nineteenth century, Jimzu was a village built of adobe bricks and situated on the side of a low hill, surrounded by cactus hedges and olive trees. The village's houses were made of mud and stone. Jimzu's residents, who were predominantly Muslim, maintained a mosque. An elementary school was established in 1920; it had an enrollment of 175 students by the mid-1940s. Most villagers worked in agriculture and animal husbandry; they grew primarily grain and fruit. In 1944/45 a total of 77 dunums was devoted to citrus and bananas and 5,577 dunums were allocated to cereals; 1,605 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards, 1,400 dunums of which for olives. Material evidence of the early history of the village was abundant.