Three Lookouts

The three lookouts (Hebrew: שלושת המצפים‎, Shloshet HaMitzpim, also Mitzpot) were three Jewish settlements built in the Negev desert in 1943 on land owned by the Jewish National Fund. The goal was securing the land and assessing its feasibility for agriculture. The founding was preceded by a complex land purchase procedure, as the British authorities had practically prohibited Jewish land acquisition in the area following the costly Arab Revolt and the subsequent White Paper of 1939.

These lookouts, Revivim, Gvulot, and Beit Eshel, later served as a springboard for further Jewish population of the Negev. The residents of the lookouts made extensive geophysical surveys and conducted agricultural experiments for this purpose.