Kafr Sur is a Palestinian town in the Tulkarm Governorate in the eastern West Bank, located 12 kilometers Southeast of Tulkarm. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Kafr Sur had a population of approximately 1,254 inhabitants in mid-year 2006, and 1,288 by 2017. 13.5% of the population of Kafr Sur were refugees in 1997.

History

Ceramics from the Byzantine era have been found here.

Ottoman era

Al-Ras was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with all of Palestine, and in a sijill (royal order) from 941/1535 an unspecified share of the village revenue was given to the waqf for Ribat al-Mansuri (com) in Jerusalem. In 1596 the village appeared in the tax registers as being in the Nahiya of Bani Sa'b of the Liwa of Nablus. It had a population of 22 households, all Muslim. The villagers paid a fixed tax-rate of 33,3% on various agricultural products, including wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, goats and/or beehives in addition to occasional revenues, a press for olive oil or grape syrup, and a fixed tax for people of Nablus area; a total of 6,100 akçe. In 1838, Robinson noted Kefr Sur as a village in Beni Sa'ab district, west of Nablus. In the 1860s, the Ottoman authorities granted the village an agricultural plot of land called Ghabat Kafr Sur in the former confines of the Forest of Arsur (Ar. Al-Ghaba) in the coastal plain, west of the village. During this British Mandate period, this territory developed into a village called Ghabat Kafr Sur. In 1870/1871 (1288 AH), an Ottoman census listed the village with 139 Household in the nahiya (sub-district) of Bani Sa'b. In 1882 the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described Kefr Sur as: "A small stone village on a knoll, supplied by cisterns." Around the turn of the 20th century, Kafr Sur and its Ghaba were areas in which the Hannun Family of Tulkarm/Saffarin owned extensive estates. The Hannuns fostered close ties with the clans inhabiting Kafr Sur.

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Kufr Sur had a population of 271 Muslims, increasing in the 1931 census to 559; 553 Muslims and 6 Christians, living in 128 houses. The 1931 numbers included the Bayarat Hannoun and the Arab el Balawin. In the 1945 statistics the population of Kafr Sur was 460; 450 Muslims and 10 Christians, with 10,926 dunams of land according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 878 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 2,644 were used for cereals, while 14 dunams were built-up (urban) land.

Jordanian era

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Kafr Sur came under Jordanian rule. In 1961, the population of Kafr Sur was 656.

Post 1967

Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Kafr Sur has been under Israeli occupation.