Jaffa (or Yafo) is one of the most ancient port cities in the world. Some claim that Jaffa was named after Japheth, one of the three sons of Noah, who built it forty years after the Great Flood. A Hebrew etymology indicates that the city is called Jaffa because of its beauty (yofi in Hebrew). The Hellenist tradition links the name to "Iopeia", which is Cassiopeia, the mother of Andromeda. Following Pliny the Elder the name is connected with Jopa, who was the daughter of Aeolus, the god of wind. However, the Hellenist and Roman accountings for the name date from hundreds of years after the original (most probably west-semitic) naming.[citation needed]
[edit] Ancient period
The ancient site of Jaffa is Tel Yafo, or "Jaffa Hill," which rises to a height of 40 meters (130 feet) and offers a commanding view of the coastline. Hence its strategic importance in military history. At the foot of the hill were springs of fresh water. The accumulation of debris and landfill over the centuries made the hill even higher.
Jaffa's natural harbor has been in use since the Bronze Age. It is mentioned in an Ancient Egyptian letter from 1470 BCE, glorifying its conquest by Pharaoh Thutmose III, who hid armed warriors in large baskets and gave the baskets as a present to the Canaanite city's governor. The city is also mentioned in the Amarna letters under its Egyptian name Ya-Pho, ( Ya-Pu, EA 296, l.33). In 1991, a replica of the Egyptian gate lintels, bearing the titles of Pharaoh Ramesses II, was re-erected on its original site. The city was under Egyptian rule until around 800 BCE.
Jaffa is mentioned in the Book of Joshua as the territorial border of the Tribe of Dan, hence the term "Gush Dan", used today for the coastal plain. Many descendants of Dan lived along the coast and earned their living from shipmaking and sailing. In the "Song of Deborah" the prophetess asks: "ãï ìîä éâåø àåðéåú": "Why doth Dan dwell in ships?"[citation needed][2]
Interior of St. Peter's Church and the Vision of St. PeterKing David and his son King Solomon conquered Jaffa and used its port to bring the cedars used in the construction of the First Temple from Tyre. The city remained in Jewish hands even after the split of the Kingdom of Israel. In 701 BCE, in the days of King Hezekiah (çæ÷éäå), Sennacherib, king of Assyria, invaded the region from Jaffa.
Jaffa was a Seleucid port until it was taken over by the Maccabean rebels (1 Maccabees x.76, xiv.5). In the Roman suppression of the Jewish Revolt, Jaffa was captured and burned by Cestius Gallus. The Roman Jewish historian Josephus writes that eight thousand inhabitants were massacred. Pirates operating from the rebuilt port incurred the wrath of Vespasian, who razed the city and erected a citadel in its place, installing a Roman garrison there.
The New Testament account of St. Peter's resurrection of the widow Tabitha, (Dorcas) (Acts, ix, 36-42) takes place in Jaffa. St. Peter later had a vision in which God told him not to distinguish between Jews and Gentiles or between kosher and non-kosher (Acts, x, 10-16). This vision heralded a major ideological split between Judaism and Christianity. A painting in St. Peter's, a Roman Catholic church in Jaffa, depicts this event.
[edit] Medieval period
Saladin's attack on JaffaUnimportant during the first centuries of Christianity, Jaffa did not have a bishop until the fifth century CE. In 636 Jaffa was conquered by Arabs. Under Islamic rule, it served as a port of Ramla, then the provincial capital.
Jaffa was captured during the Crusades, and became the County of Jaffa and Ascalon, one of the vassals of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. One of its counts, John of Ibelin, wrote the principal book of the Assizes of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. During the period of the Crusades, the Jewish traveller Benjamin of Tudela (1170) sojourned at Jaffa, and found there just one Jew, a dyer by trade. Saladin took it in 1187. The city surrendered to King Richard the Lionheart on September 10, 1191, three days after the Battle of Arsuf. Despite efforts by Saladin to reoccupy the city in July 1192 (see Battle of Jaffa) the city remained in the hands of the Crusaders, and on 2nd September 1192 the Treaty of Jaffa was formally sworn, guaranteeing a three year truce between the two armies. In 1268 Jaffa was conquered by Egyptian mamluks, led by Baibars. In 14th century they completely destroyed the city for fear of new crusades. According to the traveler Cotwyk, Jaffa was a heap of ruins at the end of the 16th century.
[edit] The Ottoman period
On March 7, 1799 Napoleon I of France captured Jaffa and his troops proceeded to kill more than two thousand Albanian captives.
Jaffa was well known for its cash crops such as citrus and bananas. Until the establishment of Tel Aviv and the era of the Mandate for Palestine, Jaffa had the most advanced commercial, banking, fishing, and agriculture industries in Palestine. It had many factories specializing in cigarette making, cement making, tile and roof tile production, iron casting, cotton processing plants, traditional handmade carpets, leather products, wood boxes for Jaffa oranges, textiles, presses and publications. The majority of all publications and newspapers in Palestine were published in Jaffa.
By the beginning of the twentieth century, the population of Jaffa had swelled considerably and new suburbs were built on the sand dunes along the coast. By 1909, the new Jewish suburbs north of Jaffa were reorganized as the city of Tel Aviv.
Image:Kook color.jpg
Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook was chief rabbi of Jaffa from 1904-1921.In 1904 Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1864-1935) moved to Palestine and took up the position of chief rabbi of Jaffa:
In 1904, he came to the Land of Israel to assume the rabbinical post in Jaffa, which also included responsibility for the new secular Zionist agricultural settlements nearby. His influence on people in different walks of life was already noticeable, as he attempted to introduce Torah and Halakha into the life of the city and the settlements.[3]
In 1917, the Ottomans banished all of Jaffa's residents as they feared the British army would occupy the city. The British did indeed occupy the city (see Sinai and Palestine Campaign), but let its residents return after a year.
[edit] Under the British mandate
British Commonwealth soldiers stand outside the Jaffa municipal building.During 1917-1920, there were thousands of Jewish residents in Jaffa. A wave of Arab pogrom attacks during 1920 and 1921 caused many Jewish residents to flee and resettle in Tel Aviv. The 1921 riots (known as the Meoraot Tarpa by the Jews) began with a May Day parade that turned violent. The Arab rioters attacked Jewish people and buildings, including the residents of "The House of Immigrants" and the Jewish author Yosef Haim Brenner.
In 1921 Rabbi Kook moved to Jerusalem when he was appointed as the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi of the British Mandate of Palestine and is still regarded as Israel's first chief rabbi as well.
At the end of 1922 Jaffa had 32,000 residents while Tel Aviv had 15,000. However, in 1927, Tel Aviv had 38,000 residents. The Jews of Jaffa lived on the outskirts of Jaffa, close to Tel Aviv. The old city of Jaffa, which was controlled by the Arabs, was almost empty of Jews. During the 1930s both cities had a combined population of 80,000 residents. By 1945, Arabs owned 146,316 dunams (146 km²) of citrus, and Jews owned 66,403 dunams (66 km²).[citation needed]
The 1936-1939 Arab revolt in Palestine, also known as the Great Arab uprising, inflicted great economic and infrastructural damage on Jaffa. Urban warfare between the British forces and Arab resistance destroyed many of the city's narrow alleys. The British demolished many houses belonging to Arab resistance. Jewish and British citizens moved their businesses out of Jaffa. As a reaction to the strike of the Arab seaport workers, the Jews built a modern seaport in Tel Aviv, which resulted in decreased income for Jaffa's Arab seaport.
In 1945 Jaffa had a population of 101,580; of whome 53,930 were Muslims, 30,820 were Jews and 16,800 were Christians.[4] The Christians were mostly Greek-Orthodox with about one sixth of them being Greek-Catholic. One of the most prominent members of the Arab Christian community was the Arab Orthodox publisher of Filastin, Daoud Isa.
[edit] The 1948 Arab-Israeli War
Prior to the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the UN's Special Commission on Palestine in 1947 recommended that Jaffa become part of the planned Jewish state. Due to the large Arab majority, however, it was instead designated as an Arab enclave in the Jewish state in the 1947 UN Partition Plan.
(c) Wikipedia
Today, the renovated streets of Jaffa offer a nice walk with some interesting surprise as these streets are the house of local artists.
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Directions: South of TA.
Follow the promenade/corniche heading south, you will see the old Jaffa port.
Website: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa
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on Mar 3, 2008
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