The name of the kibbutz was taken from the epic poem "Masada" by Yitzhak Lamdan, itself named after the fortress of Masada by the Dead Sea. It has nothing to do with the Hebrew word for base or foundation, "massad". The fortress of Masada is called in Hebrew "Metzadá" (מצדה), but Yitzhak Lamdan, although writing in Hebrew, used the name as it is known from the works of Josephus, "Masada" (מסדה). Lamdan's poem was extremely influential among Zionist Jews at the time the kibbutz was established.
As with Sha'ar HaGolan, the kibbutz's defenders retreated during the Battles of the Kinarot Valley of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War after holding out for four days of fighting. The two kibbutzim were captured and briefly held by the Syrian Army, during which time they were looted and burned down. Although the members made every reasonable effort to defend their kibbutz and returned soon after the events, a stigma was attached to them, and vindication in the form of released military records only arrived in recent years, decades too late.
Masada, like dozens of the kibbutzim near the Sea of Galilee, existed under the threat from both the Syrian Golan Heights towering from the east, and the Jordanians across the Yarmouk River. On 29 March 1968 a tractor from Masada hit a landmine, killing the driver and three passengers. Israeli forces came to evacuate the casualties, and Jordanian forces opened fire on them. In retaliation, the Israel Air Force attacked Jordanian targets east of Beit She'an. Several planes were damaged by anti-aircraft fire yet returned safely to base.
Masada suffered greatly under the economic collapse of the 1980s which affected it more harshly than other kibbutzim. In 2006 the kibbutz was privatized.
Masada under construction 1937, Shaʽar HaGolan in distance
.JPG)
-JNF009776.jpeg)
