In 1596 the village appeared under the name of Qabba'a in the Ottomantax registers as part of the nahiya of Jira, part of Safad Sanjak. It had an all Muslim population, consisting of 11 households and 2 bachelors, an estimated 99 persons. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 20 % on agricultural products, including as wheat, barley, olive trees, vineyards, goats and beehives, in addition to occasional revenues; totalling 2,280 akçe. The village appeared under the name of Koubaa on the map that Pierre Jacotin compiled during Napoleon's invasion of 1799. In 1838 el-Kuba'ah was noted as a Muslim village, located in the el-Khait district. In 1875 Victor Guérin found the village to have 120 Muslim inhabitants. In 1881 the PEF's Survey of Western Palestine described as Kabbaah: "A masonry village, with a few caves to the south contains about 150 Moslems; situated on a ridge, with olives and arable land. Water from birket and good springs." A population list from about 1887 showed Kaba'ah to have about 385 Muslim inhabitants.
In the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Qaba'a had a population of 179 Muslims, increasing in the 1931 census when Kabba' had 256 Muslim inhabitants, in a total of 44 houses. In the 1945 statistics it had a population of 460 Muslims with a total land area of 13,817 dunums. Of this, 379 dunums was plantations and irrigable land, 7,966 were for cereals, while 66 dunams were built-up land.
1948, aftermath
On 2 May 1948, Yigal Allon with Haganah launched an operation, conquering ‘Ein al Zeitun and Biriyya, and intimidating with mortar barrages the villages of Fir’im, Qabba‘a and Mughr al Kheit, leading to a mass evacuation. Qabba'a finally became depopulated on May 26, 1948, after a military assault by Israeli forces. In 1953, Hatzor HaGlilit was founded 3 km south of the village site, but not on village land. In 1992 the village site was described: "The stone debris of destroyed houses covers the site, where shrubs, grass, cactuses, and fig and pine trees grow. Most of the surrounding land are cultivated by Israeli farmers, but some are wooded and others are used as pasture."
