Dura, Hebron

Dura
Municipality type A (City)
Arabic transcription(s)
• Arabic	دورا
• Latin	Durrah (official)
Municipal Seal of Dura
Dura Location of Dura within Palestine
Coordinates: 31°30′25″N 35°01′40″E / 31.50694°N 35.02778°E / 31.50694; 35.02778
Palestine grid	152/101
State	State of Palestine
Governorate	Hebron
Government
• Type	City (from 1967)
• Head of Municipality	Mr. Ahmad Salhoub
Population  (2017)[1]
• Total	39,336
Name meaning	Dura (proper noun) from Hebrew אֲדוֹרַים Adoraim[2]

Dura (Arabic: دورا) is a Palestinian city located eleven kilometers southwest of Hebron, in the southern West Bank, in the Hebron Governorate of the State of Palestine. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the town had a population of 39,336 in 2017.^[1] The current mayor is Ahmad Salhoub.

In 1517, Dura was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire with the rest of Syria. In the late Ottoman and early Mandatory periods, Dura was the only permanent settlement in the southeastern ridge of the central highlands. Starting as a village and evolving into a town, it sprawled across large territories, becoming a center for influential families, collectively referred to as Abu-Darham.^[3]

After the British Mandate, in the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, Dura came under Jordanian rule. Dura was established as a municipality on January 1, 1967, five months before it came under Israeli occupation after the Six-Day War. Since 1995, it has been governed by the Palestinian National Authority, as part of Area A of the West Bank and as part of the Hebron Governorate of the State of Palestine.