Jaffa (Oranges but where?)
Jaffa is beautiful, so I was told, romantic and really old. So when I arrived I expected to see the flavour of its Palestinian history. Indeed, the first impression after I got out of the car in at night matched my expectations: warm air coming from the sea, the scent of a hookah across the pavement and the bustling atmosphere at Jaffa’s centre near the clock tower. Promising, I thought.
But in the morning the picture looked different. The house I stayed in was further south, away from the tourist sites. I looked at a place that once had a lot to offer although not a lot of its past was left. Sad but inspired I took my camera and decided to find out more…
In the old days Jaffa was a Palestinian port city on the Mediterranean Sea and its history dates back about 4000 years. Back then it was serving Egyptian and Phoenician sailors in their sea voyages. Historians believe that Jaffa is the only port in the world, which can boast uninterrupted inhabitation throughout its entire existence until it got closed in 1965. Today the old port is used as a fishing habour and international marina with a small area of original alleyways, staged with artists, galleries and other tourist attractions.
Jaffa’s historical importance as a port brought wealth to the city. The Arabic population made a good living through merchandising. Many of the rich moved out of the densely populated alleyways and build impressive villas in the south, exactly where I was living now. These houses were used throughout the summer months; most families also had a winter domicile in cities like Jericho or somewhere else in Palestine.
For centuries Jaffa used to be surrounded by orange groves; a beautiful site full of heavenly fragrance. Now the landscape features an industrial wasteland divided by motorways, connecting Tel Aviv to the south of Israel. The area is polluted and bears many tragic stories about change and survival.
Its downfall started in 1917. During World War I British troops under General Allenby took Jaffa, which became part of the British-administered Palestine mandate from 1922 to 1948. The British mandate of Palestine supported the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine. This goal was achieved in 1948 and after military occupation by Israel from 1948 to 1950 Jaffa became part of the unified city Tel Aviv-Yafo.
From 1948 Jaffa experienced sharp fighting between the Zionist and the Palestinian militia. Many Arabic families decided to stay in their winter homes. But as the political situation became clear they never returned and abandoned their houses in Jaffa forever. Many other Palestinians followed; more than 95% of its population fled or got expelled in May 1948. Only about 4000 people stayed behind, the poorest of the poor, the ones who could not afford to go anywhere else.
What followed was a process of erasing or minimizing any Arab influence and its mark from the new-born State of Israel. After the city got attached to Tel Aviv’s municipality most of the orange groves were destroyed for urban expansion to accommodate more Jewish immigrants. Big parts of Jaffa were demolished or neglected. Only the small part of the Historic Old Jaffa got renovated and turned into the tourist attraction, which is almost the only witness to its former existence.
But what happened to the large and impressive family homes, still full of furniture and personal belongings? Firstly the poor Arab families moved in after they had been driven out of their original homes. Soon after Jewish migrants from North Africa and the Middle East joined them. Those people were also poor as they left everything behind and came with little education and few skills. As many more Jews from the former Soviet Union and other European countries arrived fresh from the ships to seek a new future in the Promised Land they were soon running out of space. The grand villas, divided into small units, now housed a mix of people from all over the world who were traumatized and experienced a culture shock. Whole families got cramped into one room and shared just one bathroom. But after all, the Jewish and the Palestinian people got on; despite language barriers they understood each other’s needs. What unified them were the same poverty and a certain sense of survival instinct.
In years to come more settlements were built for the Jewish; they happily moved out into their own apartments with their own bathrooms and so forth. The Palestinian population got left behind again, still very poor and unwanted. By now the villas, which were under constant climate attack, appeared to be quite derelict. The salty and humid air slowly ate away the facades and the paint. Inside the buildings were a mess and a lot of them were declared unfit for living in. A phase of destruction followed and many villas were broken down, especially those along the coastline. The remaining rubble got transported just a stone’s throwgh away and poured in front of the sea onto Jaffa’s former beach. And this is where it still lies; it’s simply called the rubbish mountain by the locals. By the way, the area is also known as a secret graveyard for Jaffa’s drug related gang war.
Most of the Arab population was removed as well; further south into estate buildings, which later turned into slums. This is where most of Jaffa’s social problems are found: drug dealing, abuse and prostitution or the planning of theft from rich Jewish houses.
In the late 70s, early 80s wealthy Jews took an interest in this area. People suddenly realized that those old villas were much more suitable for the Mediterranean climate. Built in Arabic tradition with high ceilings to give way to the rising hot air and many ventilating windows, they kept the air inside the house cool without the need for air-conditioning. And the land was close to the sea, whereas Tel Aviv became a noisy big city with little air to breath and the coastline reserved for hotels. A wave of new villas started to appear, some of them are remarkably similar to Arabic style houses. Romantics, artists and intellectuals snapped up the remaining old buildings and decorated the in- and exterior with some interest in preservation. Nowadays Jaffa is no longer ‘cheap’; it has become a very popular place to live.
Today Jaffa’s population has 40,000 inhabitants consisting of 22.000 Jews and 18.000 Palestinians (12.000 Moslems and 6.000 Christians). Generally Jaffa's Palestinian residents live peacefully side by side with their Jewish neighbours, but there are differences. The Palestinian population is not allowed to build or extend existing houses, not even if they own their place. They simply will not be given planning permission. The living conditions are similar to those 50 years ago: large families live in the same house, some of them in just one room. So lots of buildings pop up illegally and extensions are built secretly, just to create more space for the extended families. A number of people have created small buildings near the rubble wasteland, an area, which is 1.7 km long and 0.7 km wide and not used for anything. The municipality has now promised to turn this mountain into a public park and was made to promise not to destroy the existing buildings, whether illegal or not.
This was what I was looking at that morning. Some old villas that seemed somehow lost, some rickety shacks and single floor living quarters plus a huge area with building rubble, blocking access to the sea. Tourists hardly make it to this end of town. However, it still has its charm. And there is also a visible process of change. I even spotted a small area where people planted several dozen olive trees. Sadly no oranges, though. Former glory may not return, but I wish Jaffa’s mixed population would be given the chance to create a future for the better.
© Astrid Schulz