the place was occupied for a "fairly long" period, and suggest that it was probably part of the fortress built by Ali, (son of Zahir al-Umar) in the eighteenth century. The design of the building is quite compatible with other fortresses of the period, like Qalat Jiddin and Dayr Hanna. In 1875, Victor Guérin found it to be a Muslim village with about 350 inhabitants. In 1881, the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described Sa'sa' as a village with a population of 300, built on a slight hill that was surrounded by vineyards and olive and fig trees. A population list from about 1887 showed Sa'sa''' to have about 1,740 inhabitants; all Muslims. Pottery vessels from the Rashaya al-Fukhar workshops, dating to the late Ottoman and early Mandate eras have been found here. British Mandate era In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Sa'sa'' had a population of 634; all Muslim, increasing in the 1931 census to 840, still all Muslims, in a total of 154 houses. The village had a small market-place in the village center with a few shops, as well as a mosque and two elementary schools, one for girls and one for boys. In the 1944/45 statistics the village had a population of 1,130 Muslims and a total land area of 14,796 dunams. Of this, 4,496 dunums were used for cereals; 1,404 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards, while 48 dunams were built-up (urban) area. 1948 In February 1948, Yigal Allon, commander of the Palmach in the north, ordered an attack on Sa'sa'. The order was given to Moshe Kelman, the deputy commander of Third Battalion. The order read: "You have to blow up twenty houses and kill as many warriors as possible". According to Pappé, the quote says which said "warriors" should be read "villagers". Khalidi, referencing "The History of the Haganah" by Ben-Zion Dinur, say they referred to the massacre as "one of the most daring raids into enemy territory." On February 15, 1948, a Palmach unit entered the village during the night and, without resistance, planted explosives against some of the houses. It was reported at the time that ten or more houses were totally or partially destroyed and 11 villagers were killed (5 of them small children). Currently, there are few remains of the Palestinian village of Sa'sa', with the exception of the village mosque,