The Old Train Station and the Water Tower

The station was opened in October 1915 during the Ottoman rule in Israel. The Turkish built the train station to be able to get soldiers, weapons and supplies faster during World War I.

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The station complex included a station building, similar in style and design to other Ottoman railway stations in Israel, a water tower (it was built to provide water to cool the locomotive), the lodgings for the Station master and a maintenance depot. You can easily notice that the building of the station looks like a typical Swiss house with several chimneys on the roof for cold snowy winters. The unusual design can be explained by the fact that the architect, being Swiss, did not know much about Palestine and its climate. The railway to Beersheba was of great strategic and military importance during the war. After the war the British connected the railway to the Rafiah railway and it became longer.

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Not long ago, the municipality of Beersheba renewed the train station and it became a tourists' site.